freelance paradigm

Try to close your eyes for a minute and remember the first time you were really in love. I mean, REALLY in love. Deeply. You feel like out of your mind, like a whole new universe came into existence within you. And you want to share it with someone so you rush to your best friend and explain how you feel. "It feels like my chest is going to explode... it hurts and yet it is so sweet..." And so on. Your friend is perplexed and doesn't have a clue of what you are saying. At the same time you (for the first time in your life) find out how poor is our language when it comes to describing intangible things, such as emotions, ideas and concepts. It is a narrow band indeed.

Suppose the next day you hear a love song on the radio. Or you stumble upon a beautiful poem and it finally snaps. "The person who wrote this feels exactly the same as I do." The very same words of the very same language suddenly give you a feeling of connection. Yet those are not just any words. They are carefully crafted together to make the very best of that narrow band of communication that is between you and the author.

So it is not about the words, it is about how those words are put together, and that is poetry. It does not have to be just poetry; even in painting there is a limited size of canvas and limited spectrum of colors. In music you are limited by the possibilities of sound and acoustics. And everywhere you are limited by the recipients attention. The band of communication is always very narrow and the need to master it is critical. Whatever theory you are studying, it could be musical, photographic, artistic (...), it is always about mastering that narrow band. How to put words together that they will convey the emotions I have now in an other person? How to make a photograph that will vividly depict the sensation of this horse running towards me even to the people who were not on this field with me? How to paint a picture that will spur the same amazement in the viewer as I feel now? How to shoot a story that I feel deeply about so that other people will find it important too.

It is not limited to emotions. It can be just a philosophical revelation, or even a scientific idea or a concept. It always starts with something very intangible which has to take a physical form in order for the other person to consume it. And the band remains narrow, so you have to master it. But deep below there is a motivation to connect with other people and we try to use whatever means we have. That is why we have so many different modes of expression, from painting to dance and from literature to music. We all want to connect and share our inner worlds.