Dear 31%, I miss you.

I have had a harder-than-usual time getting into a flow state. It’s likely related to the pandemic, having kids, a business location move, a personal move across the country, business changes (although good), financial changes (although good), life, disorganization, reorganization, refocusing, un-refocusing, creating, writing, exercising, not exercising, doing laundry, dinner, picking up the kids, doing dishes, and figuring out what tomorrow brings. Oh yeah… things are busy even when they’re “not.” Because they are.

Deep work (or flow state or focused time or whatever you want to call it) is limited to about 4-5 hours per day for most people. For the sake of tossing out a pointlessly-unmeasurable number, I’m going to call it my 31%.

My recent 31% seems to be consumed with figuring out how to best use it. Every project I start feels like it is met with roadblocks that represent other ways I need to spend the 31%. 

I go to work on finishing the music writing room and realize I can’t find my tools to do the project (largely because we just moved and many of my tools still live in a bunch of boxes). I start to unpack the boxes to find my tools surrounded by objects I need to sell or give away. As I start to create a pile of objects to sell or give away, I realize how little room I have. I start moving things around and realize it’s time to get the kids from school. We talk about their day, help them with homework, eat, get them to bed, and then I write a song on the piano. I start tuning the piano because we just moved it into the house, and it’s adjusting to its new environment. Oh yeah, it’s probably good to research what system I need to control humidity for the piano and guitars in my space before the changes start to cause problems. I go to bed.

The next day, I go to work on finishing the music room and realize I can’t find my tools…

Dear 31%,
I miss you.

I don’t think I have conquered my 31% in the past without help. I struggle at certain types of tasks, and I excel at others. When I’m a bit buried with too many options of tasks that all “need” my attention, I benefit greatly from a kickstart before I can take the reins and kick task booty (technically speaking).

My goal is for my headspace to be at a place where writing music and filming stock footage are easily-accessible and exciting. For all intents and purposes, the wandering state of task-completion I talk about above is only lacking when viewed from my anxiety and desire for everything to be completed immediately. If I’m kind to myself (which I’m really working on), the progress is real and significant. My goal of easily-accessible headspace is closer than it was yesterday. The 31% is already working.

Thankfully, I have support from friends and Carrie to help. This is my friendly reminder to myself to ask for help to get to the most rewarding and fulfilling parts of my 31%.

The Irony Alien

The past few years of my life have been particularly-enlightening. It feels like every few weeks are as exciting as they are humbling. I’m learning to define and acquire tools for things I consciously or subconsciously knew were present—like guilt and shame, depression, anxiety, and social confusion. Sometimes, my view of the world and my relationship with it is flipped on its head.

We recently watched Atlas of the Heart on HBOMax. In the series, Brene Brown presents a simplified version of her new book (aptly named Atlas of the Heart). She explores how understanding and using the correct emotional language changes our literal experience and outcome of life situations.

She and her team brilliantly use movie clips to quickly demonstrate the differences between some nuanced emotional differences. Each set of movie clips connected with me really well. She and her team are clearly brilliant at choosing the right movie moments to illustrate each emotion. And then… she talked about irony.

People with ASD have been stereotyped as not easily understanding irony. I was quick to discount this for me; I understand irony—or so I thought. People have always talked about irony, and I’ve never had a moment where I realized I was lost. This was probably because I discounted my perceived importance of it. When Atlas of the Heart’s movie clips played illustrating irony, I DID NOT get them. I DID NOT GET THEM.

I asked Carrie to pause the show.

Wait… why did I not get these moments? I understood every other emotional example so potently.

As soon as we talked through each ironic moment, I understood them, but that’s different than inherently getting them in context. I realized I’ve been pretending my way through irony my whole life. It’s not that it’s always lost on me, but I’m realizing that I’ve disregarded it as being a wasteful communication style instead of a brilliant way of communicating.

This realization felt similar to the moment I realized I have significant hearing loss in my left ear and some in my right ear (from not wearing hearing protection in jazz band where the band is to the left of the piano player). I no longer hear what most people do; as a musician, this is a frustrating realization. It feels how I’d imagine it would feel to discover I was color blind and unable to see colors that most other people have seen all along. It’s humbling. It’s mind-blowing.

There’s a whole world in social communication I don’t inherently understand—like not being able to see the color blue.

I talked to my therapist about it.

She asked if I wanted to talk/learn about irony. Strangely, I had to think about it, and was equally-perplexed that I had never wanted to learn more about it.

After agreeing, she kindly asked me to describe irony. 

Willing and excited about the exercise, I awkwardly laughed. After a bit of a pause, I told her I didn’t know how to describe it. She encouraged me to take my time. I took some time and fully realized how stumped I was. 

I get the irony of an illustrated situation when it is explained to me—like asking someone to explain the punchline of a joke.

Yeah…

As a person who feels reasonably-intelligent, it feels exposing to realize I don’t understand something so pivotal to society’s communication (movies, lyrics, jokes, etc.). 

Enter today. 

We were with some really close friends who decided to play a game involving two sets of cards—one with pictures of people’s faces (sometimes interacting with each other) and the other with text references to moments in a TV show. The point of the game was to choose quotes that would (in my best estimation) “ironically” match a quote to the pictures. 

