Let it Matter

Singing is a hopeful and revolutionary act. This is especially true when songs bend toward the difficult and unfamiliar, for that is when music’s grace gives us access to things that words alone can’t express.

Let It Matter grew out of my own experience of facing some unfamiliar and difficult things. As a “white American” I had always known that my life experiences were different from those of people of color. Nevertheless, I found that I had an inner resistance to believing that racism was deeply entrenched in my country’s law enforcement departments. I had never witnessed or experienced police brutality myself, so it was tempting for me to presume that it was a rare occurrence. Yet evidence increasingly showed that that was clearly not the case. This concerned me greatly. I had some work to do.

Part of that work included being brutally honest about how hard it can be to admit that your preconceptions are wrong, which is why I eventually wrote “Let it Matter.” As its opening lyric asserts: “Every story has a flip side.”

Another source of inspiration for Let it Matter was Circle of Peace, a neighborhood group that has met at my church for dinner every week for the past ten years. Circle of Peace is comprised of youth, parents, grandparents, police officers, business owners and community members. The agenda of these meetings is simple: To listen to and to speak personal stories, experiences and concerns in order to create a safer, more compassionate, and more just world.

It is an act of courage to simultaneously hold your own story and someone else’s story in your hands with gentleness, without dismissing either one. But that is exactly what the members of Circle of Peace endeavor to do. I hope Let it Matter reflects in some way the dedication, pain, grit and hope that keep that circle alive week after week. And I hope that this song and this inner work brought me a few steps closer to “opening up the prison of my mind.”