Today, a bit of a cool lesson/tip/hack on getting through stuff that might be difficult or you just don’t want to deal with. Let’s face it, the world we live in is challenging. This leads us in having to do a lot of crap that we simply don’t feel like doing. These can be small items – like broken house/car/music gear item to practicing/writing a song all the way to real serious shit.
On a podcast “Metal Motivation” (now called University Of Baddasery Podcast) hosted by my bros C.J. Ortiz – The Metal Motivator and Pat MacNamara there was a gentleman being interviewed that had extreme health issues. Like, I might not be here tomorrow extreme. So, extreme, that sometimes he had to set a goal of making it through the next 5 minutes, next 10 minutes – however long he needed to get through. This technique allowed him to come out on the other side and has taught me a big lesson as well.
The lesson is that when I got to do stuff I don’t want to do or stuff that is freaking diffucult, I break it down into very small compartments of time or small direct tasks. Today, I was going to a meeting that I dreaded and I said to myself to just concentrate on driving to the location first. I made a point not to think of the meeting itself, or the place inside once I get there, because I did not want to paint a story of what iffs. My goal was just to get there. Once I did arrive, I said to myself that all you have to do it to find the location and tell the people that I am there. I said to myself – just do that. Do that little task, get this done only.
We usually can survive anything as long as we concentrate on surviving next 5 minutes or til the end of today. There is a saying that says you can survive anything one day at a time. This technique helps you stay in the moment on what is important right “now” and not in 2 hours or later today. I’ll have to say this is a fantastic way of going about.
Even with guitar. When I want to write a song, I chisel out task for the next 30 minutes for me to go downstairs, turn-on your amps, tune up the guitar and open up a new Pro Tools session. That’s all. Let me complete that first, I say. Truth is once I am done, I want to do more. So, I come up with a task that for the next 30 minutes I will record my riffs down to a click track. I am not looking for a complete song, or even to be incredibly impressed. I just want to get my ideas down. If that is all I did today, then I completed the 2 tasks I had for my songwriting part of my day. Sure is more than getting all freaked out with how a new song is going to come out and how will I get this “project” done. This is how to get this stuff done!
And, don’t forget to talk to yourself! Pretend you are giving advice to someone you care about. I talk to myself internally or sometimes audibly if I need to drive home a point. Sometimes it’s the only intelligent thing you hear all day!
