On self-imposed repetition and accepting systems that control us but grant us perception of free will
Increasingly we are layering systems into our lives that we chose and controlled, that come to control us should we choose to not live actively and consciously.
All right. I will admit it. I like this new Taylor Swift album folklore, including the sad, soulful, heartbreak, too-real melody “Exile.”
This Saturday morning I found myself in my standard writing spot in the living room, hoping to convert from fleeting inspiration to comprehension of self and our world. After Taylor came Mac Miller then J. Cole then Frank Ocean.
Why? This is the reverse chronology of artists in my Spotify Liked Songs. So, with shuffle off, this is my repertoire.
I paused when it got to J. Cole “Snow on Tha Bluff.” And I thought “What is going on. This is such a weird album.”
Of course, I didn’t think it was an album per se. But this is what it would feel like if I were listening to an album: song after song, transitioning from one mood and set of emotional insights to the next. But there was no rhyme or reason.
Indeed, no CD compilation from the 1990s would ever have ventured to have such an eclectic mix - not even Top Hits. In some mysterious way. the Top Hits CD compilation even if from a hodgepodge of artists, all fit together, woven into unison through mass-marketing and common DNA that the record companies imposed on would-be artists. Whereas my Liked Songs, the only common thread is my soul. What song did I like enough to smash the ‘heart’ button in Spotify and save it at any given time in recent months or years? The algorithm was simple: “Did I like the song a lot?” Indeed, it is a playlist, but playlists are curated, where even though I have hand-selected each and every single song, ironically, it does not feel curated at all - it is just a random collection based on a non-random algorithm.
But more importantly, I paused to wonder about this self-imposed Groundhog’s Day. I have listened to this rotation of “Exile” followed by “Good News” followed by “Snow on Tha Bluff” so many times. Why? Well, there would be a feeling or a mood, and I would want to hear a given song, maybe it is “Exile.” So I would cue up the app and play the sound.
And the random album would ensue. I listen to music a lot. So I probably hear this rotation multiple times a day, if not every week. This made me wonder about patterns we constantly introduce into our life, consciously unconsciously.
If we did not live in 2020, I would hear the FM radio, or nothing at all. It would be more serendipitous -- even if, notably, it had some of the same issues of repetition i.e. “I can’t believe the radio is playing Black Eyed Peas again.”
But is there something about self-imposed repetition, rather than socially or randomly imposed repetition? I wonder if by being a mood, I put myself back into a series of subsequent moods and thoughts by the same songs that follow. J. Cole makes me reflective. Frank Ocean makes me bob my head side to side. The same way social media creates an echo chamber of values, beliefs, and moods by algorithmically rewarding and repeating sources of content that I have self-selected into my feed by following people, I wonder if I am putting myself into a creative echo chamber by repeating this playlist of sound as my muse, starting with one on-demand song, but then following with a repetitive input of songs that I have chosen for myself to follow? Indeed, I can shuffle, I can select a new playlist to discover. But technology is deceptively good at making us have a sense of free will and control yet facilitating loss of control. For example, on Twitter, I choose people to follow, but I don’t actually control the content shown to me. With email, yes I send email to certain people and my email address can be messaged by anyone who knows it, but emails just show up and I robotically work my way through them even though I know it’s a task list created by other people. The list goes on. This made me wonder about the perceived sense of control with an underpinning of control-by others.
Many days have been filled with this repetition. It’s of my own volition. But I wonder about the systems we incorporate into our lives, the choices we make that we choose to perpetuate, and whether living more actively could be better.