Sparks from the Fire

“No man is a failure who is enjoying life. – William Faulkner

Now here’s an Inspirational thought for the day.  At first glance it’s a simple truth, but upon deeper consideration might be considered in this day and age revolutionary – even un-American.

I have long been a proponent of this philosophy.  Having grown up and lived my life in show business, I have seen far too many good people crash and burn who missed the simple truth of this great lesson.

Ultimately, we’re here and then we’re gone.  Once we’re gone, what does it really matter how ‘successful’ we were while we were here?  How much money did you make?  How many awards did you win?  How high on the ladder were you able to climb?

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I am anything but lazy.  “Workaholic” is a more apt description.  I’ve known a few just plain lazy folks in my life, but I find that most people who are deemed “lazy” are not really lazy at all.  They’re really just unmotivated.

Sometimes, I just feel a bit lazy.  I just don’t wanna do nuttin’.  But if I really look at that, it’s always clear that the real reason for the feeling is that I’m a little lost or, more often, I’m so stressed out that I can’t face the work.  So I try to handle the deeper issue, not the laziness.

If you suffer from the laziness malady, just don’t accept it.  Go a little deeper.  Ask yourself why you are being lazy.  Check your motivation.  Make sure you have a goal.  Make sure you are excited about your goal on some level.  Make sure there is a right purpose to your goal.  Make sure you’re clear on that.

Every couple of months or so I like to sit down with myself and check my goals and motives.  It’s sort of an oil check.  Sometimes I’ll write them down on a piece of paper; sometimes I’ll just rehearse them in my mind, but I try to get the concepts clear within myself.  What am I doing?  Why am I doing it?  And how do I feel about doing it?  And lastly, what do I need to do to feel better about doing it?  It’s really the first beat of organization on any project that I do.

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Let’s talk about failure for a moment.  In my experience, as well as for every other artist who tries to “make it”, perhaps the hardest part of dealing with one’s artistry is the problem of overcoming rejection.  Every artist faces rejection constantly and many eventually turn to something else because of their inability to handle it.  I face rejection constantly and have learned to know that it’s never my spiritual man that’s rejected, but rather just my mortal mistakes.

And ya’ know, those need to be rejected.  It’s my duty to uncover the errors and correct them so that they will have no future basis.

Rejection is not failure.  The only real career failure you can have in life  is to turn 80, look back and say, “I wish I had tried to do that — I wish I had attempted that journey.”  Now that’s failure.

I had a young man speak to me after a concert once who said that he wished he had taken the time in his life to learn to play the guitar and that he was sorry that he would never be able to play as well as I play.  Now he was on the verge of failure.

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