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Overreacting

Emotionally, I often overreact. I’ve known this for a long time. What I did not know was the ways in which this manifested. It’s one thing when I get angry at some stupid thing that doesn’t work correctly or as expected. I will vent about that at the time, but stop and move on. That’s the overreaction that I was aware of.

Recently, I had an incident where something didn’t go well and I got pretty upset and frustrated about it. Then, I overreacted to that overreaction. In other words, I got myself pretty upset about where I was, and then got frustrated with myself about that and wondered if I’m doing the right thing. A pretty good spiral, don’t you think? Once I later realized that the initial reaction was unwarranted, it was pretty easy to see what I had done as far as overreacting.

Now that I realize that I overreact in these situations, it will hopefully be easier for me to catch myself before I fall into that again.

Sun, 2011 10 02 at 9:00 AM | Permalink for this entry

It’s a Frustrating Mess

I’ve been thinking about so much lately that I don’t know where to begin to write. It has been a bit overwhelming. But the cool thing is, I feel like I have gotten somewhere from all this thinking. Well, at least I do right now.

That’s the funny thing about this. One minute or day I’ll feel great, and the next, well, let’s just say I don’t. It goes back and forth. It seems pretty manic, actually. At the moment I am in a good place and I’m trying to stay there. One of the tricks is trying not to be so attached to what happens. More on that in my next post.

Sat, 2011 10 01 at 9:00 AM | Permalink for this entry

No Self Control

Well, maybe a little.

I have seen research that says that surfing the Internet causes our brains to respond like it does to other addictive stimuli. I have no doubt that this is true, because I have seen it in myself. I have had times when I have finished visiting my usual online haunts, and sat there for a moment, wondering where to get more.

Unfortunately, Internet addiction is more like overeating than drug or alcohol addiction, because it is difficult to do completely without the Internet in this day and age. I realize it can be done, but once those lines of communication have been established, it can be a problem to cut them.

In my case, I let surfing get in the way of doing other things, especially practicing and working on music. I would either say “just one more thing before I practice” and then be who knows how long, or I would think of something I wanted to check online while I was practicing and go check it as soon as I hit a stopping point and not go back for a while.

I finally found an application that helps me to stop doing that. It is called SelfControl. It is a Mac application and it is free, but I believe there are similar apps for Windows. It does not work exactly the way I would want, but it will do for now. What I usually do on weekdays is block my Internet access from 9 AM to Noon, and from 1 PM to 4 PM. While the app will let you choose which sites you want to block (such as Facebook, Twitter, your local newspaper), I have it blocking everything, even email.

I have found that this app has helped me stop spending time online and go do other things. The one disappointment is that when I am not using the app, I am just as bad about wasting time online as I was before. Do you think Dr. Drew would admit me as a patient?

Fri, 2011 09 02 at 8:10 AM | Permalink for this entry

Promises Promises

I know I said I’d probably write a post about what happened last week at rehearsals and before the gig, but right now it’s just not coming. I’ve either said as much as I’m going to say about it for now (see the previous post) or I’m processing it subconsciously and thus dealing with it. In fact, I spent so much time talking about it with Lori and thinking about it last week that I’m a little surprised I wrote the post I later pulled at all. I think if I do write about the subject, it will be in the context of another “incident” that triggers it again, or maybe something will happen that should have triggered it but all this processing will allow me to handle it or handle it better.

Next week, rehearsals start up again for Collective Hallucination. The next gig with them is August 12. The timing of that one is a bit of a bummer. Ian Moore is reuniting with his old band for a few shows, and that conflicts with one of the Houston dates he is doing. The other is Thursday the 11th, but I doubt we’ll make that. That’s the nature of being in this business.

I’ll be jamming again with Jeff soon, and Lori may join us. That should be fun. I got together with him a couple of weeks ago. We were both pretty rusty. I’m still somewhat dependent on an external source of rhythm, and because I haven’t touched most of that material since the band broke up, I haven’t tried to develop it in that way. Having Lori there will help if she can join us. I won’t call it a Blue Funk reunion. I’d rather leave it without a name, at least for now. Jams are fun, and that’s what I’m in this for.

Fri, 2011 07 15 at 4:46 PM | Permalink for this entry

This Ain’t No Stinkin’ Gig Report

Saturday night, I played a gig at Bohemeo’s with Collective Hallucination. I had a blast. That’s the punch line to a pretty long story that I will hopefully keep short for now.

On Tuesday, I had an incident at rehearsal that put me in a bad state of mind. Wednesday I worked on the problem, but didn’t enjoy it. Thursday I hung out with a friend who is a former piano teacher of mine, and some things we discussed and some things that happened like when I went to play for him made me start to become more aware of a bigger problem. That night and the next day, conversations with Lori made me realize what the bigger problem was and the extent of it. Frankly, I was overwhelmed by it.

