The Valley of Despair

Artists/creatives: the journey is challenging and scary yet incredibly rewarding.

If you're grinding, in the trenches, and becoming impatient, you may be in the Valley of Despair.

Here's how to deal with it:

Okay so…what is the Valley of Despair? It’s actually not as depressing as it sounds lol.

It’s basically when a person embarks on a new a behavior, action, change, journey, routine, etc and the difficulties of that reality set in.

The initial novelty of that “thing” starts to wear off and the true reality of what the journey is sets in, usually before the growth or outcome of that journey has been felt or reached.

A person whose perspective I appreciate shared the story of their own personal Valley of Despair with me - they recently got out of a 5 year relationship and initiated a radical transformation in their life.

They started waking up at 4am everyday to work out and start their day, quit alcohol, and removed all vices from their life.

The first few weeks of waking up at 4am were tough (no surprise because it’s early af lol) but the novelty and excitement of the new journey motivated and fueled him.

By week 3 or 4 though, something started to happen…the novelty of that “new phase” started to wear off. It was no longer this new, exciting shift in his schedule that he was executing - it was just something he was doing.

It became part of his routine, less exciting, more regular, and more mundane. The reality of the routine started to set in.

Waking up when it was still dark out. Being exhausted. Waking up disoriented sometimes because of how early it was.

Going to bed when it was still light out.

Declining social invitations.

Missing out on moments and experiences with friends.

He could’ve quit, however he made a promise to himself that he was going to do it for X amount of days and was adamant about keeping it.

He was in the phase of the journey where the initial excitement and novelty wore off, the reality of the everyday grind had set in, and he hadn’t been on the journey long enough to see real tangible results yet. He was in the Valley of Despair.

He also started to doubt whether it was even worth it and if he should just quit or change his approach. Long story short, he continued to wake up at 4am for the timeframe he had in mind and accomplish his goal with a ton of growth and progress on the other side.

The idea of the Valley of Despair really resonated with me and I think it’s something everyone in life experiences at one point or another but it’s especially present for those in creatives industries. For example…

1) Artists

Take releasing music for example. There’s the initial excitement around releasing music and freeing art into the world. It’s exciting to watch something an artist has created blossom and be shared with people. That said, as we know, great things take time.

It’s rare that the first song an artist ever releases takes off. Or second. Or third. It can take a while to build momentum and have a song connect and cut through.

It’s easy to get stuck in the Valley of Despair…an artist is releasing music and a song hasn’t really connected yet but they’re investing time, energy, money, and resources in creating something and haven’t gotten the desired results yet.

Most artists (sadly and unfortunately) quit before really giving it a full shot. Many artists stop after song #10 doesn’t connect but the truth is they don’t even have a big enough sample size yet to know what’s working and not working.

They might need to release 30 or 40 songs to truly know what directional changes might need to be made.

The same thing can happen with touring.

Artists go on their first tour and it’s an incredibly exciting moment when it starts - the excitement of living out a dream so many artists share (being on the road) for the first time fuels them with momentum for the first couple shows.

Those shows then pass and reality sets in…

Oh…this is what touring is really like. Long nights and early mornings. Traveling in a broken down van or bus. Penny pinching to be able to afford food, gas, hotels, and utilities.

Dealing with crappy production set ups in different venues. Things going wrong on the road. Doing laundry in music venues because there’s no other place to do it. 4 people in the crowd.

The benefits and compounding of touring can take time (sometimes years) so while they’re in the thick of it, especially in the early stages, it can be challenging.

2) Content creators

The same concept applies to content creators. The Valley of Despair is inevitable. They invest time and energy creating content and can’t wait to share it with the world. Many times it feels like there’s no better feeling than clicking that “publish” button.

They’re hype to publish their first video on Instagram, TikTok, or YouTube and as they start publishing, it’s easy to be fueled by the excitement of the new journey and sharing their work with the world.

Then…the first video only gets 10 views. The second gets 50. The third gets 100. The fourth barely cracks 500 views. What happened to going viral?! We were fed lies! All lies!

Welcome to the Valley of Despair.

Reality just set in and the grind is real - it takes a lot of hard work over time and a long time of being patient while in the trenches and staying consistent before seeing results.

Yes, it’s possible for someone to go “viral” and have the first “thing” they do take off - I’ve worked with artists who’s first song ever literally went platinum and exploded from the jump but that’s not common.

Here’s why mindset around this is so important - the Valley of Despair can be predicted and dealt with based on perspective. Who do you think is the most rattled by their first video, or first few videos tanking and not taking off?

The creator, creative, or entrepreneur who has a low threshold for the “reality” of all of this and quits after 10 videos, songs, pieces of content, etc don’t connect.

You know who’s a little less rattled by it?

The person who knows The Valley of Despair is coming and has committed to doing “the thing” consistently enough over a long period of time to give it a real shot. The person who plays the long game (long game can have different definitions).

For example, the artist who says - “I’m releasing 25 songs this year (or X songs over multiple years), I know the journey is tough, I know it’s going to take a while for a song to connect, and I’m not going to stop releasing even if the first few don’t connect. It’s the process.”

The content creator who says - “I’m giving this 12 months. Publishing 2x per week for 12 months = 96 times. Someone who’s committed to publishing 96 times is less likely (in my opinion) get rattled if the first 5-10 times don’t connect. No stress, there’s 91 more at bats.

And if let’s say worst case scenario all 96 don’t connect, they know they at least were consistent enough and have a big enough sample size to make adjustments and try to understand why it didn’t work. And then keep going. Key word = make adjustments and keep going.

So many people quit too early when they don’t even have a big enough sample size and weren’t consistent for long enough to know if it’s going to work yet. Most major successes come from asymmetrical events that are a result of consistency compounding over time.

The Valley of Despair can apply to creatives, a new job, a new hobby, practicing for a sport, etc. Literally anything in life. It was a really fascinating idea for me and one that if aware of when starting something new or uncomfortable, one can almost assume it’s going to happen so when it does, they’re prepared.

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