[Music]
um
[Music]
[Laughter]
[Music]
Oh
[Music]
Thanks
so I have to be very upfront with you
all got something about myself you see
I’m a very literal person what this
means is that I need patterns repeatable
formulas and algorithms in order to be
accepting of a situation and this has
its fair share of pros and cons it’s
major benefit is that I can take well
tested models of one subject superimpose
them onto something else in order to
make sense of a situation that I haven’t
experienced before
well likewise it too has its fair share
of cons the most prevalent being and my
family and friends will testify to this
I’m extremely rigid and stubborn in my
thinking and as you can imagine this
made it fairly difficult for me to
interact with other people when I was
younger whenever I saw advice I got the
cliche just the confident or just be
yourself how many of you guys actually
know that means I mean either as you can
imagine by the time I was a teenager
became frustrated I was frustrated with
myself as frustrated the world around me
even people that were very close and
dear to me and so like any dutiful
brooding teenager I did it I walked
myself in my room and I did one of two
things either played video games I
played a lot of video games a
Playstation 2 easy grace adventure to
climb and
or I played music and thankfully I did
latter because little did I know at that
time that would be my framework for my
human interactions later on in life but
that too came out of price you see the
more fat you ate I became with music the
more of a reduce I became in order to
study it more so flash forward I’m
graduating high school in Pennsylvania
and I am 100% without a doubt socially
awkward dreaded the thought of being
around other people dreaded thought of
meeting you but I too am a human and
like many other humans I wanted
companionship I wanted to make friends
and develop relationships and so when I
moved to Virginia for college
I said AJ damn it you can make friends
do you like it or not and so I moved to
Virginia for college and I went out to
social venues I went to parks malls if I
was feeling particularly masochistic
that night I would go to parties with
the sole mission of talking to complete
and random strangers which yes this is
awkward as it sounds and I’ve met a lot
of cool people I met a lot of people
that still talk to to the state but I
wasn’t happy because my results weren’t
predictable you see I thought if I said
a B and C to one person that should work
universally through everybody that I
meet I’m sure you all recognize that
does not work but I was too stubborn to
accept that result and so I became
frustrated again I lock myself in my
room this time in Virginia and I play
music and I remember I was playing
guitar and something clicked I
understood the meaning to the worst
piece of advice ever given by anybody I
understood what it meant to just be
yourself
and now I’m sure you’re wondering well
what is playing guitar and just being
yourself have anything to
with each other and I’ll tell you the
secret not a damn thing absolutely
nothing but if you remember one of the
benefits to the way that I think is that
I can take a model from one subject and
overlaid it on to something completely
unrelated to make sense of it this is
one of those times that my convoluted
thinking process actually benefited so
let me explain I was playing a song that
demanded a lot of speed and I knew the
notes for the most part my finger should
keep up except for my left pinky on my
fretting hand it was overcompensating
for wild with wild motions in order to
maintain that speed or to keep it even
sequence pattern of notes I suffered
from what guitarists called wild pinkies
and in order to cure well I’m glad you
like that took me forever to make that
on illustrator in order to cure wild
pinky syndrome right I’d do two things
at a synchronized my pinky with the rest
of the motions of my body and then on
top of that I had a utilizes speed that
I already had and synchronized you use
what I had keep those two points on your
head because it’s very important to the
statement that I’m trying to make and
now if you will all collectively join me
and looking like complete dorks for the
next 15 seconds I want you to think of
your favorite guitar solo and one should
break out the air guitar come on come on
we got the air guitar that’s right all
right right you hear did y’all hear that
yeah all right
so what I notice is that like a lot of
you guys were able to move your fingers
really really really fast as fast as I
can
I’ve been playing guitar for almost 13
years that’s not fair
but that’s besides the point imagine the
revelation that occurred to me when I
realized that speed was already built in
me just
building off you air guitars out there
and so when I told myself and ask myself
what instead of just training for raw
speed I trained for synchronization what
if instead training for raw speed I
decided to master the speed that I
already had I became a Patrick guitar
player but a myriad of other things
happened I became a more accurate guitar
player a cleaner guitar player a more
relaxed guitar player more confident
guitar player like all right relax be
confident and I had a synchronize and
usually I already hang at our maybe
that’s how it carries over into
