I’m just about done with my 3 week Asia trip, and I feel like my perspectives and priorities have changed a bit.
Most of the most rewarding experiences I had involved playing guitar or performing music (jamming with musicians in Kyoto, playing a guitar at a bar near Nagano, Karaoke in Tokyo and Taipei, playing Cajon in Taipei at open mic night). It made me realize I’d really like to invest lots of time into improving. I’d like to get really good.
And I’ve done just fine maintaining my business with an average of fewer than 2 hours per day spent on it. Which means I should have an incredible amount of free time on my hands.
I need to focus on practice and learning vs. just “being good”, because I think that will make it more fun and ultimately lead to better results.
I’m told that 3 hours per day is probably the most you should ever play and it will yield the best results. I don’t need to play that much every day but I might as well shoot for close to it. Maybe even just try it for a while and see how things change.
I might even buy a new acoustic guitar that’s a little more standard to play and go from there. My current ones are unusual.
I’ll focus on fundamentals and hopefully also start playing with people again. I think that would be fun. Maybe do open mic nights.
But I’d say that overall, I’ve had a bit of a mindset shift on how I spend my time. I got the impression while traveling that in these places there is far less of a focus on money and productivity, which is great. I’m realizing more and more that our system in the US is just sort of sick, and much of it has been imposed upon us by billionaires trying to create a culture of wage slaves to enrich themselves.
And I want no part of it.
Obviously, I have to plan for my future. And my job has only improved over time and paid me more, and I’m incredibly thankful for it.
But I need to realize that it’s a means to an end, and that I need to take a step back and really be honest about how I’m spending my time with it. I need to really focus on making it as efficient as possible and spend as little of my own time on it as possible so that it doesn’t interfere too much with the rest of my life.
And I also just need to review how I’m actually spending my time. I think I’m still wasting far too much time on silly activities like entertainment. I’m not being intentional enough.
Part of the problem is that I lack the energy to work on things that benefit me all the time. I may need to improve my sleep for that or figure out other things.
But I should also change how I view some of my activities. I should have times when I’m playing guitar just for fun and I don’t need to focus on learning or improvement. It can be low-energy and restorative. Just play songs I know if I’m lacking in energy.
Anyway, that’s what I hope to do going forward and I’m thankful for this trip that it helped me see that. Hopefully I won’t just slide backwards going forward.