Once the worrying brain has found something to attach itself to, it can spend hours hypothesizing and constructing elaborate tales of possible outcomes. It wrongly convinces us that somehow fixating on the future will change the course of action. While experiencing worry is a natural response to uncertainty, it doesn’t need to consume the amount of energy or number of hours it often does.
I strongly believe that “life is a journey not a destination”, but this doesn’t give me much day-to-day guidance. Where do worthwhile hustle and healthy productivity fit in the mix? When do we push, and when do we sit back? Surely our destinies are not written so entirely that we should just be along for the ride. Where do ambition, activism, and goal-setting fit?
Those of us linked to the performance industry receive our reinforcement in the form of an engaged audience, big smiles, applause, and maybe a personal story shared with us after a show, so it's no surprise that many of us are feeling more stalled and unmotivated than ever. The more successful we feel, the more eager we are to create, and right now there’s nothing to trigger that cycle. So then the question is: when we’re not creating, who are we, even?
“Missing Motivation” To say it has been a tough year for musicians is an understatement. We are all facing unprecedented challenges, and my personal view from inside the music community has been of feelings such as denial, disbelief, crisis, apathy, loss of self, and a host of others. I have had some very powerful conversations with musicians about their symptoms in addition to experiencing many of them myself, and I have spent the last several months taking a deeper look. This is all in effort to give words to our shared experience, and to allow us to find relief in…
Performing musicians across the globe are suffering greatly amidst the COVID19 pandemic. Live shows may not look the same for a very long time. While the rest of the world begins to slowly re-open, musicians’ very art form and profession are in question with no certainty in sight. What began several months ago as worry about show cancellations has now become a deep and punishing sadness. We are confronting the absence of a large piece of our identity and way of life that we still can’t quite fathom, much less know how to handle. I hope this article will both…
I wrote the original version of this post via voice-to-text on my drive home from a special evening seeing a new friend perform south of Nashville. (See more here on accommodating creativity.) On this drive, a warmth is over me that I haven’t felt in awhile. Like a hand on my shoulder. The warmth offered by a couple of life cues that tell you you’re going in the right direction, even though you may have no idea what lies ahead. There’s been a noticeable LACK of this feeling in my first few weeks of quiet time at home. (This post…
This year of travel has offered me some profound learning experiences, none more than this simple lesson: impermanence teaches you what you want to be permanent. When everything is temporary, it gets obvious what you want to keep around. Traveling full-time often means energy reserves are low and sleep is minimal, so I’ve become acutely aware of who and what requires energy, and who and what refills my reserves. Motivation is a scarce resource, and only certain activities that you’re truly passionate about can keep you going. These activities form a kind of “energy symbiosis;” they may drain you, but…
I’m sitting in an Irish hotel room after a full Irish breakfast, rain and wind blowing outside, and warm lamplight fills the room. I don’t have anywhere to be until 6pm, and I got my gym workout and computer work done before breakfast. This is the first time on this Irish tour I’ve been able to find all necessary ingredients to sit and be creative. No schedule pressure, work pressure, or appeal of nice weather outside… all is finally quiet, internally and externally. I consider myself an inherently creative person and feel lucky to have a life and career that…
I wish I could say I was pleasantly surprised by the conditions on Pine Ridge Reservation, but unfortunately they lived up to every troubling story I had heard. My heritage is Native, and it’s always pained me to know that the American Indian population is amongst the most impoverished and oppressed in the country. I knew I wanted to help, but until recently I just wasn’t sure what I could offer. Having spent the last seven years teaching music enrichment clinics, I’ve begun to more fully understand music’s ability to access and empower students, particularly those who are struggling in…
I was nervous for this trip. It occurred to me as I was boarding my first flight to South Dakota that I’ve very rarely taken trips alone. I travel by myself often, but it’s almost always to a gig with a bandmate waiting at the other end. This trip out west was my first solo venture funded by my new nonprofit (which I’ll talk more about in the coming posts.) The plan was to perform and teach the students of Pine Ridge Reservation; an area rich with culture that faces devastating hardship. This solo adventure was a new feeling, but…