17
Daniel
“So, Daniel, in order to proceed, I would like first to explain what it is I mean when I speak about a pathway between the conscious and the unconscious mind, OK?”
“OK.” Daniel sat on the floor of the exercise room with his guitar bag lying next to him. He had been relieved to learn that Ammu was going to work with them individually—relieved and just a small bit disappointed, because it also meant Kaitlyn wouldn’t be there. But even the thought of playing in front of her made his palms sweat a little, and Ammu had mentioned singing…
Yeah, Daniel decided, he was definitely relieved the others wouldn’t be there.
“Throughout history,” Ammu began, “there have been a few special people in every generation, revered for their abilities—abilities so profound that their work is recognized not just for years but for centuries beyond their death. Rembrandt, Michelangelo, Beethoven, Mozart, Da Vinci, Galileo, Einstein. They are geniuses, not necessarily for their intelligence, per se, but for their creativity. They see art before it ever touches the canvas. They hear music even when they have gone deaf. They imagine the possibility that even the most basic and obvious assumptions about the universe may be wrong.
“I myself have been taught that what makes these people special is their ability to tap into the unconscious mind, to see and hear and feel while awake that which most people can only access in their dreams, or in brief glimpses of intuition that,” Ammu paused to wave his hand in the air with a flick of his wrist, like a magician, “slip away, almost immediately, so that we never know from whence they came.” Ammu smiled at Daniel, his eyes reflecting the passion behind his words.
“The test that you took was designed to identify the young people of your generation who have the strongest ability to do this—to become aware of the thoughts of the unconscious mind. I believe that by studying what you can do, by learning how you do it and by helping you to fulfill your potential, we will eventually be able to teach others to do it as well. The unconscious mind is perhaps the greatest untapped resource of the entire human race, Daniel. To learn to communicate with it is to unlock the genius that exists within us all.”
Daniel couldn’t help but feel a little overwhelmed. Him? A genius? He was good at music, sure, but he wasn’t Beethoven, for heaven’s sake. He wasn’t Mozart. But Ammu wasn’t done speaking, so Daniel kept his thoughts, and his doubts, to himself. As though sensing Daniel’s discomfort, Ammu smiled encouragingly.
“Do not worry,” he said. “I am not asking you to write me a symphony!” He laughed out loud as though they had just shared a private joke. “No, no. I understand that you are still in the nascence of your ability. You all are. My task is to help you see what you can do. To help you understand what you can do, and to build upon it. OK?”
“Uh… sure,” Daniel agreed, shrugging a little.
“Ha! I see your skepticism! But it will not matter. I ask only that you be honest with me, that you answer my questions to the best of your ability, as thoroughly as you know how, and that you attempt any exercises I give you with the intention of accomplishing the task, even if you are not certain that you will be successful. Is that a fair request?”
“Sure,” Daniel said again, nodding his head slightly.
“Wonderful!” Ammu beamed at him in obvious delight, which Daniel couldn’t help but smile about since they hadn’t even done anything yet.
“So, Daniel, there are certain things we already know, from modern science, that the unconscious mind is especially interested in. If you are consciously trying to solve a problem, your unconscious mind will work on it as well. If you are not trying to accomplish anything in particular, then your unconscious mind is still at work, nonetheless, always scanning your surroundings for things it considers important.
“For example, it is always looking for danger. If you walk along a path in the woods, and you see a stick that looks like a snake, you might jump backward a bit before you realize that it is only a stick. Your unconscious mind identified the threat and responded to it before your conscious awareness could react, to tell you that the stick was nothing to worry about. Do you see?”
Daniel nodded.
“The unconscious mind also watches the people around us, for signs of trouble or stress, for example, or for a smile from a pretty girl, hmm?”
At this, Daniel blushed.
“The unconscious mind watches for danger, and it watches for opportunity, and it tries to get our attention if it identifies either one. It is instinctively interested in the facial expressions and body language of the people around us. Do you have any questions so far?”
“I don’t think so. Not really,” Daniel said.