interacting with other people and so I
sat down and I thought about this and I
honed it and I went out and tested it in
the field and I found that when I wasn’t
forcing contrived conversations on
people people generally thought that I
was more traffic people wanted to talk
and so me being the obsessive individual
that I am how to make a formula for this
so the definition for the worst piece of
advice ever given be yourself is eaten
to gratitude divided by the absolute
value of synchronization so what is
synchronization simply put
synchronization is acting in ways are
congruent to you for me time is enormous
I value my time very highly and so
somebody is late meeting with me or they
waste my time I will let them know that
bothers me but I won’t be a jerk about
because I don’t know what happened maybe
an asteroid hit their house I hope not
but who knows but likewise I make it a
huge point to be punctual with everyone
I am a huge advocate of if your earlier
on time if you’re on time you’re late so
then what is gratitude
well we all know it gratitude is being
thankful for what you have I want to
take this a step forward and say using
what you have to accomplish the goals
that you have or at least as much as you
can if you want to be an animator you
don’t have the fancy computer the fancy
software in order to do it I’m sure all
of you have a pen and paper
do you like Walt Disney did if you guys
want to get into shape but you’re
working 60 70 hours a week or maybe you
can’t afford a gym membership take the
stairs and do some push-ups after you go
to the bathroom my favorite example is
one of my favorite bands Queen Brian May
was doing an interview with Absolute
Radio Brian May his Queens guitarist and
he was saying how when he was a kid he
did not have enough money to buy a
guitar so he went to his dad they built
one from just pieces of wood laying
around the house with no prior guitar
luthier experience whatsoever that
guitars called red special as the same
guitar you place shows with and it’s the
same guitar you all hear whenever you
listen to their albums and Brian May is
one of the most respected and well-known
musicians in rock and roll history when
you are better at mastering the
instrument that is you two things begin
to happen first of all you become an
active person rather than a reactive
person we all know what a reactive
person is there somebody that seeks
consolation and the reactions of other
people they change their personality to
get a favorable result from another
person their yes-man that’s a reactive
person an active person on the other
hand acts in ways that are most natural
to them they are brave enough to know
one to say no smart enough to know them
to say yes and it always acts in a way
this can groove with their values and
the second part that happens is now you
have a point of reference
because you know yourself so well when
doing with other people which is so
important when learning to empathize or
modulate with other people so what is
modulation I found this wonderful
definition from the ever reliable
Wikipedia but hear me out
in music modulation is the action
changing from one key to another this
may or may not be accompanied by a
change in key signature modulation serve
to create or articulate interest in many
era structure in many pieces as well as
at interest the reason I like this
definition from Wikipedia is this
website ever so eloquently defines
modulation is one of the reasons that
music isn’t bland and doesn’t completely
suck but there’s a word here that I want
to focus on not word is key so what is a
key I’ll spare you another Wikipedia
definition simply put a key is a tonic
and a scale a tonic or the root note is
to note that the song tends to resolve
to the song or you know that the song is
built around and the scale is pretty
much like the songs characteristics it’s
the reason why happy birthday sounds
happy or why that rift with the
beginning of this talk sounded kind of
sad and if we were to her to overlay
these into human traits the root note is
like a person’s background the roots the
scale could be an individual’s
personality and when you take somebody’s
background in your personality you
effectively get someone’s perspective or
in this case their key and so I want you
to think about how two very similar
people from different cultures will
handle situations very different for the
fact that they’re from different parts
of the world
think about how somebody who lives in
your household with you will handle a
situation differently just because your
personality traits are different and
then you think about the 7.5 plus
billion different combinations of this
that exists on this planet Earth you
realize how important
modulation is in humanity because if
modulation music is the ability to
change from one key to another the
modulation in humanity’s ability to
change perspectives and so how do
composers modulate well they find
similarities and differences between
these root nodes between these scales
and they make strategies based around
what they know so if you’re in conflict
with somebody else can you ask yourself
what you know about your own background
and how that compares to someone else’s
your personality traits and how that
compares to someone else’s and then can