The players had to first take into consideration the emotion of the people in a relevant photograph. The second step was to a read and understand the emotional relevance of a TV-Show quote. Lastly, the ultimate goal was to match said photo with a movie quote that best fits the picture in a way that will best match the decision-maker’s perspective of the most ironic (or appropriate) matchup.

I lasted a few rounds before I left—I felt comfortable to leave because I know the people I was with understand that I might need to process and wouldn’t be offended by my momentary absence. Thank you, friends. :)

In hindsight, I realize I could have stayed, picked random cards, loved that others were enjoying it, and enjoyed others’ fun-having. Next time, I will do this. I just needed to grasp why I was struggling with every concept of the game.

I don’t care about winning games like this (or many) at all. Losing would be emotionally inconsequential to me.

I did, however, need to take a break to unpack the complexity of what I was feeling. When I was there, it wasn’t loud, bright, or otherwise overwhelming. It was the first time in a while (if ever with my current skill sets) that I’ve been able to connect the lack of social understanding to over stimulation. I see this as a gift.

There’s a lot more for me to process in the future, but this was an important moment for me to realize the impact on me for social overwhelm without sound, lights, etc.

Bye-Bye Logic

I started therapy because of sensory processing issues largely regarding audio sensitivity. The self-preserving side of me would love to tell you that I recognized it as a problem and addressed the issue all by myself. That’s not true. Carrie gently, although persistently, suggested I try therapy. Therapy had been incredibly helpful for her, and she knew it would be helpful.

I knew she was right.

I said, “Once I get better, I’ll start therapy. Once I do the things I know I’m supposed to do, I’ll start therapy. Once I find someone smart enough, I’ll start therapy.”

It was one-too-many times of being irrationally responsive to sounds, inconveniences, chronic stress, and/or other cymbal-brain ringing inputs that lead me to finally pull the therapy-seeking trigger. Yes — it was after Carrie, once again, gently reminded me that therapy might help me and our family struggle less.

I want to unpack a little about my little understanding of a little part of our little brains called the amygdala. It protects me while it can also throw away my ability to critically think.

Brain science is something I can define by reading what I find on Google. I’m not an expert AT ALL. Please take this post ONLY as a glimpse of my perception of how the amygdala impacts me on some moments of my life (past, present, and future).

The amygdala activates for many reasons, but for the purposes of this post, I want to process the reason I sometimes am unable to critically think when something objectively safe puts me into a state of seemingly-unmanageable risk. Simply put, my survival instinct kicks in when I feel my safety is at-risk. 

Increased perception of risk by the amygdala is often triggered by memory: not logic (logic is managed by the frontal lobe). Like most things in our brains, the perception of risk is often not rational. We can associate a specific input with another situation that our brain has told us is dangerous. This can trigger our amygdala: for me, more often than I’d like.

For example—I have a beard and wear a hat. I’m generally really great with dogs. It’s not uncommon for rescue dogs to be highly cautious (if not aggressive) towards me. Unless I know otherwise, I assume a man with a beard and a hat beat the dog — triggering its survival mechanism — the amygdala. The dog doesn’t remember me as being a risk, but it likely associates my beard and hat with another bearded, hat-wearing man that has threatened its safety. When it sees a bearded, hat-wearing man, the dog remembers to protect itself.

The frontal lobe controls logic and helps determine the actual level of risk. The dog’s frontal lobe is about 10% of its brain while a human’s frontal lobe is about 33% of the brain. Based on this, I should be much more capable than a dog at logic; I think I am… sometimes.

Regardless of the brain, there’s a tipping point where the amygdala wins. My amygdala protects me. It helps me survive (should the scenario actually need it). My amygdala activations have been mostly (if not all) false positives — which for survival purposes is a safer bet than the alternative. When my immediate perception of threat is greater than my frontal lobe’s ability to logically process the inputs, my amygdala says, “I win.” Most critical thinking and logic goes away, and survival is the only goal.

My amygdala (fight or flight) winning the wrestling match with my frontal lobe (logic) is why I have yelled, cried, and run away when my little boys are excitedly yelling while playing video games. My amygdala has also made me do interpretive dances in the forest when I walk through a thick spider web. My amygdala has helped me sing notes at volumes I can’t otherwise muster when a snake makes itself known on a hiking trail. It’s also the reason I’ve spent countless hours in a closet hiding from random noises when my frontal lobe “should” tell my amygdala it’s just my boys banging blocks and sticks together in the other room. It’s not logical. That’s the point.

A spider hasn’t killed me. A snake hasn’t killed me. Noises haven’t killed me, but for some reason unmanageable, unpredictable noises make me feel like a trapped animal in a corner with no other option than to fight my way to a safe place.

So, when I experience a moment of overreaction, I think it’s important to immediately ask myself if I’m safe. 

Breathe. And then… breathe. And then… breathe. If I can get that many “breathes” in, it’s possible my frontal lobe will help me realize I’m okay and not lose all logic.

On the other hand, if my amygdala wins, I step away and give myself space to calm down. I literally cannot be logical when I’m pissed, scared, or otherwise amygdala-activated.

My amygdala not only activates from stimuli, but it also plays a big role in social interactions and relationships.

If I’m around someone who is overreacting to something in a way I don’t understand, I default to believing their amygdala is activated. They don’t seem logical, and I assume they literally cannot be logical or reasoned with.

