From Desire to Direction: Building a Drumming Life Beyond Gigs
In the previous video from this series, I talked about desire and how both my initial desire and my core desire were formed
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpfCPqINCiI
My initial desire took shape when I was around seven years old. My core desire was formulated much later, around the age of sixteen or seventeen, when my drumming career began to take form and direction.
For most of my life, I believed I wanted to be a wealthy drummer. But when I really examined that belief, I realised it was not true. What I actually wanted was to be more successful than I was at the time.
That distinction matters more than most people realise.
Wanting Without Direction
At first glance, wanting to be more successful sounds reasonable, even motivating. But in my case, it worked against me rather than for me. And I believe this is the case where any “want,” is concerned.
The problem was not the wanting itself. The problem was that it was vague. I had no clear definition of what “more successful” actually meant. There was no specific level, no concrete outcome, no precise target.
Because of that, my wanting had no real power behind it. It was an empty want.
More importantly, it was not backed by desire.
Desire is the engine. Wanting is only the surface effect. Without desire underneath it, wanting never becomes fulfilled.
If you do not know what you truly want, there can be no real desire behind it. Wants that get fulfilled are always effects of a specific desire.
Put more clearly, a want is just words tied to a specific outcome. A desire, is a feeling. Feelings direct the words, not the other way around. And of course feelings beget actions. This is why Desire is a feeling, Seeking is the desire in action, words or wants, or just possibilities. And without the feeling, or desire. They remain empty.
The Rolls Royce and the Ford Escort
Here is another way to explain it.
I wanted to be in a Rolls Royce while I was driving a Ford Escort. But my actual desire was to be driving the Ford Escort.
That mismatch, this incongruence, created friction. It created moments of discontent. And yet, at the same time, I was genuinely happy doing what I was doing. The Ford Escort represented my true desire, being fulfilled, even though I was talking about the Rolls Royce.
I did want to be more successful than I was, and that may have helped me maintain my position. But it never propelled me toward the greater success I claimed to want.
I almost said I was seeking it, but that would not have been true.
I was seeking more gigs in the same area I was already working in. That seeking was backed by desire. I desired to play reading gigs for top celebrities. Because of that, I sought more gigs in that area. wanting the bigger success was not backed by desire. It was an effect of achieving my desire.
When you think about it deeply, this coincides with the quote,
“success breeds success.”
This may sound complex, but it really is not.
Desire, Seeking, and Wanting
It breaks down very simply:
- I desired to work with certain personalities.
- I sought more work within that niche, to fulfil the desire.
- I wanted to be even more successful. As an effect of the fulfilled desire
But what I wanted had no emotional depth to get me to seek work in that new area. So, that final layer failed because it was not backed by desire. There was no burning desire behind it. Just a want. pretty much for the sake of it.
If you listen carefully to the early parts of this series, you will start to see this pattern in your own life. What you desire. What you want. And what you are actively seeking, all in relation to your core desire.
After my core desire had been formulated, I never sought greater heights. I never knocked on new doors that could have taken me further. So I never moved into that greater position I claimed to want. The door didn’t open because I never knocked on it.
In short, I never formed the desire to achieve more.
That was fine. I loved what I was doing. The only problem was that I added struggle through incongruence by aimlessly wanting improvements without reformulating my desire.
A Necessary Caution
This is not shared as regret, but as a cautionary tale.
Desires work in progressive steps. When you formulate them clearly and seek to fulfil them, they must be fulfilled. It cannot be any other way.
This same principle appears in the Bible: seek and you will find.
You cannot fail to find what you actively seek, because seeking is an effect of desire. And desire is always fulfilled in one form or another. Through seeking that which you desire.
If you are in what I would call your core desire period, anywhere from your late teens through your thirties or even into your forties, it is not too late to reset. You can reformulate a vague want into an engine of desire that takes you where you want to go. Or more accurately, toward what you want to experience.
A good place to start is by replicating that moment I was on my way to my gig every Saturday night, but was torn by watching the Saturday night tv stars.
So, ask yourself, what are you passionate about? What can’t you wait to do every day? What gets you fired up?
The Desire That Changed Everything
I have been talking about desire as background theory because it directly relates to my own next desire, one that has been forming for years, even before I fully understood it.
That desire came from three places:
- The greater, different kind of success I wanted.
- Reflecting on my own struggles, or more accurately, my confusion.
- A growing desire to help other drummers avoid going through the same thing.
In short, I wanted to make it easier for others to succeed.
I cannot go through it again myself. And so it felt natural to want to help other drummers achieve more while they still have time to do so.
This is why desire matters so much. It is no accident that the first chapter of Think and Grow Rich is titled “Desire”.
From Desire to Tools
To help other drummers avoid the confusion I experienced, I realised I would need to provide tools. Tools that drummers could use to support their own desires to succeed.
Desire is the first tool. But the tools I am introducing assume something specific:
… that you want to earn income from drumming beyond gigs, and that you are open to building something around your drumming.
Those tools need to be accessible, even to complete beginners, at least to some degree.
When Desire Delivers Exactly What You Asked For
From my core desire point of view, I was at the top. I reached the pinnacle of success as my desire defined it. And that is exactly what I experienced for most of my life as a drummer. And dare I say it, “I received exactly what I desired. What I wanted!”
I did want something more. I simply did not desire something more.
So I kept seeking more of what I already had.
Ironically, this makes desire an exact science. Much like the law of attraction talks about, but rarely delivers on. In my experience, desire always delivers exactly what is desired. No more and no less.
Maybe that’s why they say, “be careful what you wish for.” Why? well, because if you are a long way off you are I for some hard long work. And practice! But really, a desire isn’t something to be feared as that statement implies. A desire is something to be sought out and recognized, then acted upon.
Perhaps that “something more” I wanted is directly connected to what I am now revealing through this series.
Yes, I want success. But I don’t have a burning desire for it. What I do have a burning desire for is:
… succeeding by helping others to succeed where I may have failed.
Before moving forward, take a moment to reflect.
Is there an incongruence between your core desire and what you are currently wanting to be true for you? And are you seeking to fulfil your core desire?
If there is, and you are, you can either realign with your current desire or reformulate a bigger, better one.
What Comes Next
What I am about to reveal in this series is designed to give drummers a stronger footing and a clearer path than I ever had. There was nothing like this when I was coming up, and there is still nothing quite like it now.
This is where Beatilo comes in, as the engine behind the Drum Coach Partner Program.
If you want deeper insight into each section of this training, along with additional material that expands on the ideas discussed in the videos, you can opt in to the full training series below, and get notified when new parts come out.
👉 Join the full Beatilo Partner Training here:
This will give you access to additional information for each part of the series and help you decide whether this path is right for you. You’ll also get a chance to take part in the beta version coming soon.
