Thank you everyone who’s followed so far. Couldn’t wait till tomorrow to post lol.
Cheers,
Tom
Tag Archives: blog
Stage fright, comparing yourself and other frets
Me with Cookeilidh at a new bridge opening show
It is very easy to get nervous about going up in front of people, and even more frustrating when you see someone else seemingly do that like no problem, doing stuff you never thought of. So what to do?
Have I been nervous in performance recently? Yes of course! Do I compare myself? Oh probably that too, but that’s just natural. You see someone doing what you never thought of and well, now it is thought of and you can choose to slueth it out later. Truth is we all have such different tastes, approaches and physicality so naturally that other guy (or girl) is going to do things you’re not. Like if I see someone who is slapping and popping all over the place or playing complex Bebop patterns on their bass…on one hand it’s like “I can’t do that” but on the other hand, would I actually want to study that music for hours on end? With what I listen to…is that stuff present? No? Well that explains that…
Not to be flippant but it kind of goes into the heart of the other bugaboo of stage fright.
You don’t have to explain anything, feel bad or apologize for anything. What you do (which could be musical or not) comes from your soul, your heart, your study, your world and it’s you. That isn’t going to change so why be nervous. You are doing your work up there so it’s better to be the most relaxed you that you can be.
How do you get there? Practice is the obvious one, but then there’s how to do that. I have lots of different things to work on so I like zeroing in on certain rough parts daily and repeatedly working them until I’m satisfied. I never practice the day of a show on the instrument I’m playing (got that from, of all places…Anne of Green Gables)
“promised I wouldn’t open a textbook so I wouldn’t get the jitters!”
So instead of playing my bass, or opening any textbooks respectively, I’ll go for a walk, play piano which I actually started really getting into between sets at a big Christmas gig last year, or even meditation. For the latter…yeah, yeah, get the Calm app. I have the subscription to that one and it’s totally worth it. Going for walks is my magic cure all. I take, oh lots of anxiety in my tummy and so walking is just the best for settling that and if you feel bloated or what-have-you it’s really calming. And for weight loss it’s great as your target range isn’t very high so you can keep healthy while you get centered. Walking to music has been my thing since decades ago. Find music that puts you in a calm (not pump fist in air) state. Or go the other way with it. Before a show, like on the way there, I listen to stuff that’s fun.
Do the practice. Be slightly early. Now just have fun with it.
“Out the door…thank you very much..”
Just having fun with it 😂
Cheers ,😉
Tom
Your own personal genius
Is there something you were meant to do that you haven’t discovered yet either? What I can tell you is that there is every chance you’re just around the corner from it, but what is it?
It seemed appropriate to start with a musical reference to this as the history of modern music is loaded with these life twists. Martin Gore was just a band member before the previous songwriter quit and he was thrust into the role as he already wrote one track for his band Depeche Mode.
There’s of course the story of how Phil Collins replaced the exiting Peter Gabriel because he had a go from his drum set and all the guys freaked right out. But what’s really interesting is often sparkling talents for a given instrument like how Jaco Pastorius was originally a drummer before the bassist quit and thought he’d try, and within weeks was on his way to being the greatest bassist in history.
It makes you wonder and what if it’s not confined to music? There’s every chance you are the world’s greatest cojone player but it could also be in some other realm beyond playing crazy cool world beats.
There’s the classic story of 3M, where the scientist was trying to make a permanent adhesive and instead got this stuff that was sticky but didn’t work at all. He realized the potential of a sticky note and the rest was history.
I like the idea that, put simply, the search continues and as you do, you follow what intrigues you. Jaco was in the right area. In fact, from his drum kit he only needed to be on the instrument a few feet to his right. It’s all “In the Meantime” as you search for your thing. How long can you search? I’m 44 and I’ve had bass students 20 years older than me. I know people older than that who are trying their hand at boatbuilding.
