Backwards advice: "Visualize your goals"

Yesterday I wrote about the Tommy fallacy, the misguided idea that you can copy someone's results by painstakingly mimicking their actions.

Of course, there are some things that you can effectively imitate and copy. You can watch how a chef chops onions, watch how a rhythm guitarist uses his whole body in the rhythm, or watch how a singer's facial expressions enliven the vocal line. By teaching your body the same motions that you observed the experts doing, you can improve your technical skills.

You can also find, on the web, recipes and how-to instructions for a million different problems. That's a very precise and practical way to copy someone else's successful actions.

But a generation of slightly confused success coaches took the copying idea too far and made it the centerpiece of their success advice.

They made detailed studies of some extremely successful people, people who had accomplished extraordinary things. They discovered common behaviors among all of those highly successful people. And thus they reverse-engineered a recipe for success. If you imitate all of these success behaviors, they said, you too can be successful.

Of course, those success books that delivered this recipe weren't really any more helpful than the diet books, one shelf over in the same bookstores, were. Unfortunately, their methodology fell prey to the Tommy fallacy; they assumed incorrectly that you can copy the results by copying the visible behavior.

The trouble with relying on a strictly retrospective methodology is that it can only show correlations between two variables, but it can't actually tell you which variable is the cause and which is the effect. The behaviors they observed and recommended were actually the results (or side effects) of being successful, not the ingredients of success.

For example, successful people are passionate and work long hours to achieve their goals. But this doesn't mean passion and hard work are the cause of success. The truth is the opposite: feeling passionate and working hard are the result of highly effective, successful action. Of course you work hard and feel enthusiastic if you see that your actions are highly successful.

Along the same lines, successful people quite often start out a vivid and compelling mental picture of their goal, almost as if it were already real. This observation was turned into a bit of widely repeated advice: "visualize your goals."

The advice goes like this: First, pick a goal. Then, take the time to develop a clear and powerful mental picture of that goal fully achieved.

Visualizing your goals isn't a bad thing in itself. But there are two things wrong with this line of advice:

• For most people, it's not easy to generate vivid, detailed mental pictures on demand. It takes a lot of time and real effort.
• Even if you can painstakingly build a mental picture of your goal, this willfully-created image still isn't the same as the visions that led other people to extraordinary success.
  

The original observation was correct: People who accomplish extraordinary things usually had a vivid picture guiding them. But none of those highly successful people picked a goal and then sat down and spent an hour trying to create a mental image of it. The truth is the opposite. These people had the vivid mental image first, and because they couldn't get it out of their head, they adopted it as their goal. They let their visions guide them.

My read on the profiles of extraordinarily people is that they were not so much driven to be successful per se; rather, they were driven to accomplish specific worthy goals. These people were struck by inspiration, powerful inspiration that arrived with a detailed vision, with a flurry of helpful ideas, and with a big blast of energy to get them started. Each of these people were poked pretty hard by one of those angels who drop in, seemingly at random (from our human perspective), with a mission that they could not ignore. Given a clear sense of direction, these people worked hard, overcame big obstacles, and invented things that had never been seen before, all to bring their visions to life.

You could go through the motions until you drop from exhaustion, but you cannot willfully recreate this pattern of success.

For those of us who have the capacity to receive the poke from an angel, the gift (if you can call it that) of this kind of inspiration, we still have very little control over how and when the angels of inspiration will visit us. I've written at length about how to encourage inspiration in your life and how to make the most of it when it arrives, but inspiration still remains a force that is fundamentally outside our control.

Here's some forewards advice about visualization: A strong, clear vision of a possibility is a good sign that that might be a good goal to pursue. But if you can't seem to visualize a creative goal, or if it's a weak, confused image, that might be a sign that it's not the right goal, or that the time isn't ripe for you to pursue it.

If you are struck by a powerful, vivid, detailed picture of something, something that seems cool and exciting and worthwhile, you might want to consider adopting that as your goal — even when it seems to go against ordinary business logic and common sense. That clear and vivid image just might be a hint that you have an opportunity to accomplish something extraordinary.

