Life’s Toolbox, Introspection, and Why I Write Songs

I realized something this morning. Every person goes through life with a toolbox. We pick up tools as we go along and others are passed down from our parents. The key to a happy life, and to being a solid parent, is to periodically go through the toolbox and check to see if some of the older tools are broken, and if so, determine if they can be mended. If not, perhaps they can be thrown away.

We’ve already inherited some baggage from our parents and picked up bad habits along the way. It’s best to get rid of that stuff before we start building the toolboxes for the next generation.

We will never be perfect and we will always have a few things we wish we’d done differently. However, if we make every attempt to be mindful of our thoughts, actions, and reactions, we can hope to make our children’s lives that much more stable than our own.

I realize this isn’t overtly about music and may seem out of context, but writing lyrics is one way for me to dig deep, pull out all of my junk, take a close look at it, and attempt to purge what is old, useless, or even harmful.

It can be an uncomfortable process, but the introspection is worth it in the end.