My Best Songwriting Tips (first thoughts as a beginner!)

When I first started wanting to write songs, I remember sitting on my couch and having NOTHING good I wanted to put on paper. It wasn’t that I didn’t have any ideas, but I felt like they were all dumb! Ugh. After sitting there for like half an hour not being able to think of anything, I finally decided to take a break. How could I constantly have 1 million things to say and yet when I actually needed to express that, I had nothing. After a bit more time writing though, something changed for me with songwriting- suddenly it became way easier to think of ideas and melodies that didn’t feel forced/awkward.

I am not a professional songwriter, but I am someone who has just started and got over some hurdles with writing. Now I’m finding I actually LOVE writing songs and plan to do that a lot more this year.

Starting at a blank page is the WORST!

If you want to start writing, I wanted to give you my tips as someone who was recently in your shoes and wondering how to get started!

1) Don’t worry if your ideas Don’t feel song worthy

I think this is THE BIGGEST tip I have discovered! The worst thing is a co-write (when multiple people are writing a song together) where no one wants to say their ideas!. If you take the vulnerability leap and are the first to say your stupid ideas, then it’s usually a lot easier for other people to go off that or at least have a starting point. You don’t have to say anything so poetic or deep, but sometimes just getting out how you feel about something in normal language can lead to other great ideas. It’s a lot easier to come back to a song once you have something down!

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2) Use your voice memos

There are a lot of ways of writing songs, but one of my favorites has been recording voice memos. I don’t know why, but I always have my best melody ideas in the car or walking my dog. I have hundreds of voice memos now of little song melodies (that sound absolutely terrible with the sound of traffic all around me lol). I have been liking storing these up because then when I go to sit down a write, I have something to go off of. I have also found the melodies I can actually remember without having to go back and listen are usually the winners!

3) Be open to change

This is my sister Molly! We just started songwriting together and it’s been the best!

Since my sister and I started writing, there are a lot of ideas I think are great and vice versa that one person really doesn’t like. Since we are sisters, we are probably WAY too real with each other which is actually really good because you don’t have to worry about hurting anyone’s feelings. I love my friend Laura’s practice with her friend, where each session they get one veto for an idea. That way you don’t end up disagreeing about everything. Bb being flexible with your ideas and figuring out how to work with the other person you can get a more creative song by doing things you aren’t used to ( but obviously still be honest if you have an idea you're really attached to!).

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4) Play them out

Us getting some practice playing out new songs out and about!

At a recent gig my sister and I had, we got to play all our freshly written songs! (You can also sign up for a writer’s night if you don’t have any gigs lined up.) It really helped us see which songs of ours felt most singable and naturally melodic. After the gig, we had a clear idea of which songs we would keep and which songs to retire.

5) Try different styles of writing

I used to think of guitar parts first, but I realized I actually do better when I start with the melody/lyrics first. Otherwise, my song doesn’t sound singable. You might be the opposite, but try a few different ways and see what you like! Sometimes the process is trial and error, but it’s worth changing things up to refresh your creativity!

If you want to get into songwriting, I hope this gives you some good tips for starting out! If you have any songs you’ve written you want to share, I would love if you dropped them below! Thanks so much for reading!

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How to Boost Your Creativity

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As a guitar player, I get asked to help people with songwriting a lot. I always try to be really prepared, coming with lots of melody, lick, and chord progression ideas, but when it comes to lyrics, I’ve always just told whoever I’m writing with that I am not a lyricist. Lyrics kind of freak me out to be honest! I love writing, being creative, and actually really like singing, but when it comes to putting it all together, something in me just nopes right out!

However, this year I think something in me is starting to change. I think it may be because of three huge lessons I learned last year from doing music and this blog. I’ve been learning a lot about what coming up with creative ideas takes, and all of a sudden I have become obsessed with coming up with new ideas and seeing what they turn into. I wanted to share with you a little about what I’ve learned, so you can stretch your creativity and become a better guitar player/ songwriter! Also, if you are an awesome lyricist I would love if you’d share what’s helped you in the comments section.

