💡✍️ADN #155: Face the Pain

Here’s a note I wrote myself recently that I thought might help you too.

What I do poorly is what I need to face.
What hurts is what I need to walk toward.

Most people turn away from the pain, from the hard conversation, the song that didn’t land, the project that flopped.
But every time you turn away, you build a habit of avoidance.

And avoidance is the inverse of progress.

Said another way:

“A smart person does first what everyone else does last.”

That means fixing the part of your live show that drags.
That means admitting your marketing plan isn’t working.
That means finally learning the skill you’ve been outsourcing for years.

When you face the thing you suck at — early — you buy time.
You buy progress.
You buy freedom.

Freedom from the weight of what you don’t know.

Every artist has blind spots.
But the ones who grow are the ones who stop pretending they don’t.

So here’s your challenge this week:
List the three things you keep avoiding.
Then circle the one that stresses you the most and start there.

That may be the one holding everything else back.

Once you’ve solved for it, you’ll see yourself as someone who can do it again.

Artist development in action.

See you next Sunday,
Neil