Music of Photography: Everything has a price

Last Updated on August 1, 2016 by Patrick

Let the beauty of what you love be what you do.
Jalāl ad-Dīn Rumi

Do you know the expression “everything has a price”? I remember it and now I want to reflect on it. :)

In the material world we like to put tags and prices on just about everything we get our hands on. This, to measure, quantify and give value to things, even to people or animals, flowers, beings in general etc. This is our safety measure with which we keep things from leaving us. But everything does have a price. The price we like to give to things or to people is somewhat an expression of the right price they have in reality, except for the prices we tag them with when we are astray from the truth.

Prices have a value in the mathematical dimension of the Universe, even if some people will not believe it. Numbers, cyphers, of course, are living entities, just like letters, sylables etc., and they have their own life and worth. But the self-worth, coming back to the physical dimension in which we live, so to speak, is, actually, the right price.

Self-worth is the emanation, as I can see, of self-respect, but a balanced self-respect always being and acting in its sphere of influence and never outside of it. Too much self-respect leads people to ask for millions of dollars for their work and too little self-respect makes people give many services to the wrong people, mostly unworthy of them, or give the wrong services.

But a self-respect that comes from being or a self-worth that comes from self-respect can make people give the best piece of themselves for others’ welfare always, of course, feeling happy for the joy, gratitude and happiness shared with others. This is serving or living in servitude, not slavery.

But a life lived for receiving or expecting to receive doesn’t always bring accomplishment. Actually, often it brings dissapointments and all kinds of conflicts and sorrow. It can create inner struggles such when we ask ourselves “am I good enough?”, “is it the right thing to do?”, “may it be that I’m not worthy of it?” etc. This is inner confusion, not knowing where we’re at.

But let’s look within ourselves to see if there is something that we like to do. Let’s remember that often underrated question of “what would you like to do when you’ll get older?” asked durring childhood and see if it applies today. Often, a revalorisation of our life can give us light to the things we missed.

People like to be themselves but they say that society, often, doesn’t allow them to be. Instead they try to trick the world doing something that the world considers to be fit not knowing that they trick themselves. Who are we fooling, them or us?

Everything does have a price and in order to know happiness, one must first know grief, sorrow and sadness. Being away from the things that seem to be missing from our lives is always in our mind. Actually, none of us are away from ourselves. We are only ignoring ourselves, our thoughts, feelings and this reflects in what we do.

So, work, I think, is the ultimate price for the one who is not listening to one’s inner voice crying out loud to do something for oneself. When finally heard and listened, when finally obeyed, look for that feeling beyond the door that was shut and locked from you. Then, you know no work but rather the playfulness of it all. It will be as easy as play and your great work is an integral part of your Magnus Opus.

Open that door and you will see what you’ve been missing. It is nothing, really, just a whisper, a cloud, a lady cleaning the floor. Her clean traces lead you not astray, but within. They’re clean and reflect light. You can always tell when it was a woman’s hand there… :)

It works for you and you are not working for it. You don’t need to, actually, being just your choice in life, among many you’ve made.

It leads you to your inner church and there there are lights in the shadows. Small windows, a few candles lit, the votive paintings and sculpture, the cobwebs and the dust on the chairs, do they frighten you? Where do you think the cleaning lady is? She starts cleaning if you start cleaning like in the mirror.

And so, “Nothing will work unless you do”, said Maya Angelou. But what about play? Shall we consider a time to play, now, or rest, or what else? Have you worked hard so far or hard enough? Life is a play anyway and we are the protagonists. Just enter the door, pay attention and music starts to play.. your music starts to play! ;)

The way you play and how you dance, actually, influences the very music you listen to, here and now. Every step you take is actually rewriting the score with a respective note. It has been written before for you, yes, but now you dance on the score, not on the floor. Only the cleaning lady is on the floor doing the cleaning. These are the two dimensions of life, or the world: the working dimension and the playing one. You cannot switch sides, actually, because there is no hard work. There is only you opposing your own nature.

Struggles, yes! But these are only the fear of unknown. We only fear the particularities of the rules of religion because we don’t know them. We may think we do just because we heard about them, but there’s a huge difference between hearing and listening.

Rules are not imposed because there is free will. You decide whether you give because you fear of being punished, give because you think it’s your duty and you consider that there no one else who can do it, or you give because it brings you joy to help others in need. It starts with a small step forward. No dance begins otherwise.

And then we have to pay a price if we want to live our mystery or our mystery to be living us. This is still an enigma for me. What is this price? What do you think?