I often get composers asking me how they are supposed to fit in writing music when they have a full-time job and a family.
You have a burning desire in you to compose music, but you have no time.
I get it, I have been there.
When I first started, I was teaching during the day and squeezing writing time in the evenings/weekends or whenever I could spare a moment.
In fact, even when I was technically "full-time" as a composer, I was actually part-time because my wife and I shared childcare, so I would have to squeeze my writing into the 3 hours or so when the kids were either asleep or at Nursery.
The funny thing is, and this might annoy you, I almost miss those days when I had less time to compose because what that did mean was that in those time slots, I had to be 100% (well, more like 70-80%) focused.
Over the years it took me to become a full-time composer, I have learnt a thing or two about making time for your music, no matter how busy you are.
So, here's my advice.
#1 - Change your mindset
It is so very easy to slip into patterns of worry, negative thinking, blame, and jealousy.
BUT, the biggest changes are going to come from you making these little shifts in your mindset.
Not finding time but making time
"I can't find the time" or "life keeps getting in the way" are things I have said very often myself, and I certainly hear other people say it too.
To counter, I ask, does life get in the way of brushing your teeth? Have you found the time to scroll on your phone today?
I thought so.
The biggest shift here is turning yourself from the victim of time passing, the the master of your day.
Don't 'find' time, you MAKE time.
If you can spend 10 minutes scrolling through shows on Netflix, then you certainly can MAKE time to write music for 10 minutes.
You are in control of your time, so make time for composing.
Make it non-negotiable
The easiest way to make time for your music is to make it a non-negotiable. I talk about this in episode 7 of my podcast, Composer Breakthrough.
It is all about making music something you absolutely cannot miss, like brushing your teeth.
Ok, there might be a day or two where you forget to brush, but on the whole, you brush your teeth twice a day, every day, because it is a non-negotiable.
Making composing something you do every day, no matter what.
Little and often
To help make it easy to be non-negotiable, you need to approach writing music as something you do 'little and often'.
10 minutes every day, you write music.
Can you spare 10 minutes for composing?
Surely!
Communicate with your partner
This is a pretty big one. When you are married (or with a life partner), good, clear, and regular communication is absolutely vital. And for your goal of writing music, it is no different.
You need to speak to your partner about your goals, desires and dreams (relating to your music) and get their support in your endeavours.
This makes sure that they help you make the time and also respect that time, as I am sure you would help and respect them if they came to you with the same (or similar) goals.
Embrace imperfection
Within my community, I have become known for saying "Done is better than perfect".
Done is better than perfect
It is one of my mantras as it has completely revolutionised how I approach my output.
Over the years of writing music, I became aware that some days I would think my music was "crap", but that opinion was largely because I was tired (kids waking me up).
Your mood can and will affect how you hear your music.
So I decided to get my music to a place where I considered it "done", and then I would submit it.
Ok, I would sometimes get feedback that was quite brutal, but on the whole, I realised the writing was solid.
So rather than waste my precious time (at this time I only had small windows for writing), twiddling knobs and improving the quality by maybe 1% I would send it off for the producer/publisher to review.
I would say it almost 10x'd my output (and as a direct result of that, my income)
Be kind to yourself
This is a big one.
It's all too easy to keep having a go at yourself for not making time for music, writing music you consider inferior, or some other tiny inconsequential thing but please try to speak to yourself as if you were speaking to something you love dearly.
You certainly would not say things like "this just sounds like a bunch of shitty loops" to that person (well, I hope not anyway).
Not only should you practice speaking more kindly to yourself, but you should also give yourself breaks, show gratitude for making time to write, etc.
#2 - Establish your goal
Why do you want to make music in the first place?
Obviously, like me, you have that fire in your belly that almost demands that you make music; otherwise, you feel like you might explode.
Beyond that, though, what do you want to achieve?
Do you want to just spend more time doing it for the love of it? Do you want to make this your full-time thing? Do you want to earn a little something on the side? Do you want to create your magnum Opus?
To explore your passion
If you are doing this because you want to get back into music and are not incentivised by earning, then the world is your oyster.
Although that sounds nice, too many choices can become a bad thing, so I would suggest following:
- What you enjoy
- What you are intrigued by, or
- What do you feel like you have been putting off
To replace your income
If it is to replace your income, my biggest piece of advice is to start saving for your runway.
This is 6-12 months (minimum) of your monthly expenses.
So if your monthly expenses are $4000, then you need to save at least $24,000. Ideally $40-48,000.
This does two things:
- creates the habit of allocating money
- gives you the chance to "take the leap"
#3 - Get S.M.A.R.T.
I am a firm believer in setting clear goals, and one of my favourite ways is to set a S.M.A.R.T. goal. This is a well-known acronym for goal setting. It stands for:
- Specific - When outlining your goal, make sure it is as specific as possible. For example, "I am going to produce a 10-track album of cinematic piano music that I will pitch to Universal Music"
- Measurable - Make sure that there is some quantifiable way to determine that you are progressing. For the above example, it would be when a single track is finished.
- Achievable - This will be subjective and down to the individual, but following our above goal, notice how I have chosen a 10-track album, rather than 10 albums (100 tracks)
- Relevant - As your overall goal is to make more music (and make money from it), the above goal is relevant. If I were to say, for example, create a detailed content plan for marketing, this would not be relevant to my overall goal of making more music.
- Time-bound - Basically, give yourself a clear (and realistic) deadline to achieve this goal.
So our SMART goal now looks like this:
"I am going to produce a 10-track album of cinematic piano music over 10 weeks that I will pitch to Universal Music". It now has a clear time frame that is achievable; now you have made time to make the music - one piano track per week.
#4 - Create the habit/ritual
I am not going to go into the details of hibut forming (all that jazz about 60 consecutive days), but I will give you my three tips to form good music-making habits.
1 . Make it EASY
This means getting the area ready for making music, having templates ready to load up, and having a clear goal for the session - "Today I am going to work on that tension album"
2. Remove 'Distractions'
Do not check your emails, do not have your phone within reach, and do not spend time finding the "perfect" sound - these are all distractions stopping you from actually making music.
3. Reward yourself
Each time you successfully sit down and make music and work towards your goal, give yourself a reward.
I do not mean have a beer every time you write, I mean something like, mark it on the calendar and at the end of the month of 20-30 straight composing days, watch your favourite movie or go to your favourite coffee shop.
#5 - Get Accountability
You should already have this to some degree from your partner, but I have found external accountability to be a huge factor as to whether or not I take action on a goal.
Accountability helps you to:
- Stay Focused
- Stay Motivated
- Feel supported
This can be in the form of releasing your music on a schedule or simply having a community in which you share your music.
This is the exact reason I have created the Composer Academy: to give composers like you a place to not just state your goals, but work towards them and be held accountable by the other members of the Academy.
Get accountability with your composing
Join my awesome community of like-minded composers, all looking to make more time for music and level up their careers 🤘🏼
