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Jan. 23, 2024

097 | Be Brave: Overcoming Creative Blocks With Todd Henry

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Under The Radar: Secrets To Success For The Independent Musician

Imagine hitting that crossroads moment where 'fine' is no longer fine enough—where the pull of creative authenticity tugs at your core. That's the fork in the road Todd Henry, one of my favourite humans, and acclaimed author of "The Brave Habit" found himself at, and it catalyzed a profound pivot in his podcast, embodying the essence of bravery that he advocates. We chat about bravery in the realm of creative exploration, and the paradoxes artists and musicians encounter, wrestling with the allure of past success while yearning to venture into the unknown.

In today's show you're gonna get a full lesson on how to integrate bravery  to overcome your creative blocks from the OG, Todd Henry:

  • Learn how to shed the safety net and engage with your work in a way that sets your soul on fire. 
  • Learn the BRAVE framework 
    • Block time
    • Review
    • Agency
    • Vision
    • Express
  • Learn where Todd got his start in music and what band was his favourite growing up... like obsessive, folks. You're not going to believe it...

All this and more on Episode 97 of the new and improved, Under The Radar: Secrets To Success For The Independent Musician.

More on Todd
Positioning himself as an “arms dealer for the creative revolution”, Todd Henry teaches leaders and organizations how to establish practices that lead to everyday brilliance. He is the author of seven books (The Accidental Creative, Die Empty, Louder Than Words, Herding Tigers, The Motivation Code, Daily Creative, The Brave Habit) which have been translated into more than a dozen languages, and he speaks and consults across dozens of industries on creativity, leadership, and passion for work. Todd’s book Die Empty was named by Amazon.com as one of the best books of 2013. His latest book, The Brave Habit, is one of my favourite books of all time.

Visit toddhenry.com and www.thebravehabit.com to grab a copy and check out Todd's podcast, The Daily Creative for more insight on how to unlock your creativity.

Support the show

For more information about me, to book a "soundcheck" - a quick virtual coffee chat with me and to learn more about the Musician Wellness and Music Production services I offer, please head to www.miketheschwartz.com

If you'd prefer to watch me and my wild antics, please check out my YouTube Channel
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Special thanks to everyone who's helped along the way and has believed in me. I do this all on my own and if you feel so inclined to give back, donations are welcomed. Paypal.me/miketheschwartz

This production has been brought to you by Music Fit Collective
Intro Photography and Videography by Mudge Music
Video Editing by K. Browne Productions LLC
Theme Song: "Head Down//Heart Up" by Adrian Chalifour

Huge thanks to my Sponsors & Affiliates.

Chapters

00:04 - Bravery and Leadership in Creative Exploration

09:57 - Bravery in Creative Pursuits

15:13 - Developing a Brave and Visionary Mindset

26:38 - First Record and Musical Obsessions

30:07 - Unleash Your Inner Rock Star

Transcript

Speaker 1:

Alright, guys, listen, bravery is doing the right thing, even in the face of fear or personal loss. And my guest today, todd Henry, the author of the Brave Habit, amongst many others, are my favorite books for creatives. We dive deep. We dive deep into Bravery and why it's so important for you, as an artist, a musician, a creative professional, to act with courageous leadership. This one's wild. I'm so excited. Let's do this thing, todd. Welcome to the show. My man, I really want to ask you how. Opening hot is an interesting phenomenon, and my favorite thing is starting with gratitude before I throw you right into the fire. So could you give me one thing, my man, that you absolutely love, but what you get to do every day?

Speaker 2:

