{"id":1941,"date":"2013-04-07T04:56:37","date_gmt":"2013-04-07T11:56:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/66.147.244.209\/~canadiu3\/?p=1941"},"modified":"2014-02-09T04:58:47","modified_gmt":"2014-02-09T12:58:47","slug":"of-idioms-violins-in-subways-and-wellness-in-a-hurried-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2013\/04\/07\/of-idioms-violins-in-subways-and-wellness-in-a-hurried-world\/","title":{"rendered":"Of Idioms, Violins in Subways, and Wellness in a Hurried World"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Morning<\/a>
Morning commuters a-flurry and in a hurry all pass him by: Joshua Bell (background left corner) plays a 45-minute set on a 3.5 million dollar violin.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"The<\/a>
The Joshua Bell that people know and pay to see. Externals dictate what we deem beautiful, and prestige gets top dollar.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"With<\/a>
With not even as much as a glance over the shoulder, beauty falls on ears deafened by the din of life.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

FROM CHILDHOOD we are inundated by idioms meant to inspire, motivate, caution, and\u2013occasionally\u2014rebuke.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe early bed gets the worm!\u201d To get us out of bed for school. Usually spoken by harassed mothers to children who sleep like it was going out of style.<\/p>\n

\u201cA penny saved is a penny earned!\u201d; to get us to put aside some of our lunch money and appreciate the value of being a spendthrift.<\/p>\n

\u201cAbout face!\u201d As in, \u201cyou do an about face and march right back into that bathroom, young lady! Those teeth need brushing!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBite your tongue\u201d because heaven forbid we talk back to our parents, teachers, figures of authority.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t have your cake and eat it, too.\u201d Choices need to be made; priorities, set. No matter how bewildering to a child\u2019s mind. This one particularly frustrated my 6-year old psyche, and I grew up hell-bent on finding ways to have my cake and <\/b><\/i>eat it, too. Sadly, the idiom holds true on most occasions.<\/p>\n

Enter the teenager, young adult; segue into adult years. Come forth the idioms, with a slightly different focus, to address the new stations of life.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe more, the merrier!\u201d An all-time teenage favorite.<\/p>\n

\u201cCuriosity killed the cat.\u201d An all time parents-of-teenagers favorite precaution.<\/p>\n

\u201cHit the books.\u201d Don\u2019t we all remember being students?\u00a0 The homework, tests, studying.\u00a0 Been there, done that. Can\u2019t say I miss it too much.<\/p>\n

\u201cHead over heels.\u201d Aaaah, young love.<\/p>\n

\u201cDog eat Dog\u201d as we move into the equally idiomatic \u201crat race.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBurning the midnight oil\u201d is what we do as young guns out to prove ourselves in the world of professionals.<\/p>\n

\u201cCross your fingers\u201d when we anxiously await the results of burning the midnight oil, and can only hope for the best turnout.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.\u201d To remind us to live a balanced life, despite having to make a buck in a\u2014well\u2014dog-eat-dog world.<\/p>\n

As we mature, the idioms indicate the new focus:\u00a0 work, career, family, business. Something is lost along the way: innocence, idealism, the ability to appreciate beauty and the simpler things.<\/p>\n

A social experiment was recently conducted by the Washington Post and world-famous violinist, Joshua Bell. Bell played for free, for 45 minutes, on\u00a0a violin worth 3.5 million dollars\u00a0at the Metro DC subway station. It was January 12, at 7:15 a.m., the height of the morning rush hour in one of the world\u2019s busiest capital cities. Over a thousand\u00a0people passed by Bell, only seven stopped to listen to him play; among them, a 3-year-old boy. Only one person recognized him. Ironically, the people who walked by Bell are perhaps the same ones who readily shell out $100 or more to catch one of his sold-out concerts at the Kennedy Center.<\/p>\n

Some comments to the video of the experiment, uploaded on YouTube:<\/p>\n

Michael Nagurny said: \u201cHonestly, No one is going to stop\u2026here are your options – Miss your train and maybe get fired\/Lose a chance at a raise, Or listen to some random dude play an instrument even be it very skilled. Try this is a mall or such where people won\u2019t get fired for listening and I’m sure you will see different results.\u201d<\/p>\n

