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Rainer Werner Fassbinder explores, with his usual mastery, the theme of fear in such movies as Angst essen Seele auf (Fear devours the Soul, 1974) or Angst vor der Angst (Fear of Fear, 1975). In both cases, the protagonists need to deal with an urgency for change that collides with the fear of losing control of the situation.

What is your fear? Do not say you have no fear, because I will not believe you. So, starting from the premise that being afraid is part of the human (and not only) condition, let us talk about this feeling.

Fear has a bad reputation and yet it is very necessary in our life. In fact, like everything else, you just need to know how to use it in your favor. My technique for dealing with fear is as follows: I embrace the fear and break it down into several smaller fears that are easier to deal with.

A good way to start this process is to remember that fear releases several hormones, including adrelanine, which sends us a clear and direct answer (beat it!) and that can even be used as a driving force to move forward.

Our brain is always trying to protect itself/us from changes, because changes mean adjustments. And that includes the classic self-sabotaging thought: “Should I really do this?” which is your brain’s equivalent of saying, “Are we going to be as safe in this new condition, as we are now? It has nothing to do with cowardice, but with self-preservation.In other words: fear makes evolution possible.

That is why I deeply respect my fears, but also, precisely because I want to evolve, I try to calm my ever attentive brain. Right now, for instance, I am trying to convince it that confirming a lecture, two shows, a translation and an article for the end of the month will not lead to my extinction. Perhaps to extreme fatigue, but not to extinction.

The brain is very smart and it might take a while til it can be convinced, but with persistence and confidence I usually manage to make my fears so small, that they look like, I don know, like a battery. Yes, a battey I can use to provide me some extra “zing”, and feed me for my next conquest.

Be seeing you!

G.F.

p.s. This is the 100th post by The Red Flower Press. Hurray! Thannk you for following us!

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Do you think more people were more collaborative in 2020 just out of fear? My dear friend A., who is an amazing singer and songwriter brought this aspect of the pandemic to my attention on a recent chat, and her remark kept echoing in my head for a long time.

Her comment took me to a trip down memory lane. During 2020 we had contact with the best and worst in human beings. There were people sharing help and people fighting over a bottle of hand sanitizer. There were people searching day and night for a vaccine and people (a lot of people) spreading fake news to get likes on social media.

And there was this zone of common experiences, mostly very painful ones. The whole world was suddenly dealing with great charges of loss, fear and isolation. 2020 seems so far away from our current point of view, and yet, the sadness in our hearts is right there, so close that we can reach it with a simple comment on a chat.

We could not choose 2020, but we can decide if we will repeat it forever or if we will finally try (this time for real) to find a possible balance. Without great illusions or expectations, I sincerely ask myself whether it is still possible for some event that could fix us collectively.

We are full, crowded and crammed with individual “fixes”, but where did these small individual/individualist solutions take us? Are we doomed to repeat 2020 in cyclical intervals? I do not know about you, but I failed to find anything new about the new normal. Maybe it was just a great desire to break this vicious cycle that made me warn possible “competitors” about a new call for artists.

Here is the story: me and a bunch of other artists, we were in a room waiting to be called to sign our contracts with the city hall, in order to hand over the rights to exhibit our works (in my case, a videopoem). While people kept looking to their mobiles, looking totally self-absrobed I simply cannot contain myself: as if it had a mind of its own, my big mouth opens and spreads the news: “Hey guys, there’s another call going on, but hurry up, because the deadline is coming up.”

This is the kind of spontaneous action that generates an immediate sense of guilt. Why did I do this? Why did I increase the number of competitors in a competition in which I am also fighting for a chance? Sincerely? I do not know.

My guess is that deep inside my heart I do not believe that my victory can only happen through the loss of other people. Okay, more competitors, but are they really my competitors? Do they work with the same subjects that I do? In the very same way? Certainly not. Call me old fashioned, but I believe in my work and see no reason to be afraid to share the news of a grant or artist residency.

The way I see it, meanness is one of the l old-normal-old-fashioned concepts we should leave behind. Only then we would live a new normal.

Happy Easter.

Be seeing you!

G.F.

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Autumn Leaves is one of the most popular jazz songs, with several versions in different languages. It was composed by Joseph Kosma in 1945 with original French lyrics by Jacques Prévert (later it would gain English lyrics by Johnny Mercer) and the instrumental version by pianist Roger Williams reached the top of the 1955 US Billboard charts.

Another song that deals with this time of the year is Autumn in Rio, by Ed Motta, released in 2000. While the French song highlights the sad character of the season, from a European point of view, the Brazilian artist exalts the arrival of mid-season. According to Motta: There is a place to be happy / Besides April in Paris/ Autumn in Rio.

