David just posted a new blog:
Surprise Just when I thought that life couldn’t get anymore complicated it gets more complicated, I feel like I’m drowning under a pile of major life transitions, please God, no more. As if I’m not freaked out enough and then someone will come to me and say something like, “Hey Dave, it’s no big deal, but the world as you know it is going to end.” I can only take so much pressure. This next record is going to either be filled with awesome songs that are so huge people will immediately transcend into Heaven when they hear them, or I’m going to die writing it. Look, you can already tell how overly dramatic every song is going to be.
Bobby has a Tumblr blog now! You can follow him by clicking here.
Check out his last post:
Earthquake Living I had an interesting experience as I was out driving around this afternoon. It was one of those eye opening moments that God puts in our lives every so often to help give us a little bit of perspective on things.
I’ve entitled this blog, “Earthquake Living” in honor of my bother and sister in law, who just recently left the United States to work at an orphanage with Score Ministries in the Dominican Republic. Currently they’re in Costa Rica attending intensive language school for the next month before making the move to the DR officially. As I just discovered from her most recent twitter post, they experienced their first earthquake, to which Kristen commented “our new norm.” Hence the title, “Earthquake Living”.
But the title itself has meaning. Call it, a sort of, catch phrase life style, much like the philosophy of, “living like you’re dying”. So whether you’re literally living a life defined by earthquakes, or just figuratively, try and jump on my philosophical bandwagon for just a few minutes while I make my point.
Earlier today, when I was driving around, I found myself thinking of a few emails that I received this morning. Mostly just the normal stuff you would expect in your inbox and one sort of daily encouragement (of which I would normally delete to make room for more important things, but for some reason didn’t). The point of the email was simple—Don’t miss out on the present always preparing for the future (I’m paraphrasing, of course). I thought it was a good encourage. I thought, “Yeah, that was a good one”. ”Live like you’re dying!” is what I told myself. Yeah.
Well, the encouragement from the email quickly subsided, as it tends to when other more important things draw our attention away, when suddenly I had another moment. Only this time it wasn’t nearly as friendly as the first—the email that is…
It was just about 3 o’clock when I got to the Braddock Rd exit northbound on 495 when I noticed in the distance, an SUV flipped over on the side of the road. I mean, we’ve all seen accidents on the side of the road, but there was something different about this one. There were no emergency vehicles. No lights. No sirens. Nothing! There was something though. What there was, was a crowd of pedestrians gathered around the vehicle pressing against it. It suddenly occurred to me, this must have just happened. And if all those people were out there helping something must really be wrong.
I feared the worst! It thought that as I was getting closer any minute I was going to see someone trapped under the vehicle. Thankfully, that never happened. Rather than clearing carnage, the crowd was clearing wreckage. Still, the observation did something to me this afternoon. Thoughts just started racing through my mind. I considered how lucky I was not to have been in that car or that it wasn’t someone I knew (or maybe it was!). But those weren’t even the craziest thoughts! No. What really got me was the thought that the passengers in that car had absolutely no idea that they’d be in an accident today. Think about it. Even now, they’re probably still talking about what happened this afternoon or maybe there still dealing with the results while I’m sitting comfortably on my couch writing this blog.
I wonder what was going through the minds of all the people in Haiti the morning of January 12. For most, it was probably a normal day. I imagine people were expecting to go places, see friends or family, get work done, eat that special meal they love, pick up that kid from school, whatever. Bottom line, something happened that morning and this afternoon that put all those things still “undone” into perspective for those people in a way that only people who have been in similar circumstances can relate to.
So I’m back to why I titled this blog “Earthquake Living”. I think driving down the road I suddenly realized that, for many of us, sometimes it takes an earthquake (or a car crash—I don’t know, pick a disaster you can relate to) to get us to realize what the most important things are in life. For the family driving in that car, the most important thing in life was making it home tonight. For families in Haiti, the most important thing is appreciating today. This moment. Nothing else.