So I love that I get to make things every day, I get to come up with ideas and share them with people and fortunately there are people who let me do that. I know probably a lot of musicians feel the same way Like are you kidding? I get to make things and people enjoy it, and that's. I'm interviewing for my show tomorrow. I'm interviewing a guy named Thad Cockrell who is a musician and a phenomenal musician and he just has an album project coming out and he somebody did a documentary, a short little documentary about him, and he said like I get to make things and people enjoy them. Like how incredible is that? Like what if I just get to make things, I enjoy and then share them with others and they enjoy it too, and it's just an amazing thing. So I'm deeply grateful that that is really my life, really minus through books and podcasting and things like that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, I mean, it's such an interesting world we live in with, like the creative mindset, it's really taken an interesting route. You say something in the book the brave habit, which is coming out in less than a week now. It'll be out on the day that we air this, I believe. So you said something, though, that really caught my attention being with bravery does not make you a superhuman, it makes you fully human, and I'd love to dive into that, and I got a two-part question to open things up for you. Now think, like I just said, with a creative landscape, the musician mindset and everything in a world full of inflated egos, you've got that hustle culture, and it almost seems like, from my perspective, that musicians are taught now to glorify victimhood. So, being a creative professional, why on earth should I subscribe to that statement? And part two what do you predict will continue to happen if we continue to neglect that courageous leadership that you talk about in the brave habit?

Speaker 2:

Well, I think what happens to a lot of musicians is the same thing that happens to a lot of artists or business leaders or other people that I encounter or I work with is that they get to a point where they achieve something. They become known for a thing, probably because they at some point did something brave. You don't become known for a thing unless you're doing something unique, something that is shaped by your own intuition, your own passions, your own experiences, and so you put that out there and it resonates, and that seems like a wonderful thing for artists or for musicians, that moment when you become known for a thing. But it's actually a really dangerous place for artists, because once you become known for a thing, what is your temptation? Your temptation is to protect that thing. Your temptation is to circle the wagons and to keep cranking out more of that thing that you're known for. And there's nothing wrong with that from a commercial standpoint. If your goal is just to build a business and make some money and that's all you want to do is just squeeze as much value out of your art as you can, there's nothing wrong with that. That's your choice. But I think most people get into making art not because they want to squeeze as much value out of it as they can, but because they enjoy making art, they enjoy taking risks, they enjoy putting things out that might fail. And then, when people respond to it, they're like I know, isn't that amazing? I wasn't sure, but yeah, I guess it is good. So I think that the unfortunate downside for a lot of musicians is that the industry is set up around hits. It's set up around replicating success. So if you go to your, you know, say, you have a label, which is more and more rare these days. Basically, you have a label and you go to your label and you say, hey, I'm going to, I'm going to. You know, I have this new idea, I have a new project, a new direction. I want to take my music and the same thing is, by the way, true with me as an author right with publishers. I go to them and they say, hey, I want to do something completely different from what I've done before. Well, are you sure you want to do that? Because we've got this kind of baked in audience for the thing that you do and let's just serve up more red meat to the masses, right? It is often the response, and so the the inevitable result of that is everybody rolls to the middle of the bed, everybody goes for the easiest thing, the lowest common denominator we just replicate. Maybe we could a little different from last time, but we replicate what has happened in the past. And so, personally, the net you know we talk about commercially, like that can be fine, like you can keep it going, I guess, if you do that. But personally, what happens? We become a little bit less human because we know that we're settling in. We know that, you know, we're wired as artists to go out, to take risks, to try things, to experiment, to grow, to stretch ourselves. And yet we know that we're kind of settling in, we're beginning to succumb to the forces of mediocrity. So when I say bravery doesn't make you a superhuman, it makes you fully human. What I mean is when we take brave action in our lives, we are awakening all those parts of us that want to explore, that want to be curious, that want to follow our intuition, that want to innovate, that want to do something that feels a little bit edgy and risky. And think about how you come alive when you share something for the first time that you're really proud of Versus. Oh, here's the thing. That's kind of like the thing I did last time. I hope you like it right. So I think that nobody gets into making art because they want to just, you know, crank out the same thing over and over for 20 or 30 years or however long your career lasts. So that's why I wrote this book actually is to help people understand, you know, that very natural response to shrink and decour this, to shrink into safety, to protect yourself when you've achieved a little bit of success and instead to push people to go to new places.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that touches on so much of what I teach in the music method as well. It habits are only so good as that identity. So I mean, how do we address like I love to hear your thoughts on that how do we address if there's a shaky foundation of like maybe it was a childhood trauma or something like that, where they were told they were no good at singing, or they were told they were the fat kid or they were whatever it may be? How do you overcome what you address in the book I love so elegantly you talk about bravery versus courage, as bravery being more of an active thing. So how do we, how do we incorporate bravery? Why is it a habit? Because when I talk to people, people are like bravery a habit. No, it's like so what's the difference between bravery and courage for you?

