Why I FAILED

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Father’s Day

Fatherhood is stewardship. And I am thankful to be steward over a son and daughter who continually amaze. They are my children yes, but more importantly, they are my friends. It is a pleasure and an honor to know them as people and watch them grow into the man and woman they will be. And oh yeah: they ROCK!

My son’s band - he’s the drummer. This is the night they were asked to compete in the finals of a local Battle of the Bands. The final is June 22nd at “The End” in Nashville. If you can come, you won’t be disappointed.

Spy Machine - Unstable - Live March 2008

One of my daughter’s collection of 25 - and growing - YouTube videos.

Walking on Sunshine

Clinging to Guns and Religion

At this point in the presidential race, I’m fairly open minded about our choices. I won’t vote for Hillary, but given the other two choices, I’m back to what I’ve felt for many of the last elections. Namely, “is this the best our country has to choose from?” Jeez!!!

Anyway, today’s news brings controversy about Obama’s comments while stumping in Indiana. Speaking about the frustration of middle America, he said this:

“And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or
religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant
sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their
frustrations.”

Um. ah. er…WHAT?

I have SO many problems with this statement, but above all, I’m simply disgusted by politics and the media in general. Obama’s statement highlights what I believe is the core problem with out nation today: the perception that average Americans - you know, the ones that actually live here and run our country - are stupid and/or ignorant and unable to make effective decisions on their own so we need the government to rescue us.

The government rescuing me is the LAST thing I need thank you. I have no desire to be neutered as continually more powerful and intrusive programs and institutions take over aspects of my life. Contrary to conventional thinking, it is my responsibility as a man to guide, protect and provide for my family and community. Does that mean my wife, kids and community members are helpless idiotic drones? No, because I need them too.

Does it mean I don’t need our government? Again, no. I can’t do my duties if our country is overrun by terrorists or armies of other nations. Nor can I fulfill my obligations without fair legal boundaries regarding business practices - here and abroad. But beyond that? Leave me alone thank you.

And oh, one last point about the election: even with this revealing and bone headed comment from Obama, I’m still not 100% sure who I’ll vote for. Why? because the President doesn’t hold near the power we’re told he or she does. Not only does the Washington establishment view them as a 4 or 8 year visitor, the media controls everything anyway.

Iraq is a quagmire. We’re in a recession. Bush is a complete, incompetent idiot. Paris Hilton is cool. The problem with the earth is people. People who believe in God are foolish and they all think alike. People who don’t are open minded and brilliant.

Um. Need I go on?

Organizing Me Online, Part I

I’ve made one step forward, but I have so far to go.

Earlier this week I made the decision to use this blog for more than just music. I feel freer and more light hearted since the decision - exactly as I hoped to be. However, I still have so far to go towards my ultimate vision partly because of time and partly because of the current state of tech and business.

Time:

People don’t live lives the way our computers think we do. There’s a vast difference between the papers and pens on my desk and the start/programs/office/word/my_life on my desktop. Online isn’t much better and socially it’s even worse.

Social life in the real world - networking - is a friend/acquaintance/stranger network that revolves around me (or you). It does not revolve around a place. In other words, I don’t go to Chili’s to find my friends, I find my friends and we go to Chili’s. The context is me and them, not Chili’s. In fact, tomorrow, we’ll go to Arby’s.

But online, my life is segregated by place. Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, blog(s), e-mail, etc. Though it’s true that several friends are present in all of those, many of them are only in a few. The tough part comes when I want to talk to a sub-group of friends about a topic - say, social networking.

On the off chance that all my “friends” are interested, I’m currently forced to communicate something 5, 6 or more times, in different formats and forms. Not only is this time consuming, I know the failure rate is high because of the fact that the recipients are bombarded by stuff in their networks all day long. How will they know to read my thoughts on a topic they’re interested in when my last five thoughts have been on unrelated topics?

