Trusting (And Sharing) The Process [Or Not]…

There’s a never-ending influx of “advice” on the internet, some good, some horrible. Everyone now has a platform to say whatever they want - both a great thing, and perhaps sometimes a troubling thing, as just anyone can say anything with an aura of confidence & authority, no matter how stupid or incorrect it may be. “Experts” have exponentially boomed, whether they’ve rightfully earned their podiums or not. Sometimes their advice is potently powerful; sometimes it’s not for everyone. Sometimes we need to distill it, taking what parts of it work uniquely for us, adapting it in ways that serve; sometimes it’d be stupidity to just blindly accept it all without picking it thoroughly apart; sometimes it’s best to discard altogether.

I came across this post on IG yesterday that stirred up some contemplations, on the topic of sharing one’s creative process, echoing a perspective heard/read before - and feel it to have been a valid stimulus worthy of a response…

There are different parts of me both embracing and questioning the perspective.

On one hand, there’s surely merit to it.

On the other, it’s still posing one perspective - that may not be a fit for all individuals.

Yes, we’re in the age of “content creators,” “influencers,” and a culture which social media has become an integral part of - and there are indeed many for whom this approach of sharing their creative processes makes sense. On the flip side, did anyone see - or to this day, even really care about all that much - the creative processes that resulted in the Mona Lisa, Sistine Chapel, masterpieces of Beethoven & Chopin, etc, etc…?

Granted, maybe if those homeboys were alive & well today, their Tik Toks would be poppin’ off were they sharing their processes. On the other hand, everyone’s got a fucking Tik Tok, Snapchat, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, and whatever the fuck else the latest & greatest platform is now… we’ve got millions of people “sharing their process”… yet for every thousand long videos of someone speaking through their process, how many true masterpieces are there?

And while conventional marketing wisdom may preach “build a brand,” at what point is that perspective still just a rehash of sales dogma from the past? As much merit there may be to it, at what point does giving/following such 'advice' become the antithesis of art as prescribing one-size-fits-all frameworks, rather than each artist creatively doing whatever they're going to uniquely do after having thrown out all such "rules?"

While Drake may have been “building his brand,” “selling a vision,” putting in consistent effort in crafting a social media presence… what effect, in comparison, has Kendrick Lamar’s work alone spoken for itself, without need for all the usual “brand building, selling a vision, etc, etc”…?

Yeah, ultimately the aim/goal is to make people feel something. Sometimes that may come through involving others in the process, giving them all the backstory, and taking them along for the ride in the creative process. Sometimes, the art/work itself might be the vehicle to achieve that, without need for explanation.

(And believe me, I’m triple-checking myself for cognitive biases as writing this, questioning why I may feel inclined to argue/debate here at all.)

Indeed, part of me might be going on the defensive here - in addition to the fact I often just seem to be something of a shit-disturber insistent on challenging viewpoints - because all that is something I haven’t been doing much lately… when maybe I ought to be. (Ah, good ol’ stubborn ego.)

Perhaps I’ve retreated so far into hermit mode, I’ve rationalized shutting down my exposure to the world, logically-justifying “privacy” and whatnot at the cost of reducing the type of transparency that once did provide a far greater sense of connection with the world and a greater degree of “success” consequential of it. (i.e. back in the early days on Steemit, writing without restraint, letting my life be an open book with all its ups & downs - which paid off greatly not only monetarily, but also in satisfaction.)

Of course, different stages of life. Some stages, which may entail greater reclusivity as surrendering to “the process” and being transformed through it without need to broadcast it with “success”-oriented agendas.

And granted, my aims, values, and intentions are different now.

Perhaps it’s to my detriment that I don’t have much/any interest at this point in ”building a brand” or “selling a vision.” Been there, done that, got & gave away the t-shirt to some thrift store years ago. Values change. Sometimes for the better. Sometimes for the worse. Sometimes a bit of both.

Sure enough, I still occasionally have shared parts of “my process” here - albeit that “process” seems to be mostly the notorious “midlife crisis,” far less inspiring, romanticized & alluring than all the marketing rhetoric above implies one’s sharings ought to be. Though I suppose at the least, it’s authentic.

Perhaps ironically, I continually ‘forget’ that despite not fitting (my own) conventional ideas/models of what an “artist” is, I still may be one through-and-through, really - the art not limited to just music and writing, but extending to the far broader canvas that is my life. After all, I’ve never really done things traditionally. And in that perpetual forgetting, have frequently overlooked both the “output” that doesn’t conform to mind’s expectations of strictly musical and/or written material and the creative process that is day-to-day life. (So maybe no shit it doesn’t get shared as being of value to anyone, when I’ve repeatedly failed to even recognize it myself.)

