AndyHarrisonMusic.com

Happiness and Success

When you ask people what they want in life, two very common answers are happiness and success. Our brains being the busy little file clerks that they are, seem to want to break apart our experience of living and put it in nice little categories. Our brains then seem to love to attach some sort of meaning, a hierarchy of importance and then the fun part – a collection of emotions (chemical releases) to go with each category.

So in this spirit of creating meaning, importance levels and feelings, consider these definitions for happiness and success.

You’ve heard these definitions of happiness and success before:

 Happiness = Knowing yourself (you know- know thy self and all that)

 Success = Continual improvement (you know the upward spiral and all that)

 But what do those definitions really mean, and how can you get them closer to being actionable? Consider these additions as possible hyperlinks to these two definitions:

 Happiness = Experiencing yourself as the process of living itself and not as a static, separated collection of thoughts.

 For more on this go to my post: http://www.andyharrisonmusic.com/how-your-problems-are-your-greatest-opportunities/

 Success = Living between the law of atrophy and the law of diminishing returns in every area of your life.

 For more on this go to my post: http://www.andyharrisonmusic.com/understanding-balance-in-7-bullet-points-2/

-Andy

Fan of People

© 2011 Andy Harrison

In a shack in the back woods of Georgia

In the nineteen teens or so

He was born on the edge of midnight

As the moon hung orange and low

He was wrapped in a bag of burlap

His mama looked into his ancient eyes

The crickets and the lone wolf howling

Thought she heard a whisper in his cries

Chorus:

Gotta be a fan of people

And people will be a fan of me

Everyone is my neighbor

Obvious when you look and see

Looking out beyond my own skin

Helping you is helping me

Gotta be a fan of people

And people will be a fan of me

At 8 years old he saw a steel guitar

Behind the counter at the general store

He felt his chest burning from the inside

As he held it on his lap on the floor

The air filled with honeysuckle

As he laid his hands across the strings

His voice bellowed out like thunder

Taste of tears as he began to sing

Chorus:

Gotta be a fan of people

And people will be a fan of me

Everyone is my neighbor

Obvious when you look and see

Looking out beyond my own skin

Helping you is helping me

Gotta be a fan of people

And people will be a fan of me

In a gin joint off an old dirt road

The crowd was on the edge of insane

His guitar shook the walls like rapture

His voice felt like a hurricane

The air was full of smoke and spirit

The drinks full of sweat and gin

No need for a Sunday preacher

Paradise had already let them in

Chorus:

Gotta be a fan of people

And people will be a fan of me

Everyone is my neighbor

Obvious when you look and see

Looking out beyond my own skin

Helping you is helping me

Gotta be a fan of people

And people will be a fan of me

Here’s the song I wrote today

Soul Making a Sound

© 2011 Andy Harrison

I’ve felt the breath of babies

And I’ve heard their newborn cries

I’ve touched their warm hearts beating

Seen the cosmos in their eyes

I’ve tasted all their victories

Smelled fear in their defeats

The time is coming quickly

For all to be complete

Chorus:

Nothing here can stop me

Nothing can slow me down

I’m here to change the future

I’m here to shake the ground

They call me revolution

But I’m just your soul making a sound

Nothing here can stop me

Nothing can slow me down

I’ve seen the mask of tyrants

Heard the plastic monologues

Felt the hunger pangs of poverty

Tasted fat of Judas hogs

I’ve smelled the cities burning

Watched the wars of ego rage

The time has never been so close

To break free from this cage

Chorus:

Nothing here can stop me

Nothing can slow me down

I’m here to change the future

I’m here to shake the ground

They call me revolution

But I’m just your soul making a sound

Nothing here can stop me

Nothing can slow me down

So I’ve been struck with the tremendous gifts of learning through making mistakes recently. Here are a few things that have hit me today 

1) All life is governed by natural laws

 2) Balance in life is achieved by living between the law of atrophy and the law of diminishing returns.

          A)  The law of atrophy means that things are either growing  or   deteriorating ; they are never static. That means that if you are not putting resources towards growing in an area of your life, that area  is deteriorating.

           B) The law of diminishing returns means that if you put too much of your resources into one area of your life, that area will also stop growing.

           C) So balance in living comes from putting  just the right amount of your  resources towards growing in each area of your life.

 3)  The natural resources everyone is born with to use in achieving balance in living are:

           A)  Time

           B)  Energy

           C)  Focus of attention

           D)  The ability to learn

 4)  Achieving balance in living is allocating the minimum amount of these resources needed, to live between the law of atrophy and the law of diminishing returns in every area of life.

 5)  The 3 main areas of life to allocate resources to are:

            A) Health

                a) Physical

                b) Mental

                c) Emotional

                 d) Spiritual

           B) Abundance

                 a) Work

                 b) Investment

                 c) Anything you create

           C) Relationships

                  a) Family

                  b) Friends

                  c) Community

                  d)  World

          D)  If you feel that any area of your life is out of balance, it may be that you are either putting not enough of your resources to it or you  are putting too much. Also if one area is not getting enough of your resources, chances are you are giving too much to another. Simply by retweaking the amounts, you can get to balance.

 6) Man made systems and laws do not always follow the laws of nature and may pull us out of balance. Consistent focus on aligning all areas of life between the law of atrophy and the law of diminishing returns will bring us back to balance regardless of the changing of man made systems and laws.

           A) Take a look at how our current world systems might effect balance in the 3 main areas of living, by making it easy to put either not enough or too much of our resources in these areas:

                    a) Health

                    b) Abundance

                    c) Relationships

 7)  Balance is natural and we all have everything we need to achieve and maintain it.

-Andy

Hi everyone,

I wanted to let you know about  a new website I found called Kick Starter and about a project I just launched there.

Kick Starter is a site designed to bring creative projects and people interested in them together to build funding for the projects and to create value for everyone involved.

As you know, creating music has been a huge part of my life and is something I’ve continued to do simply because I love to do it.

I’ve found, as I think many people who pursue creative projects have, that the biggest challenge to getting those projects completed is often times just gathering the necessary funding.

I believe the Kick Starter model could be the beginning of a completely new and exciting paradigm in helping to create this funding and to also bring the people interested in those projects closer to the creative process.

I’ve just started a 30 day campaign on Kick Starter to help raise funding to complete my 8^th CD. I am about 75% finished already and, if this campaign is successful, the project will be completed within a month.

If you are curious about this, I would love for you to check out the short video that I made with Asha and Given’s help and whacky ideas. The video and the Kick Starter page explain all the details about the project, how it works and the added value items offered to those who join in.

Some of the gifts offered are:

Your name on the front or back cover

Your picture on the front or back cover

Your voice mixed in a song on the CD

A song written for you

A special concert at your house

And a whole lot more

If you are interested in being a part of the project (simply by donating a minimum of $1), I am honored and grateful. Also if you are inspired to pass this info along to anyone you think might be interested (simply by forwarding this email), I am thanking you ahead of time.

You can see the video and this project’s Kick Starter page by going to:

http://kck.st/pUtWeB

This project will run through the month of October only and we must reach the goal amount of $3500 by then or none of the funding goes through.

Thanks so much for checking this out!

Love to you all,

 Andy