Speaker 2:

Well, telling somebody to be courageous for me is a little bit like telling them to be a couple inches taller or you know, jump, jump a little higher. Like it's this nice thing like be courageous, okay, great. I mean, how do I do that? Like it feels like something you have, it's a virtue that you have right, and that just feels very inaccessible to me. But bravery I can look at something and say, oh, that was brave. What that person did was brave. I might not call them a brave person, but I might say that thing they did is was very brave. You know, speaking up, whatever. So my argument in the book is that bravery is deployed courage right in the moment. It's when we meet a moment and that moment requires something of us and we choose to deploy courage in the moment to meet that moment. And so when I say bravery is a habit, what I mean is we can choose to be brave in those moments when we would otherwise shrink into cowardice. We can choose to speak up when we probably really want to just keep our mouth shut and retreat into the shadows and hope somebody else says something. We can, we can choose to be the person who speaks up in that moment. We can choose to share the idea, we can choose to introduce a new project. I mean, I'll give you an example from my own life and my own work. I've been podcasting for 18 years, since 2005, been podcasting. So it's like very, very early days of podcasting. Well, we had to explain to people like it's really easy to listen. All you have to do is like drag these files to your hard drive, plug your iPod, your iPod into your computer, and then drag the files to your iPod over a firewire cable, right, like that was literally how we had to, and it's super easy. And then you can listen anywhere you go, yeah, and then just come back and reload, you know, next week, because you can only carry, like you know, 10 episodes on your, on your iPod, you know it'll be full. So, whatever, a little shuffle, it's totally crazy. So you know, I mean I've been doing this for a very long time and I just recently, in the last year, as I was writing this book, I realized, as I was asking a lot of questions about people I was writing the book for, I started asking myself if I were to start over again, would I be doing things the way I'm doing them right now. And the uncomfortable answer I came to was no, I wouldn't, I would be doing things very differently. Which then obviously raised the follow up question Well then, crap, why are you doing things the way you're doing them? And so I have just completely. I just drove a semi truck through 18 years of work. You know, I had this back catalog. We were monetizing it with advertising. I mean, it was like basically like a, you know, a money machine. You know you, just because I've got all this back catalog people are still listening to, we would have tens of thousands of listens of the back catalog every month. And I realized, like that's fine, but I'm doing the same thing, that I'm this artist who's like well, you know, just keep cranking out the same thing. And, you know, put it out there. And you know the audience is there and it's fine, but knowing full well I could be doing something different. Yeah, it was fine, but fine isn't what I'm aiming for. Yeah, I'm aiming to do something unique, something great. And so I just drove a semi truck through 18 years of work and completely reinvented the podcast and completely started over with episode one on January 1, 2024. We went from like I had like I don't know. 2500, 3000 episodes went from that to episode one, got rid of the entire back catalog, took advertising away. So we're not advertising anymore and we're doing something completely different. But I realize I can't in good conscience be writing a book and talking about bravery and then knowing full well that what I'm doing is fine but not doing something about it right. I can't full well be doing that with a clean conscience, and so that's why we decided to do it. And so for artists, for musicians, for people who are out there listening to this show right now, like listen, when you get to a point where you're like it's fine, it's fine. I mean it's fine, I'm happy with it, it's fine. But you know deep down that you're beginning to settle in. That's probably the point where you've become known for a thing and you have to ask the question am I settling in? Am I just circling the wagons and protecting the thing I'm known for? Or am I willing to push to the next place, knowing I might fail, but also knowing it's going to bring me alive, it's going to allow me to do something that's uniquely brave and uniquely me. Art is putting your intuition into the world for public consumption. That's what art is, and when your intuition is telling you to do one thing but you choose to do another thing for expedience, that's when we retreat into cowardice. That's when I say bravery makes you fully human. You'll be fully human when you follow your intuition and you put things into the world. When you shrink back, you become something less than what you know you're capable of, and that's just not a great place to live for very long.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, man, I mean you said so many, so many rad things right there. You must have been reading my mind because I threw out some Q&A to the audience. Because I know, ever since I met you back, probably four or five years ago, met you through a mutual friend, dj Zitre, and he said you got to go check this guy out. This guy's helped me with my creative process. He knows how to talk to us as creatives. I've incorporated a lot of your practices, the idea book specifically. That is incredible from Accidental Creative, the seven word bio Like. There's so many elements there and one of the things I admire the most about your writing and your creative process is your ability to take these abstract ideas and bring them down and formulate them into a very, very simplified structure and oftentimes in acronyms, and you do so in the brave habit again with brave. I'd love for you to explore that and then we'll get into a couple more of these other questions, but you already hit it on the head. Ronnie asked could Todd just explain how like in his own life and you just nailed that one so like when, especially as creatives? I know that that's very helpful for me. Could you explain to the audience. What brave means to you using that five step process that you did with the, with the BRA VE, yeah.

