On one of my usual sessions of listening to music and doing my work, I really started to procrastinate - I mean think - about the music I was listening to, and in particular the singing. Opinions may differ of course, but in my mind the singing is the forefront of most of the songs we listen to today, and it's weird to think that in the end all they are are just words.

Before I continue on that, I would just like to state that I find it really funny and interesting that most of my ideas for these chapters come from me getting distracted while studying and so procrastinating (and 3 am of course). It shows that procrastination isn't all that bad a thing if you can just turn it into something productive. In fact, procrastinating by doing something is still doing something, and doing something will always have some effect on you, usually positive. Checking your phone while you're supposed to be studying? Well, you're socializing! Looking at memes though? Well, you're closer to your pathetic meaning of life of being happy, if only temporarily! Playing games? You're sharpening your brain! The list of the things we do because of us procrastinating from doing something else is endless. Any of the things in that list is better than just sitting idle and as long as you dont do that, maybe procrastination isn't such a bad thing. However, since I don't have the power to exonerate procrastination completely of its faults, maybe it is still very much of a bad thing. It is definitely not the worst though, so dont beat yourself up over procrastination, yeah?

Anyways, back to the actual topic - Singing. Its pretty mindblowing in my opinion how singers can turn words we use almost everyday into something that can elicit such powerful emotions in us and also entertain us at the same time. I have no doubt that the songs that do have an effect on us would have nowhere near the amount it does if we just saw the words of it instead of listening to the song. Why is that? What is it that singers can do that turns simple things into beautiful works of art?

Well, I don't know, but whatever it is, it appears to be something found in common among every artist. In fact, in my opinion, it is what makes them artists in the first place - the ability to turn ordinary and mundane things into extraordinary things that excite us. It is the ability to look at and express things from another, more beautiful perspective. To look at things from a perspective that excites us and is not obvious to the naked eye, that is art.

A few months ago, I saw the view from my balcony in the reflection of a window inside it. It was the same view that i had been seeing for almost 10 years, yet something about seeing it reflected really affected me. The reflection only provided a different perspective of the same old view. However, in a way, the different perspective rekindled the beauty i saw in it at first, when it was still new to me. Sometimes we take things for granted and let it lose its beauty, but all we need is another perspective to help remind us.

Art - and more on topic, singing is a lot like that. It gives us a different perspective to appreciate the same old words. It is what turns these simple words into beautiful melodies and sounds that remind us of their beauty. Singers are the mirrors which help us see this perspective. They make it so that we dont forget how important these words for us. In the same way, art is what makes it so that we dont forget how important our human dignity is for us.

And thats why art is so important. It teaches us to appreciate the little, mundane things in life, and life is but full of such little, mundane things.