Making music might be the thing you live and breathe to do, but it doesn’t mean you’ll feel motivated to write and record songs all the time. In fact, you might encounter months-long stretches of time where you’d rather do pretty much anything else more than writing songs if you’re a serious or professional songwriter with years of experience under your belt. This is normal, but you’ll need tools and strategies to get back to work eventually. Motivation is crucial for music-makers, but it’s not always easy to access. If you feel bored, aimless, or unsure how to make your next musical step, here are some motivation tips to help get you moving:

Writing and recording songs is one of the most hopeful things I can think of. Every new song is another opportunity to make your mark on the world, to express something completely unique about yourself and improve someone else’s life by doing something you love. If you’re reading this I’m sure you feel the same way. We all want to make the best music we can, and this desire can easily turn into an obsession. 

More artists than ever before are finding huge audiences for their music with songs that were recorded from their home studios. Long gone are the days when creating and sharing great music meant having to record at a fancy music studio manned by professional recording engineers. But don’t be fooled. Home recording isn’t easy, and you shouldn’t confuse knowing how to write songs with the ability to record and produce music. Home recording is a skill just like anything else, and it takes time and practice to get better at it. If you’re new to recording from your home studio, here are five tips to help you get started:

Frustration, uncertainty, and disappointment are unavoidable for someone who pursues music as a career. With so much out of our control as songwriters, producers, and performers, it can be tempting to think that we don’t have any say over what happens to our music. In reality, this couldn’t be further from the truth. When you focus on the things you have direct control of in music, you put yourself on a path towards fulfilling your creative potential and reaching your goals.

Recording can be a grueling process even when a professional audio engineer is at the helm. But when an artist acts as a performer, producer, and recording engineer, it gets even trickier. Between the affordable cost of DIY recording equipment and a modern listening audience that’s come to expect a constant stream of new music, more artists are recording their own sessions than ever before. Self-recording is by no means an easy process, but you’ll be far better off if you remember these basic tips:

If you’re an active songwriter, it’s safe to assume you have a lot of unfinished ideas rolling around inside your brain taking up space on your hard drives. We think if we write a ton of music, we’ll eventually stumble on a couple ideas that are really good, and this is true. However, there’s one important caveat that often gets left out of this conversation. Without transforming your ideas into finished songs, you’ll make it harder to write your best music and reach your full potential as a songwriter.

If you’ve always wanted to write music but have never tried it, you might be wondering if you need to master a musical instrument first before you give it a shot. From a non-musical perspective, there are big costs of entry to learning how to write music, and this is true to a degree. From the price of recording equipment or studio time to not knowing where to start, it isn’t always easy to get into songwriting if you have no experience. Luckily, when it comes to experience using an instrument needed for songwriting, you probably need a lot less than you might think. 

If you’re new to songwriting or even if you have plenty of experience, you might find it hard to write lyrics. Many talented songwriters are perfectly fine with bearing their souls through every musical aspect of their songs but struggle when it comes to matching music with words. If this sounds like you, it could be because you simply have no clue what to write about. Or, you may think lyrics are like windows to the soul and have no interest in revealing yours through your music. But the truth is that at any point in time, there’s an endless list of topics to write music about. And there’s no rule saying the lyrics in your music need to be emotionally deep or revealing. The important thing to focus on is creating work that feels unique and authentic to you. For songwriters struggling to do this through the lyrics in their music, here are four tips to help.