“Inspiration”.
It became such an overused word, especially in the age of social media.
But when you look deeper into it, it is one of the most beautiful things in the world, when you can use it properly to your advantage. Here’s the Oxford and Wikipedia definition for it:
Inspiration – “the process of being mentally stimulated to do or feel something, especially to do something creative.”/ Wikipedia: “Inspiration is an unconscious burst of creativity in a literary, musical, or other artistic endeavour”.
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If you’ve ever tried to write a song, you have probably noticed that on a good day, at some point you stopped “trying” to write – and the song just starts to sort of “write itself”. You play some chords over and over, and lyrics just seem to start flowing out of your mouth.
THIS is exactly one example of a spark of inspiration. This beautiful alchemy, this magic that happens when you’re really all into doing your thing, the entire world around you fades away, and you are riding this flow of creation.
And it is definitely not exclusive to writing songs, and even not just to “Art” as we like to think of it. Yes, artists and creators from other walks of life (painters for example) also report similar experiences, like “the painting was revealing itself to me”.
But even outside of art, in so many other things that you do, you can feel this flow of creativity.
Just a regular day-to-day example? For example, you had a specific email in mind that you had to write, a “persuasive” email of any sort. But you were out of ideas on how to approach it…
Then while working on something else, suddenly an idea hits you like a lightbulb just turned on, and you fire up your email app and write the most perfect email in less than 5 minutes. An email that up until a few minutes ago – you had no idea how you should even start.
This was definitely also a spark of inspiration.
And the beautiful thing is – inspiration can be like a wild horse that rarely comes, and then throws you off of it quickly, but it can also be a tamed horse that takes you on beautiful journeys in the mountains of Switzerland whenever you just feel like it…
You can learn how to cultivate it, make it stay for much longer, and get the most out of it.
And this is exactly what a lot of what the new course will be about. It will NOT just be a technical course about the craft of writing songs. Half of the course will be about it, of course, in the most concise and effective way and with many examples. But the other half…
Will be about the SPIRITUAL aspect of songwriting. And of creativity. And about how to summon the muse, the inspiration… Ride it beautifully, and get the most out of it.
(And this is exactly what all other songwriting methods are missing)
OK.
And here is the #1 piece of advice that I have ever heard about inspiration, credited to my good friend Avni.
In any form of creation (songwriting, painting, brainstorming ideas for your next project, important email writing, whatever it is that you are creating) you have 2 modes of operation:
- Inspiration mode – when you are in the flow and you are effortlessly receiving ideas.
- Editing and polishing mode.
And the biggest mistake people do is to try to get bogged down into editing mode – while they are still riding in this enlightened, precious state of inspiration. (Which is not always easy to get into)
So the practical advice is this:
1: When you are feeling that you are in this INSPIRED state, and you are “receiving” something effortlessly – for example, the song is just “writing itself” and words are flowing out, or the ideas for the new project are suddenly just throwing themselves on the page…
DO NOT stop to overthink the fine details and to “fix” this line or that line.
Don’t worry about all the imperfections of the initial draft as you are writing it – just keep letting your creative juices run free – and get as much as you can on the paper. (or on the recording app, if it’s a song that you are trying to write)
*Also super important – When you are in this state – never allow yourself to open your phone and get bogged down into SMS, internet, and other “low” distractions – because these will also shut down your inspiration flow in a heartbeat*
2: LATER – when the inspiration has subsided and you’ve got everything you could get out of that spark – go back to what you initially wrote or recorded, and sit down, analyze, fine-tune, and perfect the details.
This could be done immediately after the inspiration has subsided, or maybe a few hours or days later.
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This is it.
If you only remember these two states of operations, every creative effort in your life will be a lot more fruitful.
“Behind the scenes” bit: This is also exactly how I wrote this blog post, by the way. I have had the initial idea in my mind for a couple of days on what do I want to write this week’s songwriting email about. Then, today, when I felt like it, I sat down and “shot” the entire draft on the page within 20 minutes. Then I took a shower. Relaxed. Got back to the computer. Edited and finessed everything for 30 more minutes. And sent it to you.
(In the past, writing such an email would take me 2-3 hours of messy work.)
I hope this was helpful, and I’d be happy to hear any comments!
All the best,
Alon Cooper