Two Heads Can Sometimes Not Be Better Than One

Something to note about the amygdala is that EVERYONE has one. If I’m pissed and continue to engage with someone, I’m significantly more likely to trigger the other person’s amygdala. Two pissed-off, logicless people create a usually-winless scenario. It’s best if both people know how to control their own amygdala, and it’s likely more important for them to recognize others’ amygdala activation.

Calm the hell down and then talk. Both of y’all.

Quick note about people with ASD: According to a recent-ish study, people with ASD may have developed an enlarged amygdala from an early age. This is likely caused from an increased difficulty understanding social environments at early ages.

If I’m able to recognize when someone else is activated, it gives me a short window to engage my frontal lobe, calm down, and give the other person space, or, if possible, help them have space to reengage their logic. I do not tell other people I think their amygdala is activated; it’s a great, holier-than-thou way to say, “bye-bye!” to the logical part of their brain.

SIDENOTE: A few years into our relationship, Carrie and I agreed to debate one point at a time. If we feel like conversations are swinging in unending or escalating directions, we choose a well-defined point to discuss at a time. This has helped us not let arguments get littered with pointless, loosely-related mentions of unrelated accusations and harmful language. We’re far from perfect, but our disagreements have thus far remained to the point: ending in an agreement or an agreement to disagree.

If logic seems to be on Mars, the amygdala was a likely vehicle for its trip there. Logic needs some time to get back.

If someone overreacts to something around me, I hope to give them grace with the understanding that they likely don’t have access to the logical part of their brain. I hope others extend me the same grace when I need it. Most importantly, I hope we’re all able to give ourselves self grace for our overreactions when our logic goes away.

I cry. I lie.

Last night, my family and I watched a movie called Big Fish.

I cried. 
The movie is beautiful. 
The story is tragic. 
The ending is lovely.

Movie ending warning… do not read if you don’t know the end and care to watch the movie not knowing blatant hints at the ending.

The father and son didn’t understand each other. More specifically, the son struggled to understand his father’s flexible relationship with stories’ truths and accuracies in favor of splendor and wonder. As the father lay on his death bed, the son realized the beauty of his father’s emphasis on wonder.

As mentioned throughout the movie, his father had a goal of dying a specific way, and the son takes a wonderful (in all meanings of the word) stab at storytelling to help his father’s reality come true — the moment before his father passes away.

This wrecked me. I cried. More specifically, I ugly-face cried without the ability to be silent in the way I cried. It’s almost definitely for more complex reasons than I understand or have yet come to terms with, but it was so beautiful and sad. Death is beautiful and sad. I’m confused by it.

I remember holding my dad’s hand as he died. I think about it every day. I miss him more than words will ever communicate. I cry about his absence often.

As I lay there crying about a scene in a movie, my six and eight-year-old boys were sitting next to me and took particular notice of my crying. They were likely confused about why this moment moved me to tears.

I was most impacted by the fact that my eight-year-old said, “so… THAT’S how you cry.”

This hit me in a different way. Had I not been vulnerable around them?! I try to be.

I work hard to be vulnerable and as emotional as I know how to be, but when my son indicated that he hadn’t seen me cry (at least to the degree that was notable to him), it made me think about vulnerability.

Quick side-note: I thought I cried in front of them, and Carrie said she also believed I cried in front of them as well. I never meant to hide tears from my boys, but at the very least, it was the first time it was notable to them.

At the risk of pretending highly-emotional moments causing tears is a high sign of real vulnerability, I’m going to transition to processing the concept of vulnerability. Vulnerability has been a lot on my mind as I’ve been publicly posting about autism and things I’m struggling with and enjoying.

Vulnerability can be difficult, be awkward, and feel unsafe. It’s the opposite of unsafe. The lack of vulnerability is unsafe.

Vulnerability is the superpower of honest confidence.
The lack of vulnerability is a safe haven for lies.

We’re all lacking vulnerability in some ways, and in the same light, we all lie to ourselves and others on some level (often unintentionally and unknowingly).

As I grow as a person, I hope to be continually more honest about my struggles, and in turn, continually struggle less.

Increasing vulnerability is an uncomfortable process with gains and pains, but I want to continually “vulnerablize” myself. I’d rather know me and not an invulnerable version of me. The invulnerable version is a damned lie.

To Mask or Not To Mask

After realizing my autistic brain’s survival in a “normal” world required/(maybe) requires an artful masking technique in order to be “okay,” I’ve been exploring how an active, anti-masking approach to living would impact myself, my family, and my friends. 

The first task was to identify how I was masking; prior to my ASD diagnosis, I never really knew I was doing it. I used to unconsciously mask just to survive in a world that operates differently than I do. As I’ve tried to unmask as much as possible, I’ve unintentionally caused harm and/or stress to the people closest to me. If I don’t pretend to be okay, it becomes apparent to some people that the things that shut me down are affecting me: and therefor, them.

Masking used to be (and sometimes still is) unintentional, but if I’m aware I’m doing it to prevent pain for others, I’m starting to think it might be better to do in some situations.

Maybe masking is a tool I should use to protect others from my autistic struggles that could affect them. When I’m starting to feel overwhelmed, I’m able to kick into what I’ve called “survival mode” that convinces almost anyone that I’m okay: and, sometimes (like most of my life) me.

