Genesis the Greykid: Let's live life for a living

Russell Magee, 30, sits at the microphone in studio at the Fancy Rhino offices on Market Street. Magee goes by the name, Genisis the Greykid, when he performs his poetry.
Russell Magee, 30, sits at the microphone in studio at the Fancy Rhino offices on Market Street. Magee goes by the name, Genisis the Greykid, when he performs his poetry.

A young man I'm mentoring through poetry asked me while walking, "Genesis, what do you mean when you say 'living life for a living?'"

At that same moment across the street, a happy, homeless drunk reclined on a bench and was waving at us. After we waved back, I replied to this young man, "It means we've discovered a way to get drunk on the air we breathe."

Living life for a living, being truly human, is the goal to which everything moves. Becoming closer to whatever original purpose you believe in, right? How then, are we to do this if we're slowly consumed for eight-plus hours of the day by many things that often don't matter?

I mean, sure, many jobs may cover expenses for "stuff" you enjoy, but ask yourself this: "Am I operating in my zone of genius?" as psychologist Gay Hendricks would put it. Most reading this would respond "No." Some may even think it's impossible - that life is about working a job you hate. Or perhaps echoing from the depths, you hear the phrase whenever something negative happens: "That's life!"

Is it?

I conduct Words In Grey poetry/creative workshops all around the city of Chattanooga. Several times a year I bring these workshops to the Hamilton County Juvenile Detention Center through Studio Everything, a creative training studio in East Chattanooga. At the juvenile center, I try to help those young men and women explore. One day, Bill Weaver, a vocational education specialist at the center, told me a story about the last gentlemen that came to speak to the kids the year before.

This man, Weaver said, had been locked in prison for 15 years. I remember him telling me:

"Genesis, all feelings, all happiness, everything, is a condition of the mind. It took 10 years in prison before he realized that being free wasn't outside of those walls. Being truly free required a mental adjustment. Once he became free mentally, the last five years wasn't spent in prison at all."

What if we applied this philosophy to our own lives - that are probably less dramatic than the gentlemen in prison - where true happiness is a mindset, not a context? Where we can allow ourselves to be happy.

Have you ever met someone in a predicament much more severe and difficult than your own and yet they still appear to be full of joy? Whatever their problem is, I assure you they would love to have things differently, but they made a conscious decision which allows them to live fully.

They allowed themselves to be happy.

Knowing this, that happiness at its core is something created deep inside the heart, is the pathway to joy. These are the first steps toward living life for a living. These are the first steps toward being completely beside yourself - intoxicated with wonder, becoming drunk on the very air you breathe.

I promise you, one day it'll all make sense.

Here's the Words In Grey exercise for the month:

The Words In Grey exercises are designed to get you exploring. The idea is to place yourself into a context you may not often find yourself in, then forming some ideas and language around those through poetry, within a limited amount of time. It doesn't matter whether you're a writer or not, it's more about tapping into that "hidden wholeness," about exploring. Through this process, we discover parts of ourselves and ultimately become more acute to the human experience.

After reading this, I want you to think of something that makes you truly happy. Sit with those thoughts for at least a full minute, the longer the better. Then, as you move throughout the rest of your day, no matter what is thrown your way, continue to place yourself within that moment of happiness. It's important not to ignore anything negative, though. If something comes along and brings you down, that's OK, sit with it. Be awake, be present in whatever that sadness may be. Then smile, because you are still alive and have moved a few steps closer to understanding the magic inside of you.

For the next 30 days, at the end of each week, make notes of some of the negative things that get in your head. If there was a stumbling block that triggered you to think about something negative, we'll use that as a theme for poems.

Example: If you've gone two weeks without smoking but, after a nasty argument, stumbled back into a habit you were trying to give up - those are your themes for the poems. Write one from the perspective of the cigarette; write one from the perspective of the walls around you while the argument was happening; write another from the perspective of yourself watching it all unfold from a balcony.

Give yourself five minutes to write. Read it back. Feel the moment. By giving these stumbling blocks human qualities, by choosing to write from their perspective, it allows us to gain a truly unique sense of ourselves. We don't ignore the negative, we treat it with love and learn from it.

Genesis the Greykid was born in Chattanooga, raised in many different cities (military brat), but currently splits part of his time between New York, Washington, D.C. and Tennessee. He's a fulltime creative who's been writing poetry and music for a living since 2011, recently releasing a book of poetry with creative exercises titled "Words In Grey." Contact him at info@WordsinGrey.com.

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