churchill

 Maybe I'll never make it. Maybe my songs aren't good enough. maybe the record label that hasn't signed us yet will drop us. maybe I'll still be working at starbucks in five years. Maybe I'll never be a successful musician.

  I think about these maybes all the time. Probably too much of the time. My creative, also always thinking wife and i were talking over a glass of wine the other night when she told me it's been a while since I've talked about music. I talk about music business. About what booking agents I wish we had, what TV shows I want my songs to be on, record labels, merchandise, money, money, money. It's not that there is anything wrong with talking and thinking about these things, they are essential to building a 'career' in music. The problem is that so often those essentials over shadow the joy of actually just creating. Of sharing. Of connecting with a stranger through melody. Why did I write my first song? Why did my wife paint her first picture? Why did Beethoven create such beautiful symphony's even though he was deaf? To prove he could rise above his disability? To make money? To impress women? Maybe it was simply because he felt something inside him that he knew he had to share with the people around him in spite of wether or not he could hear it, if it was good enough, or popular. He just felt the music.

  Maybe we create because it is in our nature to create. We write songs, paint pictures, grow gardens and tell stories because we are creators. There is something inside of us that makes us create and share our creations. Sometimes, both fortunately and unfortunately for me, there are strings attached. The thing that i create is also the thing I want to be my career, my occupation. I love creating music enough that all i want to do is create music. But to do this there are a hundred other things that must be done; business.

  The dream is, of course, to find something you love and get paid to do it. Lately though, for me, the 'dream' has been a distraction from the original joy of creation. Creating for the purpose of the dream. Not creating because i enjoy creating or because it is a part of who I am. Creating for money's sake. For success. For acclaim. For the illusive 'record deal'. For any mercenary reward.

  This is something that has been on my mind a lot lately, but maybe after writing out my thoughts i'll find a new joy in creating. Maybe the way I think will change to something more like this:

I love creating songs. This song makes me happy. Maybe there are things in my heart and in my head that I think people would like to hear. Maybe I'll write another song tomorrow after I work at starbucks. Maybe just creating is enough.

-Tim