I’m curious about the power of placebo vs. nocebo. 

Maybe (and likely), pretending to be okay through masking has a similarly-positive outcome as a placebo. Maybe, in the same light, actively exploring the lack of masking has the opposite consequence of affirming the impact of a struggle.

At this point, I don’t inherently believe that intentional masking is a bad thing: everyone does it. Something I don’t feel like I do is change when I’m in the presence of someone “more dominant” than me. I don’t feel like anyone’s more dominant (or less so) than I am. I don’t see the world that way (that I’m aware of), but I see many others mask in these situations. Some people pretend to be more successful than they are, pretend to understand something they don’t as an effort to curb possible embarrassment, and unconfidently act out unconfident assertiveness (which usually comes out as aggression instead of assertiveness). I see it all as masking: acts of presenting yourself to the world in a way you want the world to see you instead of being yourself.

My fear is that I start masking again in ways that consciously convince me that I’m okay while subconsciously affirming the idea that the world doesn’t accept me as me. Maybe this, in some ways, is the baseline of socialization.

I’m still learning, and sure as hell don’t have things figured out.

I Didn’t Fail

Ever since we moved to Nashville, TN, my family and I have wanted to go to the zoo. Today we went. After a few hours, I ended up trying to protect myself from a possible dramatic shutdown by retiring to the car for the last 30-45 minutes of the visit.

I planned for the large number of people (on the Friday before Easter when kids were out of school). I expected the parenting duties. I expected unexpected stimuli. When I started to feel my cymbal brain ring louder than expected, it caught me off guard. 

I had planned.
I was ready.
I knew this was happening.
Why couldn’t I handle it?
Why did I fail?
I didn’t.
I didn’t.
I didn’t fail.

The process of planning for something painful requires a deliberate effort of curbing anxiety. When I get a shot, I know it’s going to suck. I know it’s going to stop. 

If I had to plan for surgery without pain meds, the work to curb the anxiety would be significantly more – the pain would almost definitely overwhelm me after sustained surgery. If I could, I’d remove the pain however I could.

The stimulation I planned for at the zoo was sustained with more intensity longer than I knew it would, and my current tools for managing the pain required me to prevent a meltdown by heading to the car. 

In purely-neurotypical company, leaving the group and going to my car to have silence and a sense of peace could be seen as inappropriate. I used to carry guilt for actions like this. 

Just like every person in the world, I’m doing my best with the tools I have.

I didn’t fail.

Tasks

The last few years have been a healing process: recovering from preceding years which appeared to be as hyper-productive as they were unhealthy. I’m ready to re-engage with the art of completing tasks without spending myself and my family in the process. I’m in the process of retraining my executive function muscles.

So much of my early, anxiety-driven productivity life was filled with a revolving door of task management techniques. Years ago, I settled on the Getting Things Done (GTD) method. For me, it has the most logic, sustainability, and ease of restarting when I’m in periods of being unable to keep a flow of completing tasks.

When I burned out (and was functionally forced to rest), I let task-management go. Lots of projects didn’t get done. Much to my surprise, so many projects that felt absolutely necessary were absolutely not. 

My past self used to believe the only thing stopping every task from getting done was a better system. Even though I know it’s not true, my current self still believes it. My task completion process is often brought to a standstill in the wake of the overwhelming number of seemingly-important tasks surrounding every corner of my life.

I can’t do it all. I can’t do A LOT of things I somehow believe I have time for and want to do. I believe I’m capable of doing anything I put my mind to. It is, however, time for me to be realistic about what deserves my time. 

Curiosity is my skill and my kryptonite. I have many special interests that don’t always serve my goals.

I don’t need to better conceptualize the fourth dimension; solve a Rubik’s cube in less than ten seconds; practice driving eighteen-wheelers without one to practice with (I’ve never actually driven one); learn self-defense techniques I can’t practice in person; learn about yachts I’d never even want to own; be a better practitioner of game-theory; study more about how the theory of relativity is no longer accurate or more proven; read articles about string theory’s impact on our future discoveries; figure out better ways to explain the day-to-day impact of inverse square law to musicians and filmmakers; learn how to protect my family from the after effects of nearby nuclear bombs; build furniture that puts Eames to shame (which I don’t and haven’t); roast coffee I don’t like because it’s “better;” or anything else that doesn’t directly impact my current life or goals.

My current and specific business goal is to continue to build residual income. My paths to continued financial success are almost all licensing related: partnership performance and licensable digital asset/content creation.

I love having an organized garage, sharp chisels, a tuned piano, an organized pantry, a well-maintained yard, a clean vehicle, a clean home, clean laundry, a happy family, happy friends, and health. Unfortunately, the futile chase of all of these existing together at all times is fatiguing, distracting, and life-sucking. It’s time for a reframe.

Tasks take time. Time is limited. Limits help me prioritize.

Starting next week, my goals are to start writing more music, understand the music industry (in the ways that fit my specific goals), and to continue to create and post more stock footage.

Thankful

I’m excited about my ASD diagnosis. If you feel uncomfortable reading that, I understand. For the first 38 years of my life, I knew very little about autism and didn’t know my entire experience of the world was through its lens – my lens.