And you don’t have to… anything. You don’t have to be the world’s best to enjoy it. Sometimes it’s just fun. I’ve been digging into keyboard playing over the last few months because of a Christmas gig that had long breaks and a piano in the back. I started thinking (ironically) “You know, I think I get how that bit from Depeche Mode would go..”(I had a understanding of keys, but never tried to really play two-handed that much)
But isn’t talent reserved for some higher-blessed types? Possibly not. There is lots of study on this, in fact one book to look out for is called “The Talent Code” by Daniel Coyle where he slueths out world famous talent hotbeds around the world to find what’s going on. What he discovers is that it is less magically bestowed talent than it is simply how we approach learning something. Daniel has another book called the “Little book of Talent” which condenses this idea of deliberate practice which I won’t go into other than it’s about pushing into the weak spots of what you do, in a way that you can repeat with immediate feedback. Definitely check out his books which are available on the Hoopla app. And no, I don’t work for him, he’s just good.
So is there anything you’ve thought of trying your hand at recently.
Who knows? You might be the genius we’ve all been waiting for.
😉
Cheers,
Tom
5 key tips to blogging after my 100th
Bridge the Gap
Been really busy this weekend but I had to stop in and talk about this because I’ve been wanting to do this for a while and now after just passing my 100th post it seemed the perfect time.
Let’s get straight to it. Maybe I’ll look at this at 500 and go what was I thinkin, but here we go…
1) Use an image.
Everything I’m about describe is used right above this by the way. Yes, you need some images and it’s pretty easy even on a phone where I work each morning. On your bottom left is a little plus sign. Make sure you leave some space so you can type under and then look for a photo connected to your idea. If you’re really crazy you can do photos the day before so that you’re not going ahhh.
2) Hook.
This is a Sol Stein’s trick. By the way, get Sol Stein’s on writing and devour it. That book rules. But in that first two sentences create a question or something that would make someone go “well, now I have to know what happens”
Ie. A character going “do not tell anyone what I am about to tell you.”
3) Hashtag
Before publishing go in post settings and scoll down to where you can put in relevant tags. Between 5 and 8 are best and range from specific (your town) to broad (like “writing”)
4) Prompt lists.
Lots of these to Google out there if you look. Not all are great but sometimes they will jog another idea you had.
5) Post lots.
Sorry if that’s obvious but yeah, it’s like anything. My girlfriend’s way more successful at live.me than I am and that’s because she works that puppy daily and makes connections all over the shop. Same here. If it’s your first post ever these tricks will help but it’s probably not going to start in triple digits just yet
6) **bonus** ColorNote App!
Thought of this one just now. Get a note app like ColorNote. Mine is filled with just pages of random ideas and you can just load on the go through your day and then have a boo just before you work. McCartney mentioned songwriting like this and uh… he’s pretty good at it..😉
Have an awesome Sunday!
Cheers!
Tom
Love, Sex and other things blown out of proportion
I know…oh, behave! But this subject seems to need talking, more and more as things get confused. In some less-known tribal communities in the present day everyone walks about either nude or mostly nude and the number of sexual assaults or sexual challenges are through the floor non-existent. These people still “do it” and I can’t imagine it doesn’t still feels good but it is simply a part of life.
If nothing else mankind’s fascination with this subject is the stuff of legend…both love and sex. Both are the subject of songs, poems and while they are connected…love is seen as the softer, magical thing and sex is like it’s darker seedier side that dare not speak it’s name.
Then there’s the recent Incel thing which first makes you laugh until you realize how serious they are and how angry that gets people. It’s the same reason that I think “Friends with benefits” and casual stuff of either side doesn’t work. There is still powerful emotion going on. Indeed with the writing of this I have to steer the ship somewhat carefully as I want to explain that a) it’s all going to be ok and b) no, I don’t discount how you might feel.