Saturday I was still going back and forth about how I felt. I knew I could pull off the gig, at least for the most part, but my heart wasn’t in it. I pulled out Meditation #1 from Kenny Werner’s Effortless Mastery: Liberating the Master Musician Within and that changed everything. Afterwards, I felt totally fine, and except for some slight concern over the one part from Tuesday, it felt like any other gig. I did have some technical issues with my gear that surprised me, as I had used the same setup at the private party two weeks ago. I will have to investigate that.

Our gig ended early enough that we had time to go home, unload, and then head over to Dan Electro’s Guitar Bar to see our friends The Distracted as well as other friends who were there for the show.

What was looking like it was going to be a “meh” night turned out to be a great one.

I know you’re wondering what “the problem” is. I wrote a blog post about it, but pulled it because it was no longer reflective of how I felt. That’s the funny thing about blogging. If I write too much in the heat of the moment, then I’m stuck with posts that are a bit of a blip and not as much me. I plan to write a post about “the problem” once I get a handle on what I want to say about it.

Sun, 2011 07 10 at 10:25 AM | Permalink for this entry

Saturday Gig and Then…

Nothing for sure.

Saturday I have a gig with Collective Hallucination at Bohemeo’s. If you count the similar private party we did two weeks ago, we’ve been rehearsing most of this material for four weeks, two nights a week. I say most because there were some changes to the set list this week. Nothing major, though one song did have a part that was just tricky enough for me that I stumbled on it at rehearsal. That’s never fun. It should be a fun show though. It’s too bad a lot of my friends in bands have gigs Saturday night as well, so we’re not going to see each other play.

After that, there’s nothing definite lined up. I’m okay with that, for reasons I might get into in another post. I can be happy right now with working on some other stuff that I’ve been doing.

Fri, 2011 07 08 at 3:15 PM | Permalink for this entry

Loving the Limits

Over the years, I’ve heard some people say that they love limits. Until today, I never realized that I do as well. For me, the reason is simple. Give me a choice of anything, and my overactive mind goes, ”                .” But give me some direction and then the choice becomes easy.

What’s really interesting is how this showed up in my songwriting. When Blue Funk was around and I wanted to write blues tunes, that’s what I did. When I heard people make light of songs with few chords, I wrote a couple that only had one. Then there was a time when an email was passed around about “things you’ll never hear in a blues tune.” I managed to squeeze quite a few of those into a single tune.

I really dig the challenge of being creative and unique within the restrictions.

Tue, 2011 07 05 at 1:18 PM | Permalink for this entry

Look Over There

Where?

There have been a couple of times where I’ve been playing with a band, and one guy in the band looks at another and says, “the keyboards aren’t right.”

What’s up with that? The keyboards are fine, it’s the guy playing them that’s not right. (As they say in racing, it’s the nut behind the wheel.)

Also, don’t look at another guy in the band and say my part is not right, look at me and say it. I get it if they look at the other guy and say, “is what he’s playing right?” But otherwise talk to me and let’s work it out. As an adult, you should be able to find a way to say it that’s polite and clear, and not make it seem like it’s a life or death deal. We will save that for your screw ups.

Mon, 2011 06 27 at 12:00 PM | Permalink for this entry

I’m Glad I Wasn’t In Charge

Gig report?!

Yesterday’s gig was… different. To be honest, I can’t comment on it very much because almost all I could hear was drums, bass, and a little bit of me. But I could tell there were some rough spots and Ant, the bandleader, talked with the band about how he felt afterwards. I’m guessing a lot of that was because of people not being able to hear themselves or each other.

Even worse, though, was that some band members showed up Very Late. We were supposed to be there at 4, do a soundcheck around 5, and play at 6. I left the house later than I planned, and got there shortly after 4. Turns out that I was the first one there besides Ant. The last arrivals showed up around 6:15. Apparently, they got lost on the way.

Despite all that, I had fun. I wish I could say I nailed every tune, but I know I didn’t. I dealt with the problems as best as I could and allowed myself to enjoy what I was doing. I can’t really do any more than that.

Sun, 2011 06 26 at 9:10 AM | Permalink for this entry

Another CH Gig or Two

It’s not that different

I have a gig with Collective Hallucination later today, but it’s a private party (in Egypt, TX - seriously) so that’s why I didn’t invite you.

I should be playing with them again on July 9th at Bohemeo’s. I’d love to see you there.

Things have been going fine with this. It’s been a while since I’ve played with them, but I came back up to speed on the songs I knew right away, and learned the other ones fairly quickly. I’m really looking forward to this show. I just got home from seeing my friend Kevin Anker playing keys for Delbert McClinton, and he just killed it. I am seriously inspired. I’m also stuffed with a number one Whatameal.

Sat, 2011 06 25 at 1:35 AM | Permalink for this entry

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