Like most independent musicians, the thing I like least about trying to make a music career is hustling for bookings. Writing songs is great, playing them for people who want to listen to them is wonderful, but in order to do that I need to line up bookings. Despite my best intentions, I avoid this kind of work for stretches of time, because it can be discouraging. But rejection is a necessary part of the process. And most of those folks who seem to become overnight sensations spent years doing just what I’m doing and playing the kinds of shows I’m playing, before getting the kind of attention they’re now getting. When I started this process, I hoped to be “discovered.” Waited for the big break that would suddenly get me noticed. After I got radio airplay, or a big show, or a songwriting contest appearance, I thought that was all it would take. Suddenly people would know who I was, and would book me for gigs and show up to hear them. But there are a huge number of really fantastic singer-songwriters and even if I think I’m one of them (whether that’s true or not depends on the day), there is no such thing as overnight success and not many shortcuts to achieving it. The trick is to remember that it’s a long game. What I do in the short run needs to be sustainable – I have to like doing it enough that I’m willing to keep doing it for awhile. But it really does set the stage for what comes next, and in the last couple weeks I’ve been reminded that it works. In the next few months I have a set of especially great shows (some of them newly booked), and almost all of them have come about because of connections I’ve made over time. I’ve been offered shows with people to whom I’ve previously offered spots in shows I’ve booked. I’m playing on the radio or in a house concert from folks I’ve gotten to know over time. I’m sharing shows with people I’ve met at conferences and in other contexts; playing together allows us access to higher profile places and to pool our potential audiences. Today I’ve newly booked two shows (and there are a couple others in the works) that came to me out of the blue because of relationships I’ve built over time, not instrumentally, but just being part of the community of independent singer-songwriters. I’m newly able to remember (to mix sports metaphors) that it’s a marathon, not a sprint, and that keeping that in mind makes it all possible over the long run.