Justin Rickard on David Bowie’s life
I just read a great blog post about the possible meanings behind David Bowie’s amazing life.
“So what?” You say?
“What’s that got to do with me wanting to migrate to Australia?” I hear you say next.
Well before I answer that question, read an excerpt from the blog by Jon Giaan of Knowledge Source in Australia:
…David Bowie wasn’t beholden to any one. He did what he wanted and didn’t give a stuff if it was popular or not.”
Sounds good, but I think this interpretation of the Bowie phenomenon is almost entirely wrong.
David Bowie’s evolution from glam-rocker to dandy
I don’t think you can look at his career and think, there is a man who just did what he wanted to do.
Rather, I think Bowie was a man who didn’t care what he wanted to do at all, and was just happy to give people what they wanted (through song-craft that verged on genius).
Think about the evolution from glam-rocker to dandy.
If he had any artistic integrity (in the mis-used sense of the word), he would have kept glam-rocking, even when everyone had stopped listening.
Bowie was happy to reinvent himself, over and over, for our sake
But don’t let me sell this achievements short.
To be totally ego-less about your art and just give people what they want (often years before they realised that they want it) is some next level humanity.
It’s a rare individual who doesn’t get bound up in the constraints of who they used to be, what they used to believe and what they used to stand for.
We get attached to the stories we tell about ourselves. And we can’t change because if we did, that would be to admit that we were wrong before.
So it is very, very hard to change!
Very few people can do it.
Very few people can see past versions of themselves as disposable.
But Bowie could, because he didn’t take any of it seriously. It was all just a bit of a game.
The genius of Bowie
My favourite Bowie quote?
I re-invented my image so many times that I’m in denial that I was originally an overweight Korean woman.”
So Bowie didn’t have a commitment to his art. He didn’t have a commitment to anything. That’s the genius of Bowie.
And that’s the lesson he offered us: don’t take any of it seriously, especially yourself, and don’t get caught up in whatever you were yesterday. It’s all fiction, so chose a fiction that works for you.
That’s some advice we all can live by….
Explore. Dream. Discover!
So here’s my take on what Jon is saying about David Bowie and whether he would migrate to Australia: yes, he definitely would!
If Bowie felt that Australia was the place to be and would further his career, or the people his career served, then he would move here in a heartbeat.
And so should you, dare to do what you dream to do and if that means coming to Australia, then just come on over! As the saying goes:
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover”
Attributed to H. Jackson Brown’s mother