My autism has given me the deep focus for learning new subjects and skills I’m interested in. It allows me to think outside of traditional structure: giving little credence to “the way it has always been done.” It gives me what some would call “the courage” to push against traditions or bureaucracies that, to me, seem to have no benefit. I give it credit for helping me develop a different way of experiencing my engagement with music, videography, math, candor, and self-confidence. 

I’m thankful for my ability to build complex visual frameworks of concepts with relative ease. I’m thankful for my ability to be grounded and calculated in situations where others might be reactive or overly-emotional. I am thankful that I stand for correctness when it benefits others. I like that I’m not passive aggressive and don’t receive passive aggression without calling it out. I’m thankful I have well-defined personal boundaries in all the areas I’ve learned to need boundaries. I’m thankful for my willingness to stand for what I perceive as being right. I’m thankful that I’m willing to apologize when what I thought was right ends up being wrong. I’m thankful that I like momentary failures because it helps me learn how not to. I’m thankful for my determination and resilience when I have a goal to reach. I’m thankful that I don’t see a human value difference between anyone based on age, race, socio-economic status, gender, orientation, or any other often-culturally-defining trait. I’m thankful that I have excellent recall of facts for subjects I’m interested in. I’m thankful that I’m loyal to friends and family without giving up my own self worth or boundaries doing it. I’m thankful that I am kind to people while never being a pushover.

Autism doesn’t define me, but my relatively new realization of its impact on my life has allowed me to love myself for the first time.

Although I struggle in many way, I’m finally thankful for me.

I don’t know this one

Imagine you’re on stage about to play a show.

You’ve practiced the songs.

You know the transitions.

You know the venue, and the crowd is familiar. This is going to be easy and fun.

The drummer, who you know and trust, is getting ready to count everyone in, and just as the four clicks start, you hear a band member call a different key for the song. It’s okay... you’re a professional. You got this.

The first verse and chorus are going great. Then, in the second verse, everyone in the band seems to know the song has changed. Again, you’re a professional, so you roll with it. All’s good.

The first song-became-mashup comes to an end. In the middle of the crowd’s applause, the drummer counts the band in, and you miss the unison line that everyone else nailed. You’ve never heard this song before. Again, you’re a professional, so you roll with it: albeit with slightly less confidence and engagement than usual.

The band’s playing with plenty of space and starts giving you subtle cues to step up to the mic. Things start to feel empty when you realize you’re supposed to do the vocals.

Instead of giving an awkward attempt at making up lyrics on the fly, you take a solo that was supposed to be the verse. The band covers for the awkward, short instrumental. Keen ears in the audience know something is wrong, but you and the band cover the unfamiliar moment well enough that everyone else is still having a good time.

This.

This is what last-minute plan changes can feel like for me if I’ve set expectations for how a day, night, trip, etc. is supposed to go. Thus far, my best tool for dealing with these moments is to proactively expect changes to plans. On a quest to remain flexible, I try to remember to build a caveat into each expectation.

The most difficult moments (from a plan change perspective) are when I forget to preemptively expect the plausibility of change. This seems to happen, most often, last-minute.

For example, if I was planning on going to a movie, but the group I was meeting wants to go to dinner (and communicates it once I’m about to buy my ticket at the theater window). Another example would be if I’m tired and ready to check into a hotel that no longer has room: forcing me to find another hotel or sleep in my vehicle. I’ve worked hard to keep remembering not to expect any single outcome, but forgetting can be unfortunately distressing.

One last note: I don’t want, nor expect, others to change their approach to plans for my sake. I accept and don’t expect small accommodations that might help me better engage with a group, but I’m interested in continuing to learn how to better cope with the complexities of life’s expected changes – not only hope for the lack thereof.

Cymbal Brain

This post is focused on my sensory sensitivity as an autistic person. Needless (and needed) to say, I’m not a therapist and have zero ability or intention to guide anyone on their own journey. This is a public journal entry attempting to communicate how sensory inputs affect me personally.

Sensory inputs seem to affect my brain the way a stick or mallet (or anvil) affect a cymbal. When something hits it, there’s a ringing that continues well after the impact. If something hits it again, it’s likely to ring longer. I don’t see ringing as bad; it’s part of the beauty of experiencing life with what some might describe as extra sensitivity. That said, the occasions when my cymbal brain is not given the time to rest are the moments I’ve found myself in a dark room with the lights off plugging my ears until I feel like the world might be safe for me again.

These “hits” I’m talking about can be a number of things, but my biggest trigger is sound: more specifically, loud sounds. My worst triggers are unexpected, uncontrollable, loud sounds when the environment is generally not loud. Another type of cymbal brain hit could be a bright or persistent light, flashing light, uncomfortable clothing, a last-minute plan change (if I had internally set expectations of something else happening), externally-caused distractions, a social moment I don’t understand, unexpectedly hot or cold food, and other events I’m still coming to realize are triggers for me.

On their own, I’m able to handle any and all of these inputs. When they compound, these hits become exponentially more difficult to deal with. When I’m in a less-rested state due to too many inputs, poor sleep, and/or too many hours of constant distractions, my cymbal brain can’t handle as many hits before breaking or needing significantly longer to calm down.

Prior to understanding the reasons behind my moments of overload, I’d try to push through the stimulation and not realize it was breaking me down inside. This (and masking — a subject for another post) caused an underlying guilt and shame, because it seems absurd to me for a plan change or a loud noise to render me useless or less capable of functioning. I am building tools to increase resiliency, but I’m working with significant grace for myself as I come to realize how my brain works.

