Ridiculous options. Obviously.

While I hope someday to have a ridiculous card fit for every occasion, I’ve gotta start somewhere. That somewhere is the universally-revered holiday approaching rapidly: Valentine’s Day.

So my first batch of seasonal offerings are cards based around the theme of love, appreciation and dating. Most of them are blank on the inside so you can write your own message in your own voice. One of my least favorite things, besides wet socks, is picking up a greeting card that has a great outside design only to find an embarrassingly sappy pre-written message on the inside.

So consider this my antidote to Hallmark. My mutiny against maudlinism.

Browse the full selection here. Many more to come for future occasions.

Many talented people have dealt with imposter syndrome. It’s the uneasy feeling that you’re not nearly as good as other people think, that you don’t deserve your success, that you’re a fraud who will be “found out” at any moment and your life will come crashing down around you. Imposter syndrome takes “fake it ‘til you make it” and turns it into “I’m still faking it and nobody seems to notice yet, but it’s only a matter of time.”

Imposter syndrome happens because your skills, talent and ideas feel “normal” to you. Your creative decisions just seem like something you do rather than something unique or notable. Much of your talent comes from now-innate things that seem obvious to you, so you assume these things are obvious to others as well. The choices you make feel like natural choices, so you assume they’d be just as natural for someone else.

Even if you spent years working hard to build them, your abilities inevitably become part of your everyday, normal existence. They don’t seem like anything special in that context, but to outsiders they are very special. To some third parties, they are downright goddamn magical.

To the outside world you are impressive. You are clever and creative. You are doing something original, something cool, something they’d never think of. You make choices that wouldn’t have even occurred to them, you do things in a way they can’t even comprehend being able to do. And most importantly, other people also feel like they don’t know what they’re doing. They just try to hide it as much as you do. We’re all fake frauds pretending we feel like we belong.

Just like the heroes you admire for doing cool shit that you never would have thought of, people admire you for the same reason. Stop assuming that just because something comes naturally to you (even if it took years of hard work to make it feel natural), that means it is equally second nature to everyone else.

It’s not.

You’re cool as hell.

You’re interesting and unique.

Nobody is quite like you and that makes you exciting.

Imposter syndrome is a giant pile of crap that comes from small picture, self-centered thinking. It comes from living in your head, like many creative people do. It comes from something that you think must be real but isn’t. It comes from you thinking creatively about everything except yourself.

Break out of it. Expand your perspective. Stop focusing so hard on yourself and focus outward on what you’re creating. You’re not a fraud. You’re an artist. Now go make something great.

I’ve always been drawn to the romance of surfing. Or at least my own romanticized version of it.

I love how surfers are so dedicated to finding that perfect wave. I love how surfing is the first thing they think about when they wake up as the sun rises. I love how they use surfing as a sort of Zen meditation, a way to disconnect from the troubles of the world, become one with nature, achieve a kind of inner peace. I love how that inner peace and one-ness gives them patience as they wait for the best waves. I love the idea of living in eternal summer, never really growing up or needing to “go back to school” and fit into the restraints of society.

Watching surfing is something I find to be relaxing. It’s beautiful, peaceful and impressive as an athletic feat. It makes me imagine what they might be feeling in the moment and what the life of a pro surfer might be like. I have no idea if they really are Zen and centered and seeking endless summer, but I find even the idea of their Zen contagious.

Yet I have no desire to actually learn to surf myself. I’m a night owl who’d rather be slapped in the face than wake up super early. I’m not a particularly strong swimmer. After getting my clock cleaned by some seemingly minor waves, stepping on all manner of pinchy ocean animals and watching Jaws three too many times I have a mild fear of the ocean beyond waist-level water. Surfing, though romantic and wonderful in my mind, is simply not for me.

But I relate to the passion and enthusiasm that surfers have because I have that same passion and enthusiasm for the things I create. I spend my waking hours daydreaming about music and drawing and writing in much the same way I assume a dedicated surfer daydreams about the waves when she’s not riding them. I channel my own personal Zen and inner peace and one-ness when I’m deep into working on a creative project, achieving a flow state that calms me internally even when I’m putting forth a great amount of mental effort and concentration. I don’t think of anything else when I’m in that moment. I lose track of time and disconnect from the troubles of the world. I, too, am on an endless search for the perfect wave. It’s just that my waves look more like audio waveforms than water.

Most surfers surely experience plenty of moments of frustration and distraction and not performing at their best, as do I. But after they get thrown off their board, they hop back on and look for the next opportunity for a killer ride. If they didn’t, they’d just be sitting at home, thinking about the waves they missed out on. If I were to give up after hitting a creative wall, I’d be stuck thinking about the same thing.

The perfect wave probably doesn’t exist. But that doesn’t stop surfers — or me — from looking for one. So I feel a kinship with those who surf despite the fact that I’ve never set foot on a board. And while you may not feel a similar sense of solidarity while watching surfers glide gleefully over the water, you can find meaning and motivation from the promise of another kind of wave that makes you daydream about the endless chase.

I’ve found my surf. Have you found yours?

In that spirit of whole-assing, I’d never waste your time with a new post without having something great for your enjoyment. As it happens, I have three things for you to see and hear right now.

First off, I’ve been hard at work over the last year beefing up my composing portfolio. I’ve put together a playlist of tracks that I think well-represents what I have to offer as a composer and should be an enjoyable listen as well. It’s a mixture of stuff I’ve done in the past and brand new tracks that haven’t been heard anywhere else. You can listen to it here.

But that’s not my only new music! I recently signed on to make tracks in the genres of “relaxation” and “deep focus” for Spotify. I released my first EP of three very soothing songs called Above the Clouds. The title is a nod to a blog post I wrote many years ago. Listen to this EP and give me a Spotify follow here. Maybe listen to it while you’re studying for a big test of some sort, or while you’re relaxing after, uh, taking a big test of some sort.

Oh, that’s not enough for you, huh? Well, you’re a tough customer but a fair one, so I saved a biggie for last. The feature-length indie film I scored a few years ago called I Hate You is now available in full and for free on YouTube. Go forth and watch it. I dare you! And while you do, don’t forget to notice how great the music is. Or, at least, hopefully you won’t notice how shitty the music is. If you find the music passable at best, I’ll consider it a bare minimum win.

Watch I Hate You here.

I hope it won’t be too long before I’m back in the habit of posting insightful thoughts on creativity, but rest assured my silence hasn’t been due to laziness. I’m working hard to get some great stuff in front of you in the future. Until then, stay creative my friends!

I've had a lot of people ask me when the movie would finally be released, and my answer was always the same: I have no f#$%ing idea, I'm just the guy who made the music.

Well, I still don't have an official release date, but I do finally have a trailer to share. And, of course, I scored the trailer, so you can hear some of my handiwork and make harsh snap judgments on my ability to make music.

And while there isn't a release date yet, there is a special preview screening in Los Angeles on August 6th. You can get yourself a ticket to that here. And you can learn more about the film here. 

But enough about all that. It's time you finally watched the trailer. Enjoy!

So you’ve created a thing and now some people know about it. Congratulations! Someone is about to be a total asshole to you.

What’s that? You thought you were just gonna make something cool, put it out into the world, get some people’s attention and then bask in the glory of your greatness? Good story, but have you been outdoors lately?  The world is literally teeming with pricks. Yes, there are many lovely people. You may know some. You may even be one. But that doesn't circumvent a simple truth:

The assholes are always louder.

As soon as you create something, as soon as you bare your heart and soul and make yourself as vulnerable as a human can be, that’s when the horrible folks flock to you like flies to a carcass, where they do everything they can to knock you down a peg and a half. If you pretend it will never happen to you, you’ll be particularly shocked when it inevitably does. Someone out there will always hate what you do, so let’s talk a little bit about dealing with artistic criticism in its many colorful forms.

Destructive Criticism

There once was an awful young boy who found the newfangled technology of Internet chat rooms to be fertile ground for wreaking a little boneheaded havoc. Back in the late-‘90s, the world wide web still felt shiny and new and the number one pastime for many people was to log into Yahoo Messenger or AIM or any number of alternatives to find a chatroom full of strangers from all over the world who wanted to discuss a topic of shared interested. But where most enjoyed pleasant conversation, this boy saw a golden opportunity to have a little fun in the way only an imbecile could. So he and a few of his friends created chat handles that all started with the same word (in this case it was “JET”), went into random chatrooms where everyone was generally being civil, and acted like complete shitheads in order to ruin everything.

They were always more annoying than sinister or hurtful, especially compared to the vindictive trolls of today’s comment threads and message boards. There were no threats, there was no bigotry. But while tame, these dumb children got a kick out of being genuinely irritating and disruptive, more or less sucking the fun out of an otherwise enjoyable situation. As more of them would log into a chatroom, someone would inevitably lament, “Oh great, another JET idiot."

In case you hadn't guessed, that awful kid was me, and the JET moniker came from the two friends I founded this moronic undertaking with: John-Evan-Tim. More friends joined the gang as we went along, and we probably only did it for a few months before we got bored and moved onto something new, but what a few months those were.

I fully admit it was a dumb, immature thing to do. I’m completely embarrassed by it now, even telling it here and knowing that in the big picture it's inconsequential. But my point is, even an incredibly enlightened and nearly perfect individual such as myself can succumb to destructive criticism at some point in his life.

We’ve all received destructive criticism. It's criticism with no redeemable qualities that essentially boils down to someone saying you’re ugly and no one could ever love you. This can sting coming from a complete stranger, and it can be downright devastating coming from someone you know or care about. But it will happen, and it’s especially common nowadays. Thanks Internet, you asshole.

But there are actually some positive aspects to this type of critique that we can focus on a bit to ease our ego pain.

You created something legit

When something is mediocre, it usually brings about mediocre criticism. It’s a snooze-fest all around. But when you create something real, raw and truthful, something authentic where you took a stand as well as a risk, that strikes a nerve. For a lot of people it will be a good nerve to strike, and your work will resonate deeply with them. For others it will strike a nerve that makes them prefer stubbing their toe on a lawnmower blade, and as a result they'll need to channel that feeling through vitriol aimed in your extended family’s direction. Believe it or not, that’s actually a good thing—not that they're acting like a dickhole, but that you made someone feel something. Maybe it's not exactly what you hoped they would feel, but it was still something strong. That’s an amazing accomplishment. Much of the greatest art in the world is simultaneously revered and reviled. 

Many of the most successful artists gleefully alienate people, because reaching everyone is both impossible and requires the blandest of approaches. Destructive criticism is an unfortunate side-effect of being successful in that sense. Congratulations: you’ve avoided the safe route and created something unique and very “you.”

The more popular you get, the more people will hate you

There are probably hundreds of thousands more people in the world who hate U2 than who hate you personally. If that’s an incorrect statement, I either fear for your well-being or I’m honored that such a famous person would be reading this blog post. Would you mind publicly endorsing my site, and would you like an autographed 8 x 10 glossy of my face to hang in one of your enormous bathrooms?

A ton of people hating you is often a sign of popular and commercial success. That one jackweed who thinks you’re more worthless than a pile of damp belly button lint is actually the beaten-down bottom rung on your ladder to greatness. Be sure to step extra hard on his eye socket as you climb far, far above him.

