And the messaging behind music and literature
I am a kid of the 90’s, those were my teen and early adulthood years and like many others I listened to all kinds of music. I was not the type which went to buy records, but I was the one who was going out a lot. I spend a lot of my youth in bars, nightclubs and music festivals.
Recently I was watching the documentary about Kurt Cobain the lead singer of Nirvana who suicided in ’94. I did not know much about the band, but surely I knew the most popular songs, they are still sounding in my memory connecting it to a time where I felt free and easy. A time which was fun in every sense. Being in love with someone without them knowing it, having a splash with my besties stealing some wine from dad's wine cellar and get drunk, driving around in the car without knowing where to go, just for fun. Later I travelled the world, always ready for something new and exciting.
30 years later, watching his documentary was actually a real shock. Because I never knew in what state, this very charismatic man who influenced millions of peoples with his music, was in. I may have heard that he was an addict and that he killed himself, but what brought him there I had no idea, it’s quiet a tragic story.
Conscious messaging
Today, as part of Purna Yoga I am studying the philosophy of Sri Aurobindo. Sri Aurobindo known as a philosopher, yogi, maharishi, poet and Indian nationalist. His work is extremely intellectual and some of his books are barely possible to understand for my intellect. What I learned is that it is not about the rational understanding of his writing, but about the energy behind it.
Sri Aurobindo had a vision of the evolution of human life into a "life divine". He believed in Integral Yoga, a spiritual practice he developed at Pondicherry, which not only liberated but transformed human nature, enabling a divine life on earth.
So when I read his most famous spiritual epic, a poem of approximately 24,000 lines called Savitri, I am not meant to understand it’s context, but connect to the energy behind it.
This means, if we can increase our spiritual connection by reading or listening to something which raises our consciousness, the opposite must be true.
"But few are those who tread the sunlit path;
Only the pure in soul can walk in light."
- Sri Aurobindo
What is subliminal messaging?
Subliminal messages are stimuli that the conscious mind cannot perceive, often inserted into media such as TV commercials or songs. This kind of messaging can be used to strengthen or heighten the persuasiveness of advertisements, or to convey an altogether different message entirely.
And while the media has been using it consciously to commercialise products, some musicians and songwriters had it in their lyrics and sounds unconsciously. If someone who is deeply depressed, struggles with mental illness, just surviving with drugs and writes songs and makes art, isn’t that person automatically transmitting that energy through their music?
Without making any assumptions, many people may be influenced by what they’ve been listening to most of their lives. We have no idea. But one thing became clear to me, as much as I found Kurt Cobain attractive in my days, a lifestyle which was sold as “cool”, I want to stay far away from his music today, as much as I loved it back then.
I became very sensitive to these kind of things, whether I watch a movie or listen to a song. I believe everything we perceive with our senses becomes real in our subconscious mind. Actually our mind can not distinguish between what is real and what is not, so everything becomes part of us since most of our lives are directed by our subconscious.
How do you feel about this subject? What’s the music which attracts you? What puts you off?