Dhruv

I worked in a corporate job for many years in the finance sector. Those years were valuable as they contributed to the person I believe I am today: practical, disciplined and organised. Also, that job was a real way to help me accumulate savings which have allowed me the financial flexibility to make passion-filled bold choices. I have always loved music deeply. I was entranced by songs and sounds from a very young age and spent my entire childhood surrounded by music. As a child and a young adult, I was always engaged in bands. I had taken Hindustani vocal and Tabla lessons, but was always drawn towards Western songs. My friends in school were convinced I would be a full-time musician. What is interesting is that I did not ever write an original song during my youth. I wanted to, but didn’t think it was a skill I possessed. Reflecting back, I do feel it’s partly because we didn’t have – and perhaps still don’t have enough of – Indian role models making top quality English music. It was also possibly because I didn’t have much to say at the time. Things only tend to happen at the right time.

I wanted to build a career- and keep doing my gigs on the side. Fast forward to 2013 when I was an MD in investment banking at an international firm, I finally – in a moment of pushing my own envelope – wrote my first song. I knew when I wrote that song that my life had changed forever. I had found a part of me I didn’t know existed. And I knew it was good. And it came out in one sitting, almost in the shape it was eventually recorded later in the UK. I gave up my banking career a few months later and have not looked back since.

Following your heart is not a slogan. It’s hard work filled with disappointments, challenges, reckonings of who you are, deliberations of who you aspire to be. It comprises of joy, humility and smiles of fulfilment knowing that you are so fortunate to be doing something you deeply love! Being a performing musical freelancer is a particularly challenging pursuit, where you literally and metaphorically need to be a one-man band. You need to be the performer, lyric writer, melody composer, guitar player, keyboard player, drummer, record producer, home studio enthusiast, video filmmaker, digital marketing expert, website creator, e-mail writer, gig booking agent, artist manager, social media wannabe, attractive-rounded personality and singer. All in one. It’s the kind of entrepreneurship where you are the business leader and also the heads of Finance, Sales, and all other major functions. But, in this case, you are also the only asset in the business. That’s what makes it slightly different and perhaps harder.

It doesn’t help when you have a sensitive personality – as those who write songs tend to be – and need to be able to withstand great levels of personal criticism about yourself and your artistic inadequacies.

The good news is that learning new skills is easier now than ever before. YouTube and Google are at our fingertips. Discipline and organisation are they key. It’s paramount to build a daily routine in the early years where you can just as easily slide into nothingness as the daily challenges seem to become insurmountable and the efforts required are huge. But the challenges can be overcome.
Ride on the passions that brought you to this spot. Channel that energy and do the hard work. In my case, firstly it was knowing what my key driver was. It was not fame, or even short-term financial or social media milestones. It was about making amazing music. Music that when I played back it made my own hair stand up, or make my heart sing. Or make my heart break all over again as I was reminded of something painful I dared to share.
The other required skills, is a long and foreboding list of enabling skills for my core skills. If one or a few of my enabling skills find themselves short, I might postpone “success” or even forgo it. But if that core skill ever loses its fire, then my entire pursuit becomes questionable.

So, I have relentlessly focused on nurturing my creative side by writing songs that are from the heart and move me. In fact, I’m in the midst of doing my new song right now. I think, as an entrepreneur and gig worker, it’s important to stay in love with your passion. The money will hopefully come. There are no guarantees of it coming, either way. But, if you can continue to have the love for what you’re doing, it gives you time to get the other variables of life in place. And these variables determine how you function in life. When your passion becomes your work, these variables come together and support you to live a Good Work and Good Life.