Girls Twiddling Knobs

Master Music Production with Visualization: Unlock Your Creative Confidence and Skills

• Girls Twiddling Knobs • Season 6 • Episode 98

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Feeling stuck in your music production journey? Struggling with self-doubt or tempted to buy more gear in the hopes it will transform your sound? This episode is for you.

In today’s episode of Girls Twiddling Knobs, we’re exploring how visualisation—a powerful mental tool used by top performers—can help you:
✨ Unlock your creative confidence.
🎛️ Overcome the pressure to rely on expensive gear or others.
🎶 Take your production skills to the next level.

What You’ll Learn:
✔️ The science behind visualization and how it impacts learning and performance.
✔️ Why self-belief is key for women navigating music tech spaces.
✔️ 3 easy visualization techniques to start using today.

Whether you’re just starting out or looking to level up, this episode will show you how to use the power of your mind to create with confidence and ease.

FREE Resource
Grab The Music Tech Meltdown SOS Guided Meditation for FREE! Head to girlstwiddlingknobs.com/sos and use the code 'FREESOS' at checkout!

💬 Question for You: Have you ever used visualisation to improve your music or creative process? Share your experience with us on Instagram @girlstwiddlingknobs

📌 Don’t forget to subscribe for more empowering episodes like this.

Sources mentioned in this episode: 

If you loved listening to this week's episode of the podcast, leave a review wherever you're listening now and let me know 💜💜💜

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Girls Twiddling Knobs is hosted by Isobel Anderson and produced by Isobel Anderson and Jade Bailey.

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00:01.70
Isobel Anderson
Welcome back to Girls Toodling Knobs, the podcast where we dive deep into the tools, techniques and mindset that will help empower you and women and gender diverse musicians to take control of their production journey. And my name is Isabel Anderson. I'm your host. And let me ask you this, have you ever felt overwhelmed by all of the tools and software and gear out there that will claim to make you a wonderful music producer?

00:30.23
Isobel Anderson
Maybe you found yourself asking things like, if I only had insert new piece of gear here, then would I feel like a real producer? Well, what if I told you the most powerful tool in your music making arsenal isn't something that you can buy? In fact, you have it already, dear listener. It is your mind. In this episode, we're exploring how visualization, a simple but powerful mental practice,

00:56.72
Isobel Anderson
can help you become a more confident and skilled music producer. And when I say visualisation you may think well sounds a little bit woo-woo and I get it and I'm not completely impartial and I'm not completely adverse to a little sprinkling of woo-woo from time to time but I promise you this is backed up by rigorous science. So we're going to dive into the roots of

01:24.13
Isobel Anderson
So we're going to dive in to the roots of visualization in neuroscience and performance psychology and find out how it's a really practical application that you can use in the studio and in your home studio. And we'll unpack the science and share actionable steps to get you started. And of course, we'll also address some of the unique challenges that women often face in music technology, like struggles with self-belief and the pressure to over rely on external tools and other people.

01:53.98
Isobel Anderson
So grab your headphones, get comfy and let's reimagine what's possible when you tap into the power of your inner producer. Okay, let's dive in.

02:05.36
Isobel Anderson
But actually before we dive in, I'm going to have some real talk with you. So when I do these solo episodes on the podcast, I love to script them out and research them really in depth and make sure that every single word I'm going to say I've considered and pored over. And I just haven't had the time to do it with this one. And the reason why I'm being real about this is because I knew that if I did spend all that time scripting out this whole 20 minute long episode,

02:32.62
Isobel Anderson
then I would be going outside of my boundaries that I have given myself and potentially bringing myself towards the brink of burnout because I was really feeling it the last couple of weeks I was really feeling it and it's kind of ironic because our last podcast episode was all about burnout and avoiding burnout in music and being mindful of the factors that contribute to burnout And as this episode was going out and we're having all these wonderful conversations, I was feeling like I was kind of approaching it myself. There's been loads of factors that have played into it. I found that this autumn in 2024 has been really, really busy.

03:12.57
Isobel Anderson
which I'm not complaining about. There's been wonderful things that have happened, and but it just means that me as a human, I've been spread a bit thin. And something that I think we didn't really talk about on the podcast about Burnout with Denise Devenish last time was about how there's so much labor in music and as a freelancer in general that is free and where you're having to put so much of your kind of hopes and your dreams and your passion into things that may or may not pay off. And so that very much is part of what led me to feeling so stretched. Over October and November, I did lots of applications. It was just the applications kind of ah opportunities kind of came in from different curve balls. And whilst they were very exciting, they all meant doing a lot of work up front for no money in order to throw my hat into the ring.

04:06.80
Isobel Anderson
And so I did it, you know, I'm i'm proud of myself. that I did it. I applied for a job. I applied for, I pitched for some radio stuff. I applied for a piece funding application.

04:19.68
Isobel Anderson
application that's new and I didn't get any of them. So i I'm, you know, like that's fine. I'm used to this. I'm long on the tooth. I understand it's nothing personal. But the reason I'm telling you this is not because that's in any way unusual, but because I wanted to be upfront that it meant that there was so many hours. I mean, we're talking probably about at least a week's worth of at least a week's worth of unpaid labour that then pushed so many things back, and I had to kind of put things on the back burner, things that are really fundamental to the nuts and bolts, the foundations of everything at Girls' Twiddling Knobs. And my full income comes from Girls' Twiddling Knobs. So that means that it has a massive impact on my time and my resources and my energy if I give that much of my time away.

05:09.46
Isobel Anderson
to kind of sowing seeds in other directions. So like I say, I'm not necessarily complaining, like it's part of the deal when you are in the creative industries and you're freelancing. Obviously, Girls, Children and Knobs operates as a business. I'm not just so you know giving services to different people or organizations. I'm giving a ah offers and products to multiple, multiple people in the world. So there's even a kind of added layer of complexity to what I do.

05:37.89
Isobel Anderson
So it means that when I am engaging with stuff that I don't normally engage with and for no money as well, has a knock on effect. And so the last couple of weeks, I was kind of thinking about how I'm going to be recording this solo episode. And these solo episodes take a lot of time. They take way more time than me doing an interview. And even though they may be sometimes a third of the actual audio time, they can take three, four times amount of time researching scripting and all of the stuff that comes into actually putting together a coherent episode for you, dear listener. So I was looking at this episode and I was like, I really want to do it. I think it's a really cool topic. you know how How can visualization improve your music production process and your skills?

06:23.87
Isobel Anderson
And then I thought, well, look, I'm going to walk the walk. You know, we I've talked about burnout quite a lot in different ways. I myself am a kind of burnout recover. I think I will always be in burnout recovery. I don't think that's ever going to stop. I think I'm always going to have to be mindful of it. I'm always going to feel that pull to kind of overwork. And so I felt that pull. I was like, right, well, I guess I'll just have to work over the weekends or work in my evenings. And that's what I have done for a lot of my career.

06:52.11
Isobel Anderson
But I don't want to do it again. And I do not want to get burnt out again. And I do not want to feel the cynicism and the exhaustion and the pain and the depression and all the things that come with it. So I was like, I'm committed to not burning out again. If if if there's any any way that I can prevent that, because I know, so you know, life throws things at us, but any if it's at all in my power, I'm committed to not burning out again. So I was like, okay, how can I do this episode a bit differently? well I'm going to use chat GPT. So I have written this episode of chat GPT and I do not care. It was wonderful. I'm going to not script out every single word and I'm going to allow myself to be a little bit more, you know, maybe like what I'm doing right now. What's, what's this called? A little bit more fla flappy or

07:39.99
Isobel Anderson
you know words aren't going to come ah really really easily all the time that's okay you can you can stick with me maybe as a listener this is going to be even better maybe this is going to be something that you really enjoy listening to i don't know but i'm going to just record this episode in a way that is less perfect in a way that is less put together but still has bags full of value and that you can take with you to, you know, do wonderful things for your music. So that's just a little kind of pre-ramble before we get into the juice of today's episode to just kind of acknowledge, like, even though that Burnout episode was going out a couple of weeks ago and over the last couple of weeks, I was feeling close to Burnout. I was feeling really stretched, but I wanted to model on this podcast

08:29.93
Isobel Anderson
feeling it, acknowledging it and not just then surrendering to it. So this podcast is a little bit more rough and ready. It's not going to be as, you know, scripted. It means that I'm going to be able to get on with other things and manage all the things that have kind of got bottled up in like a bottleneck of all the tasks that I couldn't get around to all the normal things I do.

08:54.38
Isobel Anderson
um because I want to make sure that I can do things like offer home recording academy in early 2025. I want to be able to serve my members in Rise and Release by providing really excellent content for them in this month, December and January. I want to make sure that I write you great emails, I want to make sure that I actually post things on social media to keep connected with you and so the podcast is just one part of all the stuff that I do and that is not even mentioning um the other little bits and bobs that I do around that like just having offered some fantastic Black Friday discounts on our courses and workshops and support of just all that stuff takes time and so i'm I'm just trying to model showing up and doing things just good enough so that you don't then kind of deplete your energy and burn out and overwork because at the end of the day all we ever have

09:45.04
Isobel Anderson
is this skin and bones and this mushy grey matter in between our heads and you know it's more important that I keep this feeling good.

