Woodshedding

It's been while since I've posted, longer than I'd like to admit. The more that time got away the more I thought about deleting this blog altogether. More recently, I've been reminded, when I fall behind on something (something worthwhile) I shouldn't just quit. I just need to wait and get back up when I'm strong enough. It's okay that life knocks us down and throws us off course. It happens to everyone. It's those that get back up who succeed. So here I am, getting back up.

While at the moment, I don't consider myself a great source to glean wisdom from, I still hope my words will encourage or inspire someone somewhere at some point. If not, it helps me to journal my thoughts, even if no one reads them. Since marketing myself is still on my "to do" list, this will most likely be the case. So today I will simply enter an update about where I am musically. I decided to sum it up by calling it woodshedding. Google AI says, "In the world of music, "woodshedding" is the intense and focused practice of a musical passage or song in private, often in a secluded space, until it's mastered. This intense, isolated practice helps musicians refine their skills and prepare them for performance." This means what I'm doing is much more than it appears on the outside. I will say, for a good long stretch I was going through some painful life experiences and music just wasn't coming out of me. Thankfully, healing is slowly taking place and my soul is starting to sing and write again. Now, I'm not absent. I just really am woodshedding. I'm practicing, writing, learning production, composing, recording, refining my work, waiting for something closely resembling excellence to take shape.

There's another reason I really like the word woodshedding. It describes something that often looks desolate, messy and forgotten on the outside. It's hard for people to imagine someone on the inside carving out something beautiful and unique, worthy of being shared and seen. Even peeking in the windows wouldn't give an outsider enough information to understand. Still, the artist toils way, keeping the faith, knowing that in time something amazing will emerge. Until then, it stays in the shed.

Photo by Noah Buscher - Thank you.