Making musical instruments isn’t something you’ll learn over night.  I probably should’ve guessed that!  I look back on ten years work and wonder where all the time has gone.  Continuing at the same rate of progress I’d have 2 lifetimes work here.  The fact is that the fundamental faith you have in your idea(s), and the optimism required to keep you going when things aren’t working out quite right, is exactly what gets in the way when questioning yourself and your methods – stubborness can be a great asset as well a troublesome affliction!  But on an even more basic level, you can’t be close to something – up to your eyeballs problem solving, scoring music, making things or whatever, and maintain the perspective you need to make good decisions, that’s a fact.

One method I’ve tried to adopt, which I’ve dubbed the ‘Shitstorm‘,  is to take some time out to pull things apart and be overly critical.  It’s like imagining a shit storm and working out where the shit is going to get it in – hence finding where weaknesses are.  With bigger teams someone might fulfil this task naturally (the person disagrees with everyone or shouts down ideas may not be useful when bouncing ideas around in a Brainstorm but can be massively helpful when full-proofing ideas and adding a reality check).  To do it to yourself, with your own ideas, isn’t an easy thing, but completely necessary.   I’m sure great artists, musicians, scientists or whatever, all have this quality: asking ‘Is there a better way to do this’ or ‘can I do it differently?’ if not, they’d stagnate.

So I’ve made some decisions, will discontinue making some models of Mk whistles, and I’ll have a whole lot more time to work on new ideas – a decision that should’ve been made about 5 years ago, but better late than never!

One of several books I finished reading recently is Scott Belsky’s ‘Making Ideas Happen’.  It introduces some ideas at odds with conventional thinking on turning your ideas into reality.  Highly recommended reading for Creatives.