All year long on this blog we give you the daily dose of “Go! Go! Go!” We give you tips and advice on how to get busy and stay busy moving your music career forward. Well, here’s a piece of advice that is every bit as important as the others: Stop!
Every once in a while you need a break. You need some down-time to decompress, to let go of the hopes, ambitions, fears, pressures, to-do lists, and anxieties that can accompany any serious pursuit.
Of course we’re thinking about this now because of the Holiday season, but burnout can happen at any time. Whenever the scales tip too far in the direction of stress, burden, hollow effort, and tedious rigmarole, it is time to take a rest.
So if you’ve got a little vacation coming up, some time planned with the family, or just need a different adventure, do it! Put the computer and headphones away. Get offline. Set down the guitar. Don’t touch the piano keys. Hide your drumsticks.
Relax! Refresh! Renew!
When you come back to the music, you’ll feel a sense of joy again, and that can only make your music better.
Hope y’all have a very very happy Holiday season.
-Chris R. at CD Baby
Chris Robley is an acclaimed singer-songwriter and award-winning poet from Maine.
His Beatlesque indie-pop and milltown Americana songs have been praised by The Associated Press, No Depression, KCRW, The LA Times, Boston Globe, NPR, American Songwriter, and others.
His poems have appeared in Poetry Magazine, Prairie Schooner, The Poetry Review, and more.
Robley has received a Maine Literary Award in Poetry, Boulevard’s Emerging Writers Prize for Poetry, and in 2016 was selected by former US-poet laureate Robert Pinsky as a finalist for the Dorset Prize.