Just Getting Started

The February Album Writing Month challenge is to write 14 new songs in 28 days. When I signed up for this year's challenge, I knew that my main obstacle would be finding time to write. Because I hate finding myself facing a deadline with time slipping away, I decided to proactively rule out that possibility by writing all of my songs in the first half of the month — a song every day, no matter what corners I had to cut to get the song finished.

It's now Day 9, and I've managed to write a song every day for nine days. Just five more days to go! As I foresaw, it has been a challenge finding time to write. And I very likely would have weaseled out of it by now, if I hadn't made my pledge so publicly. The pain of writing a weak song is much less than the embarrassment of falling short of what I said I would do. So I managed to make some quick decisions and get each new song wrapped up each day.

You know, sometimes you can tell it's time to stop working on a song, even if you're not completely happy with it. If the song makes some kind of understandable statement, if it's internally consistent, and if it lives up to the rules of a genre or musical style, then you might be done writing, even if the song doesn't seem to be very good. At that point, unless you can quickly think of a clear-cut way to improve the song, it's time to put the pencil down. The truth is, any changes you make after that point will probably just make the song worse. The song is what it is, and you'll just make it worse by fighting with it.

Luckily, my "surprisingly awesome" new songs outnumber my "disappointing weak" songs so far.

The biggest surprise in my FAWM experience so far is seeing the collective results from all of the songwriters who have signed up for the FAWM challenge. It takes some guts to sign up and say "Yes! I'm going to write 14 songs." It's like signing up to run a marathon, a 26-mile race. Just getting to the finish line is a proud accomplishment, and there's no shame if you make a valiant effort but just can't muster the strength to get to the end of the course.

But what's happened with FAWM is sobering. After finding the courage to sign up for the challenge, many of the songwriters have not yet been able to finish a single song — and the month is now one-third gone. Now you'd always expect a certain number of people to sign up for something on a whim, and then drop out, but this is more than that. More than 80% of participants haven't logged a single song yet.

To look at it from the other side, the entire body of FAWM 2011 songs, so far, has come from fewer than 20% of participants.

This tells me that, in the creative world, just getting started is the hurdle that weeds out most of the potential players.

And on the other side of it, just getting started — at whatever you hope to accomplish — is enough to make you immediately above average.

Sure, it's hard to get started. There are all sorts of obstacles: fear, and procrastination, and remembering where you left your staff paper. They must be big obstacles, because they defeat most of the people who face them.

What is your strategy for getting past this first and biggest hurdle?

If you noticed, I did three things at once: I set an incremental, non-negotiable deadline the first day (and every day); I made a public boast that would be hard for me to back down from; and I jumped into a social setting (at fawm.org) that made my daily accomplishments concrete and visible.

And this is what it takes to get started in a skill area where I've already proven my mastery. Now, we'll see how long it takes me to get started on recording my new album this year.

It's no joke; getting started is hard. But, when you do finally get started, you immediately stand out from the crowd. Because the crowds of people are all still just standing there, and you've taken one step forward.

The missing key to success

Book after book tells you how to be successful. First you get a clear idea of what your goal is. Then you get a mental picture of the goal. You see as if it's already complete, in vivid detail, and with an emotional tone of excitement. Then you muster a state of confidence, brush aside all distractions, and work relentlessly until your goal is achieved.

This advice is somewhat accurate, but it's completely unhelpful! These success authors have gotten things completely backwards! What they're describing is a state of inspiration. People who act from inspiration are more confident and more effective than other people. They have clear goals, they get more done with less effort, and naturally they are more successful in life.

This misguided success formula comes from authors who have carefully studied the most successful people they can find. It's no surprise that the most successful people are all driven by inspiration. But it doesn't help you at all to have a success plan that begins, "Step 1: be inspired." You can't willfully enter a state of inspiration — or if you could, you would already be very busy and successful, and you wouldn't be reading a self-help book!