Speaker 2:

And I do this so that it becomes easier to remember I did that with with the Accidental Creative Fresh F-R-E-S-H you know, focus relationships, energy, stimuli hours. And the reason I do that is because you know we need practical things that we can easily remember, that we can just take into our life, and so much easier if it's like an acronym or you know whatever Exactly. So the reason I laid it out this way is because we often arrive at moments in our life and we're surprised when we're challenged to act bravely, and so our gut instinct is just to react, you know, in that moment. And if we're just reacting, if we're just protecting ourselves, then we're naturally going to gravitate toward comfort. That's just our biology. Our biology is going to pull us toward comfort. You know, if, if somebody walks into my office right now and says, surprise, it's time to go run a 5k or you can eat this, you know, bowl of potato chips, well, my instincts are going to be like well, I'm going to eat the bowl of potato chips. Right, if it's really a choice between those two things, I'm going to eat the bowl of potato chips Because we, our biology craves comfort. So what we have to do is we have to prepare ourselves for those moments, just like athletes prepare themselves for those moments in the going states. My friend, chad Jeffers is launching a project where he helps musicians the guitarist for Kerry Underwood, he's a phenomenal musician, but he helps artists develop this mindset of like I'm getting ready to go on stage. What is that mindset? That stage ready mindset? Right the same. We need to do the same thing in our lives for those moments. So BRAVE is this number one block time in your life once a week. 15 minutes is sufficient, just block time once a week to look at your life, at your calendar, at your commitments, at your relationships, all of the things going on in your world. Okay, r, so block, and then R is review. You're going to review your calendar, commitments, your conversations. You're going to have projects, you're working on Other things that you know this week are areas of uncertainty and tension for you. Okay, so we have tensions in our life and we like to ignore them because they're uncomfortable to deal with. But pay attention to those tensions. Marie Pullin actually keeps what she calls a tensions database, which is like a database of all the like areas that she knows there's some uncertainty. Right, there's some tension in her life. So keep a attention, keep a focus on those tensions, those moments where bravery is likely to be required of you in some way. So if you know like you're having a difficult relationship with your manager, I know I'm going to have an interaction this week that's going to require brave action in some way, and so that review space lets you sort of identify those places, okay, the third A is agency. Agency is one of the key qualities of moments when brave action likely occurs right. So where in those relationships, where in those moments where in those projects cannot do I have some agency to take action? Meaning, do I have credibility with this person, or do I have a position of authority where I can speak into something, or do I have a unique skill set where I can take action on that area of uncertainty? So that's A is agency. And that's the first quality, by the way I write about in the book that tends to be present in moments of bravery. The fourth is V. So B-R-A-V. V is about vision. It's about ensuring that you have a clear vision for each of those areas of your life. So what is your vision for that relationship with your manager? How do you want it to be different? What would a better possible future look like in that relationship? What about that project you're working on? What does a better possible future look like for that project, you know, and what would it look like for you to make brave decisions to help you get there? Vision is the second thing. Optimistic vision is the second thing that tends to be present in places where brave action occurs. So you have a sense of agency, of perceived agency, and a sense of an optimistic vision. So that's the fourth step. And then, finally, e express Express your intent for the week in each of those areas. So, with that project I'm working on, here is my intent. When I come to a moment where I'm tempted to retreat to comfort, I'm tempted to retreat to cowardice and take the easy, safe, comfortable road. Instead I am going to choose blank right, whatever that is. Instead, I'm going to choose to do the hard thing. I'm going to have the hard conversation, I'm going to express my concern to my manager, I'm going to share the idea in a meeting. I'm going to, instead of just retreating, I'm going to speak candidly with that difficult client and I'm going to help us get to a better place in terms of our relationship, right. So express meaning that you're creating an intent in each of those areas. Again, the goal is to understand what agency you have and what your vision is. And then, when you express that intent, what it means is not, you're not done, then that just means that what you're doing is you're sort of planting a flag, saying, when I arrive at that moment when I'm going to be tempted to shrink into cowardice, instead I already have an intent in place that says no, I'm not going to do that, I'm going to, I'm going to be brave. In her book the Creative Habit, twyla Tharp, who was a choreographer, she wrote about her morning routine. She was a choreographer, so every morning she would go to the gym to do her choreography workout. And she said I would walk downstairs or the hail of cab, I would get in the cab, I'd ride to the gym and I would do my workout for after how many hours it is. And she said but the habit? The habit wasn't going and doing the workout, the habit was hailing the cab. Because once I knew that I had hailed the cab, I was already on my way. I was gonna do the workout like I'm not gonna turn around and go back, great. And and the same thing is true here the brave habit, bra VE. If you do this once a week, that's the habit that's hailing the cab. Once you've established your intent, once you express that intent, you know you're gonna have to violate your own personal sense of character in order to do something different. Once you've said, hey, I'm gonna have this difficult conversation this week with my manager, if you don't do it, that's on you. At that point you can't blame the circumstances. You can't say, oh, I was surprised by the difficulty I'm having with my manager. No, I've already you know, I've already expressed that. The same with the project. You know, if you know that there are different directions, you can go with your work and one of them is gonna be comfortable and the other might be a little bit, you know, uncomfortable. If you express ahead of time I'm gonna make difficult choices with my work this week that could lead to more value, then you're more likely in the moment to make that difficult decision.

