I'm a Cynic but I'm Changing

I wrote some time ago about Luke Sital-Singh’s Dressing Like a Stranger. Since then, his music has remained a regular companion for me during long evening walks, and those liminal moments when my mind tends to wander. In the last few weeks, I’ve found myself returning to one song in particular: Cynic from his 2017 album Time is a Riddle.

Cynic is a story of someone who has spent so long protecting themselves that cynicism has become part of their identity. It’s a song about someone who has built up walls around their mind and heart, having weathered perhaps one storm too many. Someone who “never lets anyone close”, stays in their head with “no way in” and keeps everyone on their toes. But then he meets someone who is able to “batter down those strongholds”. Someone whose connection and warmth he’s not able to rationalize away by saying that it’s just “chemicals in his brain”. Someone who quietly dismantles a worldview built on skepticism until he is forced to admit that, despite insisting he doesn’t believe in fate or even heartache, his heart still breaks when she’s gone.

I think my favorite aspect of the song is both its simplicity and the way that the lyrics and the music mirrors the journey of the singer. The song is dominated by Luke’s earnest and soulful voice with incredible restraint shown in the instrumental accompaniment. Then, almost at the precise moment the narrator can no longer deny what he’s feeling, the percussion surges underneath “When I don’t see your face, oh, my heart breaks” before growing even larger at “The laws of physics bend when you touch my hand.” The arrangement masterfully experiences the revelation alongside the narrator.

After a lot of reflection I think I understand why I keep coming back to Cynic. Like the narrator, I realize that I too have a tendency to keep people at arm’s length, convincing myself that distance is simply realism. The song reminds me that cynicism isn’t always wisdom. Sometimes it’s just another way of protecting yourself from being hurt. And perhaps changing doesn’t begin with becoming an optimist but with the admission that you’ve started letting someone in.