If you've heard this success formula before and tried unsuccessfully to follow it, don't feel bad. No one can! But there is something you can do: Learn to recognize when inspiration is at hand, and make the most of it every time, for as long as it lasts.

Sobering Truth wrap-up

Here's another sobering (but paradoxical) truth for you to chew on: Many of the world's best creative artists have only a tenuous relationship with reality.

There's a point to the weekly Sobering Truths feature: We want you to avoid widespread misconceptions so you don't waste a lot of effort going in the wrong direction.

But if we keep going down this reality-based road, we will soon pass into a neighborhood that is simply depressing and not helpful in any way. Burned-out wrecks of former nightclubs and recording studios will lurk oppressively and taunt us with revelations such as these:

Music will inevitably be free. Basic economics: Cost of production is zero. Cost of distribution is zero. Talent is plentiful, and competition is fierce. Media companies' ability to control the public conversation is rapidly slipping away. Trying to hold the line on music prices is like trying to stop rising floodwaters with sandbags -- except we're running out of sand, and these waters will never subside. And the question that musicians have been asking for ten years still has no answer: How will we make money? (Well, there is an answer, but we don't like it: Day job.)

People won't hear the words you write. In ordinary listening situations, you can't count on people hearing even half of the words. Sometimes people mis-hear the main hook of a song, even though you repeat it over and over. It's good to care about every word you write, but, face it, the words won't all be heard. Even if the singer enunciates like a fiend and you mix the vocal way out front, there are still background noises and distractions in the listener's environment. So stick to a simple main message, repeat and reinforce all your key points, and make sure the song will make a coherent impression even if many of the words get lost.

You aren't breaking through on radio. But people will have a chance to hear your songs online, on your CDs, or in concert. Decades of songwriting habits and expert advice have been based on making songs stick out on the radio. It's time to shed those habits and concentrate on how to make a good impression on the person who visits your MySpace page and clicks the Play button, or who takes a tip from a friend and launches your YouTube video. It's a new world with different challenges. (Note: if you are getting on the radio, then, by all means, follow that old advice and make sure you have three radio-friendly songs ready to go.)

Hit songs are made by record companies and radio promotion people, not by songwriters. There's an art to making a hit song. It involves skills such as advertising, promoting, schmoozing, and paying the right people at the right time. You can write a catchy song, but it's not a hit song until it gets into the hands of people with hit-making skills.

To run for president you must first be nominated. It seems unfair, but careers pass through stages, and you have to successfully handle each one in order to get to the next one—even if you feel you're ready for the next stage already.

When music industry people are friendly and helpful, it's because they smell money. It's a good thing if you smell like money! But take it for what it is. Don't be one of those naive shark victims who complains, "I thought I had lots of friends, but then they betrayed me and ate me."

There! I think that takes care of the Sobering Truth backlog. Can you see that S.T. was starting to head down a cynical and depressing path? Now it's time to give this feature a rest for a while. Artists need to be spiritual acrobats: sober and reality-based today, inebriated and lost in fantasy tomorrow.

Paradoxically, artists who are unrealistically optimistic are more likely to be productive, and artists who produce more are more likely to be successful. This means that being unrealistic might be a rational success strategy. To put it more bluntly, being too realistic will sabotage your chances of success as an artist.

It's still wise to stop by Reality Street now and then to check in and see what's going on, but, as an artist, you don't want to live here every day.

Sobering Truth: A song is a souvenir

First, a parable about sweatshirts.

Once upon a time I went to the Scottish and Irish Music Festival. It was great! Not just the music, the whole event was fun. It was a colorful location filled with lively people, and vendors offered all sorts of interesting Celtic things to look at and buy.

One of the things I bought was a sweatshirt emblazoned with the logo of the festival and a list of all the bands that performed. I bought it not because I needed another sweatshirt, but because I wanted to take home something to remind me of the positive experience that I had at the festival. I bought it as a souvenir.

