{"id":96,"date":"2026-05-14T06:06:32","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T06:06:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/?p=96"},"modified":"2026-10-21T18:20:48","modified_gmt":"2026-10-21T18:20:48","slug":"its-in-the-doing-sort-of","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/2026\/05\/14\/its-in-the-doing-sort-of\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s In The Doing…Sort Of"},"content":{"rendered":"
On ordering chaos, one clunky note at a time<\/h5>\n\n\n
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I’m learning the jazz standard “All Of Me” for the piano. Which is kinda hard with fingers built like Fred Flintstone\u2019s toes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The process is clunky and often maddening. Sometimes it\u2019s hard to tell if the splurky notes are my missing the keys or pounding the keyboard like a toddler.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And what I\u2019m learning about me in this grind is the kind of stuff I write about. Sort of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rather … intend … to write of these things. Does that count?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I wrestle with my credentials. I haven\u2019t built a seven-figure business. I labored fourteen years building a video production company. Building is a loose description. I succeeded and failed for fourteen years. I struggled and learned, wondered, and sometimes sat up in the dark quiet, questioning my life choices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are the high-credibility builders and shakers. People listen to the CEO, seven-figure builder because they\u2019ve done shit. The inter webs applaud because they\u2019ve done what they\u2019re talking about. So they\u2019re given credibility built upon experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While I\u2019m over here chronicling my struggle with playing a finger twisting EbMaj13b9 chord and not sounding like a cat falling on the piano.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I cringe to admit my accumulated college credits have earned me nothing. I have both expansive and expensive academic experience. And books. Lots of books.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And here I am, learning JAZZ PIANO. What the hell got into my head to take up playing jazz piano at 61 years old? And write about it? Or anything else?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m not running on confidence. It\u2019s audacity. An audacity driven by necessity. I need to tame the churning buckets of chaos in my head.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I am a thinker. Always have been. I think and ponder, question and wrestle with my thoughts. I research, and learn, and add to the noise of pouring tubs of lego blocks into the bathtub of my mind. Those suckers sting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My curiosity runs on eleventy seven. It\u2019s a niggling itch behind my eye that burns until I seek and find answers. If curiosity was an addiction, I\u2019d be a founding member of DCA: Dead Cats Anonymous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But does that qualify me to write? Sort of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve lived my life. And, to state the obvious, I\u2019m still living my life. Building something. I have a vision of…something. I\u2019m over here making decisions and choices with partial information. I\u2019m doing what needs doing without any promise or security that it will lead to anything other than a discordant noise in the wind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But I\u2019m doing…stuff. Scary, uncertain stuff. Because I need to. I need to deal with the noise in my head. I need to express the ideas. The cold, hard fears, like \u201cIs this another wasted semester of my life?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But sitting with my unexpressed thoughts is its own kind of chaos. And it doesn\u2019t resolve on its own. You could argue that this is just public journaling, therapy with an audience. Maybe. But the taming of the chaos is real. For me. And some of what scurries and trundles through my noggin is worth handing off. Sort of. That\u2019s for you to decide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why should anyone listen to me if I don\u2019t know what I\u2019m doing? I\u2019m certainly not a guru or an expert. Of course the experts teach us things we don\u2019t know. But it\u2019s more than that. We listen because their results are proof of concept. It\u2019s in their doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And we think, \u201cIf they can do it, then maybe I can do it.\u201d And if I can learn Jazz piano at 61, then you have a shot at that thing that\u2019s been waiting for you to breathe life into it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I write for the same reasons I sit at the piano every day. Because I\u2019m learning. In spite of my failures and shortcomings. I\u2019m applying myself, slowly, imperfectly. Because the doing is what matters. The hands on, \u2018I\u2019m going to beat the crap out of this problem until it capitulates or dies,\u2019 doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I know I don\u2019t look like I know what I\u2019m doing because I don\u2019t. To look at me is to see me twisting about, trying desperately to bring it under submission. I\u2019m likely sweating, grimacing, looking a bit spent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the doing scratches that itch. And adds to the story of me, one moment at a time. One bruise at a time. It orders my life and helps me make sense of it, little bits at a time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because at my age, I refuse to sit in silence and let the chaos win. I\u2019d rather embrace the suck and wrestle with it. So I can be the person who doesn\u2019t wait for permission to share what I know and think.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The doing is the only credential available to me. And the only one that was ever going to mean anything anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So let me ask you: What\u2019s that thing itching the back of your eye? Throwing a tantrum in your head, screaming \u201cC\u2019MON!\u201d What has been thrashing about, waiting for you to finish getting ready to get ready?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You\u2019re not ready. And that\u2019s okay. Neither is anyone else. Doing is what gives you clarity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s in the doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Make it happen. Serve it up. Maybe the table will go quiet as people savor the dish you worked and sweated over. The silence at the supper table enjoying good fixin\u2019s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The credential isn\u2019t in the title, the degree, or the revenue. It\u2019s in your audacity to show up and do what needs doing, especially when you don\u2019t know what you\u2019re doing. Especially then.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tadaa!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m learning the jazz standard “All Of Me” for the piano. Which is kinda hard with fingers built like Fred Flintstone\u2019s toes. The process is clunky and often maddening. Sometimes it\u2019s hard to tell if the splurky notes are my missing the keys or pounding the keyboard like a toddler. And what I\u2019m learning about […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":101,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"kia_subtitle":"On ordering chaos, one clunky note at a time","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[6,14,11,15,8],"class_list":["post-96","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-essays","tag-creativity","tag-jazz","tag-personal-essays","tag-philosophy","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":116,"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96\/revisions\/116"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danieldiagonally.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}