Tech and Business:

Which brings me to tech and business. Technology is simply not where it needs to be yet and it’s because of business. MySpace wants me to live in their network (Chili’s). Why? Because their advertisers are counting my eyeballs and those of my friends. Same with Facebook, LinkedIn, etc… There’s nothing inherently wrong with this of course, I’m just wanting the next phase to happen now (can you say impatient?).

What I (we) need is interconnected hubs with ourselves at the center as opposed to websites (Chili’s).

Vision:

In an interconnected world, we will most likely be connected through tags, but in a different structure than today. We currently use tags to describe content. These tags categorize the content by subject, usually several at a time. For instance, the post will be tagged life, social networking, personal development, about me. This works great in a world organized by sites and blogs.

But what if tags were the paths that interconnected our personal hubs? What if each tag represented levels of connectivity between us? Think concentric circles around a hub.
Imagine this post tagged like this: [stevegrossman - thoughts - about me - life - personal development - social networking - stevegrossman]. Now imagine your RSS feed reader set to look for [stevegrossman - social networking - personal development]. You would automatically receive any thing coming down my path that ended with [personal development - social networking - stevegrossman]. Likewise, a person’s feed reader looking for [thoughts - about me - life - personal development - social networking - stevegrossman] AND [thoughts - about me - music - success - personal development - stevegrossman] would receive my posts on both those subjects.

On my side, I would manage my content and contacts by looking out from my hub - me. My contacts would be tagged too. A close friend would be tagged: [friend, their name, e-mail (or message), thoughts] and any e-mail groupings I need like “church”. An “acquaintance” would be [tagged, name, thoughts].

Any e-mails or thoughts would go to the first person. The second person would only receive my thoughts, not e-mails. If I tagged a post e-mail, church, it would go to the first person and anyone else in that grouping. Automatically. More specifically, when I wrote a note tagged with [friend, their name, e-mail] - it would only go to one person.

This may sound like a set-up nightmare, but not really. Most of us already do this in our heads, and we have to “tag” every thing we write and usually across multiple sites and technologies. First we have to consider who will be interested in our message or who we want to contact. Where they are online - e-mail or social site. Which of their multiple e-mails will work. Where most of the people are who we want to contact and what are their addresses (what’s the MySpace nickname for Cathy?). Add to that the fact that we’re only guessing as to who is really interested in what we have to say, and TODAY is the nightmare.

The hub based network I envision connects everyone exactly where each person wants to connect. Remember, I only described my address book and content tagging. On the recipient end, they would control the input with similar tags. They can chose to accept everything I send by configuring their feeds deep into my hub, or only receive certain topics near the edge of my hub.

Either way, I sit down at my computer and sign into “Steve’s Hub”. I write a post with tags and hit send.

Across town or across the world a person sits down at their computer and signs on to “Cathy’s Hub”. They see my post because they wanted too.

Who would pay and what I’m thinking about doing while waiting for “Steve’s Hub” will have to wait for Part II

More of Steve Grossman

At 10:35 this past Saturday morning, I reached a decision. While reading an article about Evan Williams, the founder of Blogger and Twitter that described his wide ranging yet thoroughly engaging blog, I realized that I needed a change.

I realized that my recent lack of writing on this site has been caused by a strategy focused on helping artists at the exclusion of my other passions. And while a niche focus might work for a business, I am not a business, I’m a person.

So I found myself building an increasingly unmanageable assortment of outlets for my other passions – several blogs, multiple Social Networking sites and other assorted tools. This, in turn, led to an ever increasing number of half-written posts, bookmarks and links (not to mention an unfinished book).

Reading the article Saturday morning was the push I needed to move in a direction I’ve contemplated for some time. I reached a decision.

I will share more of Steve Grossman at Why I Failed.com.

For some, this means that you’ll hardly see a change here at all. For others, some of what I say might run counter to your beliefs. If you’re the first, I hope more of me helps you. If you’re the second, I hope you’ll give my thoughts a chance. If nothing else, you’ll have two opinions to take with you into life.I hope you enjoy the change.