I really believe that there is someone for everyone and that even if it takes a while before that 1st time, it will eventually happen. Physically there is no kind of person not attractive to someone, it’s simply that we have put certain looks and body types up as the it girl and it boy. Go back a few hundred years and larger people were it as that, like in African cultures, suggested wealth. One of the challenges is of course the thing both you, dear reader, and I are staring at right now. Now of course I love my ability to make use of devices and technology to put out content and connect but it is still over a synthetic machine. We are social animals in the first place. We are tribal and family centric beings, even though many families have problems so your families may not be of a “traditional” set up (may instead be a group of friends, step parents, something else). As such we need to actually be out with other beings in a physical sense. That is the one thing no app can ever, ever do is recreate the physical presence of other people. It’s been “adult material’s” one failing since Playboy first hit the shelves, it can never recreate the actual size perspective, warmth and so on of (for men with this, in traditional sense) a romantic partner. Hey but if you need that until the real thing comes along, “whatever gets you through the night…”
It’s so funny with sex advice and love advice you see all over magazines and now online as well though. I take the line from a terrific British comedy and recently played with it in a song about how this idea could really make it all work. I’m a sucker for hippy like liberalism, I fully admit (are all hippys liberals? Another discussion for another day I suppose).
Anyways the comedy is called May to December
And the quote from it was “You make yourself happy by making the other person happy.”
Just that.
What’s great about it is that it’s not about what you want, other than seeing her/him smile. Knowing you made his/her day. I think the other thing is then the joy of building something like a family.
I grew up a few friend nerd by the way so if this is you please believe me when I say that you’re not a lost cause. What helped me? Other people. But in order for that to happen, I went to work, started playing that bass I just got in bands (you don’t have to by the way, this is my example), got involved in other stuff. This probably made me less an impossible mess around people. Things weren’t easy. Still aren’t but I like what that one woman said about men she would date…
“Men are like wine. They have to be crushed and go through it a few times before they are something I want to have dinner with.”
She’s a comedian, so calm down…I don’t mean you need to be beat down but experience does come from learning with comes from bad judgement so use this phone to find out what you can do today outside of your four walls and get yer shoes.
Trust me, the friends, love and yes, the sex, will be worth it.
Cheers,
Tom
Morning Page
Books piled next to my coffee and water that I want to get through. It must be a thing to do with our age, because I do remember a lady complaining that her husband used to grab books from the library and never read them. I get some like that. I like to have that option. It is hard to see this as a pure morning page because well a it’s on here of course, but also the rule is that you are supposed to do nothing else before you get going. Frankly not even the coffee. It is sort of fair as I don’t smoke anymore so nothing is dragging me outside. Listening to my study mix which is basically low Roar and Harold Budd. Need more music. Always looking for that. Used to be Cocteau Twins all the time. Enya is the queen of fantasy writing. But yeah already saw Twitter and groaned when I saw the new addition of new shootings. Twitter is my newspaper because it is wide open and both sides can speak. It’s just depressing how everyone is used to shootings and it’s like everyone knows how to reach afterwards like it’s the same old thing. This was at 8 am. It’s that time now here. I can only guess this angry kid didn’t want to wait all day but that’s ridiculous. I know I shouldn’t think about this. I don’t have kids but I remember being a kid in Stellys High in 1992 and back. I remember being in home room as the sun crept over the farm field nearby and my desk. I remember the problems too. It wasn’t easy for me as well, and I mean I was a really picked on one. Now we know that that isn’t why always but some stuff can be but I just think of that horror crossing that memory and I can’t believe everyone should accept it as just a part of reality.
