Should musicians and songwriters be paid more?
Should teachers be paid more?
Should therapists be paid more?
I think we know the answers…because how much is real change worth? It’s worth infinity.
This isn’t a license to complain that you don’t get paid enough. It’s to recognize that if everything goes right, your effect will always outpace your earnings.
We know after the third chorus that the end is likely near.
It doesn’t have to be that way but that’s the way it is. It makes sense to us because we’ve heard it that way thousands of times in our lives.
Of course rules were meant to be broken. And this one often is…in wonderful ways…and in ways that are confusing and off putting to the listener.
Three choruses just makes sense and connects to most listeners. So if you’re having a hard time connecting, funnel your creativity into this tried and true rule.
A lot of us get caught up in the ‘opening’ part of opening presents.
During the opening, the excitement level is at an all time high…our imagination is running completely wild and free. Anything could be in that box. So we fill it with every hope and expectation possible. Maybe this one will be the one.
And then we are finished opening the gift and we’re simply left with the gift. The actual thing.
The new gift (i.e. the new opportunity, the actual conversation, the way the event turned out in real life) alters reality not in an imaginary way but in an actual way. And we have to deal with the truth instead of what we hoped the truth might be.
The truth, the reality, the actual gift is often different than what we hoped for but it’s real. And that’s a gift.
We all want to be a part of a spontaneous super special magical moment.
The interesting thing is, in order for us to bask in this moment of bliss, someone ELSE had to be very intentional about making it happen. i.e. it didn’t just magically happen out of thin air to them, but it did to us.
The best way to make special moments happen is to initiate them.
If you want the family to break out in song on Christmas it’s best to bring the guitar and be prepared to rally the family.
Whether it’s songs, gifts or party dips…we just don’t know what’s going to hit.
We make best guesses. We survey the landscape. We consider what others’ expectations might be. We review the relationship history. We listen to our hearts. We add creative spin.
We do our very best with everything we know and can reasonably infer.
And then we just gotta put it out there and see how it connects.