I spent a couple of years in the Nashville area, beatin’ the streets, playing my heart (and voice) out, and writing with some great, quality songwriters. What that experience should have cost in dollars, I paid for in sweat and humility. There’s no other city that I know of that is so BURSTING with talent, yet so TIGHT on the purse-strings…incredible artists and musicians playing to tourist-packed clubs and honky-tonks for nothing more than what’s put in the tip jar (split 5 or 6 ways). Yep, it was a couple of hungry years for the Parker family 😉 BUT, I did learn a thing or two along the way.
Lesson #1… In order to be a creative, profound, ‘outside of the box’ sort of writer, you HAVE to write past the ‘barrier’. What’s the barrier? Well, it’s the point at which the ‘normal’ ideas cease to flow. It’s the point at which you think you’ve reached your creative limits. You don’t get there until your page is full…and there’s nothing left to write about. No words. No ideas. No colors, adjectives, adverbs…nothing. THAT’S the barrier, but it’s NOT the end.
Keep writing…random words…odd descriptions…put words together that don’t belong together…ideas that don’t seem to match…and press on. You’ll know when you’ve broken that barrier – when your mind helps you to realize that it wasn’t the end after all, but rather, it was simply the final traffic light before leaving ‘small-town-USA’ and hitting the interstate that leads to who-knows-where??? Keep writing… Keep writing…
Eventually, the roads that used to be blocked or marked with a ‘Dead End’ sign lead you to new destinations. Enjoy the ride!
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