Got to change that subject. That’s another old guy thing. I think we make some sense. We’ve learned a thing or two and want to help inact change, even if it’s just some influence of someone hearing it once. We want to make a difference before our time is up to. That’s all midlife really is. Your mortality is suddenly staring at you so you live it up. That must be me now or close or whatever. I didn’t have a blog post idea this morning so that’s why frankly I just went for the morning page idea but one I have is for exercise and weight loss. I don’t have a specific diet that I can unload but I have learned a bunch of things as I lost about that 40 lbs in two years. So it’s not like super fast but it’s sort of overall health. I’m not rich. I just got paid and only about 60 of that is actually mine. I do believe that income dictates health. When you’re poor you eat to keep going or feel not hungry. It makes me throw my hands up you know. In a love-relationship you make yourself happy by knowing the other person is happy, or that’s how it should work. Imagine if we applied that idea to everyone around the world. Imagine if we were all about how can we make sure that everyone is doing ok and has enough. When you go this way people act like it’s hippyish but Freddie Mercury said that in Heaven for Everyone and it’s to me less about just being “nice” then it is actually good business. If everyone is well fed, well clothed and can calmly make informed choices then it’s good for everyone. I abhor the stuff about how War is good for science. We would get there eventually and we wouldn’t have things like…oh I don’t know…Hiroshima or the underground secret weapon of the Somme that the British used only once on the Germans as described by Tony Robinson in Time Team. That latter and less known weapon was so horrible that the Englishmen had tears when they saw it used as they didn’t want that. Aww crap how do I get off this one lol
Had a dream when I woke up. They always seem about water. Had so many about almost going the brink of waterfalls that I wrote the song Precipice. So many like this are still in mind long after I wake up and then I’m trying to think how I would have handled them differently. Like with Niagara I was like “Ok, where is the point of no return, just so I know.”. Now I live on Vancouver Island so my chance of the tragedy of being swept over Horseshoe Falls today is pretty low. There’s angel Falls too but from what I’ve seen you would have really to put in the effort for that to happen. Wish I wasn’t afraid of heights because wouldn’t it be great to hangglide in a place like Angel Falls or somewhere like that. Or fly an ultralight. Or Zipline lol.
Should start practice now before all the heady excitement of banking.
Cheers
Tom
Library Firepower
It was once stated that no place is as dangerous on earth as that local place in town, that one with the books. I like that, but I can see the reasoning. It’s the same reason barista’s were once thrown into rivers in sacks to drown. The last thing the powers that be want you to be is sober and learning.
There is so much you can get out of your local that it’s not even funny! In this age when the best thing you can have is a “side hustle” the place to fire up your ideas is in a place just down the road. Unlike this overwhelming thing the library is a single task environment. Your eyes scan over shelves and see things, dropping you in ideas and stories that you would never have thought of. Here’s the kicker…your not alone in this endeavour!
Exactly the environment those powers that be would hate! Then you add music, media, online cataloging and more things than I could describe and well, the revolutionaries of Les Miserables or Che Guevara’s would envy you.
Start the Revolution today.
😎
Cheers,
Tom
All big n tall n grown up
When is the moment you felt actually grown up?
First thing that springs to mind instantly is what age would that be anyways?
Technically adulthood begins at the age of eighteen but I know I still felt like a kid then. I went pretty much straight from Nintendo to minimum wage with almost no discernable bump in the road. I’ve heard being an artist keeps you young. I don’t know if it’s that or just our immaturity that does it, and I mean that in the best possible way. The fact that I’m on a bus at 43 right now typing this because, “well, why not? It would be cool” is apparent to me. Despite the fact that it’s a trip to my doctor which is still in the same Saanichton location since childhood (hence it being a trip) Most people my age have a car, the real serious job, kids, credit cards, bank loans and are renovating something. I’m learning to tap on my bass, getting ready to play St. Patrick’s, trying to find new beats to track and other things that are, let’s be honest, as grown up as playing with moonbeams. Even when I first mispelled “moonbeams” just now my cantankerous phone didn’t really try. Come on Pogson, you’re blah blah years old. I have a feeling that phrase will haunt me.
I have moments still of grownupness. Working minimum wage like jobs has a weird vampiric effect of making you feel like a kid when you’re not. My job now is still one done by people who I could easily be the parent of, or the weird but adorably fun uncle with the guitar. Go me.
Still grown up moments occur. Most are health when you find yourself limping because your foot just got moody. My gut health is a long running favorite. Pretty bad when you get very excited about the health properties of golden beets. This really happened.
Almost at my stop so I’ll wrap up. I think we will always have the adult and child in us. We need both, each one taking care of the other. Your adult is the protector and the child is the one who makes it all worthwhile. The child is more fun. It doesn’t need the washroom and then says “nope, nothing” once you’re there. The adult is then understandably grumpy. The child makes the joke of it. Suggests Instagram. You’re adult screams #AreYouF’NNuts?
The child winks and runs off and the adult follows, still nursing that damn sore foot.
