De-Acquisition Mode - I'm Hearing That A Lot Lately.

JMintzer said:
Much respect for that...

I finally watched "The Legend of Bagger Vance" a few weeks ago... It's a golf movie starring Matt Damon and Will Smith.

One line stood out at me. It was"Golf is a game you can never win..."

I'm challenged by it, every time I play. I tinker with my swing, trying to hit the ball farther, straighter, to make the ball draw or fade (on command, not by accident...)

I can tend to be a hermit if I don't force myself to get out. Golf does that. I get to see friends, meet new people. It's cathartic... TO ME...

Not to mention, the exercise is good for me.

I get to spend extra time with my new son in law, as he's fallen in love with the game. I can't wait till the grandchildren come, so I can take them to the range and teach them the game. If it sticks? Great! If not, I get to spend quality time with them...

I even enjoy playing golf with MY WIFE!!! I mean, what in the actual f*ck???

We all "create" in our own way.
Click to expand...
I had to quit golf. I tried hard and hit a lot of balls every week and the best I ever made it to was to be a bogie golfer. I used to put so much pressure on myself when playing. I spent more time analyzing every shot and getting ticked at myself for not doing as well as I thought I could. I realized one day that I started the thinking process when I put the clubs in the car. It didn't stop until I came off the course mad most of the time. I finally decided I had to stop. It was constantly angering me. I have not had anything else in my life do that to me. I am an analytic at heart and that game pushed me into analyzing things in a bad way.
 
JMintzer said:
Much respect for that...

I finally watched "The Legend of Bagger Vance" a few weeks ago... It's a golf movie starring Matt Damon and Will Smith.

One line stood out at me. It was"Golf is a game you can never win..."

I'm challenged by it, every time I play. I tinker with my swing, trying to hit the ball farther, straighter, to make the ball draw or fade (on command, not by accident...)

I can tend to be a hermit if I don't force myself to get out. Golf does that. I get to see friends, meet new people. It's cathartic... TO ME...

Not to mention, the exercise is good for me.

I get to spend extra time with my new son in law, as he's fallen in love with the game. I can't wait till the grandchildren come, so I can take them to the range and teach them the game. If it sticks? Great! If not, I get to spend quality time with them...

I even enjoy playing golf with MY WIFE!!! I mean, what in the actual f*ck???

We all "create" in our own way.
Click to expand...
Your new nickname is Dr. Beeper.

Which is somehow an improvement.
 
JMintzer said:
Much respect for that...

I finally watched "The Legend of Bagger Vance" a few weeks ago... It's a golf movie starring Matt Damon and Will Smith.

One line stood out at me. It was"Golf is a game you can never win..."

I'm challenged by it, every time I play. I tinker with my swing, trying to hit the ball farther, straighter, to make the ball draw or fade (on command, not by accident...)

I can tend to be a hermit if I don't force myself to get out. Golf does that. I get to see friends, meet new people. It's cathartic... TO ME...

Not to mention, the exercise is good for me.

I get to spend extra time with my new son in law, as he's fallen in love with the game. I can't wait till the grandchildren come, so I can take them to the range and teach them the game. If it sticks? Great! If not, I get to spend quality time with them...

I even enjoy playing golf with MY WIFE!!! I mean, what in the actual f*ck???

We all "create" in our own way.
Click to expand...
I get it!

One of my brothers is a scratch golfer. Plays every day (and isn’t retired) and his son in law plays with him often.

It’s fun to see how much enjoyment he gets.
So I respect other kinds of joys in life, even if they’re not for me.

Everyone is different! Sometimes fundamentally so. That’s what makes people interesting.
 
I'm in that mode. But its because when my mom passed, I came into a small inheritance, and for the first time in my life I have been able to afford bucket list items en masse, so that's what I've been doing: buying stuff to try it because I've always wanted these items (and by "try it", that could mean returning it within 30 days, more more often than not it means I "live with it awhile", rendering it un-returnable, and therefore I must sell it to get rid of it. My garage is getting crowded.)

I'm experiencing the gear I've always wanted to experience. A DGT. A EBMM Luke III. An ES-125 style jazzbox. A Superstrat. A Swart. Too many pedals to count. It's time to purge the stuff I know I'm not keeping. I made $900 in 4 days selling some pedals. Lots more pedals to go. Several guitars, several amps.

But that's the key: I'm not selling stuff I use; I'm selling stuff I've lived with awhile and know I'm not married to. I know this may sound crazy to some, but does anyone besides me long for a day when I plug my ONE guitar into my ONE amp with nothing in-between them but a cords, and JUST PLAY??

