WHO MADE THE SUNSHINE?

WHO MADE THE SUNSHINE?
*An Heir Zhivago Innerstanding.

Westside Gunn released a new album called, 'Who Made The Sunshine?' and after some back and forth with a buddy of mine about the album and our favorite songs...I started pondering the question the album cover asks. 

WMTS
I guess first I should say that the one thing that brings me so much sadness is that I am not free. I haven't always felt this way...because I didn't know any better. The more I got sad and sometimes angry, I just didn't know who or what to be mad at...until I started pondering 'Who Made The Sunshine?'

One of the first things I landed on was the idea of who or what makes the sunshine. Like there's a being or entity who makes the sun shine. And if this entity is out there somewhere, how do we find it? So I imagined my journey as a search for this hidden entity so I could ask all the questions I need to ask and learn all the secrets and mysteries.  Then it occurred to me how if all of us made our focus trying to get close to the 'Sun Maker', nothing else in the world would matter because our focus would be to do whatever works we think will get us closer to this entity. I think that requires asking ourselves privately and intimately, 'Who am I?' or 'Who are we?' If we are honest, there's a part of every one of us who's angry we aren't free in some way. And then we have to ask ourselves what does freedom mean to us? Freedom for me is a complete turn-away from the world. Mainly because I never asked to be here to begin with and now that I'm here, this is the reality I HAVE to live? I didn't even ask for any of this. Sadly, it's taken me too long to get to this focus. Now I have to figure out who I am and figure out a path to the answers to the questions I need to ask or the answers to these mysteries. I took my first, middle, and last names and typed them out in my Notes app. Then I started to rearrange the letters in my names to see what other hidden names are in my name. ERR and ZHIVA are in my name so I combined them or flipped them into a different spelling. ERR became HEIR. ZHIVA is just another spelling for SHIVA, the god...then the name became HEIR ZHIVAGO = Yuri Zhivago (of Doctor Zhivago), a doctor and poet, is sensitive nearly to the point of mysticism. This name is in MY NAME!!! 

Then I thought back to the Sun Maker and all of us as suns. The sun that we know does only one thing essentially, and that's shine. How many of us are shining? How many of us are doing what we are actually supposed to be doing? These are questions I am asking myself. And it goes back to asking myself who I am and where am I trying to go. What am I going to do to get there (finding the Sun Maker)? What am I going to do to start shining (the only thing I am supposed to do)? Shining also means bringing light. So if we are all suns, that means we are Heirs of the Sun Maker. In the name in my name, Sun Maker shows up as Zhiva. If I am an Heir, then why am I not pursuing my inheritance (aka shining light)? Why aren't we all? Why aren't we all pursuing freedom from these illusions?

ERR ZHIVAGO: SUN'S MISTAKE
To err is to make a mistake = getting it wrong = ultimately, failure.
Any day we live and don't shine like we are supposed to, is a day we fall short. Many times we fall short because we aren't doing what we need to do. We succumb to all the noise that keeps us from living fulfilled lives (shining). Instead, we need to stop and say to ourselves when we face adversity, opposition, naysayers, insecurities, 'Who Made The Sunshine?' If we know and understand that our problems aren't things that make the sun shine, who are we to let them stand in our way? Any day we fail to shine like the sun is supposed to, is the Sun's Mistake.

FLAME. EYE. TEARS
The TEARS symbolizes my sadness and weariness at this world.
The EYE symbolizes awakening and searching.
The FLAME symbolizes anger at not being free.

~HEIR ZHIVAGO