Somewhere in my psyche, there’s some idea - whether you wanna call it a “limiting belief” or maybe even some embodiment of humility - that the majority of people wouldn’t be interested in my process (even if I fully recognized and could articulate it well.) Yeah, there always might be some very small circle of people who resonate and take interest; though for the most part, everyone’s living their own lives. And in this day & age where we’ve got ceaseless stimulation of highlight reels jam-packed with exciting, inspiring, motivational stuff, ’why would people wanna spend their limited time watching someone’s midlife crisis, who doesn’t have any grand vision to sell, ain’t trying to “build a brand,” isn’t sure what they’re doing most of the time, etc, etc. I’ve been through my phase of grandiosity when younger; perhaps I’ve swung to too far of an extreme opposite since and have yet to find a healthy middle ground of balance, though will humbly accept that I’m probably not all as self-important in the grand scheme of things as personal development & hustle-culture dogma dictate ought to be the ideal.

My creative process…? Oh man, I don’t fucking know. Lol. It ain’t gonna condense nicely into succinct YouTube videos like others do. And I don’t wanna do that. Yeah, there are (already) countless music producers with tens of thousands of views doing “how I made this song…” how the fuck am I gonna “document” a process that unfolds over years with no clear direction, intention, or ability to control it on the ego’s timeline…? (Unless this is the documentation, albeit turning out different than I’d expect.) Lol.

Like, recently I’ve been mixing… refining a remix project started almost 7 years ago for a remix contest. (I clearly missed the deadline. 🤷‍♂️) There were years it sat there untouched. And then, come these hyperfocus waves. While dudes are preaching “finish stuff fast, get onto your next project,” I’m here chiseling away, refining this mix daily for a month - battling the mind’s programming around “perfectionism,” questioning if just kinda keeping stuck at a plateau as going way excessively into too much detail… or it’s actually a surrender to the process, taking way slower than any conventional norm and ego would prefer, as *it’s something quite unique unto its own that requires that much time, diligence, mini-experimentations, and refinement to eventually culminate in the final outcome I’ve “envisioned” for it that encapsulates the raw power & passion I’ve felt its potential as all along.

Borderline obsessive compulsive…? Maybe. Y’all don’t even know the degree of detail. And there’d probably only ever be handful of engineers who ever would/could know and/or appreciate. 99.99% of people who’d listen to the final result would have no clue, and really not care. Yeah, there’s a part of me that would like to share the process, letting in even just one person on the passion driving that borderline-obsessiveness over minute details. But some part of me also knows that ain’t the process. That my role ain’t the dude walking through his process with people on YouTube. That whether my Venus in 12th house and Uranus in whole sign 5th play their part, this process is to be undertaken in the sanctity of hermitude; my role being to birth & nurture the project until it is ready/complete, then releasing to the world - when/where it’s fate/destiny may be beyond my control, as no amount of trying to push or force my ego’s agenda or “vision” will override the inevitable outcome of what its (the project’s) frequency is ultimately to serve.

(That all said, again with questioning my own cognitive biases, “limiting beliefs,” and to what degree they may rationalize creating/sustaining outcomes far less “successful” than those potentially created were I perhaps to integrate more motivational hustle-culture dogma and ‘commit’ to embodying an approach to “marketing” such as the perspective that sparked this whole contemplation. But of course, the desire isn’t there to “go big or go home” as there was 20 years years ago, and it’s not something that can be summoned upon command.)

The whole rhetoric of “make lots of art, and you’ll eventually find your voice in the process…” maybe. Though, it’s been a couple years since I even worked on anything new. I’ve been in this much larger cycle, feeling like wrapping up these older projects may be necessary to ‘clear space’ for the next phase of fresh creation - which still may be a couple years away. And these can’t be rushed. And I’m glad I never did rush them, in spite of conditioning/programming that felt pressuring to do so, as with every interation I’ve progressed through them, upleveling of skills have occured such that the results are WAY better now than they ever could’ve been years ago. Frankly, I listen back to the earlier mixes and am shocked at how much they sucked in spite of me thinking they were great back then, lol.

It’s an unconventional process. Who the fuck starts tracks, returning to pick at them here & now over a decade, obsessively refining details while the majority of producers are doing videos of how they made & finished songs in an afternoon. Me, apparently. And it’s boggled the mind, as there is no seeming “order” to it. Each project is its own entity, on its own timeline, needing nourishment over the course of their own growth cycles. (No matter how often I question if it’d just be better to either abandon them or just fucking finish them already without the perfectionism.)

And apparently, this is that alleged “trusting the process.”

