The Secret Ingredient
This mix, if not obvious from the cover, is about LOVE, in its purest form, and choosing it whenever possible. Even when it's hard. Especially when it's hard.
Times have been tough for many people lately, especially since the pandemic. Many have not yet recovered their mental health. High inflation, housing prices, and other failings of capitalism certainly do not help. I have been through the wringer myself for the last 4 years as one of my partners became very very ill from medical malpractice and pharmaceutical over-prescription. She is getting better now, no thanks to the medical system...
But the point I want to make here is that through it all I had a choice. I could let myself become more angry, blame other people and the world for my emotions, OR, with healthy boundaries, and without spiritually bypassing the problems of the world of course, I could choose love. I could learn more about the idea that happiness is a choice. A choice we can have nearly complete control over. An idea that the more I practice, the easier it becomes to maintain. The the point that I recognized that happiness is a moral obligation.
This does NOT mean I go into the realm of spiritually bypassing real issues and practice toxic positivity. No, every emotion has its place, and it's important to feel them fully so they don't bury themselves in your tissues to rear their heads all at once after being bottled up too long. However, the times when I didn't choose love, optimism, and kindness with others to help with their problems, or with MYSELF when I was going through something are always the times when I make things worse.
So, whenever I could instead practice taking a breath or six and trying something as seemingly ridiculous as snapping my fingers or clapping and imagining a director saying, "ACTION!" I could surprisingly, quite easily in fact, just completely change my mindset and turn into super loving helpful hopeful me and overwhelm my other emotions with self-compassion and compassion for others even at their worst.
The best part about this practice? It very quickly does not even feel like acting. Not even light masking! There's real science in the idea to "fake it 'til you make it", but the speed in which I trained my brain and rewired it from all the positive feedback I got from this practice was a lot faster than I expected. It became like flipping a switch from panic, resentment, anger, frustration, you name it... to love. All with just a snap of the fingers.
I taught myself this technique after watching a few episodes of "The Diary Of A CEO" (I know, terrible name) featuring Mo Gawdat, the happiness expert and I became inspired to change my life in a very necessary way to help escape the constant dread of emotions from disabled partners, career uncertainty and failing capitalism. Despite consistent trauma, I somehow was getting happier by the day overall and had even more love to share.
This love is and has always been what I want to share most with the world, and I wanted to share this technique and some starting points for anyone to start their happiness journey because there are a lot of people out there who struggle with the self-love that it takes to be happy in the face of big hardships. Especially the real persistent ones.
So when you listen to this mix, crammed nearly two hours of inspirational lovey liquid Drum & Bass, I want you to do yourself a favour. Yes, you can and should sing along with lovers and friends of course. That's always a good time. But what I REALLY want you to try is to sing along by yourself and see how many songs you can find a way to sing for or TO yourself. Because when was the last time you sang YOURSELF a love song? Told yourself that YOU will be your light? That you will never let YOURSELF down? That when you make a mistake you'll make it right for nobody else but you? That you'd walk through hell and back for YOU?
I hope you accept all my challenges here, especially if you need them right now, because there's one thing I am absolutely sure of... Loving yourself is the single greatest gift you can give to the world. While I disagree that you can't love others unless you love yourself, I have seen and felt time and time again with myself and others, that when you truly love yourself, the love that you find in the world, the love that you are capable of sharing with what you find, and the love that finds you is magnified greatly. One cannot pour from an empty cup.
So let's make sure to fill our cup until it overflows and we need to start using a bowl. I got a Huge Metal one you can use right here <3