A Look Back, A Leap Forward & 3 Words For 2013

Welcome to 2013.

Stark and formal, I know, but I’m sure you’ve been wished a “Happy New Year!” several hundred times by now and you already know I wish you well, so I thought we’d break with the norm. Another standard for this period of the calendar is the onslaught of industry predictions and ways to keep resolutions. To some extent, let’s break with that as well.

One year ago I laid out some goals for this site and sought to fuel them with my three guide words for 2012. Many life changes then took hold in the middle of the year, both personally and professionally, prompting another shift in how I view this channel.

While you won’t benefit from the minutiae of those changes, I hope that regular readers will find value in a brief reflection of what the site was, where it lies currently and, most importantly, where I plan to take it this year.

A Look Back

Image Credit: William Murphy

My three words last year were ‘Serve’, ‘Tackle’, and ‘Dispatch’. My aims were clear, my results mixed.

In pledging to better serve those of you who take time to peruse these pages – thank you! – I was able to refine the content to only that which added practical value to creators. Or, at the very least, a striking opinion… perhaps a unique insight here and there. I scrapped a lot  of draft posts after running them through this filter and feel that the site is all the better for it.

I did indeed tackle more challenges with a single-minded focus, though my need to load on a variety of tasks without dismissing the lower priority ones does remain. I need to better define the most important questions facing creators today and put lesser items on the back burner.

I largely failed to dispatch, if I’m honest. I still have too many projects sitting in the “potential” category, left to linger as they’re not priority one but nonetheless sucking away creative juices to no end product.  I need both a better system for passing judgement on my ideas and also a ruthless streak in consigning those that yield no progress to the scrap heap.

Above The Static certainly reached more people and generated more conversation in 2012. What was lacking was consistency in writing and a willingness to post short, sharper pieces. These are in my sights for the coming year.

3 Words for the New Year

My three words to guide action in 2013 are ‘Meet’,‘React’, and ‘Habitual’.

Meet is simply that I need to get offline and do more old-fashioned social, be it networking, collaborating, or simply listening to the stories of the creators I aim to serve.

React is to stop the death spiral that can occur with over analysis and/or procrastination. I’ll be more accepting of content that doesn’t neatly wrap up an idea or concept and act on the impulse of needing to get something done, rather than sucking on it until all the flavor is lost. I’ll deliver ideas here more consistently as a result, removing some of the filters while still guarding against any filler.

Habitual will apply to life across the board, as I focus on changing underlying motivations and not the resulting behavior. I don’t need to cease writing long, detailed articles, for example, but I do need to understand why I’m uncomfortable sitting down for under an hour and knocking out a shorter post. From there I can develop a habit that better motivates me to create the latter, or at least forces my hand to meet a time/word limit. By extension, this will again lead to me publishing more relevant, timely content.

A Leap Forward

Above The Static is here to provide creators with the resources and advice to reach more fans by developing their web presence. With greater variety and regularity of posts, I hope to deliver a lot more value, better serve artists and reach more of you myself.

This site is simply a channel to deliver the insights that I believe can facilitate this, with the resulting discussions and actions being what makes a real difference. I’ll lay the foundation with ideas, after which our conversations across the comments and social networks will serve to build the structures that attract others.

That stated, I submit to wish you a creative and contented New Year!