Tati, a reader like you, responded to a recent article with the question:

"What do you actually refer to when you say, doing something for someone with our art?"

Tati, a musician, goes on to talk about how being a musician is not worth it without a non-musical audience to support. How can we serve those individuals without cultivating ourselves first?

I believe this is a generous question that deserves an equally generous response.

To be an artist of any kind, you must know what is art for.  

For me, it's for the experience of welcoming an idea from someone else just as they hoped we'd receive it.  

That idea could be a product, a service, a musical experience, a job interview, a YouTube video, playing a game, baking, cooking, telling someone you love them, or an employee's coaching. It is literally any form of communication from one human to another.

Then, what can the musical artist do to connect with people when there are no audiences?

Understand what music is for.  

Right now, people are hurting, vulnerable, raw, tender, sad, lonely, and need to feel part of something bigger than themselves. Music is that healing balm for such times. Music is for healing and belonging.

So then, how can the musical artist creating healing and belonging with their music?

Find the people who need it!  

• Create music, post it online, and share it with friends.  

• Start a blog and share it out.

• Create a change within themselves - learn someone else's story and retell it through music.  

• Figure out what skills are involved in creating music (analytics, critical thinking, sales, marketing, creative thought) and leverage those skills in other jobs.  

• Connect with your friends, be present, listen, and share your gifts with them.

You don't have to change the world by painting a street.  

You can change the world by being a meaningful specific to a small group of people, even yourself.  

What about you non-musicians out there?

You may not have the tool of being a musician - but you have your own tools. The artist uses whatever tools at their disposal (brain included) to create beautiful work for others.    

That's what serving others means.