subnoto::indico

The experience of participating in Marc Weidenbaum’s Junto SoundCloud group has been fun, challenging, terrifying, and a revelation. (That’s a lot of stuff for what has been two relatively simple projects thus far!) I’m thrilled to be participating.

• Fun – Participating in a supportive group, around a creative activity that you enjoy, with people whose abilities you respect, and around something the outcome of which you care about, is a hands down blast.
• Challenging – Each week I am presented with constraints around raw material, objectives, and time. These constraints present a challenge … and enforce discipline. I can’t endlessly wank off with presets or noodle with patches and “what-ifs”. I have to make decisions all along the process and decide when something is ‘good enough’ and move into the next step.
• Terrifying – There is some very very good stuff being submitted by those involved. As a participant, I am putting my stuff ‘out there’ for all of those folks to hear. I’ve got to be confident in my abilities and comfortable with my current limitations…and realize that with each effort, those abilities broaden and the limitations recede (or at least change in nature).
• Revelatory – This one is a bit tricky, so you will have to follow me. I don’t (as of yet) do this for a living. I do however have one of those high-stress daily corporate gigs. Because of that, it’s really easy to imagine that were this avocation turned into a vocation, it would be a nirvana-like, alternate profession of endlessly enjoyable, thrilling, psychically satisfying activity. However, if I squint my eyes enough, the stress from trying to juggle the Junto projects with work, family, etc., can be a rough analogy for what life would be like were this to become my vocation. That’s not necessarily a bad realization, just a more realistic one. And THAT is actually a good thing.

This last point about revelation might be easier to understand if I provide a (made up) example. Take someone like Richard Devine (who I met very briefly at MoogFest). From what I can put together, at any one time Devine is:

1. Working on a release
2. Collaborating on someone else’s release
3. Working a film or photography project
4. Creating presets for hardware synths
5. Creating presets for software synths
6. Coming up with some new MAX/MSP stuff
7. Giving a talk or lecture
8. Putting time into family life, etc.

That’s a lot of stuff. And in it all he has a lot of deadlines, personalities, and administrivia to deal with.

Now I obviously don’t have that much creative stuff going on. I DO however have plenty of deadlines, personalities, and administrivia to deal with. In a (very) weird way, I can pretend Junto is equivalent to the #1 above, and work and life are analogous to nos. 2 – 7. (The analogy breaks down when you factor in psychic return as my corporate gig has nowhere near the same psychic return as the creative stuff but, that aside, the attendant stresses are probably comparable.)

So if I sort of squint my eyes and pretend, what am I learning? Well the constraints I mentioned definitely take some of the ‘lustre and shine’ off the activity. Yes, it’s fun, but as the clock ticks and you need to get it done, fun gives way to the deadline grind. Therefore it seems that if one does this for a living – particularly as a freelancer – there are times when the grind will definitely be there.

Does that make this path of my Great Five Year Plan (to make a change) less attractive to me then? Not at all. There is an element to life that is “the grind” no matter what you do.* The question is: What kind of grind do you prefer? One that deadens the soul, or one that has more chance (though no guarantees) of enlivening the spirit?

It’s important to have a realistic understanding so you can make decisions based on reality, not as you wish things to be. And if you still choose that path – eyes wide open – then you know you are really committed.

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* – Character and discipline get you through those times.