Do yourself a favor, don’t just “live like you dying.” What does that mean anyway? That’s too general a statement and can be taken far to liberally (Notice, I said liberally not literally. There’s a difference). Instead live life as an earthquake survivor or an accident survivor. Maybe that’s a real reality for you. Well then, what did you learn from it? You have now and nothing else. Smile more. Tell those close to you that you love them more. Hug people for longer than they’re comfortable and laugh when they think you’re weird for it. Don’t waist today thinking about tomorrow or what you’re going to do then. Do it today.
-b
PS-there’s more where that came from.
New t-shirts are available on My Favorite Highway’s online store! Click here and check it out.
David and Will are going to be on Bamboozle Chat tomorrow, March 3rd, from 6-7 PM (EST). The link will be probably this one, we’ll let you know if it’s not!
Friends Or Enemies is giving away 4 pairs of tickets to each Bamboozle show (Anaheim, CA, Chicago, IL, and East Rutherford, NJ).
Transportation is not provided so please only enter if you live near each of the cities and can actually attend.
HOW TO ENTER:
1. Join the group (click here)
2. Choose which city you want to go to.
3. Leave 1 comment in that cities thread (Anaheim, Chicago, East Rutherford) letting them know why you should win.Winners will be contacted and announced on the following dates:
3/22 Anaheim
4/26 East Rutherford
5/10 ChicagoFor official rules, click here.
Remember My Favorite Highway will be playing in East Rutherford, NJ on May 1st!
David just sent a new message on SayNow, check it out:
Updates from iamdavidcook.com:
+ This isn’t easy, this isn’t clear… (READ MORE)
+ I feel the same way about Marisa Miller. (READ MORE)
+ On-stage discussion… (READ MORE)
+ Formspring. (READ MORE)
+ Wow. Go buy this CD right now. Seriously. (READ MORE)
+ Playing Words For Friends with Jon Lally… (READ MORE)
+ Young and full of running… (READ MORE)
Check out this video of David covering The Script’s “Breakeven“:
From iamdavidcook.com:
I Want One Of Those
I’m in a familiar place. I’m writing again, I have a thousand and one things I want to say, but I’m not sure how to make it fit. I’m afraid of not writing a good song. It’s strange because I don’t believe in writer’s block, but I often fall victim to something very similar, and that’s where I am right now. I have a system when it comes to writing, I also have a lot of bad habits, one of them being that after writing a verse I’ll decide I hate the song and I’ll toss it before it ever has a fighting chance to prove me wrong. I know I can write good songs, I think songs like Bigger Than Love and What Are You Waiting For are amazing songs, and I wrote them, so why am I so scared that I won’t be able to do it again? I sat down at the piano tonight and came up with ten different ideas and I found something wrong with all of them. I’m either going to have to learn to be patient, or learn some discipline. Billy Joel says he only writes when he has something to say, but then again some of the best songwriters in the world write habitually every day. The best thing in the world is when a song sneaks up on you and everything works on the first try. For example, I wrote the lyrics to Bittersweet Life in 15 minutes, I wrote What Are You Waiting For in it’s entirety in about 10 minutes. On the other hand songs like Steel City and Entertain The Pain took me 2-3 years to finish. I’m not looking for encouragement, I know I have it in me, I just need to kick my ass into gear and be honest with myself. John Mayer is my favorite songwriter, I recently watched his VH1 Storytellers in which he says, “Sometimes I get tapped on the shoulder by pure break-through ideas, but most of the time I listen to a song and I go ‘I want one of those’, and it’s how I’m not able to make one of those, it’s how I’m not as good as to be able to make one of those, it’s my failure to sound like my heroes, that has allowed me to sound like myself.” I feel like that is the story of my life, as a musician I listen to a great song and instantly think how awesome it would be if I had a song just like it that I could sing, but you can’t think like that, you have to write for yourself and nobody else. Okay, great pep talk, I’m glad we did this.
MORE:
+ This was my favorite Superbowl commercial… (READ MORE)
+ FRED… (READ MORE)
+ My Lost Prediction… (READ MORE)
+ LOST… (READ MORE)
MFH Brasil is in a popular Brazilian teen magazine called “Love Rock“. This is the first time a Brazilian magazine posts something about My Favorite Highway – but it’s definitely just the beginning
