Getting Good

You never know what you might end up getting good at.

Because getting good begets getting good.

There’s the thing you set out to get good at but then there’s a bunch of things that come along with it that you had no idea about.

If an eighteen year old kid gets hired to play piano at a piano bar a few days a week, the kid thinks it’s a decent pay check and a chance to get good at playing piano in public. But all of us who did something like that when we were eighteen know you’ll end up getting good at a lot more than that.

Showing up on time, selling the tip jar, handling drunk people, building a setlist, taking requests, playing to an empty room, playing to a packed room, knowing when and how ‘good enough’ applies to a song, squeezing excitement out of boring, squeezing variance out of repetition, and the list goes on…

Getting good at something spills over into so much more.

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Control and Process

If we could just control the outcome then we’d be happy.

No. Controlling the outcome isn’t enough. We also want to control the process of getting to the outcome.

Because any moment we can’t control has the power to derail the entire operation. And we’re convinced that every uncontrolled moment is most likely in opposition to where we want to go.

Therefore we’re convinced that the more control we achieve or possess, the more on point our process will be. So we shift our focus from developing and implementing a process to attaining control within the process.

Having a ton of control and having a good plan aren’t one and the same.

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Reliable Building Blocks

What is it about you that we can rely on? What kind of energy can we rely on you for?

Whether it’s building a band or a live show or just putting together a series of eight hour work days in an office, this is what we need to know.

Because whatever you state that we can rely on is what we’re going to build with.

And whatever you choose to be relied on for, there are going to be times where you don’t feel like bringing it to the table…but listen, we built around your promise to show up with it, so you have to bring it anyway.

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Impersonators

Flour, water, yeast and salt come together to make a wonderful, timeless loaf of bread.

However if the water decides not to show up, you don’t have three-fourths of a wonderful, timeless loaf of bread. You don’t have bread at all. It’s possible to make something completely different, especially if you recruit a new ingredient or two…but it’s silly for the flour, yeast and salt to go on acting like they’re pretty much a loaf of bread. The water is gone. It’s time to redefine the whole thing.

»» I got a lot of really interesting replies from the post yesterday. Many with the underlying sentiment of…Initially you either have the spark with a person/group or you don’t (nature), but if you have even a tiny spark it can be grown (nurture) into certain level of magical chemistry. Something to think about.

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A Little More Chemistry

Flour, water, yeast and salt come together to make a wonderful, timeless loaf of bread.

However if the water decides not to show up, you don’t have three-fourths of a wonderful, timeless loaf of bread. You don’t have bread at all. It’s possible to make something completely different, especially if you recruit a new ingredient or two…but it’s silly for the flour, yeast and salt to go on acting like they’re pretty much a loaf of bread. The water is gone. It’s time to redefine the whole thing.

»» I got a lot of really interesting replies from the post yesterday. Many with the underlying sentiment of…Initially you either have the spark with a person/group or you don’t (nature), but if you have even a tiny spark it can be grown (nurture) into certain level of magical chemistry. Something to think about.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Chemistry Class

I know if you show up everyday and write you’ll get better at writing.

And this is the case with most anything. We get better at the things we’re consistent with.

But I’ve been hitting a snag…

What about chemistry…Can it be grown? Is it fundamentally there or not there within certain combinations of people? Can you get better at having it? Better at creating it?

Certainly we can actively develop richer relationships, get to know the people around us, learn to be better leaders and followers…but in my experience magical chemistry is different.

If there isn’t magic chemistry within a group, is the only option to change personnel? Or can you tweak and learn and grow it with the existing crew?

The moment before John and Paul met, the didn’t have chemistry…yet. And I’ll surmise it wasn’t there till at least thirty seconds into their relationship. So what was developing in those thirty seconds that wasn’t there before?

In the same breath…Pete Best was replaced for more than just drum skills. Ringo was the glue they needed, the glue that Pete wasn’t. So the question here is, could Pete have developed that role over time?

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple