There’s a reason I use bassplayerdoc for my blog. Having been a regular in Microsoft and other technical forums and newsgroups since 1999, I used bass_player as my nickname. That’s because I was a bass player back then – playing for the church band every Sunday and getting invited to play in performances every once in a while. Had I not decided to focus on my career as an IT professional, I might have been either a session musician for recording artists or a performing artist myself. My family has a long history of being music lovers, most of which are simply indulged as hobbies and past time activities. I got bit by the music bug when I was 4 years old when my uncle gave me a Casio VL-1 for Christmas. He probably didn’t even know that I would love it. I’m glad he did. Playing the keyboard was my first love. However, growing up playing in various bands has it’s challenges. One of them is having to fill in for a member who went AWOL. That’s how I got into playing the bass guitar.

In 2005, my family moved from Manila, Philippines to Singapore because we felt God was calling us to go. That would mean leaving a lot of things behind, including the opportunity to play in a band. Being a bass player has it’s challenges as well. You need a very good drummer to get the groove spontaneously going (I like drum machines but nothing beats a real live human that you can wave your hand to if you need to change your beat.)  So, I went back to my original love – playing the keyboards. Before we moved here in Canada, I got myself a Korg X50 so I can still practice and enjoy music without the luxury of being able to play with a band. That left my two bass guitars laying in the basement waiting for an opportunity to be played again while my Korg X50 sat in the comforts of my home office, keeping my sanity intact when stress comes knocking in.

Most of us are stuck with doing things for the sake of doing them. When we were kids, we dream about what we wanted to become when we grow old. However, when reality starts to get the best of us, we end up settling for what’s available and totally forget our dreams and passions (like getting stuck with our day jobs because it pays the bills.) Leaders, however, know that passion is a key trait that they need to keep and maintain. Jonathan Byrnes, a Senior Lecturer at MIT and President of Jonathan Byrnes & Co., writes that “Leaders are people who leave their footprints in their areas of passion.” Customers, business partners, followers, fans and people around you will sense what you’re passionate about because they can see it in you. The late Steve Jobs understood the value of passion where he described one of his major mistakes at Apple when he came back in 1997: Letting a desire for profitability outweigh passion. Great leaders are passionate about what they do, inspire others and ignite the passion within them to do the same. We need to do the same to take our potential to the next level. The problem is finding out what we’re passionate about. Mary DeMuth, an author, speaker and book mentor, writes about how you can find your passion and re-orient your life around it.  I’d like to hear about what your passions are and how you live them out.

By the way, I got my hands dirty with Garage Band, my MacBook Pro and my Korg X50 this morning while doing my worship devotional. Ever since I got my hands on a music synthesizer, I’ve always dreamed about having a simple music workstation to play around with. While looking at my external hard drive, I noticed that the USB cable fits the port on my Korg X50. I took my MacBook, plugged in my Korg X50 and opened up Garage Band. An hour later, this is what I got.

I think this will become a weekly habit. I hope you’ll like it.