Full disclosure, I am writing this blog in attempts to guide myself out of the difficult feelings of dealing with loss in my own career. What happens when you lose opportunities you were banking on? What do you do when heartless people flake on you or people change their mind and no longer wanna work with you? What happens when we have emergencies and the rest of the world has zero tolerance? How can we be at our 100% everyday, all the time? The music business can be an unforgiving and horrible place. People don’t care what you might be going through, they only care about their own agenda.

“The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There’s also a negative side.”

-Hunter S. Thompson

Yup.

Focusing on the good instead of the loss

So, we all have set backs and in the music industry, they can be a daily, and definitely a weekly occurrence. You never got that gig you were hoping to get, your band mate doesn’t show up rehearsal, you have to go fix something wrong with your guitar, your tour gets cancelled, your album isn’t doing as well as you hoped, etc.., etc….One thing I try to focus on is that once something is done, it is done. You can only move forward, you can only make things better in the future or the present, not the past. As easy as it is to focus on the negative, we all know it is healthier and more productive to focus on the positive. Easier said than done. But perhaps these questions might help.

How do you cope with difficult situations? Is it really all bad or is there a silver lining in the situation?

What is the good that can come from this?

Maybe a part of you is even glad this happened?

What opportunities are now at your disposal that weren’t before?

Is your loss even as great as you think it is?

Maybe you have gained more than you realize?

Staying true to yourself and what feels right to you.

Sometimes when under a lot of pressure, it can be very hard to keep one’s cool and not get emotional. It is easy to want to really let someone have it, and give them a piece of our mind, but people generally frown on this. Everyone says never to burn any bridges, and to always be kind and polite and keep your options open and stay connected to people you don’t even like, just because they may come in handy in the future. Although I agree to some of this on some level, I also believe this type of networking can be exhausting and truly draining on one’s soul.

If someone doesn’t feel right in your life, or your career, or every time you see them they bring out the worst in you and make you nervous or comfortable, then consider how much of a loss leaving them behind would create, and if you truly think your life would be more positive and productive without them, then go ahead and distance yourself from these people. You don’t need negative people in your life! Avoid them at all costs. You need to be around as much positive energy as you can. The people we surround ourselves with make all the difference in our lives.

Who are the people in your network you feel most supported by, most cared for and positively benefit from?

Great, spend more time with them.

Good night folks,

Cecilia Eve