09 2021
How I Broke Free From Writer’s Block!
Like anything, tendencies like perfectionism can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand my tendency for perfectionism has driven me to keep working on songs, and keep working on my musicianship until I was happy with the results, so that is a good side of it. On the other hand I believe perfectionism has been the core reason why I was plagued with writers block for several years after the release of my Saltwater album.
And its not that I wasnt writing songs during that time. However, I was pushing myself to write them, and every little idea that came forward would be bludgeoned to death by my harsh inner critic, before it even had a chance to germinate!! It was not a fun process at all…
I was lucky enough to join a Song Club in 2020, and in the process of writing for Song Club, I have broken free from my perfectionistic inner critic! Im so happy and relieved!
How did it happen? The rules of Song Club are that you have to write a song a week, and email it in by a certain time. If you dont get it in, you get one free pass and after that youre out!! For some people that makes them stressed and anxious, but for me I chose to take the attitude It doesnt have to be a good song, it just has to be a DONE song! As long as I had something to submit, I knew there was always next week, for the rest of my life, to write another song. Even though there were a whole bunch of talented and esteemed songwriters listening to my songs, I cared more about staying in the club long-term, than what the other songwriters thought of my songwriting contribution for the week!
The crazy thing is, it often surprises me which songs the others connect with anyway a couple of times they have raved about songs that I just thought were throwaway songs, and the ones I thought were good didnt connect as much!
Ironically, as long as youre writing something, youre opening up the possibility of a great song. Its the only way to make that possible! As I now like to say, You cant write a great song if youre not even writing a song!!