you make strategies to harmonize with
them if somebody’s acting like a jerk
you say well a person to the jerk I
think that’s kind of lazy because I warn
you there is a huge difference between
what we think we know versus what we
actually know and while we may not know
a lot remember we always have to do the
best of what we’re given and so to wrap
up I want to touch on three points first
of all do not expect to be perfect if
you remember I was trying to assign
finite definitions to every single
problem that I encountered and only blew
up in my phrase take it from me save
yourself a quarter-century to suffer the
second thing that I want to touch on
master your instrument and then use it
to modulate with other people far too
often do we see the unintentional albeit
still dangerous act of dehumanizing
people because they may not think or act
or look the way that we do but the
danger isn’t that it’s common so much
it’s because it’s more like a latent
disease that none of us are really aware
of but we all carry and all of us are
forced to bear its burden and so when
you ask these questions when you ask
about your values in comparison to
someone else’s your background your
personality you seek to modulate with
them you begin to see the person on the
other side as really a person
because I think a lot of times we define
other people that don’t necessarily
agree with this is like our foe or our
enemy but directly anybody could be your
foe right a chair you’re sitting on
could collapse up from under you make
you look like a fool and then everybody
would laugh at you I hope it doesn’t
happen if it does know that you laugh
but if we stop at those words to define
another person we effectively separate
them humanity me personally I don’t
think people mind being wrong it’s being
labeled I think if we learn to not label
somebody then we will always be humbly
enough because we will always see them
as another human and whether we’re right
or wrong in that situation we will be
willing to walk away with something
positive willing to learn something and
finally this last bit of advice and
perhaps the most important one involved
there’s something that you all walk away
here tonight with I ask you please let
it be this you see the more that I
studied music theory the more questions
I answered I realized that every
question I answered spawned at least
three more there is only one constant
and that was what I didn’t know would
always be exponentially greater than
what I did and I believe it is the same
way with people so I asked you to keep
this in mind next time you interact with
somebody else thank you
[Applause]
um
[Music]
[Laughter]
[Music]
Oh
[Music]
Thanks
so I have to be very upfront with you
all got something about myself you see
I’m a very literal person what this
means is that I need patterns repeatable
formulas and algorithms in order to be
accepting of a situation and this has
its fair share of pros and cons it’s
major benefit is that I can take well
tested models of one subject superimpose
them onto something else in order to
make sense of a situation that I haven’t
experienced before
well likewise it too has its fair share
of cons the most prevalent being and my
family and friends will testify to this
I’m extremely rigid and stubborn in my
thinking and as you can imagine this
made it fairly difficult for me to
interact with other people when I was
younger whenever I saw advice I got the
cliche just the confident or just be
yourself how many of you guys actually
know that means I mean either as you can
imagine by the time I was a teenager
became frustrated I was frustrated with
myself as frustrated the world around me
even people that were very close and
dear to me and so like any dutiful
brooding teenager I did it I walked
myself in my room and I did one of two
things either played video games I
played a lot of video games a
Playstation 2 easy grace adventure to
climb and
or I played music and thankfully I did
latter because little did I know at that
time that would be my framework for my
human interactions later on in life but
that too came out of price you see the
more fat you ate I became with music the
more of a reduce I became in order to
study it more so flash forward I’m
graduating high school in Pennsylvania
and I am 100% without a doubt socially
awkward dreaded the thought of being
around other people dreaded thought of
meeting you but I too am a human and
like many other humans I wanted
companionship I wanted to make friends
and develop relationships and so when I
moved to Virginia for college
I said AJ damn it you can make friends
do you like it or not and so I moved to
Virginia for college and I went out to
social venues I went to parks malls if I
was feeling particularly masochistic
that night I would go to parties with
the sole mission of talking to complete
and random strangers which yes this is
awkward as it sounds and I’ve met a lot
of cool people I met a lot of people
that still talk to to the state but I
wasn’t happy because my results weren’t
predictable you see I thought if I said
a B and C to one person that should work
universally through everybody that I
meet I’m sure you all recognize that
does not work but I was too stubborn to
accept that result and so I became
frustrated again I lock myself in my
