The Beatles changed music as they wrote, recorded, & produced more than 200 songs.
+200 songs and 10% made it to #1.
Most won’t ever create 20 works that impact culture throughout their entire lifetime… but that shouldn’t mean we settle for 0.
We have a feel for the economics of entertainment & the probability of the genetic lottery; we know on a primal level we’ll never match Paul & John. School & society reinforce this feeling fitting us into machines not masterpieces. Deep within us though is an urge to connect, to make a difference, to be part of the conversation.
Social media, yet another stifling s-word, mires this ache in a haze of mediocrity & distraction.
We create “content” (that which is inside another thing) upon performative platforms. Whether we’re updating our network about a life change or lifestyle change-agent, we post and comment and like and “influence” in spaces that are fickle & finite. As trends & times change, so too will our work and the hours we poured into pressing “publish.”
We’ve settled for less than a goose egg here- we’ve settled for the undoing of our creative capacities.
Social media mirrors the war-torn regions about which it often pretends to publicize. It creates rifts between communities and rips through the character-development of a people. It “feeds” us shorter, more flashy, and sensational content (it’s been quipped about virality that “what works on social media is a car wreck”) and pushes us from our calling, our values, our gift.
But we don’t have to settle.
Show me your bad art. Churn through 180 bad songs and the good ones will shine through. Begin today and in 2030 your work may not be in the top #100, but it will certainly have been worth it.
