Behind the Scenes: #23 The Plateau
A Peek Behind the Curtain: A Solopreneur Produces an Album Recording
Photo by Gabriel Tovar on Unsplash
It’s almost time to begin working with my pianist on the next songs that we’ll record. Unfortunately, I have hit … The Plateau.
Let me explain. My musical projects in the past have all been completed in under six months. While I might have had the musical rep percolating in my head before I actually began the project, I have never actively worked on a project for more than nine months tops, and even that length is unusual.
It so happens that I seem to have a three-month cycle built into my psyche. That might have originated in the semester system in school, or it could be a peculiarity of mine, or it could be a natural sort of rhythm for humans. I really can’t say. But I generally complete any project in three months, or six months, or occasionally nine months.
This project is different. I began work on it in 2019 just after retiring from the dreaded survival job of thirty-seven years, so I was going through a bit of a change in work habits now that I was totally self-employed. Then came 2020, and we all know what came next. The Pandemic happened. For the next two or three years, live rehearsals were almost impossible, and I need interaction with other humans in order to bring a project to fruition. So the project ground to a halt.
By the time I started working on the project again sometime in 2023, my voice was beyond rusty, so I had to find a way to bring it back to a performance-ready state. It took time. I also had to find personnel to work with, as everyone I had worked with prior to the pandemic was no longer in New York City or was otherwise unavailable. And I made a couple of false starts, wasting a good bit of time, before I found all the right people.
So I began working on this project for real last year, but it has been living in my head, if not in reality, for FIVE years! I have never, ever worked on a project that long. And I’ve been actively working on it for over a year now. This is way beyond my usual attention span for intense work.
I managed to keep up the interest and the energy with it last year and the first few months of this year. This is the point at which I would normally have long since completed the project. A couple of months ago, I hit a wall.
The wall, or plateau, is a complete loss of interest in the project, a standstill, a butting of my head against the will to continue. I’m simply sick of working on this project and have totally lost interest in it. Looking at the song list, I dislike every song and no longer want to sing any of them. I’m tired of trying to get the voice up to speed again after a very long lay-off while my pianist is out of town, time after time. I still like looking at the project’s image, and that’s about it.
How to re-light my fire, my passion for the project, my enthusiasm? That is the question. I hear this situation is not uncommon among creatives. I haven’t encountered it often myself simply because I don’t linger on any one project for very long.
The Plateau is what I’ll hereafter call a loss of interest or enthusiasm in a project, when you run out of steam, no longer want to do the project at all, or find it hard to care about it. Instead of the excitement of running uphill toward your goal (the completion of your project), you’re at a plateau, where there’s no velocity, no energy propelling you ahead.
There are probably as many reasons why this happens as there are reasons why one begins a project in the first place. But there are some common reasons that affect a lot of people. And there are a handful of really effective tools for overcoming the “hump.” I’ll talk about those and how they have worked for me in getting through this particular plateau—or not. In case you someday experience such a loss of interest in an ongoing project, you might come along for the ride.
1. The break. The first thing I did was take a short break from the project. In the past, I’ve found taking a break for a short, specified period to help in getting my enthusiasm back. Perhaps I was just tired, and when I came back, physically and mentally replenished, it was easier to get excited about the project again. This time, that didn’t do it for me. The loss of interest this time seemed to reflect something deeper or more complicated. And again, this was the longest period of time in which I’ve ever worked on a project.
2. The Intention. If you’ve made a commitment about the project, whether publicly or to yourself, revisiting that commitment sometimes rekindles the flame. I took a look at the commitment I declared at the beginning of the Elements Two™ project. It included an intention that encompassed the value in the project for me and, hopefully, for others.
Reviewing the web page I created for the album, I’m reminded that my purpose in doing this ELEMENTS TWO™ project, as well as the original ELEMENTS™ project, is to put a focus on the importance and healing power of the beauty of nature, for us and for our planet. This brought me to revisit the purpose of EGMP, my production company, which is to offer “a different kind of entertainment, one which actively and uniquely engages both performers and audience, presenting projects that entertain, educate and enliven. It fosters transformation and the expansion of creative energy in both performers and audience, through music, visual art, technology and other creative expressions that expand the senses.”
For reasons I can’t explain at the moment, I’m having a hard time getting excited about that intention. It seems to have drained of meaning for me, at least at this moment in time. I can’t quite see at the moment how my project is going to accomplish my original intention. So I’m going to explore some other ways of getting my interest and excitement back.
3. Revisit your own work. I’ve found that reading, watching or listening to previous parts of the current project or others I’ve already completed can help get the juices flowing again. Better still, if I start at the beginning of the project and look at all the work I’ve done so far as if I’m seeing it for the first time, I often become interested in the work again. I also find that listening to or watching previous work I’ve done in any past projects that I feel proud of can get the energy moving. I usually begin to experience that work again internally, feeling it as though I’m creating it right now.
4. Get inspiration from the work of others. I might also read, watch or listen to material from similar or related projects that have been done by others, both famous and not-so-famous. I might find inspiration there, and I might find my competitive spirit, too, and that’s often useful for me. I might feel once again that the current project is a worthy project and feel justified in continuing it.
5. Find a glimmer of interest with some element of the project, no matter how tiny. If I can find something, anything at all, in or about the project that peaks my interest and start from there, I can gather steam and get moving with the work again.
6. Look at your work from a different viewpoint. I might look at the work I’ve done so far in the project and consider a different approach or technique going forward, coming at it from a different point of view, to see if that might add some heat to the fire.
Having just tried numbers 3-6, I find that I’m feeling a bit of buzz about my project now. I’m ready to begin work on one of the songs again! And that’s all I have to do. One song, and then another, and pretty soon I’ll be flying again.
How do I keep the fire going in the future?
I’ve used all of these techniques for rekindling enthusiasm at some time or other, but since I’ve never encountered a complete loss of interest in a project before, or one as long-lasting as this one, I’ve never really looked at all of them together before. I’m glad I have the opportunity to look at them now as a whole, as I can certainly use them know, and I can possibly use them to create a preventative for The Plateau, or at least for resolving it, in the future.
Two questions arise:
1) How can I make sure my projects don’t take this long in the future?
The answer here is that I need to have multiple pianists on speed dial so that I don’t have a long dry spell of no singing, after which I waste time getting the voice up to speed and getting my interest up again. I believe all of the other elements are in place, as I’m a pretty good producer/administrator of musical projects. So it’s really just a matter of finding a couple more compatible pianists, and while that’s no easy task, it’s one I surely can manage.
2) How can I use what I’ve learned about rekindling the flame of interest to avoid letting the energy and enthusiasm sag in future projects?
I see now that enthusiasm, something I’ve previously taken for granted, is something that has to be nurtured and supported, particularly in longer projects. I can’t wait for or expect it to happen. Instead, I need to cultivate it deliberately, systemically, and continuously.
And now … as I begin to feel a small glimmer of excitement bubbling to the surface … it’s time to get ready to make music again!
If you’d like to succeed at creating what truly matters to you in life, read Elena's latest book, ABRACADABRA! A Manual for Making Dreams Come True.