CREATIVE DRIVE

The newsletter that reminds you to forget

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NUMBER 42

You haven't finished that project. Let's talk about it.

I had already chosen the topic for this issue of Creative Drive when I saw a video posted by a friend, and strangely our messages coincided. (Another connection has done that twice lately. I asked her to stop reading my mind, but . . . she can't help it.) So, I'll start with a few words on the subject of pursuit.

I was raised to look at every effort as something that could work. I was taught that each word of a story or a poem was critical and that every note in a song or a suite was essential to the whole of it. Music was art, but it wasn't always for the sake of entertainment. Mom said it would be one of the few things we'd take to Heaven with us, and I took that as a revelatory truth. So, any song I conceived had to achieve that eternal quality. It was an almost unattainable standard. Thus you can imagine how it feels to know that something you've worked on will amount to mere entertainment. Still, I knew that lasting music was within my capability. Some of it would occur as a special moment of magical happenstance, but anything that lived in my mind would stay there unless I dragged it out.

How It Started

An idea for a song came to me in the fall of 2018, and it was about racism. It was about the family tree that has sheltered and nurtured us. A strong harmonic progression, words written for a lead voice and a gospel chorus, and magnificent guitar chords would make it great. That's what I knew, or at least it was what I believed. I devoted time and thought to the song. I talked to my brother about it. I started recording it, but damn it! Why was it so difficult to play cleanly? Why was it so hard to time against the tempo, simply because I'd started with guitars instead of basses? (Eventually I realized that tempo and beat aren't the same. One is a constant rate, and the other is a precise but very human accompaniment to that rate. People care more about the beat than about the tempo.) I practiced the song and wondered about it for months on end. Whenever I was out in the car, I'd listen to the rough guitars and drum loop at headache-inducing levels.

Pursuit and Revelation

Life went on, but so did my thinking about that tune. Four years–FOUR YEARS later–I realized that the song, despite its good qualities, failed to move me. I'd fallen out of love with it, I guess. So, I had to get over my embarrassment for having spent so long in obsession over a song for which I no longer had deep feelings. Once I admitted that and got over it, I was okay. I was free to use any portion of the song in a different context and create something better.

How could I pursue Heaven when I didn't know where to find it? I still don't know, nor will I ever. Heaven isn't deserved, anyway, because I'm a grossly imperfect human. It'd be wonderful of course, but right now I just want to rid myself of the obsession with mediocrity.

Do you get that? The obsession with mediocrity: what a concept it is! Let's take it apart and see what it's like.

Two Things: Habit and Acceptance

Obsession is the ultimate habit, at least in my case. I can easily say this because I know myself well enough to recognize it. I know its insistent tug and the urgency it engenders. I know that the more I scratch, the itchier it becomes. I'm always aware that the more time I devote to something internal–a musical theme, a glitch in a storyline or worse, a memory–the less I'll have available for things that could be more worthwhile.

You probably know the feeling too. Imagine that your spouse or partner has just come home and, with a smile, she or he begins to describe a lucky score on something nice for dinner. The subject of conversation may or might not be what you wanted, but hey, it's your spouse or partner speaking. The least you could do is pay attention. Instead, you replay the opening chords in a song you've been struggling to write, or you mix and match four disparate words for inclusion in a key paragraph. You might stand there like a cardboard cutout as the image of a synthesizer or an audio console fills your head with knobs and faders. You might sit there and think about nothing but pie.

My friend, you can have pie anytime. Is any of that stuff so important that you'd be willing to shut out an attempt at conversation? This is the habit we have; the tendency toward egoistic thinking. We focus on ourselves and what we want, and generally we believe it's right for the moment.

Acceptance is the other side of the coin. It's the willingness to finish a task merely for the sake of doing so. Acceptance might be essential from the standpoint of Zen or existentialism, but in such cases we're taught to recognize and set aside the worry associated with this imperfect life. The acceptance of mediocrity, however, is as remote from high principles as one can get.

Imagine that you're writing a song. It might be your hundredth piece, or it could be your third. The intro is good, the verse is strong, and the chorus is . . . . Well, the chorus is boring and you know it. By repeating the first couple of chords from the verse, you're left with something trivial. Your hope was to create a sense of drama or elation, but instead you have droning duplicity. Oh, but your partner will be home in a few minutes, and you'd like to premier the new opus. The clock counts off the seconds: tick-a, tick-a, tick-a, tick-a . . . . How can time accelerate like that!? What will you do!?