 Before I share these tips, here’s something to know about me (so you genuinely know there is nothing special about me that makes me have some creative power that you don’t have):

Last year, I jumped into music and blogging full-time from working in customer service at a healthcare compliance company (which TBH I did love all the people there and had an awesome team!). But the work was 0 percent creative. I vividly remember one of my co-worker’s musician friends coming in the office and saying “ Wow I could never do a job like this. I’m way too creative!” At the time I really wanted to do music, but financially couldn’t justify quitting, so my soul was just crushed thinking I was this bowl of oatmeal (or milquetoast you could say) non-artistic type of person. I felt that there was nothing about me that was qualified to be creative, or that had set me up to have acceptable artistic ideas!

 Ok that being said, here are a few things I learned this year that have REALLY helped my creativity and made me extremely excited to try writing lyrics and come up with new ideas.

1) Being happy and confident in who you are

Having a strong sense of self-acceptance is a huge help and lets my mind think of new ideas before I put pen to paper. I think something that actually helped with this was Instagram (weirdly enough). Last year, my page started growing and I started meeting a  lot of amazing people who also love music -- it was super encouraging to me. I have LOVED getting to meet different musicians and people who are in the music community and who are figuring things out with me. I have talked about this a little on here, but let me start by saying, normally, my page is super positive. I LOVE getting to interact with you all and for those of you who have told me my content has inspired you or resonated with you- thank you so much! But last year as my Instagram grew, there were a few rando accounts that would say some really hurtful things.

 Almost every video I did would have one comment that would say I used way too much reverb,  or one that said not enough reverb. I had a mom leave a long comment about how my playing was disgraceful, I had a thread of comments that talked about how ugly I was, I had a comment saying it was annoying how I looked at the camera sometimes… Like any choice I made, someone would seem to have a problem with it.  At first I was like WTF! These people don’t even know me. It can really hurt when anyone tears you down (even if it’s something silly like online!) or when people assume something about you without knowing who you are.

To continue to have so much love and excitement for the people I was connecting with, I had to develop a tougher shell and realize that occasional mean comments might be something I had to deal with. Once my fear of someone not liking my playing came true, it actually took a lot of the power out of it. The worry of what would happen if someone didn’t like you/ your work can sometimes be worse than having someone occasionally say something mean.  I can still get hurt by things, but it won’t stop me from being very truest version of myself, the person who I believe God made me to be. I think truly not caring what other people think about your ideas (or imagining the worst case scenario of opening up and and sharing your ideas) gives way to new creativity that’s coming from your uniqueness! It’s scary thinking about opening myself up, only to get rejected, but 1) Know you have valuable amazing things in your head to share 2) You might get rejected by someone, so look for the people who get you!

2) Turn off your inner judge

When I took a songwriting class in college, one of the major takeaways was not being too protective of your ideas and being ok with putting something that may be awful out there. Apparently, especially with lyric writing, this is so important. Basically, this means letting the ideas spill out of your mind and be ok with them being terrible. A good exercise for this is the 3 minute writing challenge. This is where you set a timer for 3 minutes and do not stop writing for that entire time. It’s a good way to free up your mind from judging your thoughts too fast and missing out on some great ideas. I think that’s why so many of us have all our best revelations when we are falling asleep or driving. You can get to the place where your mind wandering!

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3) Turn off your phone.

Recently, I have been trying to stop the habit of googling everything to replace thinking. How am I to be my own creative self with a ton of other people’s thoughts and logic in my head? Apparently, this has become a bit of an issue in co-writes according to some songwriters (like using Rhyme dictionary and Tumbler etc to think of ideas instead of coming up with them yourself) and I have definitely been guilty of using Google as a crutch when I can’t think of anything. It’s ok  to put things down and come back another time if nothing is coming to you, and I think it will actually stretch your brain and make getting to a place of creativity easier. Practicing songwriting and being creative is just as much something you need to put work into as learning a scale or lick on guitar.