09:57.59
Isobel Anderson
So that's where this episode is coming from today. But without further ado, I think I've made my point. I hope that was um valuable. I hope that you feel seen and validated and that it was nice to hear me talk from a really real place about my own experiences right now of feeling spread thin, burnt out, the the compulsive kind of pull to overwork and me very much resisting it. So I hope that's been useful to kind of hear that articulated. But let's get into today's episode. So I want to just start off by defining visualization, because like I said at the top of the episode, it can feel a little bit woo woo. And I think that

10:40.09
Isobel Anderson
Different people use it in different ways and I really respect that so visualization is not just a technique that is used in scientific research or in sports performance science or anything like that. It's used in those areas but it's also used in a very spiritual context, it can be used in a very, even a secular context, but that has a kind of spiritual undertone. It can be used in religious contexts. There's lots of spaces and contexts and people who use visualization in different ways. So I think, and I respect, like I say, I respect the fact that it's used in all those different areas. We are going to lean heavier on this scientific research today because I think it's helpful

11:22.41
Isobel Anderson
to see where there's evidence of it having an impact. Because I think that, obviously, if I'm going to share some ideas with you, you want to know that what I'm sharing is actually backed up by other people's experiences and you know wider kind of numbers and stats. so We are going to look at some examples and I'm going to offer some links in the show notes that are goingnna you can dive into if you're interested in getting into that. I'm not going to go really deep into the research. like just I'll offer you some stuff where you can if you want to in the in the show notes. But I just want to kind of start off by saying i I don't think for me there isn't a hierarchy of where visualization is used, but in this episode we will be leaning more on that kind of scientific definition. And so

12:10.54
Isobel Anderson
the The way that visualization is used today in that more kind of scientific area is probably the last 10, 20, 30 years even, but particularly the last 10, 20 years is sports performance science.

12:26.52
Isobel Anderson
What happens when you rehearse doing a really good race, like it feeling really easy, really smooth, your body feeling strong, and then you winning the race? And if you do that enough times, again and again and again, every single day, does that mean that you're more likely to perform better in your races as an athlete, for example?

12:47.55
Isobel Anderson
And they have found that you you are. um Visualization, and when you think about sports performance, then you can apply that to lots of other places where we might perform in front of people, in front of ourselves, even, you know, not all performances for an audience. Sometimes we are our own audience.

13:06.50
Isobel Anderson
um And so with music performance, people have used visualisation to help people with stage fright or even just to help people improve their performance skills just to get better, you know, not even just because they're struggling. um So I think that's really important to point out that visualisation is something that is used with a lot of evidence to improve people's performance in high pressured environments.

13:31.11
Isobel Anderson
um But it has roots in neuroscience. So there's been some great studies over the years um that show that the brain activ activates similar pathways during visualization and physical practice. So I think this is so interesting. There's studies that have shown if you practice piano, for example, and you do it, you actually move your fingers practicing piano, then you will develop those muscles and you will also develop connections in the brain.

13:59.82
Isobel Anderson
that you would expect of someone who's practicing piano every day. Then someone who does not actually play the piano, does not even move their hands, but imagines themselves playing the piano. They have found that the muscles get developed, not to exactly the same extent. I can't remember the percentage, it's something like to, you know, 40, 50%. The muscles are developed and the brain pathways are developed as well.

14:27.69
Isobel Anderson
which I think is so interesting and fascinating and exciting. It just goes to show that your brain is so powerful that it can even change you physically based on a thought, based on you visually rehearsing an action.

14:44.26
Isobel Anderson
and visually rehearsing even an emotion. So I think this is really hopeful for anyone who might be struggling with many things, including feeling confident and calm,

14:58.03
Isobel Anderson
and excited even by recording and production. So anyone that wants to improve their music production skills, which I know so many people listening to this podcast desperately do, because it's that gateway to being able to actually record your music, share your music, and build your career as an artist. So I think it's really exciting that there have been these studies that have shown this evidence of how visualization It doesn't just change how we feel that makes physical changes in our body and tangible changes in our outputs and our achievements as well. So it's really exciting. So that there's just kind of a study that I've linked to by Pascal Leon et al.

15:42.10
Isobel Anderson
so with with other people, on the mental practice and motor skills that I've just been talking about. um But there's also, like I said before, a lot of um research in performance psychology. So how athletes and athletic performers use visualisation to reduce anxiety, improve focus and build confidence. And so if you're interested in learning more about that, there's also a link to research by Moran, Aidan P,

16:09.17
Isobel Anderson
and others too. So knowing all of this, let's now think how do we apply that to music production, especially for those of us navigating the sometimes intimidating world of music technology.

16:24.41
Isobel Anderson
So visualization, I think, can really matter in music production. And visualization is potentially a really great learning tool. And again, there is some research I'm going to share that is going to back claim up or that question up. So when we think about how visualization might help us feel less anxious and more calm when we're in high pressure performance,

16:48.38
Isobel Anderson
situations. I think for a lot of women in music and gender but diverse musicians using music technology even on our own can feel like a high-pressure performance activity or situation and especially if we're in a recording studio in front of other people or a music production class in front of other people or we're just even collaborating with other people in our bedroom, for other people to be watching us using our gear and using our software, um it can be really, really, people can feel really panicked, you know, it can really feel like everyone's watching you waiting for you to slip up. So I think there's that in itself, that there's a way that all of us are performing music technology

17:30.14
Isobel Anderson
and so therefore it stands to reason that music that visualization could help us to feel more calm less anxious and just enjoy using technology either just for ourselves or with other people but as well as that visualization could help us to rehearse us doing even more complex or maybe not complex but different types of things like problem solving and learning and getting better. So everything I've described to you before has been visualising you performing

18:03.42
Isobel Anderson
a task in front of people. Maybe it's a race or maybe it's a live music performance or maybe it's even just switching on some gear in your studio by yourself or with people. But what about actually using visualisation to grow your skills and using visualisation to problem solve a music tech issue? That is also possible and that's a really exciting thing to harness. Again, that's my opinion.

18:31.08
Isobel Anderson
So, you know, could we use music, could we use visualization to break down complex tasks, like navigating our DAW, our digital audio workstation, or learning mixing techniques, or even rehearsing the steps of the the kind of vocal production process we might apply, or how we might set up our microphones to record a harp.

18:57.80
Isobel Anderson
Is there a way that we can use visualization to do that? And could we use visualization if we imagine that there's no sound coming out of our mic, even though we think that we've set it up exactly how we should do? Could we use visualization to imagine ourselves, problem solving that, and successfully finding a solution quickly?

19:18.20
Isobel Anderson
And now I'm not saying this is not the same as um manifesting. And again, ah no shade on manifesting, but this is not the same thing. So I'm not saying that just because you put yourself mentally through that process and you feel all the emotions of gratitude that you solve the problem, that it's going to happen. I'm not promising you that, but what I am interested in in this episode is can visualization strengthen our resilience, our confidence and our problem solving skills?

19:46.78
Isobel Anderson
so that we can access all the already abundant inner resources that all of us have. But for many, many women in gender diverse people, largely because of internalised patriarchy, we do not trust that they're there. We do not trust ourselves to be able to harness it. Now, it's a big generalisation. I don't want to annoy anyone that's like, hang on a minute, I feel great with music technology. Good for you. Great.

20:12.23
Isobel Anderson
But I'm talking to people right now who don't. And that maybe visualization is a way that we can start to strengthen that trust in our inner resources, our inner problem solving skills, specifically with music technology, because I think that's where big breakthroughs happen with this.

20:30.00
Isobel Anderson
So if you're interested in the research, there is some research I've linked to and that is about visualization in skill acquisition and learning specifically. So I would look at, um and in the in the show notes, go to the mental imagery and learning outcomes study by Driscoll, Copper and Moran.

20:48.04
Isobel Anderson
And I think that visualization could therefore feel really powerful because you're reimagining yourself as confident, as skilled, as calm, as collected, and as resourceful and abundant in wisdom and knowledge and all of that stuff. So visual visualization really can, I think, be a key to so to combating self-doubt and the barriers that many women in tech-driven music spaces feel.

21:17.87
Isobel Anderson
So I want to kind of stop here as well and and just take us out of music technology a little bit and give you a ah sense of my relationship to visualization um because it's not necessarily just with regards to music tech. I've used visualization for lots and lots of stuff over the last so five years especially. And I started using using visualization because of finding out about all these really fascinating studies about people using it to change things in their bodies. And there's one study that's really interesting about using a mirror for people with phantom limb pain, where they you use a mirror and you have, it's these, so I'm i'm botching this, doesn't matter, it's okay. So, I should say that one of the reasons I script my podcast episodes out is that sometimes I find it really hard to find words because of being dyslexic.

22:15.82
Isobel Anderson
so that's why I like to script them. But anyway, um in the study they have people with phantom limb pain where they have lost ah an arm or a hand even just and just a hand I mean also that's significant and they have pain in that that arm that's missing and that hand that's missing.

22:34.29
Isobel Anderson
and they use a mirror so they have a mirror directly in front of the participant which is facing, I don't know how to describe this in audio but basically it's kind of upright and they have their arm that's unaffected that's still there doesn't feel pain and they move their that arm and that hand and they look at that hand in the mirror and it means that it looks like in a way they're tricking their brain to see this other hand, but see it moving without pain. So I feel like I need to use a bit more description here. Let's say we've got, i've at the moment I've got my right hand and I've got my hand up.

23:18.97
Isobel Anderson
um symbolizing a mirror and I've got nothing on the other side. I'm imagining that I don't have a left hand and I'm moving my right hand and then I'm looking at the mirror and this fictional mirror is going to be showing me that reflection of my right hand but it will look like it's my left hand moving.

23:38.26
Isobel Anderson
And so this this study, and it's been very well published and publicized and now is used in pain management clinics and rehabilitation units for people who have phantom limb pain. um It has meant that people have been able to um reduce the pain that they feel in those missing limbs. And so that's what got me into visualization. I started kind of looking at studies like that because I was stuffing with chronic pain.

24:06.60
Isobel Anderson
And then I started to read more about things like the piano playing exit um study that I shared with you earlier. And I also began to learn about you know people and infusing certain emotions into their body and that changing the actual structure of the cells. And so I got very interested in in this in terms of just on ah on a kind of managing, integrating, dare I say, healing from chronic pain.

24:35.30
Isobel Anderson
And then that's built into finding out about people using it for lots of different things. And so I really use visualisation for most of the time. In fact, all the time that I was building girls twiddling knobs, because obviously that's been a very scary thing to do on my own.

24:49.70
Isobel Anderson
and many other things including releasing music and so it got me thinking about you know well what happens when you use it to do a very specific task like these are big things what about a very specific task and then obviously there's all this research on sports performance science and so it's to ter reason that well maybe we can use it to get to grow our confidence and our calmness around learning and problem solving and most of my work with women and gender diverse people in music tech is not really about teaching the music tech it's about teaching them how to feel calm and confident problem solving and learning and so I started to um offer this as a supplementary resource inside of home recording academy

25:35.77
Isobel Anderson
in this whole bank of holistic resources that you get when you join the programme called The Sanctuary. And so there's two meditations and one of them is about imagining positive musical features because for so many of us understandably we just see everything failing or do doom and gloom.

25:54.64
Isobel Anderson
And the other one was about how do you recover from a music tech setback? How do you regroup? How do you then draw on all those internal resources to figure out what's going on as quickly and as painlessly as possible? Because what I kept seeing time and time and time again with my students was they would face a music tech setback. The sound wasn't coming out with a mic, or they didn't know why something wasn't recording into a channel, or they were twiddling around with some knobs on a plug-in, but it wasn't doing anything. The list could go on. then And you know, spoiler alert, if you use music technology, if you use technology in any way, at some point it's gonna fail you, there's gonna be a setback, there's gonna be something, you don't know what's happening and it's not working. That is just part of the course, and everybody deals with that.

26:40.70
Isobel Anderson
Everybody experiences that, no matter how much it experience you have. Everyone will face those setbacks. The differences, the big difference is how you react to that setback. Do you make it all about you and your failings and your lack of understanding?

26:57.92
Isobel Anderson
Or do you see it as a natural part of the process of what you're doing, which is just figuring, we're all figuring everything out. So that got me interested interested and then I got interested in, well, is there a way that I could use visualization to help my students?

27:17.11
Isobel Anderson
to almost rewire that that impulse or at the very least offer them a space to to ah ah approach those music tech setbacks differently and so I made this meditation the music tech meltdown SOS guided meditation and it's really supposed to be used in a moment where something's not working And instead of going into that usual panic mode of, oh my God, it's happened again. I can't figure anything out. i This always happens to me. Technology hates me. I'm just you know not not built for this. And I'm now going to have to spend days figuring this out, or I'm going to have to get in lots of people to help me. And I'm going to feel really embarrassed. And I feel so disappointed in myself. I never should have even started to

27:59.32
Isobel Anderson
do music technology what was i thinking thinking i could record and produce my music it all starts happening and before you know it your problem-solving skills they are long gone. Because there's no space for it because what's taken over is all of this shame and anxiety and anger and frustration which is also understandable.

28:18.58
Isobel Anderson
But it is a symptom of internalized patriarchy, as well as your real life lived experiences. But it's it's ingesting those narratives again and again and again until we believe them. So i I was kind of really interested in, can I make something that can help my students to shift this, to interrupt this?

28:39.54
Isobel Anderson
um at least in the moment if not shift it internally over time so that's why I made this this meditation the music tech meltdown sos guided meditation and it's 10 minutes and it's me walking you through first calming your nervous system And then coming back to that music tech problem and imagining yourself, not trying to find the answer, imagining yourself figuring out the problem. we We don't need to know how or why right now. Figuring out the problem and it feeling easy and calm and you feeling so confident in your problem solving solving skills.

29:19.26
Isobel Anderson
and everything starting to work again and you getting back to creating and making and enjoying the process. So I made this and um this is now part of the sanctuary and but it was really informed by my own experiences of how powerful being able to actually visualize things going well and me being able to handle things in my life and build things and learn things and grow, that it really helped me to do all the things that I have done over the last few years. and So it's really informed this meditation that I've made. And so before I forget, I should say, if you are interested in that meditation, I am offering um everyone that's listening to this episode, that listens to the podcast, a free download of that meditation. So usually it's seven pounds if you buy it on its own.

30:10.64
Isobel Anderson
but if you go to girls twiddling knobs dot com forward slash night sorry girls twiddling knobs dot com forward slash sos that's girls twiddling knobs dot com forward slash sos and you use the the discount code sos free then you will get this meditation for free so just for people listening to the podcast you can get that meditation for free. It's 10 minutes. It's me guiding you. There's music as well. So if that's piqued your interest, then go and check that out. But I just wanted to share why I'm interested in this. It comes from a very personal place, but then how it's kind of it impacted so many parts of my life. And that then I've started to use this with my students as well. And I think this is also a really good example of where a non-traditional music tech

31:01.59
Isobel Anderson
educator, me, a non-traditional music tech space, Girls Trilling Knobs, is one of those places where, the you know, we we do things differently and we come at teaching women and gender diverse people music technology in really innovative and radically different ways and you will find in most traditional spaces. So who knew that you could have an audio guided meditation that might help you problem solve a tech issue. But there we go. That's how we do it here at Girls Twiddling Knobs. So

31:34.84
Isobel Anderson
Visualization, like I was saying, isn't just about imagining success. It's also about overcoming common pitfalls that might hold us back, like the belief that gear also equals greatness. So I think this is one of the big traps, is that people think, well, the reason I can't produce my music is that I don't have the right gear, or the music can't car produce, or the music has got a crap microphone, or whatever it might be. And i i I know I bang on about this a lot, and you're gonna be bored of me saying it, but it's not true.