When the pandemic hit, we started homeschooling. I don’t have to say it, but I will; I love my family more than anything. Also, two little boys just being kids (yes… loud at times) in a house I had grown to trust as a safe and quiet place created constant cymbal hits and no rest for my cymbal brain.

Now that I’m continually seeking to better understand what my triggers are and how much I can generally handle, I’ve been better at removing myself before I’m overwhelmed: allowing me to re-engage in a healthier way and more often. If I catch the overwhelm early enough, all I need is a minute or two or five. Depending on how rested I am (or not) that day, I might do the same thing quite a few times. This approach has generally allowed me to spend more quality time with the people I love without a forced shutdown.

If there’s ever a moment where I remove myself from a situation for a few moments, it’s my way of being able to spend more time in the situation: not less.

This general “cymbal brain” thought process has helped me have a working model to start with.

I still have so much to learn. :)

Studio Design: Started

My friend, Cullen Purser, is an artist. One of his many art skills (as they say) is woodworking. He helped me build my old studio, and when we moved to Nashville, there was no one else I wanted to create my new creative space. Thankfully he had some availability to come out to get things started.

Meet Cullen:

Cullen Purser holding his older Sony point-and-shoot camera (which makes anyone over 30 years old at the time of this writing explode with nostalgia).

Our primary goal was to create a desk. I took a run to Mimm’s Lumber and bought the wood we thought we’d need for the project. There wasn’t a specific intent of confirming the increase of lumber prices, but lumber-specific price inflation was absolutely confirmed.

When Cullen arrived, we made sure to take the time to feel what the space needed. We knew the goals but not the path. We made coffee, played a little music, discussed design, and got started with a loose layout. After deliberating some not-as-good design ideas (on my part), we leaned on acoustic science to find the right placement of the desk.

The space we were building out was in our new home. It had a living room (soon to be a music writing space) and dining room that connect to the entryway. The dining room is much smaller and has a window and doorway to consider. We did some research and found the speakers should be 38% of the room depth from the back wall, and the tweeters should be 67.5” from each other. After placing the placeholders within these confines, we created the equilateral triangle for the sitting position. I looked out the window and found a perfect view of our driveway and a perfectly-centered tree. Things felt right.

We started talking about function.

The desk in Colorado had a sliding top that was designed to reveal the keyboard without changing my listening position (in an EXTREMELY small room). We were determined to keep the same functionality in this desk.

My old desk was littered with accessories; I had two eGPUS, speakers coming out of the desk corners, cables, card readers, color control panels, etc. It was as good as we could get it, but I wanted less of a mess.

With more space, we saw the opportunity to keep the necessary mess while hiding it behind the desk. When you walk up to the desk, you see a clean top with a monitor, keyboard, mouse, and possibly a panel or two. All of the computer and its accessories will be easily accessible and hidden on the backend of the desk.

Building the right furniture is a big piece of making things right for me. The next step is creating the ambiance through lighting. I haven’t gotten there, but I’ll be doing that as we start the next phase.

After creating the studio desk, it became apparent that the top rolled back, but it wasn’t “a joy to use.” It was loud (which triggered my sound sensitivity), and it was a little clunky. Cullen suggested bearings, so I grabbed my old skateboard. We were able to put to use some wheels and bearings that have been with me for many stories and moments in life. Every time I use the top, I’ll get to appreciate the progress life’s given to me.

For those of you wondering, I’ll absolutely be buying new wheels and bearings. :)

For now, we have an awesome desk that begs to be used. The next steps are adding lighting and sound treatment. After that, we’ll be focused on interior design.

More to come in a few weeks!

Imposter Syndrome

In the mid-2000s, I started dabbling in video production. I had no knowledge of how to use a camera or edit. Motion graphics seemed like magic to me. I was hooked. Since then, we built a commercial film company that’s still very much thriving in 2022.

That’s not the point. Why was filmmaking easy for me to push into while music has been so hard to confidently pursue?

It’s not an ability issue. It’s a fear issue.

I realized my ability to push into filmmaking was tied to the fact that I’m “not supposed” to be good at filmmaking. I became a competent commercial filmmaker (and, of course, I continue to grow those skills all of the time). Music, on the other hand, has been a skill I was “supposed to be good at.” So, the fear of failure is high. I have grace for my younger self’s reasoning for this, but these realities are all in my head. I want to be done being afraid.

I don’t remember a time I didn’t know how to play the piano. Music is my first language. Family folklore says I played six or seven melodies before I said my first word (my dog’s name, Alex).

My childhood memories are speckled with others’ requests to play songs for them. I loved the attention, but I became keenly aware of how un-special compliments started to feel. Positive feedback became the norm, and the fear of being rejected for something so incredibly personal to me took over.

I’ve never stopped playing music. I’ve done stints of studio work, band leading, touring, scoring, and gigging, but I’ve never really committed to it.

NOTE: I do appreciate (and don’t require or specifically prefer) positive feedback. The compliments as a child started to build a comfort zone I have been subconsciously afraid of losing.

