A recent survey response I received from one of you guys blew my mind… But it made me realize something interesting.

A few weeks ago I emailed out to you a survey asking you questions about what your struggles and goals are on the drums. Someone’s response read like this:

SURVEY QUESTION: If you could accomplish anything in your drumming in 2021, what would it be? (Your biggest drumming dream!)

RESPONSE: Play live

SURVEY QUESTION: What is your biggest fear that you worry about all the time as you’re learning drums?

RESPONSE: Playing live

Wait a second… you mean the biggest, most exciting, ultimate dream… is also the greatest fear? For a minute I thought this was crazy. Then I looked back at my own life.

In middle school my biggest dream was to play drums in a rock band. I got to high school and had the opportunity to literally play drums in a rock band… and I was terrified. Thankfully I faced my fears and did it....

I remember playing a church rehearsal when I was in college where I was struggling to remember what was coming next in the song. I had a chord chart next to me with some notes I’d scribbled, but they weren’t doing me much good. I felt clueless as to what to play at the end of each song section, because I wasn’t really sure what kind of fill should happen. Sometimes I wasn't actually 100% sure what was coming next, so that made it pretty tough to know whether to play a fill. Everything felt like a stressful mess, and I was honestly pretty lost. I was faking my way through the song, but I probably sounded anything but professional.

I remember that particular week when I was in school, and I was so busy that I literally was scrambling to listen to the songs for Sunday in the car on the way to the rehearsal. My phone wouldn’t plug into the radio of my 1997 Honda Accord, so I had it sitting in the cupholder blasting the songs loudly enough to hear while driving. I...