What I Believe in The Words of Ben Stein

A friend of mine passed this to me today. It is was written by Ben Stein and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary. I’m including it in its entirety because it powerfully and articulately expresses my deepest beliefs (even though we have different faiths) and its message deserves to be spread. As I said to my friend, I’m struck by how effectively it skewers political correctness while being wholly politically correct.

Enjoy the balanced and measured words of Mr. Stein:

“My confession:

I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish.  And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees. I don’t feel threatened. I don’t feel discriminated against. That’s what they are: Christmas trees.

It doesn’t bother me a bit when people say, “Merry Christmas” to me. I don’t think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn’t bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu. If people want a crche, it’s just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away .

I don’t like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don’t think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can’t find it in the Constitution and I don’t like it being shoved down my throat.

Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship Nick and Jessica and we aren’t allowed to worship God as we understand Him?  I guess that’s a sign that I’m getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where Nick and Jessica came from and where the America we knew went to.

In light of the many jokes we send to one another for a laugh, this is a little different: This is not intended to be a joke; it’s not funny, it’s intended to get you thinking.

Billy Graham’s daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane Clayson asked her “How could God let something like this happen?” (regarding Katrina)  Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response.

She said, “I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years we’ve been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives. And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has calmly backed out. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?”

In light of recent events…terrorists attack, school shootings, etc. I think it started when Madeleine Murray O’Hare (she was murdered, her body found recently) complained she didn’t want prayer in our schools, and we said OK.

Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school. The Bible says thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we said OK.

Then Dr. Benjamin Spock said we shouldn’t spank our children when they misbehave because their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem (Dr. Spock’s son committed suicide). We said an expert should know what he’s talking about. And we said OK.

Now we’re asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don’t know right from wrong, and why it doesn’t bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves.

Probably, if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out. I think it has a great deal to do with “WE REAP WHAT WE SOW.”

Funny how simple it is for people to trash God and then wonder why the world’s going to hell.  Funny how we believe what the newspapers say, but question what the Bible says . Funny how you can send ‘jokes’ through e-mail and they spread like wildfire but when you start sending messages regarding the Lord, people think twice about sharing.  Funny how lewd, crude, vulgar and obscene articles pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of God is suppressed in the school and workplace.

Are you laughing?

Funny how when you forward this message, you will not send it to many on your address list because you’re not sure what they believe, or what they will think of you for sending it.

Funny how we can be more worried about what other people think of us than what God thinks of us.

Pass it on if you think it has merit. If not then just discard it… no one will know you did. But, if you discard this thought process, don’t sit back and complain about what bad shape the world is in.  My Best Regards.

Honestly and respectfully,

Ben Stein”

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Music & Money Monday - Sept 10

There WILL be a Music & Money post for the 10th, it just might not happen on the 10th!

Life, work projects, furniture moving and my son’s Physics homework all came together in a blur over the weekend.

And oh, btw, did I mention my daughter broke her arm? She’s fine, thank God. The doctors called her quite a broad - which my wife and I have known all along. I’ll keep you updated as to what the doctor says today.

Life does indeed come at you fast.

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An ACM and A Grammy and Why I Failed

I often get asked how I can call a career that includes winning an Academy of Country Music award and a Grammy a failure. Good question.

My usual answer is that yes, these awards do indeed mean I was a successful musician, but the reason I say I failed is that I didn’t build a sustainable career (well, that and the fact that whyifailed.com is an intriguing name for a blog and a book). I want to go beyond that though, and use my experience surrounding these two awards to give you some ideas to build your career.

