The river used to rush

Musings on creativity & self awareness; plus a new sound to share

People sometimes talk about needing to get their “creative juices” flowing when they face a creative block. I’m realizing that I typically have the opposite issue when things aren’t going my way in the studio: my juices flow a little too much, a little too often, and I can’t control them effectively.

My “blocks” tend to look like this. Maybe you can relate?

• I sense that my work is undisciplined, scattered, and lacks depth. In a word, it feels forced - published for the sake of being published.

• I feel overwhelmed by possibility and can’t prioritize my ideas. I fail to fully explore the present idea because I fear losing the next idea to memory.

• I become acutely self-critical and wonder why I can’t get anything done despite having both the energy to work and options to pursue.

Most of my musical life has felt like a constant search for good spots to jump into a perpetually rushing river of ideas. I’ve never been good at focusing on singular thoughts within this stream, which is funny, because I’ve always thought of myself as a detail-oriented and observant kind of person (characteristics honed by many years worth of detail-oriented and observant activities like writing, photography, field recording, mindfulness, and introspective music production).

What I’m realizing is that I am, in fact, detail-oriented and observant, but I’m overly focused on my identity as a musician. I allow subpar periods of music-making to shape my outlook and negatively affect my mood. Because I care so deeply about music, I become overly invested in my work at the expense of other things happening in my life.

Speaking of my life, the twins are 1 year old now. In the last 12 months I’ve spent many late nights in a rocking chair and had time outside the studio to reflect on these things and develop some necessary self-awareness.

Moonrise from the nursery, shot from said rocking chair

One of the main conclusions I’ve come to, and one that has proven extremely helpful in my personal life outside of music, too, is that my brand of creativity and expression has historically been quite noisy. It became clear that the river of ideas in my head was spilling its thoughts and concepts everywhere, constantly and relentlessly.

Now, that flow has eased, because I’ve been working diligently to implement simple strategies to slow myself down.

1. Chief among these things has been shutting down my Instagram and BlueSky, which were the last 2 remnants of my social media presence.¹ My focus now is Bandcamp and Substack, and I’m not putting schedules on sharing my work on either one. I’m already enjoying the clarity of thought and reduced stream of intrusive content that inspired feelings of competition, jealousy, and anger.

2. Second, I’m simply letting more musical ideas and urges pass by, choosing instead to observe if any common themes tie these thoughts together before I develop them instead of impulsively recording every single concept that appears in my brain, generating clutter on my hard drive and pressure to clear them out during my studio time. I’m reminding myself that it’s OK to go about my day and enjoy who I’m with or what I’m doing, and let a week pass without “completing” something.

Now, it seems that a pond sits in my brain where currents once ran. On top of that, I’m throwing fewer stones across it these days; fewer ideas break the calm, and some of these ideas just sink to the bottom unpublished, left to rest in private…and that’s OK. I’m enjoying the newfound quiet and learning to live with a little more silence.

Most importantly, I’m having so much fun with music when it does happen. I’m learning to be surprised by, refreshed from, engaged in, and attentive to it. Some stuff is coming along, slowly and methodically. But for now, I thought I’d share a demo from the last week that I enjoyed making. Perhaps this is a door opening to new sonic territories.

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Thank you all for your support. It helps fuel my work, and I don’t take it for granted.

Talk soon!

1. I’m very grateful to Seth Werkheiser and his Social Media Escape Club here on Substack for the inspiration and motivation to see this part through.