It doesn’t actually mean squat

Criticism is meaningless when it says more about the person giving it than the person getting it. Not only does destructive criticism usually have little to do with the actual thing you created, it’s often an ugly reflection of the other person’s insecurities. Sometimes that insecurity comes from jealousy (that you had the guts to create something), fear (that they could never really create anything worth a damn), legitimate psychological trauma or abuse (in which case they’re just avoiding and redirecting their own pain), or any number of other issues that have everything to do with them and nothing to do with you. Some people genuinely don’t understand what they’re even doing, especially when it’s online. They may be an ignorant kid (like I was), they might think it’s all a game, and they certainly are not connecting with the fact that there’s a real human on the other end who actually feels stuff once in a while. 

Putting your art out into the world is an open invitation for anyone to try and tear it down (at least, according to unenlightened people). But because destructive criticism doesn’t actually reflect what you create, and most certainly doesn't reflect you, it doesn’t mean anything at all. It may sometimes be a challenge to avoid taking things personally, but keeping this fact in mind does make it a lot easier.

There are two ways of dealing with destructive criticism: ignore it or respond to it. Ignoring it is almost always the best option. Responding can sometimes diffuse the situation if it’s done with positivity by thanking the idiot — er, person— for their feedback while completely ignoring the childish vitriol. It will suck the fun out of the situation if they don't feel like they can get a rise out of you. You can strike back with a witty putdown if you want, or you can forever take the high road, but people will notice the choices you make, so choose wisely.

It’s important to remember that you do not have to tolerate destructive criticism, even if you don't fight back. You don’t have to listen to it or take it to heart. Easier said than done, I know. Just don't let it bring you down to the troll's level.

Constructive Criticism

Constructive criticism can genuinely hurt, because often it’s f#$%ing true. The truth can be the biggest kick to the testes/ovaries one can receive, but the good news is if we learn how to take that kick properly, it can be really beneficial. That’s because constructive criticism is actually an opportunity. It’s an opportunity to learn what people other than yourself get out of your art. It’s an opportunity to gain some objectivity on the thing you’ve spent so much time losing yourself (and your perspective) to. It’s an opportunity to—gulp—grow as an artist.

I have a friend who started working on his debut album, and every time someone asked him about it he described all the ways he was trying to make it revolutionary and innovative. He would agonize over how his music could change the world unlike anyone before. He knew he had it in him to create a timeless work of impeccable art, he just needed to unlock that magic formula that would take the project out of mediocrity and straight to immortality. He refused to release it until he reached this lofty goal.

That was a good five or six years ago. There’s been no album. There’s never been a hint that anything will get finished. As far as I know, he’s still trying to calculate the formula for revolution, or he gave up on it altogether.

The point isn't that you shouldn't set big goals for yourself, it's that no artist revolutionizes in a vacuum. The absolute best way to make progress toward innovation is to put as much stuff out into the world as possible for people to tear apart. Even the musicians who put out a brilliant debut album have been falling flat on their face in public for a long time playing shows and figuring out what works. The same process happens in all creative fields. Some call this "paying your dues." I call it properly getting your shit together. Could you theoretically lock yourself in a room alone and emerge ten years later with a society-shifting masterpiece? Sure, it’s possible, if unlikely. But why not take a shortcut to awesomeness by having the balls to actually share what you create along the way? Why not get feedback from real people and help it shape you as an artist?

But I get it—feedback is criticism, and that can be hard to take. And constructive criticism actually does mean something, which can make it feel even rougher than its destructive counterpart. Here are a few tips to to make it more palatable.

Strip away the destructive language

Oftentimes, constructive criticism can be found wrapped in some rather unconstructive language. So even if you suspect you’re on the receiving end of some destructive criticism, your first step is to break it down and see if there is some legitimate feedback hidden amongst the name calling and jealousy-fueled tantrums. Genuinely consider all feedback until you can determine if there's anything worthwhile buried within it.

Annihilate your ego

The hardest, but most crucial, part of receiving criticism is separating yourself from it—even when the criticism calls you out on a personal level. You are not your art, no matter how much it may seem like you are sometimes. A criticism of your work is not a criticism of you as a human, so your best strategy is to swallow your pride, set your ego aside and avoid taking any of it personally. You might even try imagining it's someone else's work that's being critiqued and pretend you're an objective third party assessing the suggestions.

If someone doesn't like what you've created, you haven't failed. And you certainly are not a failure as a human being. It just means that one person doesn't see what you see when they look at your creation. That's what art is all about.

Find the truth

In every legitimate criticism lies a grain of truth. Your job is to find it. That little nugget of wisdom is like pure gold to you as an artist. It's the part that can help you grow creatively. Sometimes it turns out this "truth" is only true for the person criticizing you. That’s OK—you don’t have to agree with it, you just have to find whatever subjective truth is informing that criticism and give it thoughtful, genuine and deliberate consideration. Then if you disagree, tell the other person that they're dumb and they smell funny. This last part is optional.

Do they say your work is too derivative? Maybe you should reevaluate how much you let your influences shine through in your creations. They think your work doesn’t have anything to say? Think about the message you were trying to convey and ask yourself if you did everything you could to help it come across. Use their critiques to ask yourself the hard questions, then find the honest answers. It just may help you improve on something. Or it may show that the other person has questionable tastes. Win-win, if you ask me.

Take it with a grain of salt

Art is subjective. Sometimes a person just won’t "get" what you do, and there’s no reason for you to try and convince them otherwise. You don’t have to take anyone’s advice. Criticism can be both legitimate and straight up wrong for you. Sometimes there will be opinions you respect and value but still disagree with. After you’ve let yourself be open to constructive criticism, in the end only you truly understand what’s right and what’s wrong with what you create. 

Self Criticism

Hoo boy... This one's a doozy. Criticism doesn't always come from external sources, and the bad news is your self-criticism is often the most harsh, destructive and hurtful of them all. But it doesn't have to be! We're total hypocrites when we criticize ourselves because we're often way bigger jerks to ourselves than we would be to anyone else, including strangers. When you notice yourself laying down some nasty self-deprecating vibes, there are a few things you can do to keep from spiraling into self-destruction.

Start with the same methods as constructive criticism

Much like with constructive criticism, often you have legitimate concerns buried under piles of vindictive bullshit. The best thing you can do is strip away the unreasonably insulting layers to see if you're left with a good idea or two that will help you improve in the future. Take this example:

"I'm an idiot! Why did I think this drawing would be any good? It's slightly better than my last one, but still completely the wrong proportions. That other artist would have done it with so much more life and realism. I'll never be good at this!"

This is counterproductive self-criticism. But if you peel off the negative self talk, you might get something like this:

"This didn't turn out how I had hoped. That's frustrating, but it's a step in the right direction. The proportions look a little off, so I'll compare this with some drawings by that other artist and see if I can learn where it went wrong. I need to practice this more to get where I want to be."

Holy crap, it turns out there was a pearl of wise advice hidden in that pile of garbage! Find your own garbage pearls and over time your negative self-talk will start to silence itself.

Imagine you're a close friend (to understand how big a dick you're being to yourself)

This is one of the best strategies not only in the creative world, but for your real life problems as well. We're way meaner to ourselves than we ever would be to another human. If you heard a friend put herself down like you just did, what would you tell her? You'd probably immediately say, "Um, no," then give her some constructive feedback to point her in the right direction. Treat yourself like your best friend, because you should actually be your own best friend. There's no reason for us to be jerks to ourselves, because it doesn't make us any better at anything.  Instead, take yourself out to a nice meal, treat yourself to a couple drinks, plan an awesome vacation where you can bond with yourself, then eventually ask yourself to be your own best man or maid of honor. That won't be awkward in the slightest.

Learn to draw the line and celebrate your victories

Even if you're having trouble finding that garbage pearl, it's good to learn the skill of drawing the line. Maybe you didn't make something great, but that's OK. Let yourself be disappointed with it, then move on. Most of all, when you do reach some sort of milestone, like a noticeable improvement in skills (look back to where you used to be to feel good about where you are now) or the completion of a project (no matter how bad), celebrate! Don't just mindlessly move onto the next thing without acknowledging that you created something. Give yourself a little reward. Eat a pile of carne asada fries while chugging beer. Talk to an old friend for an hour. Spin in your office chair until you puke if that's something that you really enjoy doing for some sick reason. Every step toward greatness is a small victory. Let yourself feel good about that once in a while.

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I am a professional procrastinator. Well, I would be a professional procrastinator if I ever got around to turning it into an income source. I’ll do that tomorrow, but for now I’ll write about the pervasive problem of avoidance in our creative work.

You may be one of those gifted people with a preternatural ability to focus, never succumbing to distractions. Maybe you don’t have any sort of attention deficit and aren't prone to wasting large chunks of your day accomplishing jack shit because why not the Internet exists. Well congratu-friggin'-lations, you’re way better at adulting than I am. You can stop here and hang your valedictorian certificate on the wall after reading all of Infinite Jest in a single sitting. I’ll meet back up with you in my next post.

For those of you still with me, way to be normal. I feel your pain when you kick yourself for not being more productive. I know, it’s not “cool" to "feel stuff," but there’s nothing we can do about that now.

Much digital ink has been spilled on the scourge of procrastination, that irrepressible urge to do anything other than what you’re supposed to be doing, even when you know it’s the wrong decision. I’ve personally read quite a few methods for beating the put-it-off beast. Many systems involve things like:

• Clearing your work area of all distractions
• Throwing your phone into the microwave so notifications won’t tempt you
• Using a fire extinguisher to put out the fire you just started by microwaving your phone
• Scheduling blocks of time when you’ll do nothing but work
• Doing the things you’re least psyched about first
• Looking through your phone’s warranty terms to see if they cover “accidental” microwaving
• Only allowing yourself to focus on your one or two most important tasks
• Recognizing your urges to lose focus and understanding they are based on fear, possibly fear of failure or discomfort
• Embracing said discomfort of those fearful urges while letting them pass

These are all good ideas other than the microwave thing; they attempt to tackle the underlying psychology of procrastination and cut it off at its source. When I’ve tried other people’s systems, they work for a little while, then they start to wear off like a drug that I’m building a tolerance for. Soon I’ll have to switch to another method to achieve that sweet, sweet high I originally got from not procrastinating. It’s a constant battle, like a disease that will never completely go away, because procrastinating is a very personal thing. We all enjoy dicking around in our own special way, so everyone’s solution will have to be personal as well.

Because of that, I’m not going to claim to have the definitive answer, but I have some of my own strategies that have been fairly successful for me—and if you’re struggling, maybe they will help you. Maybe they’ll even inspire you to come up with your own system. 

1. You Have a Priority Problem

Procrastination may be about willpower and distractions and fear of failure and discomfort and all that, but those are just psychological offshoots of the root of the problem: priorities. You are constantly deciding what’s most important to you at any given moment. Research has shown that multitasking is largely a myth; you can only do one thing well at a time, and at every moment of every day we decide exactly what we will use our time to do. Choosing one thing over another is assigning it your top priority. And while finishing your young adult novel about sparkly vampires might seem like your priority, every time you procrastinate, you definitively decide that it is not. Even worse, you decide that something like marathoning Netflix is. Even as you watch the next episode of M*A*S*H, you know you should be working instead. (Even though it’s totally a good show and maybe you’ll get some creative ideas from watching, right?) In your mind, you’ve fooled yourself into thinking that your novel is still your priority, but your actions are demoting it below TV watching. If it’s really your priority, you will work on it right now.