Ammu nodded enthusiastically. “So, then! Daniel, we are looking for ways in which the music you connect to may, in turn, be transmitting these signals from your unconscious mind to your conscious awareness. Have you ever, for example, heard frightening music that warned you of a danger you had not yet seen?”
Daniel thought for a while, but he couldn’t remember anything like that ever happening to him.
“No,” he said, sounding a little disappointed. “No, I don’t think so.”
“That is fine,” Ammu said, his tone reassuring. “We are only just beginning, yes? Perhaps you have not been surrounded by much danger in your life. That is a good thing! Or perhaps your unconscious mind has been more interested in something else. Do you find that music ever tells you things about what people are thinking or feeling?”
“I don’t know about telling me things, but I do imagine songs when I look at people a lot. Like if they’re mad I might think about a song that sounds angry.” He thought about Jared and Alyssa back home and grinned a little. “Or if I know my friend likes a girl, and I see him looking at her, I might imagine him, you know, kind of singing about her in his head.”
He thought about Rush and Sketch hearing him singing and winced a little, but no matter how honest Ammu had asked him to be, he wasn’t going to talk about that.
“Good, good!” Ammu said. “And do specific people tend to inspire the same kind of music every day? Or is it always different?”
“Both, I guess? Like, my mom always sounds kind of like her yoga music. You know, chimes and flutes and stuff. But my friends tend to change more—happy or sad or angry or whatever.”
“Excellent, Daniel! This is truly excellent! Can you play for me what your mother sounds like, do you think?” Ammu waved a hand toward the guitar, but Daniel hesitated.
“Not really. It isn’t that I don’t want to. It’s just… the guitar is the wrong instrument for my mom. That’s funny, you know, ’cause I never thought about it before. I really like guitars, but that isn’t what I usually hear around her. I can’t imitate a flute with a guitar. I mean, I could play the notes, sure, but it wouldn’t be the same at all.”
“I see,” Ammu said, nodding sagely. “So who sounds more like a guitar to you?”
“Oh, it depends on their mood, really, but most of my friends make me think of different songs I could play.”
“I would like to hear some examples, if I might?”
“Yeah, OK,” Daniel said, and he pulled the guitar bag into his lap so he could unzip it and take out his six-string. He picked up the instrument and walked to the edge of the room, where he had left his amp when he had first come in. He plugged the amp into the wall and then plugged it into his guitar as well, setting it to the lowest volume setting. He plucked each string lightly, in turn.
“You are checking its tuning, yes? With your perfect pitch?”
Daniel blushed and nodded. “Yeah. It’s good,” he said.
“OK then, imagine someone frowning, and play for me what you hear.”
“Uh…” Daniel hesitated for a long time, his hands poised over the strings, ready to play whatever came to his mind, but nothing did. “I’m not sure it works that way,” he said finally.
“Oh?”
“Well, there are lots of different kinds of frowns, for lots of different reasons. I’m having trouble picking one, I think. Like, a particular frown.”
“Interesting!” Ammu exclaimed. “Good! In a way, this is very good, Daniel. This is a strong indication that your music is more than mere word association, that it is, in fact, showing you something about the feelings of the people around you. Perhaps—”
But before he could continue, Daniel began to play. He wasn’t sure where the impulse had come from, but he plucked out a few experimental notes, and Ammu fell silent, waiting. When he settled into a tune, he recognized it as an Eric Clapton song, but he played it much more slowly than the original. He played the chorus and a single verse, and a chorus again, and then, watching Ammu hesitantly, he began to sing very softly, turning the amp up just a bit first.
The song was “Something’s Happening,” from the Behind the Sun album. Daniel had never been certain what the song was supposed to be about, but somehow, in this moment, the lyrics spoke to him, as though the song itself were trying to tell him something, to convey some higher truth that remained just out of reach. He sang the chorus aloud and part of a verse, but then he stopped playing and looked at Ammu hesitantly, the last note of the guitar slowly fading away, hanging in the air between them.
“Something is happening, isn’t it?” Daniel wanted to know. “Something big.”
“Yes,” Ammu said quietly, and he nodded once for emphasis. His face was still kind, but he was not smiling now. He was not smiling at all. “Yes, it is.”