When I was in grad school, one of the ways that I manifested my fear of failure was through my perceived need to constantly ask permission.
Every project I did, I sought the approval of every one of the composition faculty. After the third or fourth time I did this, they said, in unison, “ Please stop asking that. Just write.”
I didn’t want to write something that would sink me. I had the safety net to experiment and make mistakes (and, oh, boy, did I make mistakes), but that didn’t stop me from feeling like I needed permission to write. Without the need for approval from my professors, I turned to collaborators. When my collaborators made the same boundary clear, I turned to myself.
In the midst of the pandemic, I treated consortium participation like permission to compose. (Gosh, that looks so much worse when I put it in writing.) Each time a member joined each one of those consortiums, the idea for a work to be created became more valid, more possible. I realized this towards the end of the period I did all those consortiums, when I started to become burned out, because ideas that I was not passionate about became more permissible than enjoyable. It’s a big part of the reason I stopped doing consortiums.
Whenever a commissioner reaches out and commissions something, that is clear, transactional permission to write. I thrive on that, because it means I have permission to compose. But when it gets complicated is when I’m forced to confront the thousands of tiny permissions I have to give myself while working. Or worse — when I’m working on something for me.
I have been demanding permission for so long that I don’t even know if I could write for me if I tried.
That’s a hard thing to come to terms with. How does one write without permission? That’s scary, but it’s also wildly liberating. It feels reckless, like making the decision to writing without permission from anyone is some kind of daredevil approach to composition. It feels distant and only barely possible for someone like me.
And it’s not. It’s just… not.
Whenever thoughts about whether or not I have permission to write what I want to write bubble up inside me, I have to remind myself that I do not need permission to make every tiny musical decision. I don’t need permission, but the work I have to do not is dismantle the fact that I want permission and I’m used to thinking about composition only when I have it.
It’s one thing to acknowledge the lack of need for it. It’s another to unpack the addiction to wanting it.
That’s right. I said it. I’m addicted to permission. It feels safe and cautious and wise and deliberate. I constantly want it. But the way my creative practice has become warped by permission is ineffective and unproductive. My relationship with permission is bad and too trusting. And while it scares me to think about it, I know that what I want is not what I need.
I don’t need permission to be the composer I am. I need to be the composer who would be possible without permission.
Without permission, I could be that composer. I could do anything.