What’s more worthy of a song, partying naked or being truly happy?

One of the few things that I dislike about music and quotations is the vast array of… One of the few things that I dislike about music and quotations is the vast array of different signals that they send. Our radios may serve as the Greek chorus of our daily lives, yet it’s hard to gain much sense of direction on certain matters when I can go from hearing “don’t go for the one you can love, go for the one you can’t live without” to “if you really love something, you won’t fight if it wants to be let free.”

Either philosophy sounds pretty facile to me. So where does that leave me? Confused. As John Cusack pondered in “High Fidelity,” “Do I listen to pop music because I’m miserable? Or am I miserable because I listen to pop music?” Every song I come across seems to pinpoint exactly all the things I find wrong with me (let’s face it, John Mayer’s lyrics are going to survive the test of time; he’s simply exploring the rite of passage that is not being appreciated in his own time — not without glib remarks of disdain, anyway).

There is, however, one point on which it seems all of the music world has joined in unison over — that living a “full life” basically amounts to being as reckless and free (or uncaring) of responsibility as possible.

Think about it. When’s the last time you heard anybody croon something along the vein of “brush your teeth, in bed by 11, eat your veggies, on your way to heaven” outside of a lullaby? The only instances in which the virtues of a responsible 9-5 existence are extolled is when used to ironic effect, sneering down on such practices as the mark of society’s prisoners, a classic Radiohead staple.

It’s simply just not as sexy to promote a balanced lifestyle when matched up against every “party naked” anthem out there. This could simply be because it’s a hell of a lot easier to do for free abandonment, but there is still something misguided about the 20-something who proudly proclaims he is defined by his culture, adorned in a Bob Marley T-shirt and bobbing to Blink on their headsets — en route to a calc recitation from a Young Republicans meeting. Or the friend with “live like there’s no tomorrow” as their AOL instant messenger info — with an away message reading “studying for the next six hours, blech”.

I could just be reading too much into this. After all, mild-mannered folks flock to action movies simply because of how detached the world presented is — it’s a chance to vicariously live through someone else without suffering any of the consequences. Could it be that the music is to blame when we abandon our spirits’ desires — as if we’ve been beaten into submission by the spectacle and fantasy of wild abandonment that music can give us?

Maybe we’ve all been lulled into believing we are risk-takers and hell-raisers simply based on the songs we like — never mind our long ago reluctantly submitting to “other people’s ambitions for my life,” as Ethan Hawke refers to parental and society pressure to conform in “Before Sunrise.”

I think the dilemma many of us face is determining what it actually means to be a rebel these days. I don’t mean in terms of our views on war or marijuana legalization, but in more subtle ways. What is the current definition of selling out? What really matters? This is a question I saw many of my friends wrestle with when deciding where to go to college — the friends that had significant others. I had always personally considered the people who stayed behind at home or made school decisions based on proximity to their boyfriend or girlfriend to be foolish. Perhaps, however, they are examples of people who rebelled against society’s cliche that in order to grow, it is necessary to discard the past. After all, if careers and money are superfluous, as all these accumulating lyrics are screaming, shouldn’t we be devoting all of that energy to spending time with the ones we love?

Consider this: if faced with the choice between an opportunity at your dream job (Pro NBA player, film director, Pitt News sex columnist, whatever) or being with the person in your life who you think is perfect — what would you do? The saying goes that nobody lies on their deathbed wishing that they had spent more time at the office. But what about the dreams and goals we are all chasing daily in the drudgery of school and internship madness?

Is it really worth giving up the chances of all that to merely “see about a girl,” to quote “Good Will Hunting?” When trying to make up my own opinion on this matter, I ponder the people who changed the face of the world, as we know it — Edison, Columbus, Darwin, for example. They have all been remembered long after their time. Do we know if they were happy, however?

What is the nobler goal — to make a difference, to be remembered? Or to be happy? That’s what I’d like to hear a song about.

Daron Christopher is a columnist for The Pitt News.