What’s most important to you? Social media? A movie? Creating something amazing? Playing a game on your phone? If three of those sound a little ridiculous, there’s a reason for that. Thinking about doing something accomplishes nothing; actions speak far louder than intentions when it comes to beating procrastination.

That’s not to say some of these alternate activities can’t be relaxing ways to spend your break time. But if you’re prone to putting things off, make a point of using your breaks for activities that don’t endanger your productivity by seductively beckoning you down a rabbit hole. 

Step one is to stop lying to yourself. Every time you procrastinate, remind yourself that what you’re doing now is your priority. If it seems silly to be prioritizing whatever it is you're doing, call yourself out on it and reprioritize. You know that guilt you feel after procrastinating? That exists for a reason, and you can use it to your advantage. Whenever you feel guilty for not working on something, that’s a very clear signal that you’ve been prioritizing poorly. Use that guilt as motivation to work on something great.

2. Your Time Budget is F#$%ed

I used to buy a six pack of beer every Friday, as if it were a Pavlovian response to the end of the week. I didn’t think much of it—the weekend was starting, I like beer and it didn’t cost much, particularly compared to buying drinks at a bar during the traditional Los Angeles $9 beer night specials. But then I stopped the habit. From week to week it didn’t seem like it made a huge difference, until I realized that after a year I’d have $520 in my pocket that I wouldn’t have had otherwise. That’s a significant amount. Just imagine being able to buy something for $500 every January without putting in any extra effort. If I made other small changes like packing more lunches instead of eating at restaurants, just think of how all that money would add up in a pretty short time.

Your time is similar, but with a key difference: your overall pool of cash can, theoretically, keep growing indefinitely. Your time, on the other hand, has a strict daily budget that will never change. Slaying the procrastination demon requires diligent time budgeting. Much like salvaging a few dollars here and there can add up to big savings over the course of the year, salvaging a few minutes of your day here and there for creative purposes can add up to hours of productivity in the longer term. But where you giveth, you must also taketh away. In order to give time to one thing, you have to choose something else to cut out. This is directly related to our little conversation about priorities from a minute or two ago. Remember that? If not, you may want to see a doctor. Also you owe me fifty bucks, trust me, you just forgot.

If you cut a half hour of TV out of every day, you have over 182 extra hours in a year that can be used for creating. Think of how much progress you can make in 182 hours! And think of how easy it would be to cut one half hour show. It may seem hard when so many episodes end on tantalizing cliffhangers, but if you take that feeling of “Oh man I gotta see what happens next” and just chill for a second (and turn off the TV or close the browser window you’re watching on), you’ll find that it goes away pretty quickly. And after you start drawing your graphic novel, you realize it wasn’t such a big deal.

Step two is to start making small adjustments to your limited allocation of time and see how these little chunks add up to bigger productivity. Paying attention to how you spend your time on the micro scale will make a difference on the macro scale. And when you find yourself 50 more pages into that graphic novel than you thought you’d be, it will get easier and easier to keep up the habit.

3. Trick Your Mind With Reverse Procrastination

Our brains are dumb. I mean, they’re totally freaking amazing and intensely complex works of evolutionary art. But they’re also super dumb and easily tricked. Ever heard of reverse psychology? Well if you haven’t, don’t look it up, because I don't want you to learn anything.

I mention the dumbitude of the brain because this next tip might actually sound a bit dumb itself, but it can really work. It's something I like to call reverse procrastination. Does this sound familiar: "I could start mixing that song I recorded, but I'm gonna watch an episode of Game of Thrones first."

Well, what's stopping you from pulling a switcheroo to: "I could watch an episode of Game of Thrones, but I'm gonna mix a few tracks of that song I recorded first."

We've somewhat arbitrarily assigned the things we use to procrastinate and the things we procrastinate from. Much of the time, you don't actually like the thing you're doing now any more than the thing you're putting off. Do you really enjoy getting mad at ignorant tweets more than you enjoy, say, painting? If so, I'm actually a little jealous because you're probably having more fun on Twitter than I am.

This feat of mental gymnastics boils down to something simple: the shit you do while procrastinating winds up making you feel bad. The shit you do when you're being productive makes you feel good. The mini dopamine reward from mindless tasks and the fear of tackling something harder sometimes fools you into forgetting this, but that's always temporary. Eventually, the guilt we talked about before always kicks in. When we procrastinate, we're usually putting off something we think will be hard (makes us feel "bad") with something we think will be easy and pleasant (makes us feel "good"). So most of the time, we've got the damn thing backwards.

Try mind-hacking yourself and trick your brain into thinking you're procrastinating when you're actually working. Start thinking of the stuff you are trying to accomplish as the fun part rather than the part you need to slog through. Make productivity the reward rather than the punishment. Make Game of Thrones seem like the thing you should be doing but are putting off.

I think part of our procrastination habits come from a dirty little feeling that we're being naughty and getting away with something. The third step is a way to flip that whole thing on its head. You could watch TV, and you'll get right to it after you practice piano for a half hour, then chisel a bust of Bob Ross out of that slab of marble in your living room.

4. Procrastinate Creatively

The thing is, you are going to procrastinate once in a while. There’s no way around that. It’s not even that big a deal when it’s not a chronic habit. But what would happen if you worked while procrastinating? There's no rule that says you can't do both. And while we’ve established that multitasking doesn't really help you accomplish much, if you're already accomplishing nothing, it's worth trying to get a little half-assed work in.

For example, I like to draw or practice guitar while watching TV shows. I'm essentially goofing off but also making a little progress, even if it’s not as effective as focusing on one thing at a time. Try to incorporate your creative process with your procrastination methods. Like: you want to have something awesome to post to Facebook while you waste time there, so that's a good excuse to write a bunch of jokes for your comedy act or paint a really cool picture so you can share with your followers and get some likes. If you're addicted to reading articles online, force yourself to read content that helps you learn something new related to your creative pursuits or inspires you to create more. I'm writing this post while watching a football game. I could've just sat on my ass for three hours and done nothing but watch a game, but now I'm being entertained and getting shit done.

Step four is to sneak some creativity into your procrastination. Obviously this won’t work in every situation, but I’ll bet you can find some way to simultaneously waste time and create shit.

(THIS IS NOT RECOMMENDED)

5. Find Your Own Annoying Habits

I know none of this is easy. I fail at it regularly. I’m not some hypocrite standing on a virtual soapbox pretending I’ve permanently solved all my focus problems. But these tips can be incredibly effective weapons for your anti-procrastination arsenal.

Now that I’ve gotten the ball rolling, I encourage you to find your own new ways to stave off your creativity procrastination. Build a rotation of techniques so you can switch it up whenever you get bored or a strategy starts losing its effectiveness. In the end, maybe you won’t get as much done as if you’d mustered up laser focus for an eight-hour period, but since you’re not doing handfuls of speed (I hope) that’s an unrealistic goal anyway. I guarantee you’ll accomplish more than if you’d allowed yourself to sit on the couch and watch all the special features of your new Road House Blu-ray in one sitting. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, because Road House is a f#$%ing amazing movie in so many ways. Pain don’t hurt, but procrastination does.

Most of all, stop being so damn afraid of actually getting off your ass and doing something. Besides a total lack of motivation, which may mean you need to get more sleep or exercise more or eat better, the main reason people put creative stuff off is because they’re afraid—afraid of the hard work ahead, of discomfort that comes along with being vulnerable and unsure how your work will turn out, of failing badly. But that all means exactly dick if you never start, and equally dick if you never finish. The discomfort is what makes it feel worthwhile and the failure is both inevitable and insignificant beyond giving you a new goal to destroy. Stop making excuses and start creating amazing shit. 

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If you're not familiar with the deep field photo, NASA pointed the Hubble telescope at what looked like an empty area of sky, a tiny spot far smaller than the size of the moon as it appears to us on Earth. They let the Hubble sensors gather light for ten days, and the telescope captured a gorgeous photo full of literally thousands of galaxies. Every speck in the picture is a galaxy, with only a few exceptions. I think it's the most profound picture ever taken, and I have a giant tapestry of it hanging on my wall. I use that tapestry to picture myself flying through at great speeds.

As I fly and look with awe upon the thousands of visible galaxies that represent only a minuscule spot of the night sky, I remember that in the grand scheme of things, my problems and concerns are insignificant and unimportant. This is comforting.

Then I turn back and realize that on the tiny, insignificant pale blue dot I call home, life thrives. And those lifeforms have created beautiful things like art and music; they embrace with reckless abandon heady concepts like love and goodwill; they live in a place full of natural beauty and wonder.

And it makes me proud to know that I am not really alone. I am, in fact, a part of something important, something great, something significant even in its very insignificance.

At this point, I can return to Earth with a clear conscience and a new sense of purpose.

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Among the tracks featured here are orchestral pieces, old-school video game music, an '80s horror synth clip, acoustic guitar fingerpicking, electronic music and more—I even included my remix/mash-up of the Psycho and Star Wars scores.

I hope you enjoy listening!

It’s become a bit of a running joke in a group of my friends: hang out with me long enough, especially if you add a few beers into the mix, and I quickly become philosophical. I can’t help it, really. I’ve always been bored to tears by small talk and am often guilty of jumping straight into the deep end of a conversation without letting it properly warm up. While I realize not everyone is like that, I’m occasionally surprised at how many people seem to live their lives without any philosophical context. By that I mean a lot of folks seem to be going about their daily motions without thinking too deeply or asking questions about why they’re doing what they’re doing. Will this decision advance me toward my personal goals? Does that action truly align with my values? Will that next tequila shot make me puke in my Uber? (That answer is usually "yes.")

It’s not that we should be overthinking every little detail of our lives or constantly second guessing ourselves. And it's not that we should be living within a strict set of rules. Rules are arbitrary and restrictive and make you feel bad when you break them. There are no rules in life, and it’s exactly this fact that makes having your own personal philosophy so important; since there are no rules, you can do anything you want at any time (yes, there are laws, but laws don't restrict free will, they simply inspire you to choose wisely). That freedom may sound liberating, but it won’t get you anywhere on its own, and what is life if not a fine chance to explore, discover and work out why we're here? If you’ve ever set a goal for yourself or pursued a dream, you know that to accomplish anything you need direction. We can all benefit from having a set of guiding principles which help us make the decisions that will lead us down the path we're aiming for. Nobody can truly control their life, but you can do a damn good job of setting yourself up for success, whatever your definition of "success" is. Every little decision you make can have an effect on that.

Reading about philosophy, in my experience, often consists of about a paragraph of interesting insight amongst pages of conjecture and theoretical jargon expounding on an abstract concept that was already adequately and concisely described. That’s a broad statement of opinion I realize, but as a self-professed fan of the philosophical I’ve regularly found myself frustrated and losing interest in concepts that initially piqued my curiosity the moment I start reading about the details. Bertrand Russell literally wrote hundreds of pages in the Principia Mathematica to prove that 1 + 1 = 2. In this case, 1 + 1 = 2 is the relevant, potentially thought-provoking concept, while the hundreds of pages of explanation are liable to make my eyelids drop faster than a soccer player in the World Cup. For that reason, I’ve attempted to keep the following sections as stripped to the basics as possible for your attention span’s benefit. And while I will be providing some examples for clarification, this post is not about pushing a particular agenda or school of thought onto you. It’s about helping you decide what your philosophy is, because yours is the only one that's right for you.