Have fun!
😒😃
Tom
Right here and now
Bit of a different situation this morning has me here actually doing morning writing which hasn’t happened in a year or so.
It was the same thing that spurred on the first filmed script I ever did. It’s basically how I am. I don’t really relax that much when I know there’s still things I could do or I want to do.
After things happened a year ago I moved heavily towards music. In truth both things are always and have always been there. I just swung the creative pendulum hard. It is sort of fair as my band is literally the longest running job I’ve ever had and there has been other musical successes along the way (which helps me end the long running question of “I don’t know, am I meant to do this” amongst other reasons. Trust me this has been heavily considered, both from without and from within.)
Presently, along with trying to push my work with Cookeilidh to a new level I have the goal of compiling a cd of my own recordings. I have been writing and trying these newer songs out on Soundcloud/Instagram. My principle inspiration came from the story behind the music of Low Roar, who reputedly wrote a song a day for ages. With everything else that’s pretty out of my range but I have held to at least one new one per week since last year, some of which still haven’t been on social media for different reasons. Others aren’t born yet, and are still in note form.
I’d like to get back to writing again, perhaps in a new partnership process but this is exactly the thing. My way of working was very specific back then and now it’s finding a new way. Velios was part of that exploration process, despite it’s flaws. I dont have the glacial patience for writing novels like I used to. I wrote a book back in my late 20s (not published) and it was such an albatross its just put away. It’s the time it takes, and when I say that, I mean the loss of time if you’ve spent months or years only to find it’s a dud. In film or music you can sniff out a dud in under a day. Films start with the pitch process, music with the first take. Let it sit and look again. Very easy in fiction to make it more complex that a show which has to be a simple episodic product. Or maybe I’m wrote. Just can’t imagine pitching to myself.
We have company over which is why I’m not in our living room, in bed having coffee, which brings me to my rambles as the city of Victoria undoubtably wakes up outside the curtains.
Was thinking I could get back into those blog a day things you find as they were fun. I mean, i dont exactly wake up and immediately snap my headphones on every day so it’s not impossible. That and morning pages which this post virtually is now. Not in the purest sense of course as morning pages are much less filtered and…ok…one thing I find annoying is that I was told morning pages have to absolutely the first thing you do. That first thing tyranny drives me crazy. What doesn’t vie for that morning pole position anyways?
Seems like a good spot to finish.
Can’t drink my coffee when I want to also stretch my legs into the cooler parts of the blanket.
😀
Tom
Hey over there…Sincerely, over here.
I’ve never used this site for its actual blog purpose so I thought I would crack on to it. I also dont know if I’ll use this same time as I am on my break at work. I’ve been working primarily on music lately, so since that stuff isnt hear and I have some weird cough thing, right now is momentarily fine.
In the style of Dwight…ground rules.
I will try, i promise, to swerve from the political. I address this plenty elsewhere but, as still a fan of things like the tv shows Early Edition and Vicar of Dibley and other remnants of the nineties when things were simpler and I still actually didnt know the difference between and American democrat and a republican (yes…i know), I would like this to stay primarily in that world. Suffice to say, much of my other social media gets involved there. I also am to write sans any close-proximity-politics, more commonly known as gossip. I have learned only too well how that bites you on the ass, especially considering (and this is a lesson I continue to learn and more should) nothing is simple and you really dont know that much about people around you. You only have your perspective which is flawed at best so why present the idea that your and expert.
The other thing I like the idea of is creating a space which I actually dont use in a marketing way. Now it is very tricky not to be disingenuous here as all social media is about connections but what I mean is my goal isnt to meet you at the store front where I’m doing everything with a morning dj voice and the happiest emoji I could find.
Ill meet you at the back of the store by the garbage lock up where I use to smoke. Been two months now so I don’t do that but you can if you want. It’s weird but someone else smoking really doesn’t trigger me. Being adhd and missing those near-meditative breaks does that, amongst other physical things.
So that’s about it. I’m Tom. I work, I make music and write off and on. I’ll be back in a bit.
Tom's Creativity Blog 