Ready To "Be Safe Out There."

I guess I could be the one to write the groundbreaking book on the subject of: How to wean yourself off of screen staring.

Perhaps my spending "way too much time" on YouTube, and the feeling of being powerless over it is just an obstacle to mindful living and, once I get over the hurdle, I will be in a position to give advice to others.

It's like a palette of the seven deadly sins, along with every vice, is available on every DEvice...

I guess I should thank my lucky stars that I don't have a porn addiction, and don't have 3 thousand videos of it saved somewhere, unwilling to delete any one of them because, like, where am I ever going to find another birthmark on a girl's ass exactly like that if the video is removed from the server?

But, besides "lust," there is the "envy" that might creep in from watching videos of virtuoso musical performances, inspiring me to buckle down and start practicing with a metronome for 2 hours every morning, before doing anything else, only to wind up watching 2 hours of videos every morning before doing anything else...

Then there are the "anger" videos, depicting white people just like me being senselessly attacked or pushed in front of trains by what look like Democrats of color. Then, often the "highlighted" comment would be something like: "Good, white boy deserved that for bringing me over as a slave!" left by a 20 something year old...

I've heard a lot of people talking about how they are uncomfortable out in public now, unsure of what to talk about, or how loud to do it..

This little girl, who was a "prodigy," on the bass guitar, has had a channel on YouTube that started with a video of her playing her dad's bass for the first time at the age of 4 or 5.

She was using an app called Yousician, which makes learning like playing a video game. Instead of the boring polka dots on the sheet music I learned from, it's more like following a bouncing ball on the screen and using the bass like a joystick to hit all the right notes on time, with onscreen feedback rewarding you for nailing it with some kind of splash like a mini firework.

Now, she is about 11 years old and posts videos almost daily of her playing along note for note with bass players who are considered the best in the world. And she seems to be filming from the music room in her house which is chock full of bass guitars of all kinds, a drum kit, keyboards, and a full digital recording studio. Her dad has been running the channel, and I guess the talent of the girl has done most of the work, drawing the attention of those very same best bass players in the world, and she now seems to be living the life of the rich and famous; wearing new and expensive looking things, unboxing brand new thousand dollar guitars and other musical toys almost daily.

Her channel has something like 800k subscribers, and it is linked to a Patreon so people can send money, and she even has a store which sells hoodies and hats with her brand on them....

And I'm not jealous over the overt display of material wealth.

It's actually eye-opening to "how things should be done," these days. Get a good little video camera and then go to work making content, every single day if you can. Find a niche and even if your stuff is only fit for the likes of one in a thousand people; if you do the math that might equate to 10,000 followers, who might Patreon you an average of just 7 dollars a year; but -there you go; there's a career doing what you love, 70 grand a year for making a video almost every day. That could be life changing, because you will soon figure things like: If I get a really good night's sleep and eat only superfoods and get up every morning and meditate before going for a 3 mile run, my videos come out much more easily almost every day and they are better.

So, I'm grateful to Ellen for that awakening, at the very least -for being a textbook example of how things should be done in 2424... This isn't going into a studio to cut a demo and then mailing an EP on vinyl to the local rock station, hoping they will play it during their "home grown rock" segment, and it will start being requested, and then....

The emotion I get from being a follower of Ellen's channel is I keep fantasizing about saving her from drowning after she falls through the ice when she's skating; or shooting the gun out of the hand of someone who is attempting to abduct her away from her father (In Pirate's Alley in the French Quarter, for that one -I don't know where the imaginary frozen pond is) or her having type AB negative blood, which the hospital has none of and I encounter her distraught parents outside the hospital in tears because the nearest unit of that type that could be found is a 5 hour flight away, and it would be too late, and I ask them what's wrong and they tell me, and I say: "I'm type AB negative, where's the blood lab?" type of thing and I save Ellen's life, so she can keep playing bass as well as almost anyone else on the planet.

But, yeah, it's starting to bug me almost; saving the girl over and over in my mind in every imaginable way. But rather than look at that as a curse, maybe it's a golden opportunity for me to explore what the hell is going on in my own head that might only be surfacing now...

They are probably making about $15K a month, and, more power to them. I wonder if Ellen's talent has done most of the heavy lifting, or if her dad has some kind of education in "online marketing." Both could be true in this case...

The sun is coming up and I'm about to take a walk to Winn Dixie where I might just get the ingredients to do a week's long water fast. To wit: water.

Maybe I can sort through my thoughts and emotions along the way and figure out why I'm haunted by dreams about saving the life of a girl who seems to be doing just fine, thank you, on her own...