room this time in Virginia and I play
music and I remember I was playing
guitar and something clicked I
understood the meaning to the worst
piece of advice ever given by anybody I
understood what it meant to just be
yourself
and now I’m sure you’re wondering well
what is playing guitar and just being
yourself have anything to
with each other and I’ll tell you the
secret not a damn thing absolutely
nothing but if you remember one of the
benefits to the way that I think is that
I can take a model from one subject and
overlaid it on to something completely
unrelated to make sense of it this is
one of those times that my convoluted
thinking process actually benefited so
let me explain I was playing a song that
demanded a lot of speed and I knew the
notes for the most part my finger should
keep up except for my left pinky on my
fretting hand it was overcompensating
for wild with wild motions in order to
maintain that speed or to keep it even
sequence pattern of notes I suffered
from what guitarists called wild pinkies
and in order to cure well I’m glad you
like that took me forever to make that
on illustrator in order to cure wild
pinky syndrome right I’d do two things
at a synchronized my pinky with the rest
of the motions of my body and then on
top of that I had a utilizes speed that
I already had and synchronized you use
what I had keep those two points on your
head because it’s very important to the
statement that I’m trying to make and
now if you will all collectively join me
and looking like complete dorks for the
next 15 seconds I want you to think of
your favorite guitar solo and one should
break out the air guitar come on come on
we got the air guitar that’s right all
right right you hear did y’all hear that
yeah all right
so what I notice is that like a lot of
you guys were able to move your fingers
really really really fast as fast as I
can
I’ve been playing guitar for almost 13
years that’s not fair
but that’s besides the point imagine the
revelation that occurred to me when I
realized that speed was already built in
me just
building off you air guitars out there
and so when I told myself and ask myself
what instead of just training for raw
speed I trained for synchronization what
if instead training for raw speed I
decided to master the speed that I
already had I became a Patrick guitar
player but a myriad of other things
happened I became a more accurate guitar
player a cleaner guitar player a more
relaxed guitar player more confident
guitar player like all right relax be
confident and I had a synchronize and
usually I already hang at our maybe
that’s how it carries over into
interacting with other people and so I
sat down and I thought about this and I
honed it and I went out and tested it in
the field and I found that when I wasn’t
forcing contrived conversations on
people people generally thought that I
was more traffic people wanted to talk
and so me being the obsessive individual
that I am how to make a formula for this
so the definition for the worst piece of
advice ever given be yourself is eaten
to gratitude divided by the absolute
value of synchronization so what is
synchronization simply put
synchronization is acting in ways are
congruent to you for me time is enormous
I value my time very highly and so
somebody is late meeting with me or they
waste my time I will let them know that
bothers me but I won’t be a jerk about
because I don’t know what happened maybe
an asteroid hit their house I hope not
but who knows but likewise I make it a
huge point to be punctual with everyone
I am a huge advocate of if your earlier
on time if you’re on time you’re late so
then what is gratitude
well we all know it gratitude is being
thankful for what you have I want to
take this a step forward and say using
what you have to accomplish the goals
that you have or at least as much as you
can if you want to be an animator you
don’t have the fancy computer the fancy
software in order to do it I’m sure all
of you have a pen and paper
do you like Walt Disney did if you guys
want to get into shape but you’re
working 60 70 hours a week or maybe you
can’t afford a gym membership take the
stairs and do some push-ups after you go
to the bathroom my favorite example is
one of my favorite bands Queen Brian May
was doing an interview with Absolute
Radio Brian May his Queens guitarist and
he was saying how when he was a kid he
did not have enough money to buy a
guitar so he went to his dad they built
one from just pieces of wood laying
around the house with no prior guitar
luthier experience whatsoever that
guitars called red special as the same
guitar you place shows with and it’s the
same guitar you all hear whenever you
listen to their albums and Brian May is
one of the most respected and well-known
musicians in rock and roll history when
you are better at mastering the
instrument that is you two things begin
to happen first of all you become an
active person rather than a reactive
person we all know what a reactive
person is there somebody that seeks
consolation and the reactions of other
people they change their personality to
get a favorable result from another
person their yes-man that’s a reactive
person an active person on the other
hand acts in ways that are most natural
to them they are brave enough to know
