Hi everyone,
Happy Tuesday! I have been consistently writing a weekly newsletter and daily blog for the past three years. Writing is my creative practice and I find the process of putting something new into the world each week to be incredibly fulfilling.
Most of the time, my writing goes unnoticed. However, last week, this post went viral on Facebook. Thousands of people read and commented on the post, it was shared over 600 times, there were hundreds of visits to my website, and close to 100 new people joined this newsletter. For those of you who are new to this newsletter, I’m so happy to have you here!
If you just joined this community, the idea behind the newsletter is simple. Each week, I share links to three great articles, five links to things I found and loved from around the internet, and multiple articles from my blog archive that complement the other links in the post. My goal is to help creatives like you live their best life and career.
Thanks so much for reading!
Tips
- How To Be Great: My background in classical music makes me want to strive for perfection in every aspect of my life. However, striving for perfection can be incredibly problematic for a person who is trying to push out a daily blog post and weekly newsletter while working a full-time job, and finding time for family. Something has to give in order for me to consistently accomplish all the things I need to get done in the week.
Tip: Strive for perfection in the places it matters and look for opportunities to be average everywhere else. I combat my perfectionist tendencies by making certain areas of my work time-bound. For example, I give myself one hour to write this newsletter each week and then I hit send because getting the newsletter out consistently every Tuesday is more important than the perfect newsletter I only send occasionally. In this post, blogger Steph Smith suggests that the secret to being great is simply the act of showing up consistently. Check it out.
Related: It’s Ok To Be Average (Sometimes)
- How To Create A Daily Happiness Habit: It’s the end of the semester and every single year I forget how insane the last six weeks after spring break are going to be. The reason I feel this way is that everything gets so stacked up that I don’t have any agency to do the things that make me happy, like going for a run or spending an extra hour writing about something that is perplexing me.
Tip: Work on identifying the things that bring you joy and happiness during less intense times of the year so that you can continue to prioritize those things when your schedule gets bonkers. If there is no time for me to be with my family or write on a regular basis, my happiness spirals so I try to block off time for family and my creative projects. I also remind myself that the intensity is temporary. If I have to take a break from my writing, I give myself permission to do so. Here’s a great article on the daily habits of happiness experts.
Related: Does Being A Musician Put You On A Path To Being Miserable?
- How To Help Others Succeed: Speaking of happiness, one of the things that brings me the most joy is seeing the success of the artists that I have helped along the way. The practice of contributing to this field that I care about so much by supporting the careers of others makes for an incredibly meaningful life and career.
Tip: If you are feeling a bit lost in your life and career, use your expertise as a way to help others succeed. This goes beyond traditional teaching. Think about the things that you have struggled with over a long period of time that have occurred outside the studio walls. If you see someone struggling with the same thing, offer to help. Even if you simply serve as a sounding board for someone who is struggling, you can be the catalyst for the person to take a positive next step toward their goal.
Related: 46 Tips For Creatives I Learned In 46 Years
Things I Loved
- Who knew that a member of The Buggles was one of the most prolific film composers of our time?
- The most recent Starship Flight Test was designed to fail. The entire video is fascinating but the three-minute segment at the 21:46 minute mark is a fantastic demonstration of an iterative process.
- Creep Mart is a collection of AI generated monsters on Instagram.
- This amazing takedown of the Long Tail theory by Ted Gioia is fantastic!
- Here is an infographic of eight different types of breathing practices to explore.
Last Week’s Most Read Articles
Photo Credit: J W
More Stuff From Me!
→ Enroll in Extending Techniques, a course designed for performing artists who want or need help developing non-performance skills needed for a career in the arts. Note: For a limited time, we are offering half off our beta version of this course. When you register, enter the code ExtendingTechBeta to activate the savings.
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