I hope some of those ideas are helpful to you! The biggest thing to remember is no matter what your paying profession or past experience is, you have these amazing and creative ideas inside of you. If you put something stupid down or have a creative idea you hate later on, be proud because it means you are working on you are on your way to ideas you like better. I have always liked the quote by Ira Glass  about how having good taste is basically why we are disappointed with our creative work, but it’s so important to keep practicing until you come up with things you love!

As always thanks so much for reading and I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below!

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Getting Over Your Songwriting Dry Spell

Even starting this blog, I am wondering how qualified I am to talk about this since I struggle with creative confidence just as much as anyone. I think it's important though to be open about the things that scare us and hear other people's thoughts so we know we are all in the same boat. 

When I was at Belmont, I took a songwriting class with about 8 other people. In the class, we had to write a song each week and share it with the rest of the class so they could help critique it and give feedback to make you a better songwriter. Growing up, I wrote songs a lot with my family (we were the annual bluegrass band every year at our church's Christmas show), but every time I stepped in that class, I got really bad imposter syndrome! Looking back, there were a lot of good songwriters in that class, so I think I was a little intimidated. When I went to write my song to share each week, I felt like I couldn't think of anything good enough. I would sit there in my dorm for what seemed like forever with my empty notebook, and any words, phrases, or melodies that came to my mind never seemed good enough. Needless to say, I wasn't proud of the songs I wrote for that class, and they didn't hold any truth to my life because I was so scared about sharing anything more personal. 

I didn't begin to get rid of this fear until I got so fed up with myself that I decided I didn't care if my songs were terrible. At least I would be doing something I enjoyed and being true to myself! I'm not sure if any of you have ever been crippled by having to make a creative piece that you got a little too in your head about, but if that has happened to you, I would love to have you share your story here as well! 

So let's all focus now on channeling our inner School-of-Rock-Jack-Black and stick it to the man of creativity! Here are some of the mindsets I adopted in order to combat my creative lulls:

1) Remember what you have to bring to the table

Sometimes it can be most intimidating to try to be creative when you are surrounded by other artists who you consider SO creative. You end up shutting down every idea you think of you before it can have a chance to shine. Remember, God made you with your own unique brain and thoughts, so you can't compare your ideas/ life experiences to anyone else's. You got your own thang goin' on and someone out there is going to connect with your music/lyrics. 

2) Take time to "free write"

This means write for a set amount of time (either words/music/melodies) without judging ANYTHING before it comes out of your brain. This sounds easy, but not judging your thoughts when everything you come up with sounds dumb is hard! It's normal to look back at your free writing and think that it sometimes sounds more like a text you might send after you've have had too many margaritas than it does a song. But once you are able to take that and start refining your ideas, you can come up with some of your most creative phrases and melodies.

3) Research your fav artist's creative processes

I love this video Jon Bellion did of his song writing process. Everyone does things differently, so don't feel like if you aren't coming up with anything you love that there's no hope for you. There are like a million other ways to to try to figure out how you work best. 

4) Remember how many other people are in the same boat

When there is a lot being expected of you creativity-wise, it can feel very isolating or like all this pressure is on you and you alone to come up with something great. But the truth is SO many people struggle with this and sometimes it takes just doing something until you feel good about your work. George, the drummer and co-songwriter for the 1975, completely fell apart before making their newest record and could only get over it when they decided to stop caring what people thought of their work. Put other people's expectations aside and write for you. 

Getting out with friends and talking about your creative dry spell can be the most healing!

5) Make a creative workspace

I will be doing a blog on this later, but for me, I cannot think well in a cluttered space. I feel like my thoughts are caving on on me! I personally put things that inspire me or encourage me on the walls of my music room so I am surrounded by good vibes!

I hope these little tips help you! I would love to hear about your creative process and what helps you in dry spells, so please share below!