IMPOSTER SYNDROME

An article in The Harvard Business Review says, “Imposter syndrome is loosely defined as doubting your abilities and feeling like a fraud.” I’d like to thank google for finding that for me, and no, I haven’t read that whole article yet (and might not).

I’m cognitively aware of my competence with my specific areas of filmmaking and music. With film, I’m confident and happy to be in charge. With music, I’m emotionally impacted by the fear of failure.

Haha. LOL. WTF. Failure.

When it comes to creating, I don’t want to believe in failure.

Sidetrack: I’m tempted to say that NOT trying is THE failure, but I don’t exactly see my nearly-zero-chance tryout for the Olympics as a failure: I am not an Olympian and have no desire to be. I also don’t want others to feel guilty for their own lack of following something they’re interested in. I think people should do things today and tomorrow that make them happier than the things they did yesterday and yesteryear. My personal desire is to create music. End sidetrack.

I do want to create. I enjoy it.

I roast my own coffee. I enjoy woodworking. I like disc golf. I enjoy helping friends with entrepreneurial ideas. I’m nowhere near the best at any of these. Even still, I enjoy them a heck of a lot.

CREATE SPACE FOR MUSIC

All of this has been to say that I’ve been afraid and still am. And, I’m moving forward with intention and no specific goals other than to create, collaborate, and learn.

A friend of mine is flying out to Nashville to help me create a space for creating music. We’re going to see how much we can get done in about a week (which I think will be close to everything other than chair, table, and couch-shaped furniture). We have a little head-start with about half of my old studio desk he and I built in Colorado.

This year, I’m pursuing the right kinds of collaboration, growth, writing, learning, and all things non-stagnation. I need the hell out of it.

Nashville, TN

A few days after Christmas in 2021, my wife and I were visiting family in Utah. We discussed the idea of moving the boys to a place where the community and school district supported each other’s well-being. We weren’t expecting perfection. The goal was to find a community with good schools and a tendency of mutual respect.

Thirty-five days after that conversation, our boys started their first day of school in Nashville, TN.

Our intention was to move if the right community hugged us back, and (the people of) Nashville did.

I had a directing project in late January that got rescheduled after I was already in Nashville. I had come early to ensure I would be COVID-free for the shoot and to explore the schools for the boys.

SNOW

A few days into my Nashville visit, I heard myself saying, “It’s okay. I know how to drive in the snow.” The problem is that when no one else has tread and the plows hang out with unicorns, the only travel on the road is called “help me” or “help others.”

I hit the road to get coffee that morning. As I came around a corner, the traffic was stopped. A friendly voice in a truck behind me yelled, “If you go, I’ll go!” We proceeded to pull out well over thirty cars and trucks on the first day and quite a few more on the second day (the ice day).

I wanted coffee that day, but I ended up with a new friend, a positive take on the community’s willingness to help others, and countless thankful people.

HOUSE

As the snow cleared, we continued growing our list of homes to consider. My wife found what seemed to be the perfect house on a hill. I drove by, and we fell in love with it.

We REALLY wanted that place; it was very quiet and on a hill not very far from downtown Nashville.

Loud noises or constant sensory inputs wear me down, so the quiet part was pretty important in the place we found.

We called. No callback.
We messaged. No response.
We applied. No response.

We proceeded to drive by 1,487 homes in the Nashville area. That’s not true, but it felt like it.

I couldn’t stop thinking about the house on the hill. After finding just under zero other homes we felt were ideal for us, we reached out one more time, got a callback, and ultimately locked the house in. We were moving.

KENSTUCKY

I headed home on a Friday to get the family and our things. Well, I made it about 45 minutes.

My diesel truck basically said, “the truck doesn’t know if you have DEF fluid, so we’ll stop you here shortly.” For whatever it’s worth, the DEF was full.

I found a dealer, but their mechanic wouldn’t be in until Monday (like every other dealer on the weekend). On Monday, I learned the truck needed a part that was on backorder and had to be ordered through a “special parts” case through Chevrolet.

After reaching out to our local dealer, I confirmed this was standard protocol, so I sat tight. Nothing came through the next day, so I picked up the phone to start calling other dealers in the area. I found the part. I told the Kentucky dealer I found said part and would drive to go get it (one hour away). They said they coordinated and the part was on its way.

I waited multiple days (calling each day) with it not arriving. On Friday, they decided to inform me the other dealer had sold the part to someone else (which wasn’t true). They said we had to wait until Monday. Over the weekend, I found another part. They couldn’t work with that dealer.

I posted a pissed-off video (which I don’t typically do). Friends showed up, shared, and our local dealer worked to find us the part. They found yet another. The dealer in Kentucky told me they lost it… again.

This is the part where I started to REALLY get challenged with my whole expectations thing.

At this point, I was 12 days in. The community rallied around the video. We determined that the parts guy in Kentucky didn’t actually understand the process, and the original part I found that was one hour away was still being held for us. Our local dealer (Ed Bozarth Chevrolet) got the part to the Kentucky dealer in order to get me back on the road.

GOAL: GET THE BOYS IN A GOOD SCHOOL. ALSO, KENSTUCKY. ALSO, COVID.

When we said we were moving, I had multiple friends offer to help with the move. At that point, I didn’t realize they would end up doing 95% of it. After a week of “the truck’s almost ready,” I realized we needed to make progress in other ways.

We asked for help. Holy heck did we get it.