32:03.64
Isobel Anderson
Gear is not the most important thing. Your ideas are way more important. Your composition, your your personality, all that stuff is more important than your gear. And what is also more important than your gear is growing and learning and having skills and understanding of how to use it.

32:22.42
Isobel Anderson
So there really is a trap of gear lost in music technology and music production. So there's a tendency, and I think that you see this actually most um commonly with men, I have to say, and it's a tendency to seek confidence through new gear um instead of, and i I don't think this is necessarily the case for men in a general sense, but instead of building skills, I think that for a lot of the men that I have known, and including students um in my back in the day when I was teaching in ah traditional university courses. There's a tendency to buy gear and even invest in skills at the expense of nurturing your emotional ah insight and awareness and creative concepts. But I think for women there can be a tendency to kind of idolise gear.

33:15.54
Isobel Anderson
at the expense of developing our skills. And what I mean by idolizing gear is I think a lot of women don't even necessarily buy the gear. We'll look at the gear and we'll think, oh, that must be, that must make it so much easier. Or that must mean that the sound is going to be so much more professional if I just had that really expensive 3000 pound mic. Or, you know, he's told me I need to use Pro Tools, but I've only got GarageBand. I guess I won't be able to record my music right now.

33:41.89
Isobel Anderson
instead of asking if i if I develop my skills which feels a bit uncomfortable and you know maybe I'm a bit scared of it but if I invested in developing those skills would that mean that I could produce really professional sounding recording recordings regardless of what gear I have and answers on the back of a postcard and spoiler alert yes it does

34:06.82
Isobel Anderson
Yes, having those skills instead of that gear, just the basic gear to get you started, of course, a mic, a DAW that's free, some kind of computer or device, and preferably some headphones as well. that The basic gear will get you started and that is what you need to make great music and great tracks that you can release.

34:29.72
Isobel Anderson
But in order to do that, you need those skills, those foundational skills. I don't mean you need to know everything about recording and production, but you do need some foundational skills. And I think a lot of women will presume that it's more about the gear and that it's almost not, not almost, it's not worth them investing in their skills because they don't have the gear. It's the wrong, wrong way around. And so I think the visualization could help us to take away that um importance of gear in our heads um and instead actually um embrace all the possibilities that developing skills have. So again I've linked to a study which is about um the psychology link between low self-esteem and excessive consumerism because that's what we're talking about here is that low self-esteem thinking I can't do this on my own I don't have the skills I don't have the knowledge I don't

35:20.61
Isobel Anderson
know what I'm doing oh I'll buy that microphone and then I'll sound really professional and then oh oh it didn't work oh I must be really bad with technology because I bought this really amazing mic and I still can't make it work now i I'm sure there'll be some people that are listening who really really resonate with that so really think about how is your low self-esteem maybe feeding that excessive consumerizing or consumerism or that idealization of music technology gear because I think that we can do some inner work that can show us that it's not all about external solutions. So with visualization maybe we use it to redirect our focus to skill mastery and creativity instead of material reliance and

36:06.74
Isobel Anderson
I think there's some really good practical examples of where we can use visualization to do that, which I'm going to share in a bit. um But just in case you're kind of thinking, oh, I know Isabelle says this all the time, but I don't think she really means it. I'm going to share a quote from Deadmau5, who's you know one of the most well-known and respected producers of the last... God, I don't know. I'm going to show my age now.

36:30.62
Isobel Anderson
30 years, 20, 30 years. um A prominent electronic music production producer, Dead Mouse, and who emphasises the importance of creativity over equipment. So you don't need the largest the latest gear to make a great track, you just need a great idea.

36:48.90
Isobel Anderson
I'm going to say it again. You don't need the latest gear to make a great track. You just need a great idea. So could we start using visualization, not only to feel more calm using music technology in front of other people, not only to acquire new skills, not only to problem solve, but also to kind of reteach our brain just how much we can do.

37:11.89
Isobel Anderson
with the equipment that we have to hand rather than feeling pressure or anxiety about not having all of the latest gear or all of the most expensive gear or all the gear that Bob down the road who does the sound at the pub on a Sunday says you need. So with that being said, how can we start to integrate visualisation into your music practice today?

