Finding HopeQuotes That Helped Me (Songwriting Edition) – Part 3
Posted on December 11, 2021
I had intended to post a different blog today. I’ve been working on a companion to my folklore post – for sister album, evermore – and had hoped to post it today for the one year anniversary of it’s release but I’ve been so unwell over the last month – the side effects of my new ADHD medication have been brutal – that I just haven’t been able to finish it. I have a good chunk of it done so I’d like to finish and post it at some point but I guess we’ll see. I still wanted to post though and this is what I had finished. So I hope you enjoy these quotes (here’s part one and two, if you’re interested) and hopefully writing will start to feel easier soon.
“A painting is never finished – it simply stops in interesting places.” – Paul Gardner
“You wind up creating from silence, like painting a picture on a blank canvas that could bring tears to somebody’s eyes. As songwriters, our blank canvas is silence.” – Rodney Atkins
“Hearing about a visual artist’s approach can change the way you think about songwriting.” – St. Lucia
“When you don’t write songs for a while there’s a fear you won’t be able to do it again.” – Tim Wheeler
“Write until you can’t write anymore.” – Billie Myers
“If you’ve got a really strong concept, then it’s easy to write. Whereas if you’re not sure what the true story is, it’s bloody hard.” – Shelly Poole
“Often the simplest song is the hardest to write.” – Patti Smith
“All of my acoustic playing came from my songwriting. All of the chords I’ve learned and all of the voicings I play them in are a direct result of composing.” – Mat Kearney
“I don’t think about commercial concerns when I first come up with something. When I sit down at the piano, I try to come up with something that moves me.” – Lamont Dozier
“My task as an artist is to stay as close as I can to my own essence.” – Trixie Whitley
“A song is an ever-changing, ever-evolving and morphing thing.” – Simon Tong
“My songwriting has evolved, just as I’ve evolved as a person.” – John Oates
“I write about what I know and what I’ve experienced. That’s the only way it can be real to me. I love songwriting. There is something so satisfying in coming up with an idea and turning it into a song that means something to people…” – Aaron Tippin
“Songwriting is such an intricate part of me as an artist and as a person; I couldn’t just let someone else do it.” – Shakira
“It doesn’t stop. It really doesn’t stop. It’s the way I live every single day. I don’t do anything else. I have no other interest other than music. At all.” – Steven Morrissey
“No one can attack you when you’re songwriting; it’s you and a song, which is a great place to be.” – Gin Wigmore
“People haven’t always been there for me but music always has.” – Taylor Swift
“Songwriting is a great release. It helps me work through things.” – Jo Dee Messina
“I’ve always used songwriting as a way to help me organise reality.” – Jason Mraz
“You need to work at the craft of songwriting, but not only the craft. When I see people working both on themselves and the craft, and they combine those things… I just go, ‘That’s just fabulous.'” – Fred Eaglesmith
“Music is energy, emotion, expression, escapism, enlightenment. Music is so much more than just entertainment.” – Rasheed Ogunlaru
“I write a song because I want to. I think the moment you start writing it to make money, you’re starting to kill yourself artistically.” – Pete Seeger
“Something good happened to my writing when I stopped being afraid to do something simple, for the fear that people might think I couldn’t do something more complex. Don’t be confused by the word simple. Simple is not easy, it is clear voiced, and fearlessly elegant.” – Carrie Newcomer
“I always saw songwriting as the top of the heap. No matter what else you were going to do creatively – and there were a lot of choices – writing songs was king.” – Jakob Dylan
“Every musician out there wants to be judged on the merit of their songwriting, the merit of their performing abilities.” – Laura Jane Grace
“Nothing can stop a great song, so just keep songwriting.” – Manika
“Songwriting is the way of perpetual want. Songwriters are the blessed/cursed people. You will never have a moment’s peace in your life. You will always be wanting the next song.” – Jon Stewart
“Closed in a room, my imagination becomes the universe, and the rest of the world is missing out.” – Criss Jami
“You’re never quite sure where the song is going, because you might not find the word to rhyme with the end of the line. You have to find associative meaning to get you there. So it’s rather like doing a crossword puzzle backwards. A kind of strange, three-dimensional, abstract crossword puzzle.” – Annie Lennox
“Creativity is the greatest rebellion in existence.” – Osho
I hope these have been inspiring and thought-provoking. I’m always looking for more quotes so if you have any that you love, about anything, please stick them in the comments!
Lauren Alex Hooper, MA.
Posted on November 21, 2021
During this last year, as I worked through the second year of my Masters, I’ve been thinking a lot about graduation. Primarily, I thought a lot about whether it would even happen – in person, that is; last year’s graduation was done online – and what it would be like, what it would feel like to graduate with a Masters and a Masters completed for the most part during a global pandemic and multiple national lockdowns. The whole idea seemed surreal. I was mostly thinking about my university’s award ceremony, our unofficial graduation since we officially graduate from the University of East London (UEL) – such complications are a part of life at a specialised university, I guess. I hadn’t thought much about the UEL graduation; I’m glad I went for my BA but it doesn’t feel like my university so I wasn’t super invested in going one way or another. Even if it’s more symbolic than official, my university’s awards ceremony was what I thought about when I thought about graduation.
But, as is often the case, graduation was much more complicated than I’d imagined. It’s big and complicated and emotional but long story short, my graduation isn’t official yet. I’m not entirely sure when it will be but I’m following it all up. And as my final project supervisor said, “the graduation is not the achievement – that is in you. Regardless of when you receive the MA certificate, you are Lauren Hooper, MA.” That has really helped me, over and over again through this last part of the journey, and it definitely helped me make the most of the day.