As friends boxed up the garage and production gear, my wife boxed up the house with some help from some of her friends until….

Side note: we had decided to pull our boys out of their school before we moved. Our goal was to keep the family COVID-free at least until we got to Nashville. Our youngest got COVID one of the last days he was in school, so the family was also quarantining in the house during the move out of the studio and garage.

After what seemed like the productive version of Taz the Tasmanian devil, a box truck and a suburban left Grand Junction to meet some other friends in Denver who towed the two trailers over the passes. Ultimately, I expected to make it home, but not being able to help showed how much support we had (from more people than showed up for the actual move).

CROSS COUNTRY & DODGING WEATHER

As I sat in Kentucky with a car rental and a broken truck, my friends were hauling two-thirds of our belongings across the windy, cold parts of the US that exist for things other than mountains.

A few days later, they showed up. As an understatement, we juggled a few things getting the trailers up the driveway; did I mention it’s on a hill? My friend I met while towing people out of snow came over to help us get the heavier trailer up the hill. The rental car was a Camaro SS and couldn’t handle it (primarily due to the lack of a hitch).

As we unloaded the trailers and box truck, I pretended to be a weather expert to determine just the right time for the family to leave our home in Grand Junction, CO. We had friends show up to move us into our home in Nashville. We had friends show up to drive across the country and back.

Our community is strong. Thank you all!

As the family left Grand Junction, CO, my friends who hauled things across the country headed out. One friend got to experience the lack of snow management in this area. A four-hour drive took at least four times longer, and at some point in his elongated journey, he got a photo of them going the other way and waved on their way to Nashville.

After a few nights, the family finally arrived. We slept in our own mattresses in a sea of unpacked boxes. It was the first time in way too long. It felt like home again.

The boys went to their new school and loved it. I asked my oldest how he liked it, and he said, “Everyone is SOOO nice. And, guess what, Dada? I didn’t see ANY bullies.”

As we all know, bullying moments happen everywhere. The fact that a lack of bullies was notable made me feel sad about where they came from and happy about where we were.

TRUCK’S READY!

I finally got word via carrier pigeon (faster than my corporate Chevrolet rep) that my truck was ready to pick up. We had one more load in Grand Junction with a ton of little details to figure out.

I stopped by Oklahoma City to pick up a PA for a friend (who also helped us out with the truck and trailer). I got back to a home that felt so strangely empty.

I travel all of the time for work. I’m used to feeling continually closer to the family when I’m headed to Grand Junction, CO. It was weird to reconcile the fact that the family was getting further away as I got closer to the place I used to call home.

I had a lot of items that overwhelmed me, but this trip was MOSTLY for my studio desk, instruments, amps, etc.

My friend who helped build my studio in Grand Junction had already deconstructed it for me. My other friends who helped haul cross country came over to help make sure it is packed safely and securely. After getting some much-needed disc golf rounds in, I hit the road as a snowstorm chased me over the rocky mountains. I felt tired, but I was excited to get home.

COVID AGAIN

On my way back to Nashville, I was listening to a report about Omicron symptoms, and it mentioned lower back pain. A few days earlier, I felt like I fell on my tailbone. Then it went away.

In the hotel that night, I decided to take a test. Positive for COVID. 4% more tired than usual and a VERY minor pain in my lower back. I get the asymptomatic thing.

The next morning, I tested again. More obviously positive this time.

I proceeded on to Nashville while calling anyone I had been in contact with; almost all were outside, and no one was worried about it.

After sleeping in my truck the second and final night of the trip, I made it home.

HOME-ISH

And, now I’m home. I’m staying in our RV waiting for my quarantine time to be finished. I started this journal I’ve been meaning to start for a while. I’m pretty happy about that. :)

Expectations

The COVID-19 pandemic has sucked. If you think you’re right, you’re probably wrong. If you think you’re wrong, you’re probably right. I’m probably… whatever.

Our polarizing approaches to this pandemic have made families stop talking, friendships dissolve, and so many adults set examples that should embarrass any juvenile.

I’ve been disappointed. I expected more and couldn’t figure out why. I got depressed. I got annoyed with my depression. Having young boys at home is loud. I started struggling with sensory inputs, and my wife suggested I talk to someone about it. In early 2020, I saw an ad for BetterHelp.com and decided to start therapy.

In 2021, I was diagnosed with ASD (outdated synonyms include autistic, high-functioning autism, Aspergers, etc.). Although late, my diagnosis was a gift and helped me better understand so many complexities about myself and the world around me (more on that later).

The pandemic wasn’t a small change.

Everyone had to transition to a “new normal.”

According to the diagnostic bible (the DSM-5), some people with ASD experience “extreme distress at small changes” and “difficulties with transitions.” I don’t feel like I usually have extreme distress with small changes — unless I have expectations.

Expectations fuel disappointment. Expectations fuel entitlement. I expected communities and friends to respect each other.

Society’s breakdown of maturity and its willingness to throw out the plausibility of truth in favor of confirmation bias forced me to reanalyze my view of the world and how to remain happy in it. That was a long sentence.

I started thinking more about this whole expectations thing for myself. Sadly, I discovered I’m not a fortuneteller, and the more I act like one, the more disappointed I am. I can’t control the outcome, but I can control the actions I take to get closer to my literal and figurative destinations.