Protecting Your Voice

Bob Dylan is, and probably will forever be, my favorite musician of all time. I’ve listened to his expansive forty+ album discography practically on an endless loop ever since I was a young teenager. I even went out of my way to learn how to play the guitar and harmonica (simultaneously with the neckstrap and everything) out of admiration for the guy. My favorite track of all time “Like a Rolling Stone”, like many of his other classics, lives rent-free in my brain (welcomely I might add) to this day.

But Dylan is right. He is not actually the voice of a generation. Nor should he be.

Because there exists a fine line between admiration… and choosing a proxy in lieu of having your own voice.

Now, obviously there is nothing wrong with the former. Admiration as a sentiment is actually quite good. It helps detect behaviors in others to which we ourselves would like to aspire. A poetic individual like Bob Dylan, for instance, drives fans to become more poetic themselves. Admiration inspires.

But having a public figure we look up to become our voice within itself, essentially forsaking having a voice at all, is another matter entirely. This is a bad idea because 1) it doesn't employ much critical thinking or discernment and 2) public figures aren't people who truly know us. And in a world in which we are increasingly barraged by nonstop dopamine-inducing content, complete with algorithms hell-bent on relevancy and appeal, at the risk of sounding pessimistic, I'd venture to guess that we are unfortunately getting less careful at noticing this problem. Instead, we are growing increasingly comfortable delegating our identity onto musicians, politicians, podcasters, etc., under the guise of this being an authentic identity unto ourselves. And to me, the worst part is this self-delusion. We act like we possess an assertive voice, when in fact we’re relinquishing it in the most passive way possible.

The antidote, in my opinion, is distinguishing between who is a public figure and who actually knows us. Certainly, continue to admire whoever you admire - just focus more on the latter. Parents. Your spouse. Closest friends. Mentors. Whoever you trust. Spend more time with them. Realign yourself with what you relate to about them. Because it’s those people who truly shaped your identity and helped you have a voice in the first place.

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