I would suggest taking some time in a quiet place to think about this, and writing down your thoughts as you go, because once your brain starts rolling it can be difficult to remember every insight you’ve conjured. I believe you can get a solid philosophy going in three steps, which I've conveniently arranged into an attractive geometrical shape for reference. I've written before about establishing a creative philosophy; now it's time to get personal.

The Pyramosophy

We’ll be tackling our philosophical conundrum in three layers. Below you see the Pyramid of Personal Philosophy, or Pyrperlosophy for a very catchy portmanteau. Er, Pyramosophy. Philamid? I dunno, these are all pretty dumb names. Whatever. The three layers will add up to an overall, apparently triangle-shaped philosophy, but it’s easier to break it down into smaller chunks for the purposes of this exercise. We’ll be working from the bottom up.

Level One: Fundamental

Also known as:

Spiritual.

What it is: 

The first level of the pyramid is the foundation on which the rest of your philosophy will be built upon. It deals with your broad view of life, humanity and existence, including your place within it. Or if you’re a fan of the Hitchhiker’s Guide books, this is your answer to the ultimate question about life, the universe and everything. From your broader outlook, you can start deducing your overarching, most important goals. This part of your philosophy will wind up fundamentally influencing every decision you make, often on a subconscious level, hence why I’ve referred to it as the Fundamental level. For many people, the Fundamental philosophy is more or less synonymous with one’s spiritual outlook. You can have a spiritual belief without being religious—even an atheist can be spiritual in a way, but if you really hate that word you can consider this part your anti-spirituality—but if you are religious in any way, your core religious beliefs will strongly influence this stage in our philosophy building project.

I should point out here that if you do identify with a pre-existing philosophical framework of any kind, now would be an excellent time to re-examine those beliefs and question absolutely everything about them. The beauty of doing this is that if you really, truly believe what you think you believe, those ideals will hold up to intense scrutiny. But if you have any doubts or concerns over shaky logic, they will become very clear. This can be uncomfortable, but don’t be afraid of that discomfort; rather, embrace and explore these new avenues. You never know what kind of insights you may stumble upon. Remember, there are no rules in life that say you have to adhere to the status quo. If you've chosen a belief system that resonates with you, you don't have to agree with each and every aspect of it. Resonance is what you’re looking for here—if something doesn’t resonate, ask yourself questions until you find something that does. You may not come to a satisfying conclusion on every issue, and that’s fine. Just file those things away as topics to explore in greater detail in the future. But you may find that you believe some things simply because someone told you they were true, or because they vaguely seemed right at one time. In order to have true conviction, it's important that we individually lead ourselves to every belief we have. So in order to avoid becoming mindless drones, it is paramount to question our beliefs, why we believe them and what made us believe them. For a long but absolutely brilliant article related to this topic, it's well worth reading Wait But Why’s post about The Cook vs. The Chef.

QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF: 

• What is the overarching meaning, purpose and nature of life, humanity, the universe?
• Which of my pre-existing beliefs resonate with me on a deep level? Which don’t?
• What seems to be missing from my Fundamental philosophy of life?
• What do I want to contribute to the world? What should my legacy be? What are the most important things for me to accomplish in my life? Why am I here, and why is everyone else here?
• Based on my answers, what are my overall values?

SIMPLIFIED Examples:

• You may consider yourself a Christian, even after questioning all of your beliefs, because your Fundamental view of human existence aligns with the general tenets of Christianity, and you want to live a life true to those tenets.
• You may be a nihilist who believes that there's no real meaning to existence, and that you might as well put your efforts into gaining as much money and status as you can because it provides some comfort in said meaningless existence. No judgement here! This is about figuring out what you really believe, not trying to fit into someone else's mold.
• Maybe you believe in a benevolent force, but one that doesn't interfere with everyday life, and you feel like your time is best spent serving others and starting a family.
• Here's a simplified version of one aspect of my Fundamental beliefs: I view the universe as one fascinating, interconnected whole, and I think we can transcend mundane, everyday experience through cultivating that connection and creating our own meaning even where there may be none. For me, one of the best ways of doing that is through creating stuff.

NOTE: The above examples are, of course, limited ideas. Yours should be more complex if they need to be. Dive as deep as you can. Write down every belief you can think of, group them together and prioritize/organize. You don't have to label it if that doesn't interest you, though labels can be an easy way to reference each of the Pyramosophy levels.

Level Two: Environmental

Also known as:

Lifestyle.

What it is: 

Next up is the Environmental level, in which we take the principles of our Fundamental philosophy and start to build our world around those values and goals. You don’t have to think on as grandiose a scale for this—as the pyramid narrows, the scope of each level narrows as well—so maybe “world” is too big a word here. You’re simply looking to set up your surroundings in a way that helps you achieve the goals of the Fundamental level. The goal is to make it as easy as possible to live the way that’s most important to you, and you start by controlling what you can of what’s going on around you. Note that I said “what you can,” because life is a good 90% uncontrollable at least. And while part of my personal philosophy is that happiness is gained by learning to let go of the illusion of control, the fact is we actually need a little illusion in our lives; studies have shown that feeling like you have some control over your life can do wonders for your happiness, so it’s time to embrace that 10% of life we really can have some influence over.

While the Fundamental level is rather abstract and conceptual, the Environmental level is far more grounded in immediate, material reality. It is this level that helps inform you of where you should live, what kind of job you should have, what you should own, the kind of people you should surround yourself with, how you interact with those people, etc. But while we’re dealing with a lot of tangible things here, don’t mistake it for superficiality. This level is also when your personal goals, morals, values, social habits, even political leanings start taking concrete shape, because they are an inextricable part of your world. The broader Fundamental principles start forming into everyday applications in the Environmental level. Think of your "world" not only as your immediate physical surroundings, but as your ideal lifestyle both in the traditional sense and the "spiritual" sense (sorry for using that word again.)

As you figure these things out, you may come to realize what's missing in your life. With this realization comes a plan to obtain those missing pieces. All this will come into clearer focus in the next section, but you should now begin to understand what your definition of success is. It's time to set yourself up for that success. Opportunities really only present themselves when we allow them to. Do what you can to make those opportunities start appearing.

It’s worth noting that you’re probably not gonna figure all of this out on the first try. These steps usually take more than just a few minutes of thought; start paying attention to the things in your daily life that stick out as seeming particularly important, and gradually incorporate them into your ideas.

QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF: 

• What are my more immediate goals, based on the broad values I’ve established?
• What environment (living, working, social, etc.) is most conducive to me achieving those goals?
• What currently isn’t working in my life, and how can I change these things? 
• What can I control in my life?
• What physical and mental state should I achieve in order to be successful?

SIMPLIFIED Examples: 

• The Christian might need an environment where she's surrounded by a like-minded support group, including a local church community, and might seek work with a company whose values align with her own.
• The nihilist may want to pursue a career with a high probability of great financial gain and live in a busy city center where he can live as fast and exciting a life as possible while he can.
• The family and service-oriented person might want to live in a town that's great for raising kids and has lots of community volunteer opportunities.
• I need an environment where I can find peace and quiet so I can focus on things I find meaningful, like creating. I like simplicity with minimal distraction, so I try not to have things that I don't need or use. I benefit from some structure and routine, and I think in order to spread happiness in the world, I need to be healthy and happy myself first.

Level Three: Mental

Also known as:

Behavioral.

What it is: 

Now we’ve reached the top of the pyramid: the Mental, or behavioral, level. This takes the Fundamental values we first established, which now exist within an Environmental context, and provides a practical mindset to help you walk the walk of your personal philosophy in everyday life. It’s really only this level that you’ll be tasked with keeping in mind during your day-to-day activities, but it was useful to flesh out the lower two in order to really understand the “why” of the Mental level. Otherwise you’re just living by an arbitrary code that has no real depth or meaning. Or worse, you’re living by a code that’s based on someone else’s philosophy rather than your own. Or maybe you’re just picking and choosing inspirational-sounding quotes that kind of "sound right" without considering if they truly reflect your authentic self. This is the level many people start with when they think of a personal philosophy. That’s a mistake, but one you no longer have to make. Because now that you’ve established yourself as a true individual with his or her own thoughts, you can feel confident in finding the way of your Mental level. High fives all around.

It's time to figure out what you need to do on any given day to live a life that’s true to those values and goals you now know are most important. What actions can you take to help fulfill that promise a little bit every day? “Little” is a key word here; you can absolutely aspire to grand, important things, but every big accomplishment is just a series of little accomplishments that add up to something large. As we ascend the Pyramosophy (nope, still sounds stupid), the big concepts get slowly broken down into baby steps, tasks into subtasks, grand aspirations into small, daily habits. You may want to change the world, but you’re still only living one day at a time—what can you do today to create the future situation you feel is ideal for yourself? How can you remind yourself to stay on track? Your mental state helps bridge the gap between where you are now and your Environmental ideals.

Since you’re now trying to create habits to keep you on track, it’s handy to come up with clever mnemonic devices like acronyms or catchy slogans for this stage. Anything that will easily stick in your head is useful, because if you can’t recall your own philosophy, you won’t have much hope in living true to it. This level is all about execution. Execution comes from action, so whatever you decide, it should be actionable. Here is where motivational quotes often fail, because many are a clever assessment of a situation but don't provide any useful advice for what to do, just how to briefly feel a little better. If you choose an action step that doesn't seem to fit in with your two lower levels, that's OK—if it's truly important to you, it belongs somewhere in your philosophy. You can always revisit and revise as you go.

Now is the time to take a good, hard, critical look at yourself and your behavior. It's not always pretty, but it's incredibly important to be self-aware as you build your philosophy. Only you are responsible for getting where you want to be. Nobody else has a say.

QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF: 

• What do I need to do on an everyday basis to live a life that’s true to my values and goals?
• What should I remember in order to walk the walk of my personal philosophy?
• Are there any clever ways (acronyms, mnemonic devices, etc) for me to easily remember actionable guidelines? How can I simplify the big concepts so I'm not tasked with memorizing a novel?
• Can I create any visual cues as reminders, like decorations at home or phone lock screen backgrounds?
• How do I turn my beliefs into actionable habits?
• What could I do differently to ensure that I stay on track? How am I holding myself back?

SIMPLIFIED Examples: 

• The Christian might remember Bible verses that resonate with her, perhaps those reminding her to reserve judgement or forgive others.
• The nihilist might remind himself that any day could be his last, so it's important to embrace risk and live the moment to the fullest. Or he may need to recall good financial advice to make sure he is comfortable and stable in the long term.
• The family/service person could find ways to remember that giving is best and selfish urges can be overcome with willpower.
• I have little sayings and symbols that remind me to spend as much time as possible creating, exploring, noticing and connecting (among other things), because those are the everyday activities that I think are most important. I fail often, but these personal slogans help get me back on track when that happens. Straying from them doesn't cause me to feel lost, because I have a firm grasp on what I believe is real and important.

