Today I join with the millions around the world to take a break and comment on the life and times of Michael Jackson.
Yes, his music was electric and his performances dynamic. And his personal life was tinged with distortions from what most people would consider normal. His was not a story that most of us could have lived, nor would we have wanted to. His death has done exactly what a lot of his music did: unite millions of people in moments of oneness.
There is no way any of us can understand the bizarre things he did throughout his life, no more than we can understand how one guy gets the talent that others dream of. We also cannot understand how fame distorts the perceptions, motivations, and dreams of people. What exactly drives a person whose death is felt in waves around the entire globe? Why has his death touched so many? And is there anyone else whose death would be felt this strongly?
Michael Jackson showed that he had a soul that was beyond his early age when he first appeared on the stage for the world to see. His energy and smile transcended his physical age. He was able to perform and we, the audience, surprised at his ability and talent, were held captive as we addressed our own questions of whether this style of music was fleeting or here to stay. Regardless of our opinions regarding the boy, we were held captive at some time or another in his youthful performances.
With the years of his music production and his energetic and magnetic performances, the general public begin to split on its opinion of Michael Jackson. Many continued to be moved by his music, not so much because of the depth of the lyrics, but because he literally moved. One couldn’t watch him without wondering how he did it or without tapping a foot and secretly wondering if he were even human. Others, because of the unsettling physical changes apparent in him, became more despondent in their interest. Yes, he was an interesting character and a talented performer, but geez, what a weirdo.
And that’s where this entry picks up.
The soul pushes us to do things. It is that part of each of us which is connected with the divine (regardless of what we call the divine). The soul is alive and well within each living person and it is that which nudges us to create, to move, and to evolve. The problem with our following the soul’s guidance is that we have no way of knowing just where it will take us. What we want and what is best for us are rarely identical. That’s not necessarily a bad thing; it’s just a thing. Our souls are always, always working for the greater good of the individual and of humanity as a whole. It wants little more than to remind us we are all connected and to have us become as aware as possible in this lifetime so that our entire species can become more conscious around the planet.
There is no doubt in my mind that the intents of Michael Jackson throughout his life were to make music and make money, but I must add here that I would wager to state that his soul had a much bigger undertaking. I believe his soul (and yes, he had one) knew that the physical body housing it could reach a lot of people. And I mean A LOT. So the soul set itself to work inspiring this person to create the music, to push the limits, to expand people’s understanding of dance and then to challenge basic thoughts and knee-jerk reactions that were hard-wired into who we were as a nation and as an earth-resident through his questionable ethics and morals.
Because the soul works behind the scenes and is always trying to remind us of our oneness and of our intent to evolve, his soul created a single unifying expression: music. People everywhere are moved by music. His soul was quite successful in this endeavor. It seems that most everyone alive has enjoyed a shared time with another because of music and specifically here, Michael Jackson’s music. And because the soul is always working to evolve us as human beings, his behaviors, actions, and family-life, challenged our morals, and what we consider sacred in our own lives.
Many lost interest in Michael Jackson as he morphed in full view of us: he lost his “blackness” and became more angular, and well, more “white.” Some of us hated that. Others hated that he had questionable relations with young boys. Others decided he had gone off the deep end with his bizarre residence or his treatment of his children or his spontaneous marriages or his love of a primate or his … the list goes on. But what it did to us was to challenge us to make a decision about what we thought. It brought things to our own awareness that otherwise would have gone unnoticed. He made us face things with his own choices.
I believe his was a soul in turmoil. I believe his behaviors came from a place deep within that no one really knew, not even Michael Jackson. I believe we witnessed his turmoil through those behaviors that unified us in a stance for or against him in many different times throughout his life. The chaos that his physical self showed us was the direct result of a soul that refused to rest. If the soul pushed for change and growth, his showed us the results of another operation or of his fathering a child. If his soul pushed for him to create something that would unify the people, he produced more music or he proceeded with actions that would stand us firmly against him. Regardless, he did what he was supposed to do.
The positive contributions by this man will remain a legacy to all. The number of people that he influenced and inspired is probably so monumental that we couldn’t understand it anyway. His music paved the way for many around the world to continue to learn and grow through music. And the negative things he did, even if they were distorted by the media, were equally as important because those events, those actions and consequences, forced us to look at and make a decision about how we felt as individuals about a man, his music, and where we stood as individuals.
We must follow the nudge of the soul as we creep through this life. The soul will never push us to a place that is not our highest place to be. If we go to a place that is not our highest selves, we can rest assured we didn’t follow the soul in the getting there, but instead we followed the voice of society, the ego, or our own desire for fame. The soul will give us multiple opportunities to grow and learn and we have to recognize those. We have to know that our souls would never want us to distort our physical bodies, but instead, want us to care for them. Our souls do not want us out of full health, but instead, want us to remember what health means; that our physical, emotional and spiritual selves are all unified. Our souls do not want us to choose sides, further segregating us, but instead to remember we are all one.
As the media fan-fare dies down and Michael Jackson is laid to rest, we should realize that finally, there is peace within this man. This man of a hundred faces, whose name is recognizable in most every nation around the globe, whose actions over the years caused discomfort in our own belief systems, can finally find peace. I believe he did exactly what he came to do: impact a world, and cause people to think.
Let us not get caught up in only Michael Jackson’s contributions to the world of music and elevate him to saint-like status. Let us not forget the questionable things he did and the way the media, and we, violated his privacy as we demanded to know more about him. Let us begin to peer into that face that is splashed all over the headlines everywhere and peek behind the lyrics of the man. Let’s look into the body that housed a soul, which wanted only to see people as one, but knew not how to do this. Let us all allow our own judgments to fall away as our own souls blossom forth and begin to accept everyone as they are: imperfect humans playing host to souls of perfection.
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