(ok, ok... I'll allow TWO of each. And even two pedals LOL.). But I find it ridiculous I currently have 11 guitars, 9 amps, 3 pedalboards (and a couple dozen pedals NOT on the pedalboards)... as I get older, I want simple. Too much choice is not good for me. 90% of the time when I sit down I'm only using reverb. Maybe a delay. Every time I watch Jim Campilongo or Duke Levine or Brian Setzer plug into an amp and use no pedals and make beautiful music I think "that's all I really want to do."
(ok: Setzer has a Roland Echo, Campilongo has onboard reverb with his Princeton, and even Levine uses a reverb pedal with his tweeds)
 
László said:
I loved reading your post.

To live a life in the arts and not have a day job takes a rather unusual gear, one that few people have - or even want.

People who aren’t artists do wonderful things, can be creative, can appreciate and love the arts, etc. but to live the artist’s life?

That takes a fundamentally different kind of person. - one who can accept the risks to follow your bliss.

And I don’t mean a different level of passion, though that’s also true. I mean a different approach to life.

One of my best friends who’s a brilliant composer and producer puts it this way: You have to be a little bit crazy to make the sacrifices and take the lumps. But we wouldn’t have it any other way.

This is why I could never retire to a life of golf and other leisure activities: I’m still driven to live the art.

Because it’s an unconventional way of life, it probably takes a different kind of life partner to be able to say, “Hey. Be yourself. I understand and am supportive.”

By sheer luck, the woman who was my high school and college sweetheart, who married a young lawyer many years ago, still manages to get it and was supportive when I left law behind and went into the arts 32 years ago.

I was, and am, lucky. And I somehow managed a bit of success at it.

Couldn’t live any other way. It’s who I am.
Click to expand...

I had to reply to this.

I came to a point in my life where I had to decide: stay with the woman I loved and marry her, or move to Nashville to continue trying to "make it" (at that time, Nashville was the hot bed... NY and LA had dried up for the most part. Austin was cooking, but no way I could stand the heat... Nashville is bad enough LOL).

I decided to put "life" before "career". I suffered a job I hated for 13 years, then started my own company, which I also learned to hate quickly, for another 15 years. I never loved my work. On my best days, I liked it "enough." But I actually wrote a letter to myself, and I titled it "I don't need music to save my life." I had a GREAT wife, GREAT friends, great social life. While my dad had passed, I still had my mom and siblings, my wife's family is great. I gave up music for several years, I mountain biked, backpacked, became a runner, got into firearms, went on great vacations (nothing expensive; no trips to Europe... just magical places we could drive to every year, that became magical because of the COMPANY. I wouldn't trade those trips for anything.). I loved my life.

As time went on, subconsciously, doing something I did not love started to eat away at me. It culminated with me having a mid-life crisis at 51. Alot of other stuff happened simultaneously: mom diagnosed with cancer, best friend cancer, sister in law cancer, wife aneurysm, dog got sick and died... it's been a rough few years around here. Wife is fine BTW.). But during the lockdowns, I went into a very dark place. Started questioning my life decisions. It was scary, truly scary.

Long story short (if it's not already too late for that LOL): I do not regret "giving up" on professional music and marrying my wife. I still consider it the best decision I ever made. Decisions have consequences, and I've had to learn to live with them. I am very fortunate... I have people who love me, I am not totally healthy (I have active Lyme disease, foot problems, fatty liver, EBV reactivation, am unable to exercise due to the foot).... but I realize things could be worse (my best friend is undergoing her 3rd round of chemo for a cancer that keeps returning). My wife's aneurysm was surgically repaired, she's fine. However, back to the music thing...

I realized that, in a way, I DO need music to save my life. It's simply who I am. I don't have to be a professional musician, but I have to be immersed in music. Listening to it constantly, playing it as often as possible. Just before the lockdowns I formed a band with some old friends, and not only are we still going strong today, the once a week we practice is like my weekly therapy. We don't gig that often, but the "Tuesday night music club" has surely saved me to some degree. IDK what I'll do when the band comes to an end.... but I'll have to figure something out.

This mimics my father: he wanted to be a pilot since he was a young boy, and when he got out of the Navy after WWII, he did become a pilot. He also began building his own airplanes. He did it his whole life. Take a few years to build one, fly it several years, sell it for a profit, build another. He needed FLYING to save his life... he was a construction electrician for most of his life. He didn't love it, but he didn't look at it that way... he married the woman he loved, they had children, and you take care of your family. He wasn't bitter about it; he was happy to have a well-paying, steady job to provide for his family. And he could afford to indulge in his flying hobby. That made him happy. I do remember conversations where he said if he had it to do all over again, maybe he would have become a commercial airline pilot, but that's not really the kind of flying he loved, and of course he wouldn't trade his family for anything, in hindsight.

