I swear all of my more introspective moments unveil themselves on the famous “Monday Musing” nights as I’m writing this on a Monday, but why would that be any different as I write my 20th post. For quite some time, I’ve always been more the type who appreciates true, inner beauty over outward aesthetics. Boy did I come across one of the most beautiful albums I’ve ever heard after listening through it a second time two years after initially listening to it. This album is Gallant’s “Ology”. The messages and sublime falsetto that Gallant presents in the album create for a musical experience unlike any other when you listen to the album from start to finish in one go.

While there is a vulnerability in many of Gallant’s songs across the album, the umbrella term in the title “Ology” is what ties everything together and had me really thinking. The use of “Ology” was specifically tailored to the artist in this case. Ology being the study of a certain subject, Gallant decided to compose this album as a sort of “Self-Ology”. Quite the interesting concept if you ask me. I guess this album resonated with me since I’m always in this sort of mindset anyways, but the lyrics hit home a lot more due to certain personal characteristics and vulnerabilities uncovering themselves in the past few months.

At the core of these internal battles of mine is the rare quality of being “demotional”. I’ve had conversations about the characteristic and found it interesting how such a seemingly simple idea can perplex even the smartest of minds. Well in short, it is essentially the ability to be able to detach from things yet still be quite emotional. So not the best quality I guess when dealing with your own “self-ology”, since it deals with confronting a lot of uncomfortable topics head on with conviction. Not really though because it allows you to separate your mind from your physical being in a sense. When you can detach yourself even from, well.., your own self, then you can approach this interesting dissection of your very being in the most thorough and delving manner possible. Yeah yeah.. I know the doubters already out there who have the sort of claim that you can’t be your own therapist and will parallel it to this same notion I’ve presented, but life’s a little more fun when you color outside the lines at times, no?

My own “self-ology” has illuminated many daring conclusions that have shaped and colored many of my thoughts and actions, much of which have changed courses so rapidly in the past few months in both good and bad ways. It took me quite some time beating around the bush with the self dissection, which I’ve been able to extrapolate out towards general human existence since I couldn’t see through the woods without the outside perspective that Gallant was able to provide. The ultimate conclusion I came to is this:

The fundamental qualities/states of trust and happiness are the source of one’s “Ology” and are, in more cases than the flip side, eluded rather than obtained.

Harsh reality it is, eh? This could stem from the self-deprecating quality the real me withholds from everyone else with my more low-key narcissistic self being projected more often. However, it is ever present when I’ve looked around at people from any and all socioeconomic backgrounds. It comes down to the analogy that I mentioned to a good friend of mine that people are all like icebergs: 10% is what you get from the surface level impression that causes human differentiation and 90% is the fundamental core pain and/or ecstasy that binds humans as one.

The only issue with this is the fact that it is in our human nature to disregard the 90% of true existence the majority of time and pay excessive attention to the 10% which isn’t all that valuable. As time passes on, you come to this realization, but it comes all too late to fix some more deeply rooted issues. Humans are too fixated on the insignificant aspects and will always overlook the significant parts. As a result, this creates more divide among us when we could more fully utilize the social fiber that binds us all from differing backgrounds as a learning playground to pull from.

Ultimately, it comes down to the paradoxical, nuanced quality that humans can somehow find discomfort in comfort and comfort in discomfort when it is convenient. Unfortunately, convenience is the root of an unbalanced view that unfolds with the study of any subject matter. But it may not really be a problem with convenience as much as it is an issue with the way in which people express themselves. It’s easier to understand the inner workings of an introvert, such as myself and Gallant, through a more “artistic” form of expression to confront our inner demons in the most raw way possible. On the other hand, it is interesting to see how extroverts are more readily available to confront matters, in the most pure form, when it is time, but they often have a hard time, or rather convenient obliviousness, coming to the point when they find it necessary to do so. This isn’t, by any means, a way of dividing humans based on interactive energy and thinking but rather a way of looking in from different angles as to how the heart of the matter gets tackled. As mentioned before in one of my previous posts, it is all about perspective and expanding upon it.

Through this entire blog series of “Introspective Musings” since I’ve switched over from my WordPress site to Medium, I’ve tried to hopefully garner attention to this matter in varying lights. Ironically, I’ve presented these different “lights” in a dark fashion and even continued to do so in this post, so I apologize for my darkened nature spilling out all the time in my posts. I guess that comes at the expense of the mantra that everything in life will balance out when you are daringly honest. From all of this though, the real question is this: Will you be able to balance out your personal “Self-Ology”?