Final Thoughts

If you’ve been following along, you’ve probably done a lot of critical thinking by now. Hopefully you've reached a new level of self-awareness. It's time for one last once-over. Take a look at everything you’ve written down, take a metaphorical step back and reassess it all from a broader perspective. Does it all jell? Does it seem like it’s missing anything? Does it need simplifying? Does it feel like your own? Do you really need that part about watching a minimum of 20 episodes of reality TV every week? You don’t have to make up a name for your philosophy, though sometimes it feels nice to do so... Kind of like you’re taking all the work you’ve just done and neatly placing it in a container for whenever you need it. Either way, the pyramid is still a pretty simplified and easy to reference symbol for your new system. Congratulations! You've got yourself a personal philosophy. The final step is to go out there and put it into practice to see how it fits your life. Work out the kinks and tweak it to taste. Most importantly, use it to discover what changes you can make right now, if any, to start properly living according to your philosophy.

Before we finish, though, there is an important note: your beliefs will change. They have probably already changed many times in your life. They may have even changed while you were doing this exercise. This is natural, a good evolution of the self, and it should be embraced. But that means eventually your pyramid may become obsolete. The Christian I used as an example may stop believing in god. The nihilist may realize that money and social status isn't nearly as important as he initially thought. Or it could be a more subtle shift. I recommend revisiting and revising your philosophy at least once a year. Reevaluate how you’re doing with living according to its principles. Adjust your goals and parameters so they're up-to-date. Never be afraid of questioning everything once again.

Sometimes you will stray from your philosophy because you are human. That’s OK. Learn from those mistakes, forgive yourself and get right back to it. The point of having a philosophy is to have a home base that you can return to when things get off track. It’s much harder to right the ship without it. Pretty sure that was a mixed metaphor, but f#$% it.

Having a personal philosophy will not solve all of the problems in your life, nor is it designed to. It’s more like taking a medication for anxiety or depression—the right one can help get you to a good place where you’re able to more effectively tackle the source of your problems. But it still takes a great deal of hard work and concerted effort to get your ducks in a row. It’s a tool, albeit an important tool. And as the world around you continues to become more complex, more intense, more crazy, you will have a solid foundation on which to build your life. At least, that's what I hope for you. Now go skip the small talk and start philosophizing.

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He created a 30-second teaser trailer for the book and asked me to put together a Danny Elfman-inspired score for the video. I jumped at the chance and am quite happy with the resulting music, even at only half a minute in length. Take a look!

Buy the book at Amazon.

Learn more about Adam at his website.

Hear more samples of my compositions on Soundcloud.

When you first start, there's little fanfare and you don't make much of an impression. You don't really catch anyone's attention for a while, but eventually the occasional passer-by takes brief notice of you.

After you've been at it for some time, you get a few people to stop, sit down and listen. It's a start, but compared to the size of the crowd, it doesn't feel like much.

So you try to get a little louder to reach more people. Maybe you spend some money to amplify your voice, or perhaps you ask a nearby friend with their own audience to mention the cool things you’re creating. This gets a few more folks to pay attention, but many just consider your extra volume an annoyance as they pass right by.

Occasionally, someone goes out of their way to put you down. It hurts for a moment, but once you see they’ve just been wandering aimlessly through the crowd being destructive and never contributing any of their own creativity or positivity, it’s a lot easier to ignore them. You know you're making something genuine and you can't possibly please everyone, though some criticisms do manage to stick around in the back of your head.

Much of the time you hear no feedback at all about what you’ve created. Sometimes you wonder if anyone even heard you in the first place, or if your friends and followers are just pretending to listen because they want to be nice. These thoughts can cause you to doubt yourself and question why you're doing this in the first place.

But every once in a while you’ll create something great that gets noticed by a lot of people, many more than you’re used to reaching. Some of them stick around and become true fans, but most probably move along with little acknowledgement. You realize you're going to need many more of these moments to build a big following, and it can be tempting to start focusing your efforts on reeling in as many people from the big crowd as you can. But spending too much time thinking about them can cause you to neglect the smaller group of people who are already genuinely interested in what you're making.

Eventually you conclude that you don’t get much satisfaction by shouting at the bigger crowd of people, whereas nurturing the small tribe you've built for yourself creates genuine, profound, mutually beneficial connections.

And as you pour your heart into creating great things and forging those deep connections with fans, friends and strangers from all over the world, the big crowd starts to fade away from your attention, slowly falling out of focus. Soon you realize that your crowd, no matter how modest it may be, makes what you do feel far more fulfilling. They more than make up in quality for what they lack in quantity.

…Of course, that’s usually when the rest of them start noticing.

There are fifty thousand articles online about turning your creative passion into a full-time career (that's an exact number I counted myself, so no need to check if it’s accurate). Many of said fifty thousand articles include very good advice. You should read them and maybe take what they say to heart. But there aren’t many articles tackling the far more common situation: being an artist and having a—*gulp*—day job.

I mean, I get why this is the case. It’s more romantic to think about dropping everything and making a living from your hand-knit beer koozies. It’s idealistic. It’s "the dream." An article about how you may be better off figuring out how to enjoy life without becoming a full-time artist doesn’t inspire clicks. Worse yet, it may sound cynical, as if the author is telling you to bitterly give up on your dreams and aspirations, put on a tie and start talking about mutual funds to incredibly stuffy people at wine and cheese parties.

But I clearly don't give a shit about pageviews, so I'm going to let you in on a dirty little secret: the percentage of people who achieve the aforementioned full-time artist dream is less than 100%. It's difficult to get any hard numbers on a stat like that, but here are a couple examples to give you an idea: one study estimated that 90% of all musical acts could be considered "undiscovered." And a Washington Post article found that roughly 1.4 million people were making a living as artists in the United States. We don't know how many people in the country are attempting to be career creatives, but the total population is about 320 million. By the way, those 1.4 million are nearly all white and have a median salary of about $30k, which for many of us doesn't even qualify as a living wage. More people are incarcerated in America than are making that level of a "living" from art.

In other words, it’s not impossible, but the majority of us will never get to the point where we support ourselves completely with our creative passions. So it's probably important to understand that it’s more than OK to be an artist with a day job. It doesn’t mean you’ve given up on anything or sold yourself short. Maybe you’ve been working hard for years and your craft hasn’t brought in adequate income. Maybe you have a family, and with it comes pressing financial needs or time you’d like to spend with them rather than running a business (which is what you'll need to do to make a career of your art). Maybe you don’t want to turn your art into a business at all. Or maybe it's still early in your career and damn near impossible to make enough money to pay your bills.

Welcome to the world of creatives with day jobs, populated by the vast majority of artistic people. But among the broken dreams is a world in which you can not only survive, but thrive. You don’t have to be cynical and bitter, you can be optimistic and realistic. Yes, realistic optimism is an actual thing that involves recognizing harsh realities while understanding how to make the best of them. This post isn’t about giving up on your dreams, it's about embracing the journey to achieve them. It's also about accepting the reality that you may never be able to work on your number one creative passion full time. Here’s how you can live like that and be happy.

Your Job Matters. A Lot.

Many people want to make a living from their passion because they hate their job, but they’re trying to solve two potentially all-consuming problems at once. We'll get back to the passion part later, first we need to talk about that sucky job of yours. Not wanting to continue on your current career path is one thing; working at a job that makes you want to decorate the cubicle wall with your brains is quite another. Don't fall prey to the logic that says a bad job helps you suffer for your art; there's plenty of suffering in the world to inspire you. Being in misery 40 hours a week will not help your creativity in any way.

I used dread something I called the “Rock Star Hangover.” The RSH occurred when I would be out playing a show at night, sometimes to hundreds of people, basking in the adulation of the crowd, getting free drinks, making new friends, and generally being treated like a champ into the wee hours of the evening, only to lug my gear into the car, go home, wake up early and shuffle like a zombie into an office I hated and go back to being treated like the same old nobody I had been the day before. It sucked, hard, and I predictably hated a good chunk of my life.

If you find yourself in this situation—chronically suffering from your own version of the Rock Star Hangover—you're never going to find anything resembling happiness. This is because your day job matters a lot. If you wake up every day and go to a job you despise, it's time to make a change. This can be scary. But it's not only worth it, it's unbelievably important. You will feel a huge weight off your shoulders when you make that move, although be warned it can take more than one try to get it right. Regularly hating a large portion of your life is like slowly poisoning yourself, and it saps your precious creative energy during your off time, AKA when you need it most.

The key is to find a job that allows you to be creative for some of the time, or at least satisfies one of your other interests. There are many job titles that let you be creative in some capacity, which helps keep you from getting excruciatingly bored. One strategy is to find a job in an industry that interests you. Maybe you're a musician and you'd enjoy working at a record label. Maybe you're a woodworker with a passion for animal shelters. Maybe you're an actor who is secretly aroused by spreadsheets. No judgement here. I've gotten many jobs where I've been paid to write blog posts and promo video scripts and things of that nature. It's not always deeply satisfying, but it often helps scratch an itch.

No job is gonna be sunshine and high fives 100% of the time, and you'll probably have to do your best to embrace some busywork. But if you spend at least some of your time exercising your creative muscles or pursuing a genuine interest, you'll be more satisfied in your work and consequently more energized and present for the important stuff when you get home.

Think of those moments that you don't enjoy as necessary evils, like going to the dentist or standing in line at the godforsaken DMV. You'll still have to do stupid shit like that even if your life is amazing and you're a celebrity chef just like you always dreamed, so just power through the rough patches and find a job that minimizes them rather than serving as a weekly 40-hour rough patch.

Embrace Sacrifice, Retain Balance

OK, so your day job is sorted out. Let's get back to talking about your passion. There's no way to dance around a few hard realities in this post. Here's one: if you spend a lot of your free time working on creative projects, you're going to sacrifice time that could be spent on other things. Things that could genuinely enrich your life. Luckily, this sacrifice will feel like an easy choice if you're really doing something you love. But every once in a while you may find yourself second-guessing the time you dedicate to creative stuff. This is especially true if you're trying in earnest to turn your passion into a career, which means spending a lot of time working on the business side of things (including not-so-creative mindless tasks and dealing with the bullshit of "making it" in various creative industries seemingly set up solely to make your success impossible). Even if your work has purpose, working during your free time isn't always going to feel good.

This is natural. We're all making sacrifices with every decision we make, it's just a matter of choosing which sacrifice feels like less of a loss. Artists often give up the type of stability that comes with the "traditional" life path. But the alternative is sacrificing the pursuit of your true passion, which would weigh you down with much more regret later in life. You've chosen to dedicate a lot of time to your creative projects, and sometimes you will feel like you're missing out.

But you also need balance in your life. In those occasional moments where you feel like you're needlessly depriving yourself or pushing others out of your life, take a step back and restore the balance. Go out with friends if you're afraid your social life has taken a hit. Get some exercise if you've felt too immobile. Read a book if you're behind on your reading list. No project is more important than maintaining a healthy and complete lifestyle. If you run yourself into the ground, your art will once again suffer. Also, if you neglect your well-being you totally might die. That would suck. You really won't be creating much then.

Get Organized and Set Small Goals

I've never really been one for detailed planning or super-specific goal setting. I generally like to keep my options open and make decisions based on how I feel in the moment. But when I do plan, I plan like a motherf#$%er.