Speaker 1:

That's amazing, yeah, and I love how you touched on that. One really stuck out to me, to the perceived the three P's you know proficiency with your skill in your mindset, people, the network. And this is so applicable in the studio, this is so applicable on the road in on tour. I'd love to, I'd love to pick you up to, on on your guitarist, but there, because that's that sounds like exactly like what. What we're doing with that. That is that, like the stage performance, so many people get wrapped up like big-time people. I've been, I've been working with that. You wouldn't believe, but well, you would because you know them too. But the, the amount of Performance, anxiety, imposter syndrome, all these things that come out After you've been doing this for so many years. The perceived agency thing is so true and I love the fighter pilot analogy that you use are the example in the book. That's fantastic. Could you talk briefly about why perceived agency is so important and expand on those that for, especially for musicians in a band setting, in a, you know if they are at the label, which, as you said already, is very rare. But in that team setting, how can we look to build the team around us? How can we build that platform. What does that look like for? For a creative, like a, like an author or a musician or anything?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so I'll give an example. I did an interview not too long ago with a friend of mine we used to play music together, actually Amos Heller, who is a musician in Nashville. He's currently on tour with an up-and-coming artist named Taylor Swift. He's the bass player for Taylor right? So so you know he's, he's, he's been with her since 2007, so they've gone from everything from playing, like you know, casinos to now, like selling out stadiums around the world. You know it's kind of like crazy the the ride that they've been on Not to, not to denigrate casino gigs, cuz. I'm just saying Money's money, it's a little different doing that than doing like a stadium, right, definitely. And so you know what what he said because I asked him about that I was like how is it different playing a stadium versus playing like a club or something? He, by the way, still plays, you know. He'll like fill in for other bands and stuff and play when, when Taylor's not on the road, and play like gigs and all different kinds of settings, and he's like the thing that what he told me was like what he discovers, like you have to be so good, you have to be so practiced in your craft and show up. The way he described it. And if somebody told him early on was like be a bro, be a pro, be apropos, right, and to be a be a, be a pro part for him is like you have to just be like this is what I do, this is my thing, this is my craft and I have to do everything I can to make sure that I am at the top of my game, craft wise. He said a lot of musicians who end up losing the gig or ones who just like come in and they try to wing it based on their Talent, they try to shoot from the hip and he's like no, you got to be, you have to be like on top of it, you have to show up and you know your parts, front and back, like you've got it all figured out, you know, and then you can work the challenge yourself right, like in the mall, asking like so what's it? Like like you're playing the same songs over and over and over, and night after night After night, right, and with a few variations, but mostly night after night the same stuff. And he said I Find ways of challenging myself in the moment. He's like so I want to land that that one right. Like I want to land it a little more perfectly, even if it's like I'm holding a whole note, like I want to land it as perfectly as I can. And he's like focused on, like trying to Improve his craft. Within that is agency and a nutshell right there. It's like I, I can make myself better. I can't control all the variables. I can't control if the weather's bad. I can't