Idealism vs Action
Before I get into it:
If you are experiencing a block in your artistic creativity then living cyclically could revolutionise your composing in the way it has revolutionised mine.
When we live in cycles, we learn that what ebbs will flow again.
The first step to diminishing creative block is to notice your cycles (any cycle). Trust in it. How do you feel in different stages and does that relate to your creativity?
In up to 3x 60-minute sessions a month, we can work towards leaning into the trust that what once was will be again.
The first 3 sessions are pay-what-you-can (£50 per hour minimum) and £80 thereafter.
I was a co-panellist for Royal Philharmonic Society's RPS Composers cohort the other month.
I was spouting my usual ideas about money, capitalist expectations, cyclical creativity, etc. (you may know me by now haha! If not, this is me to a T!)
And someone rightly asked me this (rephrased), 'but how do I reject capitalism when we need it in order to survive?'
This was a brilliant question. Because my first answer was:
I don't know.
This is the society we live in. Our survival comes first and foremost.
However, when you cannot thrive in a capitalist system, when it grinds you down, gaslights you, profits off the blood of your ancestors and tells you that you are not enough - then we have to find a certain kind of resistance, right?
The composing world is not immune to this. Funding is scarce, composers fight amongst themselves for crumbs sprinkled by those who hold power, or encouraged to work for free (expoooosure). People are leaving the industry daily, burned out and damaged by an inherently skewed patriarchal and racist hierarchy.
There is never one solution for how to change the system within which we live.
My role as a panellist, as a teacher and as a human is to look critically at what we are told and to see if there is another way of thinking that will serve my clients, loved ones, and myself better.
Their journey itself is not mine to dictate. I can only dictate that for myself.
However, my second answer was:
Find a little bit of control wherever you can. Change what you can. Resist where you can. Ask for more money. Advocate for your fellow musicians when advertised rates are too low. Speak up. Join together.
Find what is important to you and create that balance in your life where you can.
Don't let capitalism rule your health and wellbeing.
Don't let it take your creativity.
My role is to shift perspective.
When we have shifted perspective, then we can see what new options are available to us.