37:36.02
Isobel Anderson
So there's a few techniques or a few ways you could approach this. um And so one technique could be spending five to 10 minutes just imagining yourself confidently using your recording software or mastering a specific production technique. But I'm going to just invite you to do a really simple visualization with me right now. We're going to keep it super simple. And I think for a lot of people, this may be where we need to start.

38:04.80
Isobel Anderson
However, I do think that the meditation that I mentioned, that I will share again later on. I think this could be a great way to make it a bit more kind of ah nourishing. But let's start just with my voice right now. So I want you to with just listen to my voice and in three, two, one, close your eyes and just focus on your breathing.

38:31.71
Isobel Anderson
so breathing in and out just let yourself breathe naturally if you want you can notice how your breath feels going through your nose in and out and you can also let your shoulders drop and your feet you can feel your feet both on the ground your bum on your chair Maybe even let yourself have a big sigh.

39:10.41
Isobel Anderson
And now I would like you to imagine that it is the morning and you have a morning to yourself to work on your music. I know how luxurious. And you come into your home recording space And maybe that's just a table in the corner of a room. That's a shared living space. Maybe that's a whole room to yourself at home. Maybe you're in the very fortunate position of having a beautiful garden office that you have your studio in. And maybe you just wouldn't imagine that you do. Fine, let's put that in the visualization.

39:53.71
Isobel Anderson
So you're in your absolutely beautiful, calming, gorgeous home recording space and you switch on the computer. And as it's loading up, you make yourself a coffee or a herbal tea or whatever it is you're going to have.

40:09.35
Isobel Anderson
and you brew yourself a a cuppa and you come to your computer and you load up your recording software and as soon as it opens up you feel a little little burst of excitement because you know this is your time to create this is your time to make your music and you just feel that little kind of oh oh can't wait to do this this is gonna be good because you know you're gonna have fun making music and you load up the session that you've been working on and everything is flowing really well, you've got a really great, ah your computer's not making any dodgy sounds, everything seems to be talking to each other and you know exactly where to go in your DAW, set up a new audio channel, you maybe get your guitar out or maybe it's a harp or maybe it's a synth

41:04.29
Isobel Anderson
or maybe it's your voice and you record something and you have a really nice strong signal and then you listen back to it and it sounds wonderful.

41:15.97
Isobel Anderson
And then when you're ready, you can open your eyes. And that is an example of visualization, which is really simple. But all we're doing in that example is just rehearsing that when you open up your software, it feels exciting and you know what to do in it.

41:35.45
Isobel Anderson
And believe me, if you do that every day, even for a little bit, and even if you did it twice a week, or even if you did it just at the beginning of your your recording sessions whenever you do them, it will make a difference. It won't mean you never have a tech issue. It won't mean you never have writer's block. It won't mean that you never know what you're doing.

41:54.60
Isobel Anderson
but it will mean that you feel less anxiety, you feel more calm and you feel like you have what you need and you already have what you need to record and produce your music and enjoy it.

42:11.05
Isobel Anderson
So that's an example of where you could just spend five minutes, either every day, if you feel like this is something you really, really want to turn around or um you know enhance in your production process, but you could also use it at the beginning of a as session to just enter that space with more clarity, calmness and confidence.

42:35.00
Isobel Anderson
You could also do what I'm going to call is a task-based visualization. So before sitting down to produce, you could visualize the steps you'll take to get to a desired outcome. So this could be really good if you're looking at a morning and you're like, I really want to finish recording this track by the end of the morning and I need to record guitar and I need to record vocals and I need to re-record.

42:56.12
Isobel Anderson
the piano, let's say, just plucking this out the air. And you mentally rehearse yourself doing all of those things. Visualization can really help you to get clear in your head what you're going to do so that then when you come to do it, it doesn't feel like you're flapping or like you're under pressure. And then another way that you could use visualization is problem solving visualization. So picture how you'll overcome challenges which is what i talked about in the meditation which i'll remind you of in a minute but overcoming challenges such as technical issues or even creative blocks where you're kind of i'm sure i'm not the only one that gets into a hole sometimes where i everything i do everything i record just sounds crap to me

43:38.17
Isobel Anderson
And I listened back and I'm like, Jesus Christ, it's awful, it's so bad. I can then have a ah sleep for a couple, you know, go away and sleep sleep on it for a couple of nights, not sleep for a couple of days, I wish. Sleep on it for a couple of nights, come back and realize, actually, it wasn't that bad. It was fine. And I was just getting in my own head.

43:59.25
Isobel Anderson
So we can definitely easily use use visualization to imagine ourselves creating in a way that feels good and I just walked you through that before where when you listen back to what you've recorded it sounds great and you love it and you're like wow oh my god that was so easy and it sounds so good. We can use visualization to help us get to that place.

44:20.15
Isobel Anderson
um And we can also use visualization as ah ah as a way to get to a long-term goal. It doesn't have to be something small. It could be to get us to the end of a recording project, to the end of recording a whole album. and We can just imagine ourselves at the end of that process feeling so proud, feeling so excited and feeling really calm and not stressed. And I think that's really, really powerful for so many of us.

