Free Form Rock-n-Roll

I've been thinking about starting a blog on and off for probably more than 10 years. I've even had a handful of false starts over the years (and I think I've even written this exact sentence about 3 years ago).

There were lots of reasons I never really started (and by reasons I mean excuses) like, "I don't have the time" or "I'm not a good enough writer" or "I don't know if I have anything interesting to say"...

...and then I wrote my first book last year called Sell More Faster, which was published in September of 2019. This didn't really change my view on my excuses but what it did do was open a floodgate of thoughts I wanted to write down, if for no one else, for me.

It's been 6 months since the book came out and of me trying to find a way to start blogging. I've actually written quite a bit in that time but until April 7th, when I launched this blog, I hadn't publicly published any of my blog posts before. Then, 1095 days from my 50th birthday, the time felt right so I quietly but publicly pushed my first post Fitter at 50 and I gave ya'll a glimpse into my motivation to start on that day. In this, my 2nd post, I wanted to talk to you about how I am now attempting to overcome my excuses with the plan to publish on a much more frequent basis.

About 6 weeks ago, right before the Covid lockdown, while driving into work I was listening to Tales from the Golden Road, which is a call-in show on the Grateful Dead channel on Sirius/XM. As I was pulling into my parking garage a caller asked a super profound question of the hosts, who combined have been Dead Heads for over 80 years. The gist of the question was "how does Grateful Dead music make you feel, how does it effect your mood and how has that changed over the decades?"

(Side note: If you are not a Deadhead, here's a little more context. If you are then you can skip to the next paragraph. For you non-Dead Heads, one of the things that makes Grateful Dead music special is that if you listen to any song from any time in their 55 year history, they never play it the same twice. If you listen to the same song from the same year, you'll hear a ton of similarities but if you listen to a song that they played in 1969 and still play today, the song will have evolved so much that, unless you are a fan, you may not even realize it's the same song).

3.

The hosts, David Gans and Gary Lambert both chuckled and one of them commented that was probably more like a 4 day conversation at which point the conversation took an interesting turn.

The caller then commented on how Grateful Dead music changed HIS view on how he thinks about both music (first) and life. More specifically the caller, a classically trained musician, talked about how before he discovered the Grateful Dead he thought about music (and songs) as having a specific structure and progression and how a song was played either 'right or wrong'. He then went on to talk about how the Dead showed him how music can actually evolve, grow and take on a life of it's own - and how it opened his mind in how to look at life in the same way - ie: life doesn't have to have (nor does it usually have) a specific form or structure but instead has a life of it's own.

And then it struck me that my real challenge with starting to blog was that I didn't really have a single subject or theme or structure that I wanted to write about and more importantly that simple yet profound thought was my answer, which is to say I'm just going to write what I feel and see where the words take me.

The challenge with that (for me) is that it is, on the surface, in direct conflict with my theory and framework on the importance of knowing your W3 (Who is your customer, what are they getting from you and why do they want it). But then I realized that I know exactly who my W3 is - ME.

So as I sit here, listening to Shakedown Street from a 1988 Shoreline show (which sounds very different to Shakedown from '77 Cornell or '19 Boulder), I'm encouraged and enthusiastic about just putting it out there and seeing who else is curious about what I have to say and is in my W3.

So, if you are out there I encourage commenting to let me know what you think - or you can just email me at amos@sellmorefasterbook.com

Until next time....which will look nothing like the last time......