This is what you'll do: Say "okay" to the two-chord repetition and double it so that you'll have room for the lyrics. Then you can triple or quadruple it at the end for added impact. Everything will be fine. You might not love it, but at least you can say you've finished the song.

A Vicious Circle

You can see where I'm going with this. First, let obsession drive your focus. Second, let acceptance be your satisfaction. Third, let obsession revisit that acceptance. Fourth, acquiesce to the acceptance. Fifth, obsess over the original idea and whatever excuse you made in order to accept it. You now have a vicious circle that feeds upon itself. It never ends. It won't stop till you do.

So, the needle has reached the end of the record, where it orbits the spinning label. At this point you have choices: You can turn off the record player and be done with it. (You might even toss the thing into your collection of junk for a garage sale.) Alternatively, you could lift the record off the turntable and shatter it with a ball-peen hammer. (There's one in the utility drawer, where it's been for years.) The better choice, though, is to gently remove the record and place it into its protective sleeve for future use and then slip a DIFFERENT record onto the turntable. After all, you have more than one record in that mental collection, right? You probably have hundreds of records, and some of them are very good.

Free Yourself and Create

I have said more than once that some of my best music has been generated from ideas I didn't initially like. For example, one theme started with two chords that happened to sound like a well-known piece from the era of progressive rock. That was unfortunate, but I sidestepped the problem by altering both chords and immediately adding a third, whereupon the similarity was erased. With another piece it seemed as if I'd painted myself into a corner. I played the opening sequence over and over but couldn't hear anything I loved. I couldn't see the way forward, either. So, again I changed it. I played with the tempo, the beat and the phrasing until, at last, I could hear a way to resolve and restate it. I was very happy with the end result. Then, however, came my song of four years. First, it was the kind of pop song that I'd be unlikely to hear on a favorite station. Second, the content felt important but was also pedantic. Third, it had a chorus that, despite my desire for something upbeat, felt dated. I was a music critic in the 1980s, and I assume that the chorus had evolved through my awareness of the dance-floor esthetic.

The lyrics were good, and the chords were interesting. The tune had a pretty lilt, and in my mind I could see a big gospel chorus. So, why didn't I like the song? Why did the recording process have to be such a bear?

It simply wasn't for me, no matter how much I wanted it to be. We should all discuss the sin of racism, but it wasn't up to me to lecture anyone. Then there was the matter of mentality; of my obsession with the project. I'd become so hooked on it that I'd write to my brother and discuss it. Certainly he had things to do, but he listened and responded anyway. He said it could be a classic, but a classic tune mirrors a mold. Neither of us was interested in music that came from a mold.

A decision was made, and I felt relieved, but the rationale was different for me. I'll tell you why:

I thought of Japan, where I once lived. In the Japanese perception of things, excessive eating leads to "metabolic disease." Similarly, one who is unhappy in his work or is unwilling to work is said to have "a mental illness." It doesn't characterize the person as mentally ill, but instead it means the individual is troubled by an imbalance of perception. So, food is good in moderation, and work is fulfilling when one looks forward to it. In this case, my obsession with a song equated to unwellness. The project didn't make me happy, but I thought about it constantly. The project was nowhere near completion, but I thought about it instead of working on it. I had become a habitual recycler of something that was incomplete, whereas I could've been more productive if I'd attacked it like a sculptor. If the marble cracked, fine. The pieces could be used for other things.

A QUICK EXERCISE

Your pet project consists of various parts, each of which is valid. Suppose you've imagined or developed a character for a short story or a script, and you've tended to think of that character as the lead or the protagonist. Is there a problem you haven't been able to resolve? Have you lost sleep due to that problem and allowed it to assume some monumental stature? You'll have several solutions:

a) Keep your character, but alter his or her use in your story.

b) Place your character in a different context.

c) Focus on the problem and redraw it as a place or a circumstance.

d) Stop and immediately move to the next idea.

That's Right!

You can stop, but you shouldn't quit. By stopping you simply break away from your obsessive worry. It's just a story, after all. It's only a song, and you have other themes in mind. So, it can be good to stop because you'll be free to work toward one or more other goals.

Do not quit, though. Don't quit until you're dead, and even then don't let anyone know you've quit. Your loved ones should find you with your belt tightened and your open hands ready to capture success.

The song I wrote can be finished anytime, but I won't do so till I'm worthy of the task. If I do it the right way, and if I take it in stride, the song will be with me when I get to Heaven.

I'll see you next time.

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? Copyright 2024 by Lawrence Payne. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated or distributed without permission from the author.