Inner Michael

A Life Celebrated, A King Remembered from Walking Moon Studios on Vimeo.

Some souls come to this planet to change the world. Or maybe they are sent. Michael Jackson was one of those souls. Some people are destined for greatness and in the case of Michael Jackson, that was evident very early on.

I truly believe that his life didn’t belong to him; maybe it wasn’t supposed to. He’s likely one of the rare people destined to experience a life that is not his own. I don’t think he could ever claim a singular life that belonged to him or allowed him to choose anything over most things being chosen for him. In so many ways, the man’s life belonged to everyone but him. He truly belonged to the world.

Imagine having no time that belonged to you, no childhood of your own, no privacy, no complete trust in anyone, no love that didn’t ask the question “what for?”—do you love me for me or the reflected light of privilege, stardom and wealth? And especially—a life that found no respite, no rest.

Michael Jackson was driven which raises the question: “what drove him?” There are many answers to that question. There is a quality that visits all true artists—the impulse and compulsiveness to create. Art that wants to come through you and express itself in the world while coming through your life, never lets you rest. An artist is literally a slave to the art itself. There is no way to stem the tide or—god  forbid—try to reverse it. A driven artist trying to ease up or slow down or even take a break will find it as impossible as trying to reverse the flow of a river or in some cases, dam up a fire hose.

The art, almost as if possessing a life of its own, expresses and the artist is dragged along by it. It is a form of possession. The art, in Michael’s case was a spigot that was always open. David Nordahl once told me: “You have to remember that Michael heard and saw all of his work in his mind before it was created. He only tried to duplicate in reality what he saw or heard in his own imagination. He would try to come as close as he could to the real creation that was coming through him. It always came up short of his ideal of perfection.” That kind of music cannot be duplicated exactly in this realm; it’s otherworldly. Mozart too, heard the “music of the spheres” which is what Michael was referring to when he said that his music lived in another realm and he just plucked it from where it was “created in space.” He identified the origin many times citing God as the First Creator.

I would argue that high art does originate in other realms and that art has influenced the world more than any other enterprise of human endeavor. Science is not far behind but it’s hard to love science or have it inspire great change in the world through passion. Unless you’re a scientist, that is.  Art though, by its very nature, is passionate.

Art has the capability of haunting an artist until it finds expression. The painter must paint; the musician must birth music into the world through instrument or voice; the poet or lyricist must find the concise and precise words that can tell a lifetime in a stanza; the writer must spill the essay onto paper; the actor must embody and breathe the character to life.

There is that something that lies behind the creative impulse that is hard to describe. Whatever it is, it insists on birthing an idea into reality that may have originated a moment ago as a fleeting thought. It circles back round to haunt until it has flesh on the bones and comes alive. It will not be denied. Similar to the onset of labor pains, there is no turning back—high art demands a birth.

For some, the compulsion is a “calling.” A calling is something that grabs hold, insists, intensifies, creates tension and results in a spiritual path or quest that mimics magnetism and pulls one into its orbit. It involves being “in service” to something greater than the self. Once in the grip of a spiritual magnet, there is no way but forward. A spiritual quest compels. It is accompanied by coincidences that propel one along a path, at times almost causing whiplash. It’s a place where you “know” and you know that you know. The spirituality of Michael’s work is easy to find if you know how to look beyond the secular. His book “Dancing the Dream” is full of spiritual references and to those trained or knowledgeable enough to recognize its subtlties, it’s replete with the musings of a spiritual seeker on the path to becoming an adept. Once on that path, nothing else will quench or satisfy.

It’s far beyond the little ego and the machinations and acquisitions of the ego for the sake of itself that most humans experience. It is the ego sublimated by the quest itself and the knowing of something far beyond the skin-encapsulated finite and small self”s ego. It is a touching of the Self (capital S) and once touched, sets off a longing for integrating the Self which eclipses the little human ego. Nothing less will do. It becomes its own haunting. It is sometimes characterized as “The Hound of Heaven” or the inner voice that will not be silenced or the soul’s longing for union with the Creator. The mystics, gurus and adepts have spoken of it often.

When an artist meets this aspect of himself or herself, little else has any meaning or attraction. And Providence begins to move and take over. Coincidences happen. The perfect book falls from the shelf, a gift appears in the form of an instrument that informs the journey. Spirit makes itself known and nothing short of that will give rest.  It will never be ignored again. Some literature calls that condition the “soul infused personality.” Rather than your brain, thinking, or deductive reasoning, the soul is in charge and is driving the human vehicle.

In Michael Jackson’s case, Spirit came in the form of music and demanded to be recognized and even obeyed. He was a student of sound and rhythm. In fact, as an artist, one could call him a slave to it. Sounds delighted him—all sounds.

And we, the audience watched the birthing process. We watched as soaring music and song was created, as new images and forms and concepts made their way onto a screen. We, the students watched the master in action—teaching, compelling, demanding our waking, coding our own spiritual journey—with a universal language called music that reached around the world and touched every continent, every heart that not just heard, but felt it and knew with another knowing that it was not usual or ego-based pop, rock or funk. It was something more.

Yes, some come to this world with a grand mission written on their souls. Too many times we mock, or scoff or illegitimize them in some spectacular ways. We test or demand they be tested. We can be jealous of their light. It’s unfortunate because when we are preoccupied with the container for whatever reason, we can mistake the contents and miss the master. And a master lays down his life in great sacrifice.