Songwriting is painful

One of the great misconceptions of artistic creativity is that it should be an effortless, gentle and fun process.

In my experience, birth is accompanied by a fair bit of pain. 

Imagine the birth of a song like the beginning of labour.  You know the song is coming...you can sense its shape and energy and movement.  You know it already, and yet you don't.  You haven't seen what it looks like in the light of the world. 

In the final stages of labour (and at the beginning too, if memory serves) feelings of anxiety and even panic may come.  Can I do this?  Am I up to it?  How much more pain and time and stretching must occur before the birth takes place? 

I find that at both the early stages of a song's existence, and right at the end, I often feel deeply unsettled and jumpy.  Sometimes it's hard to eat or sleep. 

Not coincidentally, those are the same feelings that can arise when one is falling in love, working out a conflict, interviewing for a job, organizing a group project, or preparing to walk onstage. Something anticipated is coming, and it's exciting and scary, and it requires my full presence and commitment in order to come out okay.

For all the joy and excitement of bringing new life into the world, it's hard work.  It's often slow and painful and inevitably messy.  That's exactly as it should be.

If you feel uncomfortable when you're writing a song, it's a good sign.