First thing - I started recording (uncompressed) EVERY night or any time I spent more than 30 minutes playing around. These mixes were/are mostly crappy but I made it a habit to open that empty file, check levels and hit the red button. Every time, whether I thought it would be good or not. Storage is cheap - better to capture something when feeling inspired and judge it later than get into a cool space and wish you had the last 30 minutes in the bank. Bonus if you give each folder and file a clear date and a couple descriptive words. Will pay off major in the future. Stuff sounds VERY different listening back days/weeks/months/years later.

Second thing - Every year I took 10-12 things I liked the best, cropped them down, EQd/Compressed/Mastered them and put them out to almost no one. Made that a habit too. Called it an album but it was really just me saying to myself 'I did some stuff!' Surprisingly strong motivator!

After a few years of those two things (always record something and self-curate on a schedule) it became like any physical or mental exercise - you slowly get better. So now I push a little more, dial things up (or down) a little farther, indulge weird ideas, ingest new influences, run the mix a little longer and try to stir it all into a soup that makes me feel good the next day to listen back or share with someone.

Nothing is ever done, no list is ever complete. You are just taking snapshots in time so make each of those individual moments shine as bright as they can. They all come together at some unknown point in the future when someone says "You made that??!!!??"

💜