Many are sharing their Facebook auto-generated year in review slideshows. Ill offer something verbal instead of pictoral. 2014 has been a challenging and darker year than any other in my 30s. Stage 4 cancer has touched my immediate family (though now in remission, cancer is still a timebomb). An auto collision resulting in severe injury has touched my extended family. My Susanna is struggling with migraines more than ever and I feel powerless to help her suffering. Its crushing to watch those I love endure these maladities. Activity and revenue in my business is on a pronounced decline for a blogs worth of reasons. I have been ruminating on crescendoing existential crises that concern the state of the music production industry, the decreasing sustainability of music production as a profitable career, and the nagging notion that the best years Ive experienced at it may already be in the past, despite the fact that Im currently attaining better quality sound for my artists than ever before. Im frustrated at the erosion of some personal and professional relationships on which I mistakenly thought I could depend in the long term, but thats to be expected in an industry where loyalties often barely last a season to begin with and a few sour people would rather take advantage instead of grow and sustain an ongoing working relationship. My decade-old life goal of building a new home on my Rockford mountaintop seems to drift with foggy postponement into the future as a presently insurmountable proposition because of its forecasted cost... its not like I seek to build anything extravagant, but the only way to catalyze this plan is to sell my present home for liquid cash, which puts me out of a place to run a studio. I imagine some of these concerns are very first world problems and look silly to people with more pressing issues lower on Maslows heirarchy. Some people struggle to feed their families and cant pay their bills despite working several jobs. Still - dont invalidate anothers struggle because their unique perspective cannot be perceived from outside their circumstances. Its just been a year of reflection and questioning the current path more than usual for me, wondering if its the best to take and what changes I need to make. I wouldnt diagnose this as preliminary midlife crisis, because its not like Im thinking of buying a motorcycle or taking up skydiving or moving on a whim to some other corner of the globe. The time to reinvent yourself is best enacted by the drive of your own volition, rather than by the force of changing circumstances which are impartial to your ability to adapt when they strike. The new year is an occasion on which to state resolution, and Im particularly good at keeping them, so the coming months will be characterized by some changes Ill make before the need to make them is forced upon me. Its time to become more disciplined. Im going to continue learning nutrition and fitness to reach some target health goals across the next year. Im going to become more effective at networking. Im going to record my own music purely for the love of doing it, even if the hope of generating even paltry revenue from it is evaporated in this age of the depraved widespread opinion that artists should give their art away for free. My studio business practices will galvanize as Ill be more selective of the work I take on, and Im restructuring my pricing for the first time in 9 years. For months now Ive been avidly studying currency intraday trading in the foreign exchange markets, which I find to be an utterly fascinating way to make income. I am experimenting with some practice forex accounts and have experienced a vision of the possibilities - disciplined currency trading can nicely supplement and even supplant ones career, and this could be an aspiration that lies a few years ahead for me. I also still aspire to build to relocate my home and studio when a threshold of true preparedness is crossed, and despite the expense Ill do whatever is reasonably needed to hasten its fruition since time is irretrievably accelerating past. I dont know what Ive posted here. Its a rambling combination of confession, introspection, and resolution. I hope each of you had a good year, or if you didnt, that you can summon the means to make the next year better - to find and provide fulfillment in your relationships, to find self-actualization in the work you do, and to make the people and things you touch better than you found them. Those are all I really want in life, even if the circumstances by which they are accomplished undergo change.
Posted on: Wed, 31 Dec 2014 20:57:48 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015