control if there's wind blowing and the sound is funky or I know everybody's using in ears, but you know I can't control like what, what happens with that. But what I can control is how I bring myself to the situation. I can control Whether I'm prepared in the moment to do my thing, because we all know, listen the music business, especially if you're like touring. It's like wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, go, go, do your thing, go, go, go Right, and that's kind of what it feels like and so you have to be ready for that go go go moment. It can't sneak up on you. You have to be prepared and that's the being a pro part. Are you serious enough about your craft to say I am going to absolutely be maybe not the best in the world, but I'm going to be absolutely the best that I can be at my craft? That's that's agency. That's developing proficiency. And then the people part you mentioned is like am I developing? Am I, am I just a good collaborator? Am I developing a network of people around me who see me as a beneficial collaborator? I want to be around that person. I want to collaborate with them. I want to. You know, I want to. I want to pull them in the projects because that person is taking agency over their relationships, right? So I think that's the. That's the key thing in developing agency is just making sure that you're being the absolute best as a musician and as a collaborator.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely man, so wise, and, yeah, I heard your interview there with him. That was, that was so good. And then I went out and like I'm a total Swiftie, right? So, like one of my, one of my favorite things to talk about is what would Taylor Swift do? And if you're open to it, I mean, I know we got to, we got to be pro on the clock here. We got a couple minutes. I just wanted to hit you with a couple fun rapid fire questions, if you're game for it, and then we can let the people know what, what you're up to, where they can find you and where they can get their hands on a copy of this. I think this is your best work to date, and I loved herding tigers. I loved accidental creative so much. Brave habit is something that I've just gone through like four or five times. So awesome, awesome. So before we get to that, though, I'm going to put you out into a, into a rapid fire thing. Many people don't know you're. You're a musician too. You alluded to it Stones or Beatles, beatles, okay, excellent, any favorite song?

Speaker 2:

I mean, I said, it's not, that's not even a difficult question. No, not you, I mean stones are great, stones are great, but the Beatles I mean in my mind, like if you look at the progression of the Beatles between the early 60s and the late 60s and what they did and how they evolved and musically like what they were producing at the end of their time together, I mean it's I don't know that we'll ever see anything like that again.

Speaker 1:

No, I had very. Yeah, well said, all right, first record. Do you remember buying your first record?

Speaker 2:

Oh my gosh, I owned a bunch of records back when I was a kid like literally records. I think probably the first band I was obsessed with when I was a kid kid was kiss actually All the records, and I owned like every solo. You know, I had the Gene Simmons record, the Paul Stanley record, the Peter Chris record, the Israeli record, like I had them all.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, as a kid, I'm old by the way. You're like the kiss version of a Swifty. Really, you've got everything.

Speaker 2:

Right, right Right.

Speaker 1:

I mean, what a brand One time we could spend another episode on that. What a brand.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. And also, by the way, I look back now and I'm like what was I thinking? But I was, yeah, great, it's fine, they're good, good band. I'm not saying that they're a good rock and roll band. It's like funny how obsessed I was with them.

