To round off our Artist of the Week feature with I The Victor, we have an exclusive reflection written by ITV’s Rebecca Ramos.
I love art and expression.
I love the way that it feels to go on this metaphysical completely intangible yet entirely graspable journey. A journey from within your psyche and mind to a place where you tackle fears and emotions that you would never be able to otherwise. This is how I feel when I write a song that gets to the very core of how I feel and then allows me to let those feelings loose and be free of them. I get to displace and re-order and re-evaluate my mind and its associates. I am the managerial centerpiece of the entire power plant. We all have this amazing directorship over our own respective hearts, minds and thoughts.
Why then do I stumble? Why do I find peace to be more fleeting than the cursory feeling of fulfillment with my accomplishments? More transitory than the way I want summer when it’s winter and vise versa.
I compare myself constantly to those on my same path. Why can’t I have what they have? My mentality can become a wasteland full of judgement and envy. Greener than any field in the suburbs of Atlanta I ever ran through to burn off the negative energy.
And I know because I‘ve spoken to them that they do it too. We all do. Why? Is it simply human of us to compare and to think “if I just had THAT, I would be happy” or “I deserve that and they do not”? There is a cyclical toxicity in that kind of repetition. I encourage you to steer clear. I have had to.
I constantly have been catching myself, friends. I have been working on it. It isn’t healthy to live that way.The revolving door never stops. You have to get out.
We get to decide if sitting on the internet keeping tabs on others lives and accomplishments is really the way to accomplish our own goals and aspirations. My logic would argue against this. It doesn’t follow that joy and fulfillment come from comparison and envy. How could it?
Thank you to my friend Allison for giving me a place where I can write about this. I‘ve been assessing myself for a couple of months and it’s nice to sit with some of the results and see if I am where I want to be. I am much closer.
I want to live this life purely. I want to be kind and sincere and ecstatic for the ones I love who are shooting for the stars with me. I want to encourage my friends on every level and path that we are all on our way and that what seems to be inescapable and immovable right this minute will be a molehill in retrospect.
We’re allowed to love life and live it immensely. Perfection is an illusion and happiness is fleeting. Joy, however, is not. Joy is already yours. Find the things, the people, the hobbies, the passions and the thrills that attract you and cling to them. Don’t let society tell you that you have to let them go. That’s so silly. We don’t live to just exist. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. And don’t compare yourself to your friends. And never compare yourself to those you do not particularly favor. It is far to easy to become what you despise when you are focused on what others are doing with their lives.
Maybe it has somehow become human of us to paint a facade of ourselves in which everything is seemingly flawless. I‘d like to break that cycle if it’s so. It’s more human anyway to allow ourselves the humanity of uncertainty and transition and mistakes and, ultimately, growth.
Find your things that make you feel alive. Keep your things that make you feel alive. Build yourself around an unshakable center of joy and peace.
Stay compassionate. Stay human. And while you’re at it, stay posi 🙂
-Rebecca
To read our Q&A with ITV, click here, and to listen to our exclusive stream of I The Victor’s “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” click here.
To stay in touch with I The Victor, follow her on Twitter here.
Check back next week for our Artist of the Week takeover with Gin War.
- Today in Music History: April 7 - April 7, 2023
- EP Review: Michigander’s It Will Never Be The Same - March 31, 2023
- Deep Dive: Spotify’s ALT NOW Playlist - March 30, 2023