Part of the reason, as I've mentioned in previous posts, is that I'd be an unredeemable mess of disorganization if I didn't set some strict productivity boundaries for myself. But even for the freest of spirits, structure is essential. And when you don't have the luxury of spending all day creating, you're going to need to form a habit of creating. This isn't a habits blog—there are already plenty of people who do a great job of helping you build habits like Leo Babauta and James Clear and Chris Winfield—but in order to get into the habit of creating, you need to incorporate it into your daily routine.

Create a routine not to build a rigid framework that you can never stray from, but to have a productive home base that you can go back to if you get distracted and veer off course. Otherwise your lack of productivity will spiral out of control and you'll be having a beer with a friend three months later wondering why you never finished that novel about a cockroach detective who is trying to figure out who the mysterious invisible murderer is in everyone's favorite roach motel. (I just came up with that on the spot while typing, feel free to use it.)

Find an organizational system that works well for you. Set goals so you have something to work toward, even if they're vague to start. Getting too specific with your long-term creative goals can be stifling and frustrating, but breaking those bigger goals into specific short-term tasks will give you something manageable to work on now that will result in solid progress on the whole. When I first started drawing Of The Fittest, I made an initial goal of updating it twice a week for a year. It seemed like a modest ambition, but 365 days later I had 104 comics, which to me was a big accomplishment (and a lot of work). So form a habit of small artistic progress every day after you get home from work.

Force Work in Chunks

Unless you're some sort of focusing psycho, you might have some trouble concentrating on just one thing for hours at a time, especially when you're a little tired after working your hopefully-not-completely-soul-sucking job. Creating can be fun, but it can also be exhausting. And frustrating. Sometimes just thinking about everything you haven't done yet can wear you out. If you get sidetracked and waste that initial creative energy, you won't get much accomplished. "Man, I can't paint a detailed portrait of Boba Fett playing with kittens, what was I thinking? Oh shit, they put the next season of Always Sunny on Netflix! Might as well watch three or four episodes. What was I doing again?"

In order to get creating and avoid the instant gratification monkey, you may need to force yourself to get started. This is normal. Set a timer and make yourself begin working for 20 minutes, distraction free (no phone, no email, no social media, etc). If you're not locked in when the timer goes off, step back, take a break for a few minutes and eat some string cheese. I find string cheese is pretty good at getting my creative juices flowing. Then go back and try again for as many sessions as you have time for. If you are truly in the zone when the timer goes off, ignore it and go as long as your feeble body will take you. Ride that wave to glory, my friend.

Most people aren't able to do anything continuously without breaks. In fact, it's been scientifically demonstrated that taking breaks is good for your creative energy. But even if you just get one rather unproductive but good-intentioned 20 minute block in, that's still progress. And if you can get a couple chunks of work done every day (again, form a habit), you'll be in better shape than most people who walk all the way to the corner coffee shop to write four sentences of their screenplay about a vegetable who was raised by fruit, then goes on an epic journey to find the broccoli family that abandoned him as a child. Again, on the spot, you're welcome for the idea.

Embrace Your Inner Hippie and Be Grateful

Of all the things I've talked about here, this is probably the most important. Entitlement is the enemy of creativity and happiness. And as Mark Manson brilliantly wrote on his blog, we are not entitled to make a living doing what we love. If you create from a place of entitlement and think that you deserve to get noticed or discovered simply because you are pouring your heart into it, your work will suffer. In fact, when we create art simply for the sake of creating art, we tend to get noticed more because it's authentic.

So allow me to get sentimental as shit for this final point: the single most important thing about being a successful creative person is being unabashedly psyched that you get to do this awesome thing that you love to do. Many people haven't figured out their passion. Many people aren't as creative as you are. Some people think their time is best spent marathoning episodes of Peep Show like I did the other day. Other people can't do the thing that would make them happy because they're too poor or they live under an oppressive regime or they lost both arms in a freak Segway accident. 

But not you. You know what you love. You get to do it. And you may not yet be lucky enough to do it from nine to five on weekdays, but goddammit you're glad you have the time and privilege to do it at all. Don't insult the poor folks who can't pursue their passions by being ungrateful. It's all about loving the process, because that's the part that makes you happy. Sure, you'd like to get a final product out there or land a paid gig. That accomplishment feels great, for about a day or two. Then you know what happens? You say, "That was fun, I think I'll do another!"

You say that because it's the doing what you love to do, in any capacity, that makes you happy and fulfilled. Embrace it. It's f#$%ing awesome. Now go out, follow your dreams and create great art.

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THIS IS PART OF A SERIES ABOUT MY EXPERIENCES SCORING AN INDIE FILM. CHECK OUT THE FIRST POST IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY. FULL SERIES HERE AS THEY'RE POSTED.

With my work on the film score nearing completion, I am focusing most of my creative energies on getting it finished. I have many ideas for general creativity-themed blog posts in the near future, but until I can spend the required time writing them, I give you this film score-centric post to tide you over.

It turns out scoring a film requires developing some creative philosophies (the importance of which I detailed here), using some extremely advanced techniques (and by advanced I mean not particularly advanced, you see what I did there?) and making some interesting discoveries and observations along the way. Here are seven examples from my recent experience.

1. Enhance, Don’t Dictate (AKA Don't You Dare Tell Me How To Feel)

If you watch an Indiana Jones movie, there’s score behind nearly every scene, consistently but gently reminding you of how you should be feeling at any given moment. This helps propel the story forward by letting you know if the hero is worried he’ll be killed by a Nazi or excited by the fact that a Nazi’s face is melting off. In movies like that, the music ramps up when the action starts getting exciting, it’s full of dissonant orchestral stabs when someone is about to get literally stabbed, it plays a sweet minor-key melody when a character is sad, possibly because she was recently stabbed. When done by a great composer, the score both enhances the feel of a scene and helps dictate on a subconscious level what the audience should be feeling.

But for films like the one I’m scoring, that level of musical involvement is inappropriate. I Hate You isn’t a movie with 90 minutes of score behind it. There aren’t any car chase scenes or Nazis (spoiler alert). In fact, the plot and overall effectiveness of the movie is almost entirely dependent on the actors' performances landing emotionally with the audience. The score should underline the emotion of the moment without being blatant and let the acting do the heavy lifting. For this reason, I needed to make sure my score enhanced what was being shown while not dictating to the viewer what he or she should be feeling. This directly leads to the next point...

2. Get The Hell Out Of The Film’s Way

It’s really tempting for any musician to latch onto something that sounds “cool” and insist on including it in a song or composition. This can be a bit distracting when recording an album, but it can be downright disastrous when scoring a film. Nothing should steal your attention from what you’re watching. I need to enhance the emotion of the scene, but I also need to blend into the background so you barely notice that the scene was enhanced in the first place. It needs to feel natural and, against most of my musician tendencies, almost unnoticeable.

Then again, I want the score to be good, and in that sense I do want people to notice it. So you can probably guess that this is an incredibly delicate balancing act to accomplish. Until people see the movie, I have no real way of determining if I was successful.

3. Write For Someone Else’s (Fictional) Vision

I’ve collaborated many times in the past, but this was my first experience writing only with the goal of achieving someone else’s vision. This is not my movie, and while I could make suggestions on the direction I took the music, in the end I was creating this stuff to fulfill an artistic vision that had nothing to do with me or my opinions. I was surprised to find how liberating that was, actually. No longer was I bogged down by my own arbitrary goals; now I had a clear goal that was completely external. It was a really fun challenge.

In addition, there was the added layer of writing music to correspond with what a fictional character was feeling in a scripted moment. This was also a new but equally rewarding process for me. Sometimes trying to translate your own feelings into art becomes a burden. Your personal viewpoint can become needlessly complex. The characters I was scoring to had complexity, but not the kind that is accompanied with my own constant internal push and pull, second-guessing or emotional baggage. Not that I have emotional baggage, though. I'm light as a goddamn feather, I swear!

4. Power Through in Bursts (And Prepare to Kill Your Babies)

A lot of artists think they need to wait for inspiration to strike before they start creating, but that doesn’t really work (especially when you have a deadline). There were many times when I didn’t feel like f#$%ing doing anything, but I knew I needed to get shit done. So first you have to force yourself to just start. Then you need to work in bursts—I prefer 20-30 minutes at a time—which help you get through manageable chunks without getting too frustrated, bored or mentally overtaxed. Sometimes one of those bursts turns into a 2-hour session of pure brilliance. Roll with those moments or you’re an idiot for wasting them.

Speaking of wasting time, there is a real danger of spending a lot of time creating something only to find that the director doesn’t think it fits at all. In fact, that’s guaranteed to happen several times. I got extremely lucky on this project because the vast majority of the time I got a cue in the ballpark of the director’s vision on my first try, but there were plenty of times when I had to throw part or all of a cue away because it just wasn’t right. For one part of the movie, I think I had to start over five or six times at least. I always started with a rough sketch and never spent too much time on something I didn't know was heading in the right direction. Even though I wanted to send nothing but polished products, I knew my time was too limited to waste polishing a turd. So I always got the general feel down for a cue, sent the rough idea to the director with a thousand disclaimers, then moved on to something else until I got feedback.

5. Don’t Get Attached (To Your Future Dead Babies)

Related to the last point, you really can’t get too attached to anything you create, because it might get rejected outright. Not because it isn’t good, but because it doesn’t fit the director’s vision. Well, I guess it could also be because it sucks. Sometimes when I was really hitting a creative wall I would work on pieces that I was sure would get rejected just so I would feel like I accomplished something that day. That could turn on the creative faucet and lead to other ideas that did work.

One time I had dedicated an entire day to writing music but found myself frustrated with everything I was making. I decided to embrace my bummed out mood and take on a part of the film that was a little more melancholy. I wrote a cue that I was convinced would be rejected, but the director thought it was great. Then I cranked out two more ideas that day (pretty sure I stopped and watched a movie in the middle, thanks Netflix) that I didn’t feel confident in, and they all were enthusiastically accepted. I surrendered to the mood and used the negative energy to my advantage.

You don’t want to spend too much time on something that won’t work, yet forcing yourself to do just that can sometimes be helpful. Yet another balancing act.

6. You Don’t Need No Satisfaction

Working within very specific (to less than a second) timeframes often means you can’t satisfy your musician instincts to make something symmetrical, musical or properly resolved. Even though you're helping to tell a story, you can’t tell your own story with every single cue, especially when it’s only seven seconds long. Music that works within the context of a film doesn't always work on its own. But the movie is the most important thing, so there are times when you have to let it go and write something that normally wouldn't satisfy you in order to help the big picture come to fruition, or as I like to say, "fruitify." (Note: I've never actually said that before.)

7. There’s No Way To Prepare For Everything (AKA Always Have a Spare Pair of Pants)

Unexpected things always happen, especially when you’re recording at home. For example: I did most of my acoustic guitar recordings during warm weather, and for most sessions I’d be sure to close my window and turn off my fan before I started. This led to some sweaty and uncomfortable moments, but it ensured I wouldn’t be picking up any unwanted background noise. That is, except for that time I got lazy and left my window open on a particularly hot but quiet night thinking it wouldn’t be a big deal. The result was having to EQ out the high-frequency sounds of crickets behind several guitar takes. Another time I had to stop mid-take because, even when your windows are closed, it’s damn near impossible to record while a police helicopter is hovering overhead. I hope they caught the bastard. Wait, were they looking for me?