I guess it all boils down to:

If you love what you have, you have everything you need.
 
ruger9 said:
But that's the key: I'm not selling stuff I use; I'm selling stuff I've lived with awhile and know I'm not married to. I know this may sound crazy to some, but does anyone besides me long for a day when I plug my ONE guitar into my ONE amp with nothing in-between them but a cords, and JUST PLAY??
Click to expand...

Sort of. I do want the one guitar and one amp. But I also need the pedal board. :)

But then...although I love the single coil guitar I have (SE Silver Sky), I also want something with humbuckers. Or a humbucker and a p90.

Yeah, this is more complex than I thought...
 
JasonE said:
I also just realized this thread was about thinning down your possessions. I am failing big in that regard right now. I have started another pedal buying spree. I have bought 3 in the past 3 weeks and am looking at 2 more... I may need to find a pedals anonymous group....
Click to expand...
I Run That Group But It Is For Buying Them, Not Getting Rid Of Them Or Slowing Down On Buying Them. :)
 
gush said:
3.5 years till retirement for us.

I probably will ditch most of my gear but not all.

I still want to play during retirement but we plan on traveling so there's not much point in having a ton of stuff at home if I'm not there.
Click to expand...
This makes sense, but give yourself a chance to find out how much travel you really want to do. We discovered that while we liked going places, being home more than we were away, by a good margin, was best for us.
 
ruger9 said:
I had to reply to this.

I came to a point in my life where I had to decide: stay with the woman I loved and marry her, or move to Nashville to continue trying to "make it" (at that time, Nashville was the hot bed... NY and LA had dried up for the most part. Austin was cooking, but no way I could stand the heat... Nashville is bad enough LOL).

I decided to put "life" before "career". I suffered a job I hated for 13 years, then started my own company, which I also learned to hate quickly, for another 15 years. I never loved my work. On my best days, I liked it "enough." But I actually wrote a letter to myself, and I titled it "I don't need music to save my life." I had a GREAT wife, GREAT friends, great social life. While my dad had passed, I still had my mom and siblings, my wife's family is great. I gave up music for several years, I mountain biked, backpacked, became a runner, got into firearms, went on great vacations (nothing expensive; no trips to Europe... just magical places we could drive to every year, that became magical because of the COMPANY. I wouldn't trade those trips for anything.). I loved my life.

As time went on, subconsciously, doing something I did not love started to eat away at me. It culminated with me having a mid-life crisis at 51. Alot of other stuff happened simultaneously: mom diagnosed with cancer, best friend cancer, sister in law cancer, wife aneurysm, dog got sick and died... it's been a rough few years around here. Wife is fine BTW.). But during the lockdowns, I went into a very dark place. Started questioning my life decisions. It was scary, truly scary.

Long story short (if it's not already too late for that LOL): I do not regret "giving up" on professional music and marrying my wife. I still consider it the best decision I ever made. Decisions have consequences, and I've had to learn to live with them. I am very fortunate... I have people who love me, I am not totally healthy (I have active Lyme disease, foot problems, fatty liver, EBV reactivation, am unable to exercise due to the foot).... but I realize things could be worse (my best friend is undergoing her 3rd round of chemo for a cancer that keeps returning). My wife's aneurysm was surgically repaired, she's fine. However, back to the music thing...

I realized that, in a way, I DO need music to save my life. It's simply who I am. I don't have to be a professional musician, but I have to be immersed in music. Listening to it constantly, playing it as often as possible. Just before the lockdowns I formed a band with some old friends, and not only are we still going strong today, the once a week we practice is like my weekly therapy. We don't gig that often, but the "Tuesday night music club" has surely saved me to some degree. IDK what I'll do when the band comes to an end.... but I'll have to figure something out.

This mimics my father: he wanted to be a pilot since he was a young boy, and when he got out of the Navy after WWII, he did become a pilot. He also began building his own airplanes. He did it his whole life. Take a few years to build one, fly it several years, sell it for a profit, build another. He needed FLYING to save his life... he was a construction electrician for most of his life. He didn't love it, but he didn't look at it that way... he married the woman he loved, they had children, and you take care of your family. He wasn't bitter about it; he was happy to have a well-paying, steady job to provide for his family. And he could afford to indulge in his flying hobby. That made him happy. I do remember conversations where he said if he had it to do all over again, maybe he would have become a commercial airline pilot, but that's not really the kind of flying he loved, and of course he wouldn't trade his family for anything, in hindsight.

I guess it all boils down to:

If you love what you have, you have everything you need.
Click to expand...
I certainly agree with your conclusion. And being a full time musician isn’t something I’d recommend to anyone with other priorities.

My life choices are not a prescription for anyone else.
 
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