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Do What You Love

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This is part 8 of a 12 day blog series called “12 Steps You Must Take To Get Into Creative Flow Whenever You Want” or the more seasonal “The 12 Days of Creativeness”.

Everyone who has experienced creative flow will tell you that it is enjoyable and exhilarating. My experiences of creative flow have been amongst the most enjoyable of my life.

And like the other features of creative flow, it’s a two way street.

Not only will “being inspired” produce an enjoyable and exhilarating experience, enjoyment and exhilaration will produce conditions where inspiration happens.

So how do you create conditions for enjoyment?

Read The Other Posts In This Series

Of course I’m not suggesting for a second that you’ll find reading my posts the most enjoyable experiences of your life! Far from it.

But by taking the steps I’ve outlined you’ll start to enjoy your creative process be more likely to experience creative flow.

Working towards a desirable outcome is an enjoyable activity.

Working for a compelling purpose is enjoyable.

Taking responsibility for your situation is empowering and inherently enjoyable.

Learning, discovering and figuring stuff out by doing is much more rewarding and enjoyable than being taught.

Writing music from a position of strength (being who you want to be) is much more enjoyable than writing it from a position of weakness (being who you perceive you are).

And thinking about your process as an enjoyable activity, not as a struggle, is enjoyable (obviously).

But taking steps to enhance your enjoyment is an end in itself.

Do What You Love

This is your choice.

1/ Choose to produce the music you love, not what fashion demands.

By writing music that you love, your music will shine and your audience will find you. It will be easier, you’ll produce more quicker and at a higher quality than if you just make what is in fashion at the time.

So if you love to produce african nose flute techno, go ahead.

2/ Choose to do more of the work you love.

If you write jingles or commercials for other people and have been meaning to write more of your own music that you love – make the time.

If you’ve been doing loads of remixes for other people and haven’t been able to work on that album – make the time.

You might lose a little income at first, but by doing more of what you enjoy you’ll be invigorating yourself and your creative process. By doing this you’ll be extending and increasing your ability to write music to order.

3/ Choose to make music (or whatever you enjoy) your life

If you’re successful in a career that you don’t love, just imagine how much more you could achieve if you do what you love.

Love What You Do

There are always going to be certain tasks which you enjoy more than others within the creative process.

But you make even these tasks more enjoyable by being creative about it.

I used to hate starting work on the arrangement.

So instead of schlepping through a basic arrangement by copying and pasting parts in Logic, I used Ableton and recorded my basic arrangement in live.

Voila! What was the most dreaded became my favourite part of the process.

Outsourcing

If you can’t find a way to enjoy a certain part of the process, have you thought about outsourcing it to someone who does?

Many producers already do this by employing an engineer to do the mixdown.

But if you can’t afford an engineer how about a collaboration? I’ve often thought about a partnership where each person was responsible for a different parts of the process.

Learn To Enjoy Your Experience

One of the major “ahas” I’ve had from my training as a coach and NLP Practitioner is that by focusing on particular parts of your experience it is possible to enjoy almost any task.

Although this is a very individual process and varies wildly from person to person, I’ve had success helping my clients to find enjoyment in what they do.

But whether you do it by doing what you love, loving what you do, finding a way to love what you naturally don’t, or a combination of all three – it is essential that you learn to enjoy it.

Most assume that doing “hard work” is the only route to success. This misses the mark.

Because when you enjoy it, your route to success won’t feel hard or like work.

This is part 8 of a 12 day blog series called “12 Steps You Must Take To Get Into Creative Flow Whenever You Want” or the more seasonal “The 12 Days of Creativeness”.

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Filed Under: Featured Post Tagged With: creative flow, creative process, creativity training

How can I help you?

Claude VonStroke (Dirty Bird, USA)

Mike Monday’s process has helped me enormously. I have two record labels, a heavy touring schedule, a wife and two children, and a music production career all running in tandem. There are times when it seems unmanageable and i get lost in a downward spiral that limits my effectiveness as a leader and my ability to be creative in the studio.

Whenever i have a session with Mike we talk it all out and a sense of calm comes over me. i get back to basics and work out all the things in my head that need to get worked out. His process is both calming and therapeutic.

I would also like to add that the additional fact that Mike is a music producer himself and a veteran DJ lends itself to an extra level of trust. I don’t think i would take advice or listen to someone in the same way who was from outside the music industry. In an nutshell I find Mike Monday’s process to be an extremely valuable way to organize and free my chaotic brain to do what it is supposed to be doing.

Johnson Peterson (Yolanda Be Cool)

“I found the time with Mike to be extremely beneficial. His process opened me up to ideas that, even where obvious, I had overlooked or forgotten and I am looking forward to taking them with me to the studio. It was definitely worth it.”

Janelle Palmer (Tutukaka Coast, New Zealand)

“What your course has done for me has been remarkable and I really feel so grateful to you…

Radical is a good word for it! The most unexpected thing I’ve found about the course is the impact it has had on other areas of my life – I was quite surprised about that…

These are definitely transferable skills we are learning here!”

– Janelle Palmer (Tutukaka Coast, New Zealand)

Brett Adams (Los Angeles, California)

“I already think this is one of the greatest decisions I’ve made, and we haven’t even started the curriculum yet.”

Vernon McCarthy (Wellington, New Zealand)

“I just felt inspired to send you a really quick message to say hello and let you know that I am going great guns at the moment.

Managing to get a average of two hours every day producing. This is a huge turn around for me and am loving it. It hasn’t been easy though but I have kept at it.

And much of it has been due to the help and inspiration from yourself, the group and me now actually putting in the work. The online community is such a good thing. Everytime I have gone to have a look I have found something relevant to my thoughts and that has helped me.”

Joe Roberts (London, UK)

“Mike has helped me to start living the truism that it’s not what you use to make music, it’s your ideas.

Those ideas only mean anything when you start putting them down though and that’s what this course has already helped me to start do regularly.

I’ve made more headway in two weeks than I’d managed in a couple of years on my own starting projects, then giving up and starting something new but never seeing them through till completion.”

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