The Only Real Obstacle is Me (and my behaviors)

My biggest obstacle is not time. It’s not gear. It’s not money, and it’s not material. It’s me. It lives in a behavior I call tool-switching, a debilitating concoction of perfectionism mixed with a healthy dose of avoidance and fear. It encompasses all the good fears: fear of not being good enough, fear of judgment, fear of failure, and probably a few other fears I can’t even name.

The behavior usually starts with friction. Something gets hard, I blame the tool (maybe it’s the audio interface, maybe it’s the DAW, maybe it’s a plugin), so I research for a “better” tool. Sometimes, I buy the “better” tool, then fiddle with the “better” tool, and sometimes, I even make a little progress, but eventually another obstacle arises, and I repeat the behavior.

What frustrates me most is that I’m aware of this obstacle and know the warning signs, yet I still give in too often. What complicates the situation is that there is sometimes a legitimate tool problem or mismatch.

I’m currently working through this behavior. I’ve been stalled on a song release for three weeks. I’ve encountered some legitimate problems: the vocals are off-pitch, the bassline is too busy, the drum groove feels wrong, and, with my focus on recording, my guitar playing has suffered. Lead playing feels like a chore, and my rhythm timing could be better. For the most part, I’m ok with this list. These are all fixable problems, and at worst, I take a few weeks to work through them.

My bigger challenge lies at the core of my behavioral problem-I’m running into some legitimate issues with REAPER. Takes don’t behave the way I’m used to, routing is different from what I’m used to, and I’m running into issues using EZdrummer’s Bandmate inside of REAPER. These problems are frustrating me and stealing my time. I’m trying to work through them because I don’t want to switch tools just because I’m experiencing friction, but at the same time, I know the way I want to work is possible in another DAW. I’m only now realizing that my years of recording experience with 4-track cassette recorders, early DAWs, and digital multitrack recorders have produced an unconscious, inherited workflow. Right now, REAPER is violating that workflow, and I can either adapt my workflow to align with REAPER or find a tool that matches it. I’m leaning toward the latter.

And I’m struggling. Do I press on with REAPER, or do I find another DAW? The thought of testing another DAW used to entice me, but now I find it irritating and frankly, a waste of time. I have work to do, and I have enough mental baggage to deal with without the irritation of having to find another tool.