Ain’t that the truth? Usually, when you work really hard at something, it does get easier. Of course this is true, however, this can also mean you’re not necessarily getting better at whatever thing you’re working on. I think to truly deepen your work and evolve as an artist, unfortunately, at least for me, there is the continual requirement to put yourself in increasingly uncomfortable situations.

I’m mainly talking about writing and storytelling in front of audiences. I do see how things could be easy. In classes and workshops I’ve taken, there was always talk of finding your ‘writing voice’. Essentially, a writing style that is uniquely yours. This takes an enormous amount of work.

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What is it about certain songs? You know which ones I mean. The songs that stick with you, trigger certain feelings when combined with specific experiences. They get lodged in our brains, stored away to be released at exactly the right time.

I don’t know why, but the song Awful Sound by Arcade Fire gets me every time. I have listened to it probably a million times, but every once in a while, it knocks me right over. I’ve even already written a blog post about this before.

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In my youth, I was a competitive figure skater. As an athlete, my training took on many forms. Sometimes I was ahead of the game, sometimes I was far behind. If I were to be honest, most of the time, I was just trying to keep up.

I got the odd injury, shoulders or back or in one case a broken nose, but I remained relatively healthy. The setbacks I experienced as a skater were more of my own doing. I could really be terrible to myself. My competitors really didn’t have to do much, I should have gotten a gold medal or two for defeating myself.

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A few weeks ago, I listened to the 1000th episode of the WTF Podcast with Marc Maron. It was a bit of a surreal experience listening to Maron and his producing partner Brendon McDonald talk about the history of the podcast. They went through it all - how they met, the events leading up to the creation of the podcast, and how it has evolved over the years. Maron even got all teary eyed at the end when he talked about the impact his partnership and friendship with McDonald has had on his life.

WTF was the very first podcast I ever listened to, and I can say with a certain amount of pride that I have listened to each episode since - all 1000 of them. You could say it has really stuck with me. I’ve gone in and out of devouring each episode as soon as it’s posted to taking breaks and binging those that had stockpiled.

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