Anyway, my favorite example of an unexpected surprise is when I realized I had to wear “guitar playing shorts.” You might think one’s attire doesn’t make much difference in a studio, but one particular pair of shorts that I wore made a subtle but noticeable creaking noise if the guitar on my lap shifted even a millimeter. These sounds make a difference when you’ve got a sensitive mic trying to pick up all the nuances of an acoustic instrument, so several times in the middle of recording sessions I’d have to change into my soft, light-fabric sleep shorts and try the take again. Lesson learned: those are my guitar playing shorts.  

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Creativity and philosophy go hand-in-hand in crucial ways. In fact, you will have trouble making any worthwhile art without first understanding the philosophy behind it. Luckily, it's easy to achieve in a few simple steps.

Anyone who talks to me for more than a few minutes learns that I enjoy getting philosophical. Sometimes I dive a little too deeply into a topic very quickly, but that's just the kind of guy I am; I like to skip past the superficial crap and get right to the interesting stuff.

I'm a firm believer in establishing a personal philosophy that provides a frame of reference for making important decisions. That's a much bigger topic for some future posts to cover, so for now I'm focusing on a smaller, but related, topic: the creative philosophy. 

In this post I'll tell you three important things:

1. Why all creative endeavors need a philosophy

2. Examples of creative philosophies in action

3. How to find your very own personal creative philosophy

Why Creativity Needs Philosophy

All great artists have philosophies. Actually, most mediocre and even some crappy artists do, too. I’m not trying to define what good art means to you here, but I believe many creative people who aren’t living up to their potential may just be lacking a solid philosophy. Or it's possible they're just forgetting to go into a psychotic meltdown and cut off their ear so they can give it to a friend. We all have our creative quirks.

Much like the art itself, there is no right or wrong philosophy to have. But you need to have one. That philosophy can change from project to project, even from day to day or hour to hour, but it needs to be there. If you don't believe me, read an interview with one of your favorite artists. At some point they'll drop a philosophical bomb that reveals where their mind was when they created their last work. It won’t necessarily be deep, intellectual or even original, but it will exist. A musician will speak of his overarching album concepts or his preferred sound palette. An actor will share insight into her method of capturing a character. A painter will explain why the f#$% he decided to paint a single, upside-down triangle with his own blood on a pink canvas.

In many ways, the process of creating art is simply the process of applying whatever philosophy (or philosophies) you’re working under at that moment to your medium of choice. As I’ve talked about at length before, art is at its core simply a decision. But in order to make that decision, you must have a direction. Even deciding to be as directionless as possible is a direction, so don't try to pull that smart-ass question on me. I speak smart-ass fluently, so I saw it coming a mile away.

Most high-level artists are greatly philosophical when talking about the purpose of their creations, but even artists who you wouldn't associate with being museum-worthy inevitably reveal philosophical guidelines. Smash Mouth wasn't out to write songs with political or social commentary, they just wanted to be a fun party band; that was their philosophy. Well, that and cursing out audiences for throwing bread at them.

In order to make a decision and create something that has a purpose, you need a framework to operate within. It doesn’t have to be fully formed when you start, but it should become clearer as you make progress on the project. And it can change any time you want; just look at David Bowie’s discography and see that change in action. You could even think of it like this: it's the art itself that has a philosophy, and in order to maximize its impact it's your duty to figure out what it is.

Real-World Examples of Creative Philosophy In Action

In order to avoid putting words in other artists' mouths, I'll use a couple examples from my own experience to show you what applying a creative philosophy might look like in the real world. Or as close to the real world as I live, anyway.

Years ago when my band Shaimus was making what would be our third and final album, we recorded a song called “Rainy” which featured an atmospheric audio track of a gentle rainstorm in the demo version. Our producer (Brian Fennell of a great Seattle-based band called, naturally, Barcelona) insisted we jettison any literal reference to rain in the final product. In his vision of what our album would become, it was far too on-the-nose to have the sounds of actual rain; it was like we were saying, “See what we did here? The song is totally freakin' rainy!!”

This choice was in line with his personal artistic philosophy. We very easily could have had a producer who loved the idea of putting rain sounds in. Neither of these preferences are right or wrong in an objective context, but they have a far more concrete answer when working within the framework of a creative philosophy. You'll notice this example seems like a very small decision, but even small things can have large consequences in your final product, so it's important to be applying the philosophy even at a granular level.

One of my personal philosophies when it comes to music is that I believe a truly great song can be performed as a solo voice with acoustic guitar or piano accompaniment and still hold its own as a great song. This is important for me as an artist because I love interesting song arrangements and cool production elements, but I won't allow myself use these things as a crutch to make a mediocre song "better." If it doesn't pass the stripdown test, I don't consider it a good song. This is just one of many guiding ideologies I use when making music. Another one is to try really hard not to suck. That is very difficult for me sometimes.

When I'm drawing my comic, much of the philosophy is dictated by the characters themselves. It's quite satisfying to let a fictional talking dinosaur's personal philosophies guide my creative flow every once in a while.

Finding Your Philosophy

If you’re having trouble figuring out what your own artistic philosophy is, there’s a very simple way to get some insight: have a thoughtful friend “interview” you about what you’re creating, as well as what you’ve created in the past. This will get you into a mode of thinking critically about what you do and why you do it. You should probably record this interview for your own reference. If the interview itself doesn’t go as well as you wanted, there's still hope: I’ve done enough interviews to know that you often think of the best answers well after it's over, kind of like thinking of the ultimate comeback to an insult you received the day before. This is very frustrating in actual interviews, but very handy for this exercise, because even if the exercise initially yields nothing useful, it may just get your gears turning enough to help you find direction later.

You might also try re-writing your artist bio, but instead of just listing your accomplishments, write personal stories of how you came to be an artist and why your approach to creating is unique, notable or interesting. This is generally a better way of writing a bio anyway, so if you get a good result you've killed two birds with one stone. If you're writing an artist statement (as many visual artists must do) or just want to establish your "elevator pitch," you'll want to distill this philosophy down to as few words as possible (a short paragraph or even just a sentence or two). Then you just need to hang out near elevators all day and hope to see someone who can advance your career.

Again, you can always change your mind on these things, and evolving is something great creatives do. It's also important to note that you're under no obligation to tell anyone about your philosophy. It's perfectly acceptable to just use it as a personal guide without the need to declare it publicly. People are too damn nosey these days, anyway.

So before you create another thing, sit down and think through your artistic ideology. When you think you're on to something, you can use it as a guide for whatever your next project is. Even more importantly, if you discover some basic and essential aspects of your approach that you believe should be consistent in everything you do, go through what you've already created and start cutting out the things that don't fit in with that vision. This can really help you hone your niche and your brand. Now get philosophizing, Plato!

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A Not-So-Frosty Snowman

PLEASE NOTE: This section contains spoilers about the cartoon The Snowman. If you haven't seen it, you should definitely check it out here. It's less than 30 minutes long. If you would rather skip straight to the music, just scroll to the bottom.

I think I first saw The Snowman when I was in pre-school. I remember being captivated by the mesmerizing colored-pencil animation, the dreamlike atmosphere, the gorgeous music and, of course, the unusually heartbreaking ending. It's a faithful adaptation of the wordless children's book by Raymond Briggs that has always stuck with me, so I bought it on DVD several years ago. It's only as an adult that I can fully appreciate it for being the masterful work of art it is.

I can't think of anything else I've seen that so perfectly captures the feeling of being a child, where dreams are vividly real and fantasy blends with reality. The lack of dialog and the mostly-nighttime setting (plus the haunting score by Howard Blake) add to its dreamy, surreal nature.  The story zeroes in on that amazingly magical feeling—the not to mention the deeply ingrained childhood desire—of being singled out as special: the titular snowman comes to life and the only one to witness it is the boy who made him. They become instant friends and sneak around the house while his parents are asleep; later the boy is whisked away to a gathering at the North Pole of snowmen from around the world who have come to life, and he is the only human (besides Santa) present. His snowy new friends are all welcoming and warm (well, as warm as snowmen can be), but his true bond is with his frozen new best buddy.

Describing the admittedly goofy-sounding plot does no justice to The Snowman, though. Frosty this is not, and you are not watching a sentimental Rankin/Bass Christmas special. The film reminds me of childhood dreams in which I saw Santa Claus come down the chimney or my favorite cartoon character jumped out of the TV screen and wanted to hang out with me. Not only were they lifelike, they actually made me slightly sad when I woke up to a less whimsical reality.

As an adult, with only a hazy recollection of an early childhood that is still sprinkled with a vague remembrance of magic and wonder, the film winds up feeling like my own memory. This childlike state is only underscored by the ending, still heart-wrenching for me to this day: the boy wakes up in excitement the next morning and runs outside only to find that his snowman companion has melted. And lest we think it all was just a dream, he pulls from his pocket a scarf that Santa had given him the night before.

And therein lies the final genius of The Snowman: childhood, for all its magic and awe, still can't avoid the harshness of reality. Snowmen melt. Dreams end. Magic slowly but inevitably gets stripped away as we age. But there is something so real about even the most fantastical of dreams that it becomes tangible, a real piece of magic that's part of ourselves for the rest of our lives. All we need to do is pull out the scarf every once in a while to remind ourselves that it's still there.

It's a beautiful intersection of fantasy and reality, of childhood and maturity, of heartbreak and hope.

As a tribute to one of my favorite works of art, I re-imagined the main musical piece, "Walking In The Air," on guitar with orchestral accompaniment. 

About This Recording

The original version of "Walking in the Air" is piano-based, so I wanted to transcribe it for acoustic guitar. There are some really nice harmonies that complement the main melody, and the chords have a distinct rhythm essential to the identity of the piece, so rather than try and mash them together in an overly-complicated solo arrangement I decided to arrange it for two guitars, which I overdubbed.

I grabbed my new Intel 2-in-1, a computer that switches between a laptop (with a touchscreen) and a tablet. I mentioned in my last post that Intel gave me one of these to fool around with and incorporate into my music-making process, so I used it to watch The Snowman and listen to the score for reference and inspiration. Sometimes I also stopped what I was doing and watched cat videos, which is really my own issue to deal with.

In the film there is a vocal part and some orchestral accompaniment in "Walking in the Air." I didn't try to match the orchestration, but I did want to start fooling around with some brass and string sample libraries I recently got. They're extremely powerful and I've barely scratched the surface of all the features, so for this recording I kept the parts very simple. Luckily, these libraries sound pretty great out of the box for simple chordal arrangements, so I had fun beefing up the overall sound with them.

Here's what I came up with, hope you enjoy it.

Hear it on Soundcloud here. I'd recommend listening with a good pair of headphones.

The computer, by the way, is a Toshiba Satellite. With a Windows 10 upgrade it switches automatically between laptop and tablet mode whenever you rotate the screen. It also has Cortana, which is their virtual personal assistant. So far I've found Windows 10 to be pretty intuitive and a legitimate step up from 8. I can't always decide between wanting to use a laptop or a tablet, so it's pretty handy to have both in one device.

#spon: I'm required to disclose a relationship between our site and Intel This could include Intel providing us w/content, product, access or other forms of payment.