There are various different parts or different layers to this day so I thought I’d split them up and look at them one by one…
DRESS
I stressed A LOT about what to wear to graduation. I’ve struggled with body image for a long time and, to be completely honest, I struggle daily not to get sucked down the rabbit hole of hating how I look. That, combined with just really wanting to feel good about myself for such a special occasion, meant I had multiple meltdowns and almost meltdowns over the whole thing. It’s just a very loaded thing for me, especially at the moment it seems. So that was a big thing to throw into an already complicated and emotional situation. I went back and forth on multiple options and only at around midnight the night before did I make the final decision.
Probably because I’d spent so much time thinking about how I felt and how I felt about how I looked, it didn’t really occur to me to think about anyone else’s reaction; people commenting on my appearance isn’t something that happens very often. But suddenly, there were all of these people – including people I didn’t even know – saying really nice things and I didn’t really know how to respond to them. It was kind of surreal, nice but still surreal and strange. As I said, it’s just a really loaded and difficult place in my head. I loved the way it sparkled under the lights when I walked across the stage but then I look at the photos of myself and… I really struggle with looking at photos of myself. This whole topic really needs its own post but it was part of the day and so I didn’t want to leave it out. I’m trying to separate how I feel when I look at the photos and how it felt to hear people say positive things. That’s all I can do right now.
CEREMONY
Between a very early alarm and getting to London in time, it wasn’t the most relaxing start to the day and I found it very stressful (which didn’t help the migraine and nausea I had to battle all day – it was unfortunate that coming off my antidepressant and graduation overlapped). But we got there (Union Chapel is a beautiful venue and it was very cool to be graduating there), the COVID precautions were really good, and it wasn’t long before I was heading in with a handful of my coursemates.
There was the usual sprinkle of chaos. We had to get into order by surname, despite the fact that a not insignificant number of us had never met or even seen each other in the one set of online lectures we all had together. And it didn’t help that multiple people had been left out of the program (and some, myself included, didn’t get the official certificate after crossing the stage). So it was… interesting. But it was lovely to see some many people that have been a pretty significant part of the last two years of my life; I’m just sad that some of my favourite people couldn’t be there due to other commitments.
There were five or so courses that walked the stage before us, plus the head of each course gave a speech. Given how little time I was actually onsite during my course (not even six months of the two years), I was surprised how many people I knew. When you’re in the building, it’s not hard to end up becoming friends with people from other courses but with everything online, those casual encounters don’t happen and, to me at least, it felt like the different courses existed in their own bubbles. But having said that, I realised I knew a lot more people than I thought and it was an unexpected bonus to get to celebrate their achievements along with those of my close friends and coursemates. And some of the speeches were great, inspiring and moving; there were some great quotes there that I’ll take away with me.
When it was our turn, the head of our course gave a great speech and then, one by one, we were walking across the stage. Because they didn’t have my certificate (due to the aforementioned screw up around my graduation) but as I was receiving a separate award (more on that in a moment), they asked if I’d wait until the end of the line. That was fine with me; it was really nice to get to watch everyone do their walk and cheer for them.
AWARD
My name was finally called and I got to walk across the stage. It was kind of a blur of sensory information – lights, noise, the ground felt like it was moving under my feet – but I made it across the stage. I didn’t take it in at the time but watching the video my Mum had taken and hearing the cheer for me… it makes me pretty emotional. It’s a bit like with the dress: I guess I’m just not used to being noticed. I’ve spent so much of my life feeling invisible that being seen – feeling seen, really seen – kind of takes my breath away. I don’t know how to describe it, if I’m honest. It just means a lot to me.
As I said, there wasn’t a certificate for me but each course gives an award to one student for ‘outstanding achievement.’ And given everything I’ve just said about feeling invisible, I was very emotional when I found out that I was being awarded it; I’m still processing it, to be honest. So, having crossed the stage, my head of course (who has also taught me on and off over the last seven years) had me stand to the side while she introduced the award. She said some really, really special things – particularly about my final project, which I absolutely poured every part of myself into – and presented me with the award. We took the picture and I slid back into the row with my coursemates. Everyone was so lovely about it and I’m just so grateful to all of them for making my Masters experience what it was; despite all of the hard stuff, I wouldn’t have had it any other way because of the people I met.
RECEPTION
After the final few courses walked the stage and the last of the speeches, the ceremony concluded and we moved upstairs to the bar for the reception. It was somewhat surreal to be seeing and hugging and hanging out with people I’ve (pretty much) only seen online for the last eighteen months or so, surreal but wonderful. I saw so many of my friends; I got to meet their families; I caught up with a handful of my tutors, both from the MA and from my BA (some of them I haven’t seen properly since early 2020 at the latest since they didn’t teach on the MA and so I only ever saw them in the halls, something that obviously didn’t happen when we moved online). I had some really lovely, really special conversations that I will treasure. These last two years have been so weird – with such extremes of difficult and wonderful – and, with all of that still so fresh and still going on to varying degrees, I just felt so aware and so grateful for the good things, many of which are tied to my MA and therefore graduation.
I was absolutely exhausted and in a lot of pain afterwards. I could barely walk to the car. But all of the time on my feet, all the anxiety, the medication withdrawal, the emotion… it just hit me like a train. It took me days to recover – not an unusual experience – and, with my Granny’s Celebration of Life a few days after and the whole medication change, I don’t think I’ve fully processed it yet. It’s been such a weird, busy, emotional time and it’s just been hit after hit after hit. I’m doing my best to cope with it all but it’s a lot. But I did it. I finished my Masters. I am Lauren Alex Hooper, MA. Those two letters after my name mean so much to me because they represent how hard I worked to be here and I can’t be anything but proud of that.
Finding Hope 