My take on Michael Jackson, the man not the myth

A couple of weeks ago we lost a legend. Honestly, I never thought that I would ever be uttering the words “Michael Jackson is dead, not Michael.” For me it just didn’t seem real. I guess because I looked at Michael Jackson as one of my heroes. Someone I looked up to and respected in this world of entertainment. I always thought his artistry was brilliant, something to wonder. From his early childhood years to his latter adult years and everything in between, I thought of him as a child prodigy who became a giant of a man in this world of entertainment. To describe Michael Jackson the artist you can use so many adjectives because he was just absolutely brilliant. To this day if you throw on a Michael Jackson record at a party people will feel an obligation in their legs to get on the dance floor and move. His music is timeless.

He was a man, a boy who chose to walk in his light at a young age. He realized who he was and what God ordained him to do at the tender age of six, and he didn’t run from it. Instead he embraced it, and from that point on the legend of Michael Jackson grew. At times he seemed immortal, something of a God, and after watching his funeral the other day, maybe he was. Some say he was a musical genius, I say maybe he was a musical God. How else can you explain the millions if not billions of fans who adored him world wide? How else can you explain it? How else can you explain the sadness felt by millions if not billions world wide?

To different people, Michael meant different things. Not only was he an entertainer with the power to move millions, but he was also someone’s son, someone’s brother, and someone’s father. He was a man who cared about people. He understood that he was a blessed individual, and he understood that in order to continue to be blessed he had to bless other people. He understood that God gave him this power not just to sing songs, but to call people to action. To me that’s the whole beauty about Michael Jackson. He wasn’t just an entertainer. He was someone who really and truly cared about people. He cared about this world we live in, and he didn’t have too.

I’m a fan of Mike who had to come to grips with this tragic situation. I had to come to terms with what Michael Jackson meant to me. I had to come to the reality that there is an underlying lesson here to be learned and it has to do with addictions, vices, and demons. On stage Michael was at his best. He was happy, but off stage was a tortured soul. Someone told me recently as a matter of fact, and I believe this to be true. The devil attacks you when you are at your weakest, and off stage Michael was at his weakest. Can you imagine the pressure of trying to top Thriller? I’m sure to many artists if they sold half of what Thriller sold they would consider it a success, but to Michael it was considered a failure. That was a demon in itself. Don’t forget that we are also talking about a man who had been working since he was six and whisked all around the world at a very young age. So in essence he never had a normal childhood like perhaps me or you. That’s another demon that he had to wrestle with. Everywhere he went he was mobbed. So he was often times confined and there is absolutely nothing normal about that. Imagine fighting with that demon on a day to day basis. Imagine all those weights on his shoulders. It was only a matter of time before the demon of being a rock star would haunt Michael Jackson so much so that it would take his life.

The lesson I learned from this tragedy is that we all may have demons attacking us. Your demons may be bigger than mine. Mine may be bigger than yours, but we all have them. Yet, we can’t let those demons over take us, and tear us down to a point where we eventually lose our life way to early, because someone on this planet is going to miss us. Someone such as our parents, our siblings, our kids, or just the people whose lives we touched in some way, and then our situation will be looked upon as tragic.

Rest in peace Michael Jackson, you were the greatest entertainer to ever live and you will surely be missed. I love you dude.

Eddie L. Oliver