How to handle a crisis of confidence
A couple of days ago I wrote a post that didn't stay up on the website very long. It was called 'A transition of sorts' and it outlined my plan to give up on fulltime music. It was long, whiney, inflated, egotistical, sad. Actually, I'm going to restore it...hang on.
Ok. Done. I put it back up on the site. Go read but it's a real trainwreck. I'm sorry in advance. You know what? I'm not even going to copy a link to it here.
Those of you who have followed me for some time know that I was a professional, working, fulltime guitarist for about three years. You also know that I had to move back to my hometown and take a 'real job'—a day job—to pay off some student loans after college. And you know that I got pretty comfortable with that paycheck. That I made good money but spent even better money, chasing gear and thinking that owning amazing stuff would get me back to where I wanted to be as a musician. I told my story in a post called 'More is more to lose.' I shared that even though I dreamed of being a fulltime musician again I made some stupid life choices and now I'm working to get back on track.
When I wrote and subsequently deleted the super whiney blog post about quitting my dream on Sunday, I was in a bit of a crisis of confidence. The crisis hasn't really gone away. I'm 27. I haven't played guitar as a fulltime job since 21. It was easier back then, I didn't have so many expenses, I wasn't sick of Ramen. It was all so new, it was an adventure, and it was before some other circumstances in life that hurt me deeply. It was before I grew afraid of taking risks. It was before my big corporate job.
Today I feel like a fraud. I'm running a blog about professional music and the life of a professional musician when I'm not gigging nearly as much as I used to. Somedays I blog just because it's all I can do until I'm back on track. It has me feeling like a fraud. In my whiney blog post that I deleted and then restored so that you, my readers, can witness the trainwreck that it was, I wrote this:
At 18, I was a professional, touring guitarist with a worship band. We traveled each weekend. For more than 30 weekends per year, we would travel and play Friday night, Saturday morning, Saturday night, Sunday morning, and travel home Sunday nights. We played chapel services on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. On Wednesdays, our only day off, we would rehearse 4 hours and play in our home churches that night (another hour or so of work).
Like a ballerina wears holes in her shoes and bruises on her toes, I wore my hands to the bone playing music. Calluses ripping and tearing and forming new calluses, muscles in my fingers spasming, wrist aches, and elbow pains—I endured them all to do what I love. I adapted to treat the pain. I kept super glue in my guitar case, to glue the tips of my fingers. I learned hand and arm stretches and performed them like ritual before picking up the guitar.
Now I do none of those things. If I'm lucky, I get Sunday off to attend church or play the morning service. I got to play last Friday night for the first time in ten weeks, it was my first Friday night off in ten weeks. For TEN STRAIGHT WEEKS I've had to stay late in the office and work weekends. And then to hear myself whine about all of this makes it even worse. I sound like the guy who peaked in high school—you know, like the Buddy Garrity character who sells used cars and can't shut up about the good ol' days, when he was on the championship football team—I sound like that guy.
So I'm stuck where I'm at and I'm whining about where I'm at and I hate to hear myself whine. Now add the social element, that all of this has played out on Instagram. Being just brutally real with you here: I struggle with the impulse to do and say things just to grow or maintain my following on social media. I struggle with the message I'm sending to younger guitarists. I struggle to present myself cohesively while still allowing for flexibility in some of the choices I make. I struggle to show or admit on social media when I'm wrong about something. I struggle with the thought that my following really only came when I was buying and reviewing gear like crazy, hashtag Geartalking like a mad man, that's when people got excited about me. Where were those people when all I could afford was a Boss DD-5 but I was touring the US? I asked that question of a close friend, a fellow guitarist, but one who's had a much more prolific career than mine. He gave me some incredible wisdom. He told me not to blame people for only jumping on board when I started collecting cool gear. It was a hobby, I was having fun with it, they wanted to share in that fun, they valued my thoughts on the gear I bought, used, reviewed, and sold. There's nothing wrong with that. But I'm also under no obligation to continue to impress those people. If they want to see gear but my Instagram feed becomes post after post about my girlfriend with little inspirational quotes under each one, they can unfollow, that's their right.
Because of the wisdom that this one friend dropped on me, I decided to reach out to a few more friends and convey this same disappointment and morose to them, this crisis of confidence. I told them about how I'm starting to think I should give up this dream, how I'm looking for a way to keep going but I feel old, out of touch, bored with gear, trapped by student loan debt and trapped in my job. I asked them for wisdom.
My friends are incredible. And I should add, this is how to handle a crisis of confidence in a nutshell: Reach out to your closest friends. Share, and listen. Glean wisdom. Here's a bit of wisdom I received from them, and I think it's helpful to anyone who might be stuck in a bit of a rut like I am, anyone who's stuck in a job they hate, stuck in a cycle of comparison to others on social media, or stuck in an addiction.
You don't get joy from a website. The people who like your pictures, follow you, comment, read your blog...that's all great, but you can't treat it like a measure of your joy. Most people like winning, like competing, so tracking followers and likes is an easy way to quantify progress, like a high score. But a high score in what? what's all that a measure of, really? Progress in what? to what end? It's JUST likes and follows. A 'follow' isn't a measurement of anything more than a follow. It's not a reflection on you or the content you're generating. It's not your job to provide people with likable content anyway. Just do what you love and don't worry about the follower count.
Take a leap of faith with your career and you'll go further than you'd think. Nobody is going to hire you based on your Instagram profile or blog or Youtube channel or even recordings alone, you have to get out there and pursue it passionately like there's no safety net. You have to take risks.
Don't be afraid to make a fool of yourself.
When you picture yourself in professional music, don't picture the gear around you. Hashtag Gearnerd crap isn't real music. Make goals in music, not in gear.
Don't take yourself so seriously with gear. If you want to buy something, buy it. You're an adult. If you want to sell something, sell it. There's no need to justify your decision to anybody. Don't pressure yourself to buy, to sell, or to keep. And don't let others pressure you to use what they think is best.
You have fun doing it, keep having fun doing it.
You're valuable and credible whether you're gigging 200 times a year or work a day job to be able to gig when you can. (That's me right now, working a day job, trying to pay down debt, dreaming of fulltime music, blogging cause somedays it's the only thing I can do to work on my career). If you, too, are doing all that you can, know that you're valuable as you are.
Don't hide your personality. Don't feel like you're stuck in a rut musically—those few tired riffs and licks you play over and over—that's your comfort zone, that's part of your personality. People WILL hire you to put your personality on a record or in their mix. Be confident that, with all the genres out there, and all the bands and producers and record companies and indie projects that are out there, you'll find a place where your personality on guitar can shine.