HAPPY NEW YEAR and welcome to 2018!
New year is always an exciting time for me, I like to re-centre myself and set some goals, even though everyone says new years resolutions are stupid, I don’t see the harm in thinking about what I’d like to achieve this year. I’d also like to thank all the people who have become a part of my journey during 2017.
A friend gave me the advice last year: “Don’t ever try to be big, people can see straight through it and it’s fake. Be yourself and the people who like it will follow you, keep the ones who do and look after them”.
That’s my aim now. I don’t have a million followers and I don’t need that! As long as there’s a handful of you guys who are loving my stuff then I’ll keep putting it out there for you guys and I’m seeing that handful grow now which is exciting.
Every little step forward is exciting, every time you guys let me know you’re digging the stuff I’m doing it means so much, YOU mean so much.
So last year has really shown me something about myself and it’s about how I define success and how our society defines your success!
What the fuck does that even mean to say “I am successful”?
Does it mean that you are making a lot of money?
That you have a million followers on social media?
That you’ve reached some level of fame with an impressive income attached?
That possible you are horribly miserable with an eating disorder and a draw full of anti-anxiety and anti-depression medication but that you have enough material possessions of a certain calibre that you can be defined as a “success”?
There’s nothing wrong with being rich and famous if you’ve worked super hard at something that you are proud of. Man, I wish I was rich and didn’t have to look at my weekly budget to see if I can afford fuel AND milk this week.
But I think it’s really important to stop and take some time to define to yourself what success means to you! Not what all you’re friends and family think, not what our society has told you that success is, but what success is going to look like for YOU! Because success is ultimately about YOU being happy with what you have achieved.
This is what success looks like for me, and this is why I am a success, this is why I am happy, and this is why nobody can take my success away from me no matter how hard they try.
I’ve been writing songs my whole life, literally. I have written so many songs I could release 6 albums with the material I already have. Life has taken me down some interesting paths and I haven’t ever pursued my music professionally like I am now. Why? Partly because I was really, really scared to do it and partly because I had to chase a number of proverbial rabbits down holes to realise who I am and what I want to do with myself.
That’s just life.
I actually lived with this horrible fear that I would never see what could come from my talent and my songs. I knew I was talented and I knew I was writing songs that people liked and I was scared that I would never step into my true self, doing the thing I was meant to do because of fear of failure.
One morning about 5 years ago I was out having breakfast with my husband at the time and my kids (yes I was married, one of my proverbial rabbits), and I just got sick of hiding from my fear. I had absolutely not a single fucking clue what I was doing, I walked into the only crappy music venue in the tiny town we lived in and booked my first gig.
The venue owner was extremely rude, haughty, borderline egomaniacal and insulting. I think he actually let me book myself (for free might I add) because he wanted to laugh at how much of a failure it would all be.
I remember he asked me what the name of one of my songs was and when I told him it was Losing Control (this awesome song is on my album coming out in Feb), him and the girl behind the coffee machine laughed at me!
And I’ll never forget his golden (bullshit) advice “live music is dead, nobody wants to go out and see live music anymore, you should just give up now”. (his business didn’t last the duration of time that I lived in that area…funny that!).
When I got home I realised that I had no PA equipment and no idea how to operate any of that anyway, all I had was my acoustic guitar and all my songs, I really had no idea what I was doing, I was just so sick of doing nothing, and it felt good!
The night of the gig rolled around and it went off, I think this was the universes way of encouraging me. My family came from all over the place, my friends all came and brought hoards of people, I’m still not even sure where the hell everybody came from!
Looking back it was possibly one of the best gig’s I’ve ever done. The venue owner didn’t know what the fuck was going on and was very prompt to tell me that I could come back ANY time I wanted to (surprise surprise I never will).
That first step was by far the hardest. I went out the day before my first little gig and I got a tattoo on my wrist of the treble clef to remind myself that no matter how far I go, I’ve always done more than what I ever thought I could do.
From that moment on I have been a success. From that moment I stopped living in fear and I started working towards what I wanted to do with my life. With all of the gut wrenching lessons I have learnt along the way, all of the highs and lows, all of the demons I’ve faced inside and out. I am living authentically and am spending my energy on the thing I always wanted to do.
This is what makes me a success to myself, everything else is a bonus.
Maybe take some time today to figure out what your success looks like to you?