Now it's ten years later. Though my memories of the festival have faded and blurred together with several other similar events, I still wear the sweatshirt, and I still like it.

Now, let's think about the challenges facing an entrepreneur who makes sweatshirts and hopes to gain me as a customer. The sweatshirt designer could show me shirts that are better in every way than the sweatshirts I already own, and at absurdly low prices, but I still wouldn't buy any of them. I have plenty of sweatshirts already, and I don't need any more.

But someday I will buy another sweatshirt, even if I don't need one. It might be for another music festival, or a friend's rock band, or some social cause that I feel strongly about. Whatever it is, it will certainly be another souvenir, another token that helps me feel connected to something I feel good about.

Now -- as songwriter, you're the sweatshirt designer. People already have too many songs in their music collections. And, today, everyone can get an endless amount of music for free if they're willing to look around a little. And if they're not willing to dig for free downloads, then hey, 99 cents a song is not a lot of money.

Can you compete by writing better songs? It can't hurt if you write great songs, but you still have a formidable challenge if that's your strategy, because you have to go up against the favorite songs from the entire world, from every period of recorded history.

You might be able to twist some arms and get people to listen to your songs once, and they might admit that you've written some fine songs — but that doesn't mean that they'll add those songs to their collection and put them on their playlists.

No, if you want to win a place in the musical soundtrack of people's lives, your song better be more than just a song. It should offer people a chance to feel connected to something that feels meaningful and important to them. You song should tie the listeners to something that they already feel good about.

So how do you do that? There's no short answer, and I guess we'll have to explore this further in a later post. But for now, start paying attention to what musical artists (and their record companies) do to help you feel that their music is connected to something meaningful and important.

And think about how happened to collect your own listening library. Out of millions of songs available, what led you to these particular few thousand songs?

Every Monday is Sobering Truth day for the Unruly Beast.

Sobering Truth: "Happy Birthday" is one of the most successful songs in history

"Happy Birthday" is one of the most successful songs in history. How? It became a part of a standard ritual, the ritual of blowing out candles on a birthday cake.

There are other songs that will never be forgotten, not because they're great songs but because they fit perfectly into certain moments of our lives. The DJ plays "Celebration," by Kool & the Gang, at every single wedding and bar mitzvah reception I attend. "We Are Family," by Sister Sledge, is nearly as pervasive.

"Closing Time" is a newer song that's quickly claimed its own niche. Some bars play it every night; when patrons hear it, they know it's time to leave.

None of these songs is particularly eloquent, but each of them expresses a simple idea that fits perfectly with a particular social occasion.

What are some other common occasions that could use a catchy song? Could you write the perfect song for one of those occasions and perhaps claim your place in history?

Every Monday is Sobering Truth day for the Unruly Beast.

Sobering Truth: You can't always copy other songwriters' tricks

In songwriting, you can copy any idea, any trick, any technique that you hear in a song that you like. Let me be clear: copyright law prohibits copying any specific material from anyone else's song. But you can always copy a technique and express it in a different specific way. If you can separate the good qualities of a song from its specific notes and words, you can re-express them with your own original notes and words.

But, here's the catch: even if your copy is successful, even if you manage to perfectly translate another songwriter's technique into your own song, it still might not work for you.

Here's an example: One singer-songwriter's debut album included a song that was a carefully studied copy of Paul McCartney's style of gentle, acoustic love songs. As a copy, it was brilliant — it was a masterful feat of songwriting, performance, and production. But it still was the weakest track on the album. The style just didn't work for this artist.

Another example: I love the profanity-laden songs of Rancid, but when I put similarly strong language in my own songs, I almost always end up taking it out. I'm not a language prude; it just doesn't work for me the way it does for Rancid.

It sometimes may seem unfair what other songwriter can get away with. A Caribbean band writes a sunny song with a childishly simple melody and scores a big hit; but your similar song merely sounds childish. Bob Dylan rambles nonsensically and it's brilliant poetry, but your own similar efforts just sounds like gibberish. Whatever the specifics, successful songwriter-artists know their strengths and weaknesses and have learned to work with them. You'll need to take them to know yourself and tease out all of your own strengths and weaknesses.