one to say no smart enough to know them
to say yes and it always acts in a way
this can groove with their values and
the second part that happens is now you
have a point of reference
because you know yourself so well when
doing with other people which is so
important when learning to empathize or
modulate with other people so what is
modulation I found this wonderful
definition from the ever reliable
Wikipedia but hear me out
in music modulation is the action
changing from one key to another this
may or may not be accompanied by a
change in key signature modulation serve
to create or articulate interest in many
era structure in many pieces as well as
at interest the reason I like this
definition from Wikipedia is this
website ever so eloquently defines
modulation is one of the reasons that
music isn’t bland and doesn’t completely
suck but there’s a word here that I want
to focus on not word is key so what is a
key I’ll spare you another Wikipedia
definition simply put a key is a tonic
and a scale a tonic or the root note is
to note that the song tends to resolve
to the song or you know that the song is
built around and the scale is pretty
much like the songs characteristics it’s
the reason why happy birthday sounds
happy or why that rift with the
beginning of this talk sounded kind of
sad and if we were to her to overlay
these into human traits the root note is
like a person’s background the roots the
scale could be an individual’s
personality and when you take somebody’s
background in your personality you
effectively get someone’s perspective or
in this case their key and so I want you
to think about how two very similar
people from different cultures will
handle situations very different for the
fact that they’re from different parts
of the world
think about how somebody who lives in
your household with you will handle a
situation differently just because your
personality traits are different and
then you think about the 7.5 plus
billion different combinations of this
that exists on this planet Earth you
realize how important
modulation is in humanity because if
modulation music is the ability to
change from one key to another the
modulation in humanity’s ability to
change perspectives and so how do
composers modulate well they find
similarities and differences between
these root nodes between these scales
and they make strategies based around
what they know so if you’re in conflict
with somebody else can you ask yourself
what you know about your own background
and how that compares to someone else’s
your personality traits and how that
compares to someone else’s and then can
you make strategies to harmonize with
them if somebody’s acting like a jerk
you say well a person to the jerk I
think that’s kind of lazy because I warn
you there is a huge difference between
what we think we know versus what we
actually know and while we may not know
a lot remember we always have to do the
best of what we’re given and so to wrap
up I want to touch on three points first
of all do not expect to be perfect if
you remember I was trying to assign
finite definitions to every single
problem that I encountered and only blew
up in my phrase take it from me save
yourself a quarter-century to suffer the
second thing that I want to touch on
master your instrument and then use it
to modulate with other people far too
often do we see the unintentional albeit
still dangerous act of dehumanizing
people because they may not think or act
or look the way that we do but the
danger isn’t that it’s common so much
it’s because it’s more like a latent
disease that none of us are really aware
of but we all carry and all of us are
forced to bear its burden and so when
you ask these questions when you ask
about your values in comparison to
someone else’s your background your
personality you seek to modulate with
them you begin to see the person on the
other side as really a person
because I think a lot of times we define
other people that don’t necessarily
agree with this is like our foe or our
enemy but directly anybody could be your
foe right a chair you’re sitting on
could collapse up from under you make
you look like a fool and then everybody
would laugh at you I hope it doesn’t
happen if it does know that you laugh
but if we stop at those words to define
another person we effectively separate
them humanity me personally I don’t
think people mind being wrong it’s being
labeled I think if we learn to not label
somebody then we will always be humbly
enough because we will always see them
as another human and whether we’re right
or wrong in that situation we will be
willing to walk away with something
positive willing to learn something and
finally this last bit of advice and
perhaps the most important one involved
there’s something that you all walk away
here tonight with I ask you please let
it be this you see the more that I
studied music theory the more questions
I answered I realized that every
question I answered spawned at least
three more there is only one constant
and that was what I didn’t know would
always be exponentially greater than
what I did and I believe it is the same
way with people so I asked you to keep
this in mind next time you interact with
somebody else thank you
[Applause]
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