Speaker 1:

But that's where we're at right. That's why it's so important to make sure that we're coming at it with courageous leadership, I think, because we have an opportunity, as creatives, to change the world, I believe. So that's right. Last one, rap of Fire, first song you ever played on guitar I'm assuming it was guitar. Yeah, you said you mentioned it in the book.

Speaker 2:

First song I ever played on guitar? That's a great question, because piano was my first instrument. Actually, before I picked up guitar. I could tell you piano, yeah, piano, for sure I actually. I learned to play by ear and we when we were. I was at school one day and my aunt across the street had a piano and I came home and I went over to her house and I just started playing the song on the piano. I never had lessons, never anything. I just sat down and started playing it and everybody was like what in the world is going on? And so that was my first instrument. And then I grew up, like in high school I became obsessed with like Boogie Woogie and like 50s Rock and Roll and Jerry Lee Lewis and all that. So I was like learning how to like, do the you know the left hand Boogie stuff and then my right hand and sort of became obsessed with Jerry Lee. So I'd say probably like Jerry Lee Lewis was like my first musical obsession. When I was in high school I saw the movie not a great movie, but Great Balls of Fire, starting Dennis Quaid, back in the late 80s, early 90s, and I saw him like light the piano on fire and he was like stomping on the piano and I'm like, oh my gosh, like this is unbelievable. You know, like I always thought 50s music is like, oh, you know, this like D-Wop stuff or whatever. And then I saw that and I'm like man, these guys were like radicals back then yeah. Yeah, and so I became obsessed. So that was my first like musical obsession.

Speaker 1:

I think my goodness, okay, where can people find you? And then we'll close off with the signature question what are you up to? Where can people find you? And, yeah, how can they get their hands on the brave habit?

Speaker 2:

So Todd Henrycom is my website the Brave Habits available wherever you buy books and, if you like podcasts, listen to Daily Creative. It's my new show. It's about 20, 25 minutes every week where we walk through some core element of what it means to be a creative professional People having to go to work and solve problems and make it up every day and this week is about moments when we get frozen. Last week we talked about how to find motivation when you don't love the work you do all the time, and we have actually. Thad Cockrell is going to be coming on here in a couple of weeks to talk about his journey and how he went from like almost quitting to ending up on the Tonight Show to like releasing a record then he's charging $99 for, so it's going to be a fun story.

Speaker 1:

That'll be.

Speaker 2:

That'll be the in two episodes. That'll be the last week of January.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I love that. I've been a long time listener, ever since I got into your stuff. That was how I educate myself and love the new direction, love everything about it. If you had one. I know you dropped so many gold nuggets here, but if you had one thing to help inspire a listener out there, a musician or any type of creative, to to find and unleash that inner rock star, what would that advice be?

Speaker 2:

In your life there are going to be a series of moments. Life comes down to moments, and your life is going to be defined by how you respond in those moments, and your moment of deepest regret later in life is going to be whether you rose to or succumb to those moments. And so my challenge for everybody listening is you know, in those moments this week because they will come this week are you going to train yourself to rise to the moment and be brave, or you can just come to comfort and cowardice, because most people don't regret moments when they rose to the moment and failed. They regret moments when they shrank from action and chose comfort. So choose to live a life where you rise to the moment and be brave, and then you can die empty of regret but full of satisfaction for a life well lived.

Speaker 1:

Oh man, Thank you so much for your time. You're spacey energy Todd. Thank you.

Todd HenryProfile Photo

Todd Henry

Author

Positioning himself as an “arms dealer for the creative revolution”, Todd Henry teaches leaders and organizations how to establish practices that lead to everyday brilliance. He is the author of six books (The Accidental Creative, Die Empty, Louder Than Words, Herding Tigers, The Motivation Code, Daily Creative) which have been translated into more than a dozen languages, and he speaks and consults across dozens of industries on creativity, leadership, and passion for work.

With more than fifteen million downloads, his podcast The Accidental Creative offers weekly tips for how to stay prolific, brilliant, and healthy.

Todd’s book Die Empty was named by Amazon.com as one of the best books of 2013.

His latest book, Daily Creative, offers daily sparks of inspiration and practical advice for creative pros.