So go ahead and study songs that you love, and learn to copy the songwriter's techniques. Just be aware that mastering the technique is only half the battle. You still have to actually make the technique work for you.

Sobering Truth: People don't trust their own musical taste

Many people don't trust their own ears when deciding what music they like. Some carefully-staged scientific experiments have confirmed this unfortunate fact. People rely largely on external cues — for example, if other people seem to like the song, or if the artist is on a respected record label.

Separately, an overwhelming body of anecdotes confirms that even the people who are paid to exercise their musical judgment — people whose decisions could directly affect your own musical career — mostly don't trust their own ears either. They also largely rely on external cues.

As a songwriter or musical artist, you must learn to trust your own ears. If you can't find the courage to have an independent opinion, who can? More importantly, without confidence in your own musical tastes, you won't be able to create anything new and powerful.

If you want to have a career in creating music, it's important for you to realize that "creating unique, better-quality music" is not a realistic business plan. Creating better music is only Step 1. You need to plan to put just as much or more effort into Step 2, to work on those external cues that will help people (both fans and music insiders) see you as successful and thus decide that they like your music.

Many musicians find it distasteful to work on marketing, branding, promo, and the other elements of Step 2. Remember, this stuff is necessary only if you want to build a career; if you just want to make music, you can skip it.

But there is one external cue that is completely under your control, and there's no reason for you not to master it. I'm talking about your own attitude about your own music.

Your confidence and enthusasm for your own music makes more difference than you might realize. If people sense that you like your song a lot, they're more apt to like it themselves. Conversely, if your performance is tentative and apologetic, your audience will be underwhelmed. If you aren't sure about your own song, why should they stick their neck out and like it?

So make sure that you are writing songs that you can perform with confidence and enthusiasm. Write about subjects that light you up.

When you practice performing your songs, don't just practice the words and notes. Also practice your confidence and enthusiasm. Success begins as an attitude inside yourself, and, like so many other things, it too improves with practice.

Sobering Truth: You finished the song, but it still needs work

I finished writing my song! All the verses are penciled in, all the chords figured out, and I sang it all the way through. I'm all done, right?

No — sorry. What you have now is a first draft.

It's easy to understand why creative people love their first drafts. The ideas arrive in a flash of inspiration, some kind of mysterious magic. It's almost like you've been touched by the Divine and given this great blessing in the form of a song. Why would you want to mess with that?

Besides, after inspiration fades, songwriting is just another form of work. It's creative work, sure, but it's still work. And many of us got involved with music because we wanted to avoid having to do anything that resembled work.

Sorry to say it, but after the song is "done," you still have work to do. It's time to take a close look and ask questions like these:

• Does the song hold up well from beginning to end, or are there places where the energy sags a bit? Maybe you can just cut out some of the weak spots, and make it a shorter song. Or consider changes that will give those spots a little more punch.
• Are there places where the music sounds tired or un-fresh? Maybe you can use some less obvious chords or change the rhythm a little to make it sound less like "I've heard that song before."
  
• Are there any spots where the lyrics make you wince a little bit when you listen to the song? Overused cliches, things that don't quite rhyme, extra syllables that make the rhythms awkward? Look for different ways of saying the same thing, so you can remove any "wince potential."
• Are there places where your words are easily misunderstood? It's not your fault if "she's greater" sounds just like "cheese grater." The English language is full of gotchas like that. But it's your responsibility to make sure the message gets across.
  

Play your song for songwriting friends or other people who can give you an honest critique. If things stick out and bug them, see if there's a way to fix those spots without hurting the main message of the song.

Hopefully you're not rushing into the studio to record your album tomorrow. It's best if you can live with your song for a few weeks or months. It often takes that long to shake out all the rough spots in a song, and of course it's better to do that before you commit to its final form.