In 2013, on my first CD, I also vocalized my special affection for the season that brings relief to the inclement heat of the tropical summer. After Summer is the name of my homage to the golden lights and mild temperatures of autumm. In my ode to the season, it represents a ritual of saying goodbye to summer and its promisses to enter a period of achievements (in Brazil, we say that the year only begins “after carnival”, which in practice means “after summer”).

Ten years later, I look back at this summer of 2013 and feel a little nostalgic. There are many dreams involved in releasing a first album and, most of the time, only a small part of them come true (we cannot all win all the awards, can we?). Perhaps the great lesson of these last ten years has been exactly this: that it is necessary to keep going, even if one or two projects fall by the wayside.

Or maybe the greatest lesson of the last ten years was learning how to turn those left-behind-dreams into fertilizer for the dreams that will still grow. Just as the leaves that fall in autumn will serve to enrich the earth, in a perpetual cycle of creation. How many past ideas merged into the projects I now take to the stage? How much of yesterday remains in today and will certainly accompany us tomorrow?

A little too philosophical for your taste? True. It must be the season.

Be seeing you!

G. F.


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One of the things I like most about podcasts is the possibility of doing other things while listening to an episode. I am not a fan of multitasking at all, but sometimes the only way to get started on a necessary, but boring task is to combine it with a more pleasant chore. Podcasts work like a charm! There is just one catch to the format: it makes anyone too susceptible to the power of voices.

As I often say, voices are very powerful. I once read that hearing is the second sense to reach the brain the fastest, second only to smell. So how do you escape the spell of an interesting podcast narrated by a beautiful voice? It is simply impossible!

Anyway, precisely because I am aware of this weakness of mine, I try to change programs quickly, so as not to develop any severe form of crush on an unknown voice. You do not have to tell me, and for the sake of discretion, I will not ask you, but I am sure it has happened to you, too, and we both know that kind of crush can be a huge problem.

While a flesh-and-blood obejct of desire is subject to mistakes, like any human being, the voices hover over our heads, fluttering, intangible and infallible. Enigmatic, voices can be very deceiving. One of the most commom mistakes is to assume that the rest of the body matches the voice, which is not always true. For whatever reason, some extraordinaire voices choose the most plain bodies to live. Go figure!

Today I received a very kind compliment on the comments of one of the podcasts I produce (the complete list you can find by clicking here), which made me very happy, because a kind compliment is always welcome. On the other hand, it reaffirmed what I already knew: voices go much further than we may ever suppose. It also made me think about the size of the responsibility of any content producer, which today basically means all of us.

In this moment of virtual assistants, the multiplication of applications that allow you to change and edit voices with high fidelity, and very sophisticated chatbots, I would like to suggest a moment of silence and reflection on the role you want your voice to play.

Oh, and you can access my current number one crush-podcast by clicking here. Unmissable, essential and another great reason to learn Portuguese.

Be seeing you!

G.F.

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The Girl Code is the tenth episode of The Simpsons 27th season. Its first segment holds a delightful scene at Springfield Elementary:

Principal Skinner: “Welcome to computer coding class, which, uh, replaces our last educational fad -mindfulness. Did anyone ever figure out what that was?”

Class: “Uh… Uh… Uh…”

Milhouse: “Uh, shutting up?”

Principal Skinner: “Sure. Why not?”

I just love the definition of mindfulness as ‘be quiet’ because it is impossible to argue with. The episode came right to my mind, when I heard about J.O.M.O.

Oh no, another hipster acronym? Probably, but this one might interest you for the Joy of Missing Out may be a form of liberation.

Do not worry, we are not talking about happiness through alienation (never worked for me), but the ability we have, but which we increasingly give up, to enjoy the here and now. that is, it is mindfulness with a touch of happiness.

You not only do not do stuff, you choose not to do them! I have already written about the right not to do things, which sometimes seems like a taboo. Well, J.O.M.O. is not about defending a right. It is about having a choice. What kind of choices? All kinds, from staying informed but not watching all the news (is it just me?).

It has also to do with not feeling pressured to watch all the series and, instead, rewatch an old movie or maybe go back ten pages in the book I am reading, just for the pleasure of rereading a passage.

The way I see it, J.O.M.O. has mainly to do with knowing what your priorities are and recognizing that for every door we open, several others remain closed. It is not possible to do everything, all the time, and this is not easy for me to recognize.

I am usually that person who is constantly applying for calls, while looking for gigs in the summer and (why not?) filling out forms for artistic residencies during the winter. Not to mention the “almost finished” article that the magazine asked me to write . .. last year. In short: I am the one who tries to open all the doors or at least peek through the keyhole.

As much as I love what I do, it is always necessary to know how to put limits on the to-do list. After all, not even the most organized of the agendas can change the fact that there are only twenty-four hours in a day, regardless of how many activities you schedule to perform.

As much as “overcoming internal challenges” is a frequently repeated subject nowadays, there are times when the best thing to do is to embrace external limits and invite them to dance.

Be seeing you!

G.F.