Killer song, dude – I love this one! – Jeremy K.
About This Song: (lyrics below)
There is a lot to say about this song so I hope you’ll bear with me.
If you’ve ever had a pivotal moment of desperate, “one step away from losing it” frustration and despair, you’ll relate to this song.
I FINALLY realized one day what the real problem was that was keeping me from “getting my music out into the world”.
- It wasn’t the “heartless” music industry.
- It wasn’t my mother telling me that music was a bad career.
- It wasn’t my shyness or performing anxiety, fear of criticism or any of the other reasons or stories I was telling myself.
It was me. My victim thinking.
This was my moment of truth.
To quote the old motivational speaker cliche: “If it is to be, it is up to me.”
This song basically records the precise moment I started to take charge of my own reality… and my own change.
From that point onward I dedicated my life to healing the thoughts, beliefs and behaviors that were robbing me of my joy, power and health REGARDLESS of whether I was ever able to make a living from being a singer/songwriter.
It was “triggered” by a Bruce Cockburn song, “Loner”… then morphed into a conversation with my imaginary “inner Bruce Cockburn”… by the end of the song I was actually stepping out of my habitual “victim” mentality and owning that I had to “climb out of canyons of my own creating, …escape the prisons of my hesitating…”
The deeper truth here for all of us is that we are ALL trained by our culture to be victims.
The dominant message from the media is that we are not pretty enough, rich enough, thin enough, talented enough or happy enough as we are and and it’s not our fault… we are “victims” of this or that or whatever.
Their solution? Just buy something to fix it!
But no “pill gonna cure this ill”.
Transformation is an inside job. It is sometimes messy and difficult.
If one of my songs can help to give you a little courage in your darkest moments then I’m satisfied that my 40 year journey of self healing is truly what I’m here for. Not fame. Not money. Not “getting my songs out into the world”. Just real transformation.
I invite you to join me out here on this journey back to your core truth: You are an amazing being of LIGHT. Let it shine today in whatever way you can let it shine. – Mark
p.s. Check out the BRILLIANT electric guitar solo by my dear friend Gene Moore (particularly at the end of the song)…
Minstrel Fires
Song #104 | 6/7/1988 | CD: Visions and Voices
When I look at you dancing I breathe deeply
Everything you do looks so damn easy
But envy never healed an aching heart or soothed this strange desire…
Envy only wraps you up in wires
It is raining, I am running I am walking, I am stumbling
I’m dreaming that I’m shouting I wake up mumbling
And the faceless voices Scattered all about me
Speak of a passion that would free me
Refrain:
If I could, I would fly Into the Summer sky
If I would, I could fly Into the Summer sky
My music is my lover It is my enemy
It is my destination It is my agony
Wrapped up in mad desires
Following the lights of Ancient minstrel fires
Refrain:
Let the neighbors talk Let them dream, let them wonder
Let my voice be full of thunder
I must climb out of canyons Of my own creating
I must escape the prisons Of my hesitating
Refrain:
Copyright 1988-2015 by Mark Shepard. All Rights Reserved. Used by permission.