ACM
I had a simple dream for most of my life: to be a sought after recording and live drummer. My detail of the dream was that I would record and play with a famous band and then get hired to do work for other artists that wanted “my sound, feel and ideas” added to their projects. The fact that I was to do all this in LA is another story altogether, but I ended up in Nashville and after many years as a side man, got asked to play drums for the newly formed Gibson/Miller Band. My final audition was a gig in front of the producer because he had to have a drummer that could record. That was fine with me because I wouldn’t have taken the gig without being on the records anyway. Step one of the dream. Check.

Not too long after that, GMB became pretty successful and of course, we eventually won the ACM 2 1/2 years later. Step two of the dream. Check.

But step three never happened, and the main reason is I was dreaming. I purposely used the word dream for this story to illustrate what I wrote about a few weeks ago in Dreams vs. Goals. As I look back at my time in music, the common thread is that I was good enough to make my dreams come true despite of the fact that I didn’t really have goals, plans, strategies and dates to keep me moving forward. But I WASN’T good enough to reach my ultimate dreams or build a career. And neither are you.

No one is good enough to simple drift through life and get everything they want. It just doesn’t work that way. Yes, I was blessed by some great things, and yes I worked hard to make the most of every opportunity. But what I REALLY failed at was making more opportunities. That’s the essence of goals: short term goals are about planning, thinking, strategizing and working to create and or find the opportunities that you can then turn into work. Long term goals are about the same steps applied to create and or find combinations of opportunities to build a career.

I played drums on some great records with GMB and we kicked butt live. What I didn’t do was parlay that into a recording career on other projects. I kept thinking “I need some time off to relax while we’re off the road” and, “I’m sure they know it’s me on drums and they’d be calling if they were working on projects.” Not to brag, but everyone in Nashville pretty much assumed it was the usual “A team” session band on our records and never thought another thing of it.

What’s tough about this story is what happened next: the lead singer quit GMB. In an afternoon, that chapter of my career was over and I found myself freefalling in a gap between the sideman I had been and “the guy in GMB” I no longer was. Had I been building the step three I envisioned in my dream, I would have been just fine. After that, my music career never completely recovered. Don’t feel too bad though, because I was about to play on a Grammy Winning project.

Grammy Award
A year of two after the end of GMB, the other leader of the band, Blue Miller, an excellent singer, songwriter and producer, got linked up with an unknown artist named India Arie. This led to the need to record some demos, and he gave me a call. One thing led to another, and eventually Blue produced, and I played drums on, four or five tracks as part of her development deal with Motown.

Now the story gets interesting because within the year, I decided it was time to pursue something else. That’s a LONG STORY for another time, but I was soon settling into my new job while playing drums on most weekends. That fall, I was asked to travel to a seminar. As a group of us were checking in the hotel, I picked up a time magazine with Alicia Keys, Joan Osbourne and India Aria on the cover. India’s album, with me on 2 tracks was nominated for 8 Grammy’s!

She didn’t win any of them because Alicia swept everything that year. However, unbeknownst to me, the label held onto our tracks and 2 of them ended up on the Voyage to India CD. I was so busy with my new job that I was only vaguely aware of that fact and I was completely clueless that she was nominated for a Grammy in 2003. That is until I showed up at work to questions by a co-worker about India winning the Grammy for best R&B Album. I had to go to the Grammy website to find out if it was true!

So what deep piece of advice do I have for you? Well, two things. One, you will most likely work most with good friends and ongoing work associates. I have a Grammy because Blue Miller called a friend he could trust to play what he needed. Second, you just never know what life will bring you.

It may be cliched, but don’t try too hard to figure out life. Just enjoy the ride.

More About Me

As I start this post, I’m reminded of the dialogue from the movie “Beaches” where the self-absorbed character who’s been chatting endlessly about her accomplishments pauses and says:

“Well, enough about me. Let’s talk about you. What do YOU think of me?”

I’m not like that person and that’s why I’ve neglected to say much about me. I’ve realized though, that nothing I say here means much without some revelation about who I am and what I’ve done. So, here’s a link directly to more about me.

Let me know if you’d like to know anything else (within reason).