Ya know, i used to be a bit of procrastinator… I’ll admit it. I was your typical ADD kid daydreaming or goofing off in class trying to make people laugh. Re

The Importance of Habits To Your Success

cess was best class. And i was GOOD! I mean i owned the blacktop! Tetherball, foursquare, and soccer baby… Couldn’t be stopped.

Anyway… I also was the guy who would usually wait til the last minute and then in a brilliant act of focus and stress manage to weave together a great paper and turn it in on time.

Having served in the military i learned a bit about discipline and grew to know and understand that STRUCTURE was NOT my enemy, but ACTUALLY VERY conducive to my creative and intuitive type brain.

How to Regain Your Focus Using The Conscious Driver

How To Regain You Focus

One of the most important tools, maybe the most important skill in home recording, in learning things in the digital realm, and in making practical level progress in general, is a concept i call the conscious driver.

IMAGINE… You are juggling a couple of tasks simultaneously, you have a stack of to do’s this week, and you’ve just found yourself traveling to some landing page sales offer-after checking your email, again….

6 Time Management Tips for Artists

6 Time Management Tips for Artists and Entrepreneurs

Despite the deep reserve of worthwhile ideas and plethora of potential time wasters, we all have the same amount of time in a day… And its never enough.

Since time is a fixed commodity, and we all get the same amount of it, it is a fools errand to pursue the question of how can we get more of it.

As stephen covey said “time management is a misnomer,” supportively stating that we are in pursuit of the effective management of ourselves.

As a singer-songwriter and modern musical artist i have found the use of systems and functional structures for managing projects, (musical, entrepreneurial, or otherwise) finances, my life, my habits, to be of utmost importance.

Structure For Artists?

Yes… And i want to go a little deeper in talking about what these systems and structures require to be functionally most effective….

Quite simply… it is thought. The thinking process behind each piece must be out of solving a problem or creating a better way to automate or increase the time spent managing recurring tasks.

This sounds simple… and guess what… it is. But it requires time and focus.

As a combat vet turned singer songwriter producer, and entrepreneur in the new music business – i’ve struggled with doing what i love and developing my crafts full time… Namely, because there is just so much to do as an independent artist going the DIY route.

Defining what you need to be focused on, prioritzing the most important things, dodging distractions and staying motivated, while staying sane, and on top of everything that needs to be managed to keep myself growing, afloat financially, as well as mentally…

SHEESH… It’s exhausting!

First the issue has to do with being responsible for so many more things than just being a writing songs and producing my ideas.

Managing Your RSS Feeds

RSS feeds are really really convenient. You may know what they are, and you may even already have an RSS feed reader like Google Reader – aggregating several or more RSS feeds from your favorite sites. If you’re still a bit sticky with RSS, or you’re not clear on some fundamentals for making better use of this ultra convenient tool, the following article will cover the bases. From what, why, and how; to some concepts and best practices for organization and more effective use.

What is RSS, and Why Do People Use It?

The web is great. The web is really really big though. Their are many cool websites and blogs you’d like to keep up on, but not always as much time as any of us would like.

Its a very simple concept, and thus, best illustrated by a stripped down minimalist post. There are 3 steps to really learning and evolving in knowledge and experience for your career.

Step 1: Figure out what you REALLY need to know.

Do not cop out on this. Only you is really going to be able to determine what tangible, practical things you really need to know, to do what you want, to get where you want to be.

Break things down. Strip it down into pieces and individual skills that you need to know. Be SPECIFIC!

Step 2: SLOWLY learn it

If you’re dealing with a bad habit of dwelling on negative thoughts, or distorted memories, or some particular instance that you’ve blown out of proportion and turned into a recurring loop, understand you are certainly NOT the only person to ever fall into this mental trap… Here is some perspective and insight on countering negative thought patterns.

Here is why you do not need to be bothered by them….

If…. You have gone through everything logically, addressed your thoughts up and down with brutal honesty in a conscious way….

Then… You do not need to worry about your thoughts or negative perceptions in a way that effects you, your mood, your feeling, and most importantly your beliefs about yourself…

Don’t place too much emphasis on your thoughts…

Curb the psycho babble for minute. Thoughts are important and all that. I understand that thoughts effect the way you feel, which effect the way you act, and what you do.

But at the end of the day, you don’t/can’t always control what pops into your head, and why, and reading any further into it is ludicrous.

The answer is to detach from your thoughts, and just kind of passively watch them stream by.

Think of your mind as being a cover-flow for your thoughts. You can scroll through and then you CHOOSE one to focus on. This is critical. You have to, you GET to CHOOSE, which one you focus on….