Welcome Angela Webber of The Doubleclicks to WWdN! She’s sharing this special guest post with us while Wil Wheaton is at sea. You can get her band’s latest album, “President Snakes” on Bandcamp, listen to her comedy/RPG podcast, “Gosh Darn Fiasco,” watch her web series about cats, or follow her on Twitter and Tumblr. She is trying very, very hard to be the genuine best.

Hello everyone! As that introduction says, my name is Angela and I am a self-employed creative person. I’m in a band, I write things, I tell jokes, and I generally try to make things as much as possible. This is really really cool. But also: it’s sort of terrible. Like many creative types, I live with depression and I’m pretty bad at being self-motivated, I’m full up with imposter syndrome and I have enough negative self-talk to sink a Bucklebury Ferry (or larger water-traveling vessel, that was just the first one I thought of). But I do it—I make things all the time, and it’s my job, and I’m actually a pretty happy person these days. I’d like to share with you some of the ways I’ve found to make myself happy in a motivational post I’d like to call:

FINDING THE BEAR THAT HELPS YOU MAKE THINGS: Using negativity for positive ends

It is so easy to hang on to the negative things in life. I, just for a quick example, remember negative online comments much, much longer than positive ones. Logically, I know this is ridiculous. People who hate my stuff don’t matter, and people who like me and my art are really the ones that should care about. I tweeted something about this once, about how I wish I could remember the positive things more than the negative ones, and my friend Michael gave me some really great insight. It’s a survival instinct to watch out for the bad things more than the good ones. If you live in a forest with a scary bear and a bunch of delicious berries, you need to keep that scary bear on your mind all the time. You need to hide your food and yourself, you need to avoid the bear’s territory—and no matter how delicious those berries are, that bear is going to be bigger in your mind. This applies to internet comments, to drama, and to rejections of all kinds.

So what do we do with this, when we’re supposed to be all self-motivated and CREATIVE? How do we keep our energy up and ourselves happy? Well, I take negativity and I embrace it. If these negative thoughts, these scary bears, are the ones that are going to stick in my mind anyway, I might as well find the bears that help me. Here are some thoughts that keep me going.

Some (somewhat inaccurate) negative thoughts that keep me going as an independent artist

1. Trying to make other people like you won’t work

In the music industry as in any other, there is a lot of rejection. There are contests, applications, concerts, and festivals that everyone wants to “win” or be a part of. I often hear my friends and colleagues in this world lamenting that they were not invited to perform on a particular show or added to a particular compilation or whatever—and it bums them out so much. Rejection is going to happen. It’s gonna! We all hate it! I get it! I want people to like me and I take rejection super personally.

So here’s my deal: you’re always invited to your own party. Especially now in the days of the Internet and Kickstarter and Twitters and such, if you are a motivated human, you can be your own producer. You don’t need to get into a festival or get a publisher or be signed by a record label to make things—you can just make things (warning: income may vary). And you can invite other people to make things with you! My band really, really wanted to do shows with our heroes in comedy and music, but sitting around waiting to be invited to open for them was depressing and boring. So we started our own show called #NerdNightOut, which turned into a series, which turned into a national tour where we got to perform with our heroes at legendary venues around the country. It took a lot of time, but no one could take it away from us, because it was ours.

Starting your own party keeps you busy (take that, depression!), keeps you creating (gooooo creating!) and makes you a more valuable member of your creative community! And you aren’t waiting. Success on your own terms is so much better and so much longer-lasting than success on someone else’s. And yes, getting that mainstream recognition can boost your income and your audience, but making things on your own in the meantime can only help you.

2. If something already exists, someone else can do it better than you

Sometimes you want to jump on the Popular Things train because it’s popular. If you could just be “the next Wil Wheaton” or “the next Cards Against Humanity” or “the next Pomplamoose,” you know you’d succeed, because those things are already popular. It seems like math, doesn’t it? Just make another catchy video-song cover and you’ll get a million views? But here’s the thing: THOSE THINGS ALREADY EXIST. With keywords and genres and “elevator pitches,” it can seem like the only way to succeed is to compare yourself to a thing that already exists. Sometimes we, the Doubleclicks, struggle because we think we need to fit into one box or another (“comedy”, “music”, “kids music”, “feminism”, “nerdy”, etc) so we can really “catch on”—but that’s exactly the opposite. If you can’t be categorized, it means you’re doing something new, and that should be the goal of creative work—to add something to the world. To quote my own song, the things that make you different are what really make you shine. No one can be YOU better than you can. Everyone can be THEM better than you can.

Here’s an example: say you write a song you hate about a superhero you don’t care about because you think you’re gonna get a million views from people who like things like that. Best case: you have to sing a song you hate a bunch because people like it, and you temporarily make some money and gain some fans that are going to want you to do MORE things that you don’t like to do. Worst case: you’re wasting your time, and no one will like it. Your target audience should be you. If you make a thing you love, at least you love it. And if other people love it, that means you get to keep making things you love for people who love the things you love to make. It seems so simple but it’s so easy to forget.

3. ONLY REGRETS

I could move to Los Angeles and try to make it big at television comedy, or I could stay in Portland where I have my friends and stability and a place to create. I could go to a big convention in Seattle next month, or I could spend that weekend writing and recording music. Tonight I could take a nap, or I could go to a party. Decision paralysis is a bummer, and no matter what I pick, I’m gonna wonder What Could Have Been.

Sometimes I look at someone who made a different choice in their life and I see their successes and I am jealous (sometimes I’m jealous of my friends! Here’s a helpful thing about that). But that’s silly—because if I had made that choice, I wouldn’t have had the successes, or failures, or experiences that I’ve had now. Plus, she seems like she’s happy, but that’s just social media, y’know? She’s probably sad and jealous sometimes too (thanks, negative thoughts!). All you can do is choose your own adventure and don’t look back. You’re gonna miss out no matter what you do, even if you’re just missing out on a nap that will recharge you with a brilliant new idea. So yes, you’ll have regrets, but you would have had regrets either way. This isn’t a positive way to think about it, but I never promised happiness in this blog post! YOLO!

4. There are things you will never get over and you absolutely need to cry about them, possibly for the rest of your life.

This isn’t really a “creative career” truth, but it’s a true one and it’s important. I was just in therapy to deal with some bla bla bla traumatic past bla bla etc, and my goal was to “fix” my depression by just erasing, processing, undoing, whatever, the things that happened in my past. This is not how things work, friends, and this is what my therapist told me: you aren’t broken just because you’re sad. And you aren’t gonna “get over it.” Sometimes you’re gonna be reminded of sad things and you’re gonna be sad for a while and you’re gonna cry. It’s ok. Give yourself time. To quote another of my own songs (again, cause I’m great), dilute those bad memories with good ones. Be honest with the people who love you. It’s fine.

Best of luck!

That’s all the positive negativity I have to share with you. I promise these things help me. I hope they help you. I wish you the best: may your bear be helpful, may your anxiety spirals be short, and may your berries be delicious. Please tweet at me @angelamwebber with your thoughts!