To which \u201ceiffler714\u201d replied:\u00a0\u201c<\/b>Doing it where it was done was the whole point. Do people truly recognize high art when they stumble across it or only when they are prepped for it? If instead of Josh Bell what if they had put Steven Tyler and Joe Perry of Aerosmith in that station? Pick two other pop artists whose music is disposable but identifiable. I’m guessing there would have been a crowd when they finished.\u201d<\/p>\n

Subscriber \u201cjimmy g\u201d\u00a0<\/b>pointed out that \u201csome things are more important than money. Most everything of real value is, love, peace, happiness, music. art. but our owners have taught us [our] value is being cattle and produce for the machine. The death of a mind.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indeed, the Divine created us in 3 parts\u2014spirit, soul, body. We ARE a spirit; we HAVE a soul; we LIVE in a body. Most religions and faiths across the world subscribe to this belief.<\/p>\n

We feed the body and all it desires. Bigger, better, faster, more; the insatiable demands of the flesh.\u00a0 This is why we get caught in a vicious cycle of work: we work hard so we can acquire; the more we acquire, the more we want; the harder we work.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, spirit and soul are starved. Emaciated, even. The food on which they thrive: art, beauty, the sublime, good literature, daydreams, relaxation and quite time, meaningful reflection\u2014all tossed aside as fanciful, frivolous, unnecessary in favor of the \u201cmore important,\u201d \u201cgrown-up\u201d things of life.<\/p>\n

Granted, it is easy for most to connect with the physical, as it is what is visible to us. We see and readily perceive outward beauty, and as such, are more inclined to focus on this. In the specific case of Joshua Bell and the experiment, the outward beauty and prestige of a $100 ticket at The Kennedy Center is a clear winner\u2014a \u201cmust-have,\u201d if you will\u2014compared to taking the time to listen to some seemingly random starving artist violin player in the subway. People saw and heard what the physical dictated.\u00a0 Never mind that the talent was one and the same; the violin, priceless.<\/p>\n

Our lives have become way too compartmentalized; way too consumed by externals.<\/p>\n

But an ailing soul and spirit will eventually affect the physical.\u00a0 So much so that when negative emotions set in, it is difficult to feel and look beautiful.<\/p>\n

There is a vast chasm between happiness and joy; satisfaction and contentment. The latter, more fleeting than the former. The acquisition of new things, for instance, may make you happy and satisfied, but for how long? Feeding your spirit and soul, on the other hand, will provide a more lasting effect which will show up from the inside, out. Inner beauty reflected. Clich\u00e9 and idealistic? Perhaps; but also true.<\/p>\n

Depression, fatigue, anxiety, anger, stress, envy, greed, materialism; the attachment to \u201cstuff,\u201d and mental turmoil are common afflictions in this modern age. Countless studies have already proven that these conditions often contribute to the destruction of healthy cells, diminish anti-aging properties, and cause hormonal imbalances. They also trigger a plethora of beauty-related problems: poor skin, hair loss, eating disorders and obesity, to name a few. No matter the external solution or wonder treatment, the problem is not truly addressed until the inner causes are dealt with.<\/p>\n

Focus and balance need to be restored. YES, life is<\/i> often dog-eat-dog.\u00a0 And many times, we may <\/b><\/i>have to burn midnight oil to succeed. But there\u2019s so much more to it than that.<\/p>\n

\u201cTake your hat off to someone\u201d and let them know you appreciate them. Start with your family, perhaps. Hugs are always great, and the best thing about them is when you give them, you generally get one back.<\/p>\n

Forget about the \u201cgrass being greener on the other side of the fence.\u201d Feeding your soul and spirit, more often than not, makes the grass on your own<\/i> side greener.<\/p>\n

\u201cStop and smell the flowers.\u201d Their beauty is sublime. Or stop to have a listen at a violin player in the subway.\u00a0 Allow the music to infuse and uplift your soul. And it won\u2019t cost you $100, either.<\/p>\n

The sands of time run swift for us all. And I will\u2014at the risk of idiom-induced nausea\u2014make my last two references: \u00a0life\u2019s too short for you to spend all your energies chasing after material, physical gain. After all, you can\u2019t take it with you when you\u2019re gone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

FROM CHILDHOOD we are inundated by idioms meant to inspire, motivate, caution, and\u2013occasionally\u2014rebuke. \u201cThe early bed gets the worm!\u201d To …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1941","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-lifestyle","mauthors-angie-duarte","mauthors-philippine-canadian-inquirer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1941\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}