#i have to write a mini essay for the project too actually which fucking sucks

[bitterpngs]

after trying to write my 20 page essay i had to take a break and it’s so hard extracting myself from that break mentality. i do not want to finish these courses.

[prettyloudpracticeblog]

It’s taken me until recently to realize that I equate ease with skill, and the accompanying inverse belief is that lack of ease is lack of skill. I used to be really good at writing. It used to come easily to me, like a lot of things, and these days I find it’s not as easy to write as I found it to be in high school. I cast too heavy of a judgement upon myself and everything that I do, at worst to the point of convincing myself it’s not worth trying the thing or anything at all. So it comes with great courage and energy that I get this blog post written

This blogging experience has continued the theme of the past week. I was concerned about writers block so I tried to freewrite in a stream of consciousness style with my eyes closed. I felt confident I would be able to interpret and edit my babblings later, but when I peeked to check how much I had written…

There was nothing on the page.

Ok, cool, not surprised, I must not have clicked on the page to place my cursor there, oops.I clicked in the Google Doc and the cursor blinked. I closed my eyes and tried to capture my thoughts succinctly and accurately as they flowed- rather, dribbled. But only at first. I found myself capturing ideas and feelings and reflections and a nice starting point to build a nice internet essay. After a couple minutes I peeked to see…

>What do i want to write

>A blog summarizing my twitch experiencee so far

Hwat.

It turns out that the touch pad on my new laptop is super, well, touchy. The fleshy pads at the base of my thumbs keep touching the upper corners of the track pad and causing the cursor to leap up the page. I suppose I must have used the backspace key at some point while my eyes were closed because the accidental highlighting of a longass paragraph like this is the only explanation.

I sighed. This wasn’t worse than anything I’d survived this week.

Like When I set up my gear to get everything balanced on the soundboard, only to discover that the soundboard’s software is all screwy, making it incompatible with my new computer.

When the camera got knocked out of place cuz I’m a goofball and have many much hair

When the internet went out hallfway through my program, or i started dropping more frames the louder I got

When my back started to ache because my chair was too tall and my keyboard was too low

When my new schedule gave me a busier morning than I anticipated and I returned home in the same moment I was supposed to go live, with my piano in my trunk and a mighty rumble in my stomach

When i got a new follower and came to realize mid-stream that i left the alert box behind the second mini camera i added last minute before going live, so when i hear the new follower alert sound for the first time ever I have no fucking clue what just happened

So many things went wrong and that’s not even considering frustrations that I had within practice itself

Yesterday when the stream started dropping over half the frames and I decided to call it for the day, I was really relieved to have time to get something to eat and clean up my warzone of a room. It’s a huge point of shame for me that I’m almost 27 and struggle to keep or get my room clean when it’s cluttered in an immobilizing way. I had to tiptoe around my own belongings, and this morning it was a bitch to set up the boom mic stand that I clip my webcam to because of the scarcity of clear floor. But I also felt bad because I was taking attention and energy away from what I had originally intended to invest it in. I felt like I wasn’t trying hard enough.

I write a lot about mental health, in the music within our current repertoires a band as well as new stuff I’ve written which needs further realization and practice. A lot of what we play right now is about being in the thick of the struggle, being weighed down by the symptoms of depression and anxiety. But I’ve come recently to explore the idea of one’s thoughts influencing and even creating one’s own reality. I’ve been thinking that perhaps, instead of fixating my musical thoughts on [how much it sucks to not be able to choose between all the pressing matters I need to spend my last spoon on], I should write some songs about growth. About making mistakes. About parenting myself. About doing the work to mentally defrag my brain. About setting goals as well as setting boundaries. I won’t grow from a “woe is me” attitude, and I won’t grow if I believe I’m not cut out for this either

I’m doing my absolute best to stay positive in spite of all the challenges, but it’s only going well because I’m in the mindset that I’m learning and doing my best and i’m staying active and not wasting time that I truly can spare towards my endeavors. People I meet who WORK in music are ALWAYS working; from what I’ve seen and been told, the successful ones never slow down and never stop. Always gigging, always promoting, always posting and practicing and writing and dreaming and planning and I feel like I’m not cut out for it sometimes because I have to have time to slow down dude.

Or do I just think I need to have down time?

How does an individual KNOW when they’re trying their best? How do you know you’re seeing someone try their best and truly giving all they’ve got? You can never know how much another person has to give, but I’m finding it surprisingly hard to evaluate whether I’ve done a noteworthy, worthwhile amount of work or not, whether I’ve earned a break or not, whether I actually need a break or just feel like doing things I like.

But music is the thing I like. I love playing and practicing and teaching and learning and writing. And I love it when people see what I’m doing and interact with me and my Internet endeavors. I love it when people connect to my music because they can relate. And that’s why I want people to listen to my music, because of a connection and appreciation. I find it hard to keep a social media presence as a musician because, with the ways our social platforms are saturating and evolving. I kind of NEED people to care; if they don’t go out of their way to wonder about me and manually check all my posts, the way to get through to fans with news (eg, of a show) is through a monetary investment in an advertising boost, or through posting every single day on their personal accounts, spamming groups, and direct messaging.

I fear that people will begin to tire of me if I post too much. I fear they will believe I only see them as valuable to the point where they benefit my music career. I fear being perceived as two faced, shallow, or insincere. I fear being tuned out because I only ever post about one thing.

But one thing I’ve learned about fear is that it only ever eats at your insides and doesn’t nurture, doesn’t help you grow. Being afraid to share my story and be present with my music is one of many mistakes I’m growing past this year. I’ve already grown in my problem solving abilities on this project so far, and it’s because I’m coming to accept myself as I am instead of holding myself back because of “unreadiness” or “imperfection.”

Nothing is ever going to be perfect. Why expect yourself to be perfect? Why expect your work to be perfect? The flaws serve a purpose: to show you where and how to grow. I’m reviewing the footage from the past few days and coming to some awesome realizations about myself as a pianist BECAUSE I can see the signs pointing me in the direction of growth. I will be successful if I continue to meet myself where I am, set realistic goals and workloads, and keep writing about it.

I appreciate you reading all of my thoughts. I appreciate you accompanying me on this journey. With each passing week there will be more and more for me to share with you, and it means the world to me to not be alone. Keep working hard, I’ll see you next week.