I think I'm not alone in this.

How do you cope with lack of belief in yourself? There are quite well documented and widely recomanded ways how to deal with it in real life, but it's something else when producing. ...when right in that second before a creative descision a doubt appears out of a sudden. You're supposed to base that descision on your taste, on who you are, what you like and what do you believe in. ...but what to do when that doubt just screams at you that all that stuff is just wrong? ...based on past failures.

How do you silence it? Breaks? Switching projects? Calling it a day? Alcohol? Socializing? Scheduling a therapy? ...or do you listen to it somehow, use it in some way?

You are sooo not alone on this one. A lot of us are all in the same boat. It's super easy to get down on yourself for not stacking up to the people that you look up to; especially when it's so blatantly obvious in an age of the internet where it's all about followers and plays and reposts and blah blah blah blah

the point is, it's all a matter of perspective. I try not to focus on the number of people listening to my stuff or supporting me, but I really find joy when I find the people who genuinely enjoyed my music (and sometimes that's only a handful of people), even though my self-critical nature is telling me that my mix is terrible, or my arranging skills are terrible. Ignore your instinct to tear your work down because of the technical nitty-gritty of it all, and try to realize that there are people out there that enjoy your art because it's a raw expression of who you are I know that's SUPER cheesy and kinda lame sounding, but it's really helped me in my production.

Also, for what it's worth, I really enjoy your music

We all go through this. What helped me is studying cognitive behavioral therapy or CBT. Cognitive behavioral therapy is also known as talk therapy and it's one of the primary tools that therapists use to talk their patients out of depression. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying you're depressed or anything but it really helps deal with negative self talk. Here's a pdf of the book I found online.

http://islamiconlineuniversity.com/counseling/resources/David%20Burns%20-%20Feeling%20Good.pdf

The entire basis of CBT is that the way we think determines the way we feel and if we can change the way we think then we can change what we're feeling. Instead of trying to "ignore" or "silence"your thoughts like a zen buddhist you should try to replace them with thoughts that are much more productive to your well being. Keep in mind... you have to actually believe in the new thought. You can't just tell yourself "The music that I'm making is the best thing I've ever heard!" because you won't believe it unless it really is that good.

For example, lets say you were feeling doubtful about some piece of music. You might be thinking to yourself "It doesn't sound as good as X artists track and I'll never be able to be as good as them." With CBT you write the thought down on a piece of paper and then you evaluate the truth of what you're saying. Maybe it doesn't sound as good as X artists track but does that necessarily mean that you'll never be as good as them? So instead you replace the old thought with something like this...

"It's true that my music doesn't sound as good as X artists track but that doesn't mean that I'll NEVER be as good as them. They've been producing for a decade while I've only been at this for a few years. If I keep on practicing everyday then I'll keep getting better and one day I'll be just as good as "X" artist. Now why don't I try working on some sound design/mixing etc..."

I'm not saying to lie to yourself. If your music doesn't sound as good as you want it to sound then you need to be honest with yourself. That's the only way you get better. Yes your music may sound off to you now the question is "why?". What is it about your music that doesn't sound as good as "X" artist? Take it as an opportunity to learn and grow! Is it because the chord progression is to cliche? Does something in the mix just sound off? Keep on experimenting until you figure out why things sound like crap and then learn from it!

My music sounded like crap 2 years ago and to this day I still think that it sounds like crap in comparison to my heroes. However, compared to the stuff I was making 2 years ago I'm LIGHTYEARS better than I was then. The only way I'm able to get better is by trusting my intuition when things sound like crap and not trying to lie to myself by saying that things actually sound good. Then I mess around with things until I can get things to sound good and my mixes improve.

When you say what you'd like your production to become are you referring to what genre you'd like to go into?

You have to ask yourself whether the source of your low confidence in production is due to your music not following your tastes or whether it's because your afraid that nobody else will like it because it's to different.

If you're making music that is really different from anything else out there then you should be even more proud of it. Music that doesn't sound like anyone else has a tendency to attract its own audience in the same way that introducing a new product to a market allows a company to capitalize on its first mover advantage.

Look at madeon. When he started making his complextro style type of music I remember reading somewhere that he was told there was no market for it and it wouldn't be successful. Now everyone is trying to copy him with that nu-disco type of sound. Same goes for Aphex Twin. His music is incredibly different and unique and I'm sure he wouldn't have been able to release his music if he was always concerned about whether his music had commercial appeal or not.

I don't know whether that's what the source is considering I'm just making assumptions but if you could give CBT then it may help you out. Give it a shot and if it's not for you just throw it out like everything else.

EDIT: I forgot to include that I wasn't aware that you were in this for 8 years.

If that's the case then find something else to replace the negative thought with. Sure maybe you've been in this for 8 years but like you said isn't your old stuff terrible in comparison to your recent stuff? That's because you've been getting better dude! You've been making progress! You should seriously be proud and treat yourself out to dinner somewhere for your hard work. You've got to be doing something right if your new music is closer to your taste than your older stuff.

So, I checked out your music and I think it's really, really good. You just got a new SC follower.

Honestly I struggle with the self-confidence thing myself a lot. For me it really stems from not having the knowledge/resources to make the music that I really enjoy listening to. I want to make certain types of music really badly and I get the ideas for really cool tracks but way more often than not I struggle to recreate them as real songs and they end up sounding terrible. When this happens it triggers a downward spiral of losing any sort of self-confidence, creativity, and productivity I initially had.

To keep this from happening, I really try to just go with the flow. Rather than trying to make a super complicated sound or mix-down that's already planned in my head, I just play around with things until something interesting comes out and I run with it. If I do that it removes any expectations from the song I'm making - it doesn't HAVE to be any specific thing, so whatever it ends up as is the 'right' thing, if that makes sense.


In the very back of my mind I usually still am like "fuck if only I could make one of those Mefjus-style basslines..." haha

Quote from: FarleyCZ on February 11, 2016, 09:52:26 pm

...based on past failures.

I think this may be the core of your problem. How do you define success, and how do you define failure?  Are you in this to "make it"? Or to make good music? What have you done that you consider a failure?

Well that's a milion dollar question. It would have been nice to "make it", but I don't think I've ever had ambition to do that, so that's definitely not it.
I understand music as a way to share emotions. So for me success is when listener is somehow emotionally affected by the track. ...at least a little bit. Failure is when I trust the track, but in reality it doesn't speak to anybody. When I like the track, but not many other people do. When it's just empty despite all the effort.

Have you released any music commercially? You should try.  If you use your friends´reactions to tell you if what you make is good or not, you will almost always be disappointed unless you make "lowest common denominator" stuff.  None of my friends really like the stuff I make, but on spotify there´s a lot  it seems.  it´s just a matter of getting it out there.

Tried few YT promoters wit not much success. I do think about Spotify lately though, as that seems to be go-to location to find music for a lot of people. Still not sure if I'm ready for it, though. Also no idea how this content agreator thing works.

I listened to you SC, and I think you have your own expression, and a lot of tracks that you should be proud of.

Thank you!

How to deal with low confidence? Get confident, stupid!

(/Simpsons)