During my first week of procrastinating working very hard on the score for I Hate You, I was naturally a bit curious to learn more about the methods and techniques of established composers. Spending time pretending to pick up tips from the pros was an excellent way to avoid the fact that I was freaking out about how the hell I would successfully pull this shit off. One YouTube video wound up being a big inspiration, but not in the way I had initially imagined.

In a roundtable discussion between some incredibly successful Hollywood composers (including Danny Elfman, Hans Zimmer and Trent Reznor), two parts in particular jumped out at me: one was when each of these musicians—again, we're talking about some of the most well-respected composers in the business—expressed their extreme insecurity any time they started a new project. The other was when they revealed that the first thing they do when starting a score is to spend a lot of time panicking and putting the whole thing off.

On the one hand, it sucks that those feelings apparently never go away. But on the other, I was feeling the exact same thing that some of the greatest composers of our time felt, ergo I was clearly already becoming a legit composer of legendary status. Still, while I had already written a small bit of music that was met with enthusiastic approval, I really did have to get something else started. I didn't have the luxury of spending a 40-hour work week on writing music, after all.

Getting Organized: The Score Grid

First I needed to get good and organized, which is apparently a thing I enjoy doing. I made a grid containing every music cue I had to tackle and assigned each one a name and number. Then I noted things like the movie timecode start/end times, whether the cue was diagetic, non-diagetic or both (I'll explain what that means in a second), if I had started writing any music for the cue, plus a brief note about what needed to be done next. FYI, diagetic music comes from within the scene itself (like the muzak playing in a diner where the characters are eating) as opposed to the movie score. I pretended to know what that word meant when I talked to the director, then looked it up later so I would seem smart.

I saved this master chart in Evernote and linked to individual notes for each cue where I could write detailed ideas, keep track of feedback from the director and add scratch audio recordings from my phone or perhaps images of motivational posters that say "Don't f#$% this up." I had the grid set up next to my workspace to refer to as I jumped between cues.

Below is a screenshot of part of the grid from about two months ago. And yes, I did name a cue "Crotch Shot." Such custom name designations are the privilege one has when scoring, and it had the added bonus of a long email chain with the subject "CROTCH SHOT" showing up over and over in my inbox.

I should probably note here that I actually didn't even think about diagetic music when I first agreed to score the film. It didn't even occur to me that I would be responsible for creating music inside the scenes themselves, which speaks volumes to my inexperience with scoring features. But the variety of diagetic music in this project really upped the diversity and challenge of the scoring process, which was great. If I wasn't feeling a particular cue at any one time, I could always change gears to write the score for an '80s John Carpenter-esque action movie. Which I did. And it was awesome.

Building The Sonic Palette

One of the first things I needed to do was establish the sonic palette, which is really just a fancy way of saying I had to figure out what instruments I'd be using. With modern sample libraries, the timbral possibilities are nearly endless, but in order for a score to feel cohesive there needs to be some consistency in the sounds you're hearing throughout. Brad, the director, said early on that he wanted the score to be mostly organic, which suited me just fine since I planned to base a lot of it on an acoustic guitar foundation. But since one of the main characters really likes video games, there were certain cues where I wanted to include sounds that threw back to classic video game music without sticking out too much sonically. So several pieces received a subtle synth pad based on a square wave (one of the types of synthesized sounds commonly heard in Nintendo games).

The palette was slowly built in this manner. Often I would find myself using a new instrument for a scene, only to realize that it might sound "out of nowhere" in the context of the movie since it hadn't shown up in any music prior. There was one cue where I used a hammered dulcimer sound, then retroactively added dulcimer to several earlier scenes to find that it fit in rather nicely. I never did find a way to work in a kazoo, though. This has been added to the list of my life's greatest regrets.

Of course, you can go overboard. You don't want to include every sound in every cue. You don't want to force an instrument into a place where it doesn't make sense. You also want to have a few surprises along the way to keep it interesting. So it becomes a balancing act, the art of deciding what goes where and why, and more importantly what doesn't go where. As you do this, the sonic palette comes into focus, and that makes each successive decision easier to make.

Once I got the basics of the sonic palette down, it was off to the races...

By the way, you may have noticed what looked like a tablet computer on a stand displaying my master grid in the photo above, but that's actually a 2-in-1 laptop/tablet hybrid. The fine folks at Intel, who you may remember had me make some music on an all-in-one a few months ago, wanted me to give this Toshiba a try as well. It's a laptop with a touch screen that can be rotated 360 degrees to be used at many angles for things like watching video or using it like a tablet. In the above example, I incorporated it into my music-making process by having the grid on-hand to consult or to look up music-related stuff without using any resources from my recording computer, which can come at a premium when you're using as many software instruments as I do. I updated the computer to Windows 10, which was simple and free. One of the benefits to the upgrade was making it way easier to switch between laptop and tablet mode—very key for a computer like this—while still being a clean and familiar interface.

#spon: I'm required to disclose a relationship between our site and Intel This could include Intel providing us w/content, product, access or other forms of payment.

Many people see me as an organized person, but I’m gonna let you in on a dirty little secret: I’m actually an incredibly unorganized person who constantly forgets things. I forget brilliant ideas I thought of five minutes ago and incredibly important tasks I need to do today. The only reason I seem organized is because my life would be a completely unredeemable mess if I weren't vigilant about having my shit together. I'm totally overcompensating.

It's important to keep things as simple as possible when organizing, but that's easier said than done; in addition to an office job that involves a lot of writing, I need to keep track of music projects, comic ideas, blog posts, to do items, grocery lists, amazing ideas for inventions that will make me a triillionaire and any other asinine crap that pops into my head. Plus, I need to remind myself to take the trash to the curb and update my fantasy football roster in a futile attempt to not suck this year.

Keeping things simple means using as few apps as possible to implement a single organizational flow. There are about a thousand and four productivity apps out there, and after trying way too many of them, I've mapped out a system that works really well for managing both my creative and personal lives using three apps. While there's obviously no one-size-fits-all solution, maybe my plan can work for you, too. Here's how I do it.

PLEASE NOTE: I am not sponsored by or affiliated with any of the apps I discuss here. In fact, many of them can be easily swapped out for similar apps that you prefer. This is more about the method than the tools themselves. Although if they want to send me free stuff, I'm not above that in the slightest.

Step 1: Dump 'n' Sort

The first step to taking control is having a place to dump every single thought you have for categorizing and organizing later. Dumping is as important as it is funny to say. For me, this is best done with Evernote. It’s where I keep all ideas, projects, recipes, reference information, etc. The best part of Evernote is that you can use it very simply or set up complex, powerful systems. I use tags like a boss because they're more versatile than notebooks.

Here's what I do: any time I think of a blog post topic or a funny joke or a song lyric or something, I send it immediately to an Evernote folder called Inbox. I do this by either making a new note on my phone while I'm on the go or forwarding an email to Evernote or clipping a webpage using the web clipper. The only exception here is if it is a simple, single-step task that has any urgency (like "take out the trash tonight"), in which case I skip directly to Step 2. Whatever app you use for dumping, the most important thing is that it's readily available at any given moment (i.e. on your phone) so you don't forget anything.

The second half of Step 1 is sorting your dumpbox, or else it just becomes a useless graveyard of formerly relevant thoughts. Assign a time once a day or once a week to clear it out, and I mean clear it out completely. Nothing should ever sit in there—it's the beginning of the journey, not the destination. What I do is clean up the rough ideas I jotted down, tag them according to my own system (see below), delete them if they're f#$%ing stupid (this happens often), move any urgent tasks or scheduled events to Steps 2 & 3 as you'll see momentarily, then delete or move everything out of the Inbox vigilantly (I use two other notebooks called "Active" and "Archive," but it doesn't really matter where notes go as long as they're tagged properly).

Here's a glimpse at part of my Evernote tag hierarchy. Strategically hidden are my "crimes to commit" and "embarrassing blackmail material" tags, among others less relevant to this post. I never keep sensitive personal information in Evernote like account numbers, passwords or personal documents. I keep a separate Evernote account for work stuff because I like to keep it in its own silo.

Finally, I keep a few key tags in the shortcuts area and only use these for projects I'm working on right now. This way I have a quick place to access everything I want to get done next without overwhelming myself with all the other stuff I may or may not do in the future. When I finish a project, I remove the shortcut tag, delete or archive the note and find something new to take its place.

Step 2: Taskify

Anything that's urgent, has a specific deadline or is a simple To Do item goes in the task list. This includes recurring tasks and reminders to set an early alarm for tomorrow or buy a new brake light bulb or kidnap a small child. Todoist is my app of choice for this.

While Evernote is the first place ideas go and is home for my bigger projects, I check Todoist to see what I absolutely need to do today before I can move on to anything else. Occasionally I'll have a note in Evernote with more information about a Todoist task, but I've found with this system I rarely need to do that.

Everyone swears by a different to do app, but I like Todoist because it’s simple, it’s very quick for adding tasks and due dates/recurrences, it has an easy drag-and-drop interface and there are well-made apps for every place you could want to use it: your phone, your web browser, etc. I need a task list app that has zero steps between my typing a task and it being added to my list. I hate apps that make me choose a due date or a priority or something before I can enter it in and move on to add another one. Todoist has all that stuff, but it's optional. I like to make sure I only have a small handful of tasks to do on a given day so I can get them done and move on to my Evernote shortcuts. Or at least move on to playing Fruit Ninja for three straight hours.

Here's a look at what my Todoist might look like. In this particular example, "Record a dubstep version of 'Hey Jude'" actually probably belongs in Evernote instead, unless for some reason it had a hard deadline. Considering its vast real-world applications, that could be the case.

Step 3: Scheme

By now you've dumped, sorted and tasked. There's one final step for complete organization, and that's to scheme, or plan out your schedule. I need to have events like meetings, concerts and dinner dates live side-by-side with my tasks so I have a visual representation of everything that's going on in one place.

For this I use Sunrise calendar because it takes my already existing Google calendars and kicks them up a notch or three by integrating with a ton of apps, most notably Todoist. Now I can glance at my calendar and see events and meetings, what time the Eagles will be embarrassingly beaten this week and my Todoist tasks, which I can drag and drop to different times right in the calendar if I want. I get reminders on my phone for both tasks and calendar items from a single app.

I also like Sunrise because it has a nice design, an easily-hidden sidebar, Facebook event syncing and a lot more. I do have a few quibbles since it's a pretty new service, but for the most part they're minor and hopefully temporary. Again, any calendar app you prefer will work for this step as long as you can get your tasks integrated.

Here's a screenshot of part of my calendar day.

Go With The Workflow

Even though the calendar is Step 3 here, it's actually the first thing I look at in the morning to check out a snapshot of my day ahead. Then I check in with Todoist throughout the day to see what stuff needs to get checked off the list, and later I consult Evernote to dive into whatever bigger projects I’m currently tackling. This covers just about everything I need to feel productive and on top of my entire life in just three steps and three apps. As a result, my life doesn’t burn to the ground in an apocalyptic conflagration as it would without these tools. Thank god for the Internet.

Here's a handy flow chart that summarizes the above:

Now if someone would develop an app that unified all 3 of these services into one, I'd give 'em 20 bucks and hug 'em forever. How do you organize your creative life?

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