Monday is Sobering Truth day for the Unruly Beast.

Sobering Truth: Computers will write songs by the billions

As far as I know, no one has built a computer program that writes ordinary rock songs from scratch, but it's bound to come. There are no technical barriers; and eventually someone will be willing to spend a few months writing it. Consider these examples of computer-generated material:

• My Songwriting Assignment Generator combines randomly selected words and phrases in a limited set of formulas to create a nearly infinite set of songwriting suggestions.
  
• Wolfram Tones generates actual musical compositions in real time. The resulting music doesn't quite sound like the music we're familiar with, but it doesn't sound like it's from another planet either.
  

Either of these approaches could be extended to creating formulaic rock songs from scratch. It's not a trivial challenge, but it's easier than any number of clever computer programs that have already been created.

When computers are writing songs, will that make songwriters obsolete? Not at all! But it will make it even clearer than the value of your songwriting doesn't come just from creating stuff. It comes from what you have to say. Art is different from manufacturing; it's about expressing something.

This means, more than ever, you'll want to find the value in who you are. Think about what's unique about yourself. Learn to love your imperfections -- those are now assets!

Don't try to write perfect songs; we can let the computers have that niche. Aim to write your songs.

Sobering Truth: You have 30 seconds

It's sobering but true: Your musical success may depend on the first 15 seconds of your first two songs. If those openings aren't strong enough to convince people to listen further, you might not get a second chance.

We all know that, ideally, you should listen to an artist's entire album two or three times through before offering an opinion or judgment. You have to live with music a little before you can fully grasp and appreciate it. It's somewhat demeaning that thumbs go up or down after as little as 30 seconds.

But you can have some sympathy for the person faced with a big stack of demos, or for the music fan poking around on the web hoping to find interesting new bands. There is so much to listen to, and life is busier than ever.

Don't count on infinite patience. Put your best stuff up front. Of course, you still have to follow through. If people decide to listen further, you have to show off your depth and artistry and deliver something distinctive and worthwhile. But none of that matters until you pass the 30-second test.

Sobering Truth: It's not a good song until it's sung well

If the singer can't deliver a good performance of your song, it's not a good song. No one in the audience will say, "It's a good song, but shame about that bad singer." They'll say "Bleh! Let's get out of here."

This means that the path to songwriting success starts with a rather humbling strategy: Make songwriting subordinate to singing.

First of all, you should be willing to transpose a song so that it's in a favorable key for the singer.

If you're lucky enough to have a good, strong singer in the band, one who can take anything you give them and make it sound good, then count it as a blessing. Do what you have to do to keep that singer in the band.

If you're a solo singer-songwriter, working on your singing might be a better use of your time than working on your songwriting. On top of that, you should be willing to ruthlessly rewrite your songs to suit your own vocal strengths and avoid your weaknesses.

If you're writing for another singer, you should know your singer's range (notes they can sing) and tessitura (notes they sing best, usually the middle half of the range). Learn your singer's strengths and weaknesses, and write for them.

If you're writing for an unknown singer, write pessimistically. Assume you'll have an average, barely-competent singer. Stick with a limited melodic range, allow rests between lines for catching a breath, and don't write anything dazzling or acrobatic. Or if you do write anything that requires special vocal skills, don't make the song depend on it. Plan an alternate version that an average singer can perform.

Footnote: Don't be thrown off by what I call "the karaoke effect." You might hear a bad singer torture a classic hit song and still recognize it as a good song. But that works only because the song is already established through repeated listening to its well-performed version. As you listen to the song getting ruined in karaoke, the good version is overlaid on the badly sung version in your mind. But unknown original songs don't have that advantage.

Footnote 2: You'll notice that this blog has a bias towards songs with vocals. Let me just say that I have nothing against instrumental music, or music where the vocals play a less-central role. There are plenty of fine examples in my favorite genre, progressive rock. But in the interests of keeping things simple, I'm going to focus on songs with lyrics and vocals.

Monday is Sobering Truth day at Unruly Beast.