I don’t know how much energy I have actually put into being successful but regardless of that I’d be pretty shocked if I were to ever be what I considered a ‘success’ in a material way. I mean, perhaps I am successful in spirit and might find greater success there, although often my heart feels like a harden piece of rotten meat which was left out in the sun to turn into some glob of dry dung, but maybe it just need rehydrating. Up to a certain age success felt like one stumble away, down a flight of stairs, or out of some bar entrance into a waiting limo, now it feels like a fading string of Xmas lights that I no longer have a ladder to reach or I’m too lazy and cheap to go to Home Depot to buy, maybe though that is the actual key to success, to feel it’s out of reach so you start groveling around in the gutter looking for a dropped Bic lighter only to discover that the sewer grate is actually a door to better things. So, have you given up on success or perhaps, grown to understand that success is in fact under your nose or sitting collecting dust next to your desk full of broken dream synths?
Define success…
Its funny that my answer actually rhymes with success
Summary
Success?! More like, I suck! Yes!
Being on David Letterman and Fresh Air in the same week and going out to eat afterwards and ordering anything on the menu you want including two desserts with a glass of Sauternes and not ordering oysters just because they are one dollar each.
Try harder
A starving man finds 1 dollar oysters to be a huge success.
Not if they give him diarrhea after!
I am successful at failing.
…or is it a bigger fail …if i succeed at it?
One of those.
You’ve never been truly starving.
Extreme hunger is not starvation.
I certainly would not claim to be and yes I do know their is a whole world of real misery out there and I’m not talking about people who can’t figure out most things relating to midi.
The reason I asked you to define success is that it is so different for so many people.
A goat herder would be very successful to have a large, healthy herd that he can feed and water, and survives the winter.
A mother would consider herself successful to raise her children to be happy, educated, and independent.
A rapper would think him or herself successful to have a platinum album. A soldier would be hugely successful to come home alive.
Champagne, fillets, and caviar are only one type of success. Will that expensive meal mean as much on your deathbed as it did when you ate it?
Interesting discussion for sure. You are alive and presumably healthy and into making music. I consider you a success.
I very much understand your point and appreciate it or it’s not lost on me. The question just doesn’t have to do with my unstated idea of success but whoever cares to reply.
Isn’t it also a mistake people who don’t go without (as far as necessities) to think that success to someone who lives in poverty is just to have enough to eat and a place to sleep? People who live under such conditions are just as fully formed as we are and have dreams which extend beyond just living comfortably, which is something those who don’t go without don’t often think of, myself included, but I try to.
But yea, maybe I don’t even know what my idea of success is but I do understand the feeling of not feeling successful.
I don’t want commercial success. I want to express myself and bring interesting vibes into this world for myself and for other ppl to experience and I will never give up on that.
This sounds like success = fame & fortune.
I think most people saw that ship sink in the early 2000’s as the music industry collapsed and streaming monopolies took hold. Ultra manufactured Pop stars, social media culture and tik-tok were definitely the nail in the coffin. Kids don’t even give a shit about music anymore, generally speaking, they’d rather be watching a Twitch stream.
I hope to one day be in the music/audio field of work, that’d be my dream. But I’d gladly lose music for my friends, family and SO.
It’s so very hard to become successful, most who do are partly lucky as there are so many talents out there who aren’t given a space, time or investment.
I know it’s different from where we all live, but to be able to study to become a whatever I want/am capable of when I’m 30+ makes me not worry so much about the future and what I’ll “be”. I know I’ll always enjoy making music, and hopefully someday I’ll be able to make some tunes with my future children. Even if I’ll never fill out an arena.
We’re all many things, and being a “musician” is, at least for me, not even in the top 5 most important things.
For some it might be their ticket out of a shitty job they can’t get out of because of circumstances out of their control. I wish all of those people the very best of luck.
No, I have not given up on being successful, because it is not a fixed state. I have been successful in the past at various things, and I have had failures - both by my own metrics.
I will be successful in the future and I will also fail, failures are as valuable as success because they teach you things, like what you did wrong.
I’d also say that if your measure of success is about material possessions and status, then think about what those people you aspire to be like do differently from what you do. Would you be able or prepared to do the same?
Personally I measure my own success by how happy something makes me, not how much money I make or how much it might impress others. You might reasonably say that is a cop out, but it works for me.
I was being half sarcastic but most if not all of my previous ideas of being successful in a “famous” sort of way don’t really exist anymore as you’ve highlighted. I can honestly say I have zero interest in being famous in any recognizable way. It’s hard enough as it is to find people who I find sincere or are interested in the sort of conversations I find meaningful.
I guess success for me is doing something I find meaning in while living comfortably.
Right, I feel your pain though. When I was in highschool I just wanted to be the next Smashing Pumpkins, but here I am making weird electronic music on Bandcamp with 3 followers. Couldn’t escape getting a real job in the end.
Yes. I just turned 40. And I’m so much happier not giving a fuck about what will appeal to Gen Z or whoever comes after them. I just make music for myself. Don’t care about gigging. Nice place to be.
And a little bit for us Current sounders. 