44:46.25
Isobel Anderson
So if if any of that sounds interesting, then I really encourage you to think about how you might use visualization to best support your music production process and your music more widely. But if you want some help and you want it to feel, you know, easier, I've done the hard work for you in that I've made a whole meditation that's 10 minutes long. It's called the Music Tech Meltdown SOS.

45:10.35
Isobel Anderson
It's a guided meditation with my voice and music, and you can grab it at girlstoodlingknobs.com forward slash SOS, and just use the promotional code SOS free to get it for complete, for no money, completely free. It's usually seven pounds, but you can get it for nothing when you go to girlstoodlingknobs.com forward slash SOS using the promo code SOS free at checkout.

45:36.27
Isobel Anderson
So I just want to finish up by having some closing thoughts and just doing a little bit of a recap. So we've covered a lot of ground about how visualization can help you unlock your potential as a music producer, not by focusing on what you don't have, but by honing in on what's already within you. Because you actually have so many resources inside of you, not just in terms of your ideas for the music you're going to make, but the creative problem-solving skills that you have.

46:08.16
Isobel Anderson
You are capable of figuring out music tech issues even if you maybe don't think it right now. I promise you you are. There are very few times where you will genuinely have to rely on somebody else coming in to help you figure something out or googling for weeks on end.

46:24.73
Isobel Anderson
A lot of it is about confidence and about being able to bring your nervous system back to a grounded state and in order to access those innate natural problem solving skills that we all have inside of us. Just like we all have the ability to learn, we just need to be in a state where we feel safe to do so. So it's it's helping you to feel safe to problem solve.

46:48.85
Isobel Anderson
and because you've solved so many problems in your life. i I don't, you know, I don't even need to know your backstory as a dear listener. I know that you have solved so many complex, really difficult problems. You can do this with music tech too. And sometimes it's okay to ask for help. And sometimes we need to use a shortcut. Like I said, I use chat GPT to outline this episode today. It was great, but it's absolutely within your power.

47:16.00
Isobel Anderson
to figure these things out, to figure things out in general, you can trust yourself. And so I think it's important to start maybe practicing ways to build that trust if that's something you know deep down is lacking or is something that you would like to grow yourself.

47:33.13
Isobel Anderson
So it starts small with daily visualization. I think that's one of the most important things is that if you know this is a ah kind of deep set issue or challenge for you doing this daily, and even it could even be for one minute, honestly, but setting aside five to 10 minutes even better to mentally rehearse using your favorite tools or mastering a specific production technique, just picturing yourself succeeding and feeling that clarity and that calmness and that confidence of music tech.

48:01.31
Isobel Anderson
that I promise you over time will add up to a big shift in not just how well you're using it, not just how much you're learning, but how much you're enjoying it too. I think we also could do with reframing reframing our gear lust. So next time you feel tempted to buy new equipment, just ask yourself, have I fully explored the tools I already have? And using visualization to you know find that confidence or or access that creativity about what you could do with the tools you still have could be really helpful. And also I think using visualisation to face challenges head on. So we can use visualisation to prepare us for common hurdles. Like I said, it will it will always happen with technology, including music technology.

48:47.74
Isobel Anderson
You will face technical glitches and even creative blocks. So we can imagine ourselves carvling so calmly solving the problem and moving forward with these. And don't forget that we've taken the hard work out of it for you with the Music Tech Meltdown SOS Guided Meditation and you can grab it for free. Just head to girlstwiddlingknobs dot.com forward slash SOS and use the code SOS free at checkout.

49:12.87
Isobel Anderson
And then you will get it for free instead of £7. So remember, the most transformative work doesn't always happen in the studio. It happens within. I'm pointing at my head and my heart and my soul. my bet I think my soul's in my belly probably. It happens in here. It happens within us. Building your confidence and skill set is just empowering.

49:39.21
Isobel Anderson
Building your confidence and skill set isn't just empowering, it's the key to owning the creative process and your career as a woman or gender diverse person. And before you go, I would love to hear from you. So try the Music Tech Meltdown SOS meditation this week and let me know how it goes. Grab it at girlstwiddlingknobs.com forward slash SOS and use the code SOS free at checkout to get it for free and then reach out on Instagram. So go to at girlstwiddlingknobs.com on Instagram and let me know how you found it. How did you find the meditation? Has it helped you troubleshoot a tech problem you are struggling with? Is it just helping you feel more confident overall if you use it regularly, maybe even every day? Let me know at Girls Twiddling Knobs on Instagram or leave a comment wherever you're listening to this podcast. Let's keep this conversation going because your growth and your success starts with you, dear listener.

50:30.86
Isobel Anderson
So thank you so much for tuning in and don't forget to join me next week when I will be knitting with sound with the wonderful Felicity Ford aka Felix. But until then happy producing and remember you have got this.


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Isobel Anderson

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