Even if/when it sure as fuck doesn’t feel like I’m trusting it most of the time. Which is fair/understandable, given that it’s difficult (if not impossible) to fully zoom out while focusing in on all the detailed work to see the bigger picture of what any given project is in a larger whole (of my “artistic career/life”). And frankly, I don’t and can’t know what that larger whole is. (At least consciously. Perhaps ‘at a soul level,’ according to new-age dogma, ‘my higher self’ knew it all along, and forgetting it is just part of the human experience. 🤷‍♂️)

And this - this tiny snapshot of the creative process with a musical project - may be but a fractal… a microcosm of the larger macrocosm of life itself. Different aspects of my life - health & nutritional development, unconventional living arrangements, financial management resembling nothing conventional, relationship dynamics far outside of cultural norms, the evolution of consciousness/awareness, etc, etc. - each undergoing their own (intertwined) developmental processes on their own timelines, unable to be forced, only surrendered to and (hopefully harmoniously) worked with. Each subject to their own sets of ebbs & flows, inseparable from emotional waves upon which I surf at some times and under which I get pummeled, drown, die, and be reborn again at others.

Oh yes, these processes.

The “journeys,” not just the “destinations.”

It’s sometimes tough to put into words all the growth along the way. The development over the course of these music projects still in refinement 7 years later, not merely observable in the product/music itself - but the progress, reflective of the inner development over that course of time. The skills. The fluency in using the tools. The refinement of the senses, both auditory and feeling - growing in attunement to the subtlest of nuances & variations in processing sounds differently and their synergistic addition to the larger whole, becoming conscious of details that’d have totally escaped detection all those years ago. The increasing capacity for bringing them all together, so as to translate emotion into sound, as desired, in ways that couldn’t have been done previously.

Or with the processes of healthy, diet & nutrition, bodybuilding. Similarly, becoming increasingly sensitive over time to the inputs into body and their effects. Slowly but surely learning the technical details of why & why not to ingest certain things, what they do & don’t do for health. Cultivating habits over time conducive to greater health, becoming more discerning about how to honor the body temple in supportive ways, discarding what no longer aligns with ‘new’ values & higher standards. Realizing what had been done ‘wrong,’ recalibrating with “discipline” (albeit occuring naturally over time as a simple byproduct of choice, aligned action, and “embodiment”), observing the shifting of results. Developing an appreciation & love for the process of getting an exercise regiment right, experientially feeling the benefits, and occasionally awed while looking in the mirror, seeing a work of art in progress notably ‘better’ than years prior. Developing a relationship with utilizing ChatGPT as a consultant through the processes (as well as teacher/tool for learning more Indonesian, and the whole personal development journey of undertaking the acquisition of a new language)… 🤯💎

Financially… still no Lambo, but having gone through multiple market cycles, growing in wisdom to manage decisions a little better as time goes on. Even in spite of the years seemingly ‘passively waiting’ on the surface, growing in understanding & maturity while enjoying a few harvests of fruits here & there - not about the material things, but increasing capacity for greater degrees of freedom & control. The greater rewards, not a bank or portfolio balance, but a growing sense of competency & confidence - not just in investments, but oneself and the ability to manage them more sustainably with a longer-term “vision.”

And the processes with relationships & friendships… well, I’ll confess to be something of a mess there, lol, perhaps not having completely embodied the same type of maturity & wisdom as elsewhere, maybe rationalizing dissociation & isolation in ways that’ve kept me closed to possibilities for truly fulfilling connections with others. I sure as fuck ain’t qualified to offer advice in those departments. But maybe this too, is “part of the process” - the retreat, serving recalibration of values, rebirth, and other processes that’ll eventually have me emerge to be of greater value & integrity when it is correct timing to exit the cocoon and share more again.

Yada, yada, yada.

Do I trust all these different processes? Probably not. But hey, I ain’t trying to position myself here as some infallible role model with answers, selling anyone on anything. Sharing my process…? Apparently, yeah, this would qualify. For the reasons & motivations that Abdul dude presented above? I don’t fucking know. Not really. This isn’t exactly the “brand” I’d want to build, lol. “Vision”…? I don’t fucking know. And reading some cliche platitude for the 11,236th time about how you need to have one and do xyz… I’m feeling over it. But hey, that’s just me. Guaranteed, there are other people who need those messages. (Maybe some repressed part of myself included, no matter the inclination to brush it off out of stubborn independence.)

Moral of the story?

You figure that out - or create it - for yourself.

Out of all these contemplations above, I have no clue which parts may resonate or not, which fractal messages may reflect something of value within yourself, unlock or activate something worthwhile.

And maybe that is where not all art will/can fit into Abdul’s framework implying context ought to be given. Cuz any piece of art will always be viewed subjectively. Maybe sometimes we don’t need the artist describing their process and backstory, as sometimes the art will speak for itself - and to each viewer/listener/reader intimately in its own particular way, which may not benefit from the artist’s monologues trying to impose the way they see it (when it is the art as its own entity to come into relationship with the audience for their own discoveries through it).

And maybe sometimes the process of sharing the process is (part of) the art itself.

Or some shit. Lol. 🤷‍♂️🤪