We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Charlie Archer a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Charlie, thank you so much for opening up with us about some important, but sometimes personal topics. One that really matters to us is overcoming Imposter Syndrome because we’ve seen how so many people are held back in life because of this and so we’d really appreciate hearing about how you overcame Imposter Syndrome.
I’m still working on this to this day. Oddly enough, I didn’t always second guess myself in the way that I have in recent years. When I first started making music, I had this naive confidence in myself and my work. As I met more incredible creatives over time, who knew so much more than I did and had so much more skill, the veil fell away and I saw my creative youth as a weakness. I had never formally studied songwriting by the time I started doing it professionally and I constantly found myself writing a song and playing it side-by-side with a popular song I liked and thinking “I can’t compete! That’s just too good!”
The change came when I grounded myself in my purpose as a writer. The imposter syndrome only functions as a means of comparison; “I’m not good enough because I’m not as good as everyone else.”
When you shift that mindset and refocus your energy as a creative on the ART and the PROCESS, that’s when everything changes. Because now, no one else gets to determine the benchmark for your success. No one else gets to decide if your work is good enough. The burden of responsibility falls on you. And when that power is taken back, you begin to give yourself permission to fall in love with your work again. And all of the decisions you make are in service of your own unique vision, not a communities expectations of that vision.
Like I said, I’m still working on that. But I’ve come a long way. And I do believe in myself in ways I haven’t in a long time now. It makes me really really excited for what’s to come because I know at the end of the day, I’ll be proud of it. And that will be enough!
Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?
I’m grateful for this question but struggle with the answer often. The current scope of society and the landscape of the internet so strongly rewards having a “story”. And I understand the value in that, it humanizes the person behind the art. But I have always been a big believer in the power of “show, don’t tell”.
I’ve lived a lot of life. I’ve been on a journey just like everyone else. I’ve loved, I’ve lost, I’ve learned, and I’ve changed. As artists, we’re expected to mine our experiences for source material and then bleed into a song to make something worthwhile. I do that because music is my means of navigating life and it is therapeutic to use my art as a tool of expression and self-reflection. But my story is my own. And I’ve tried to share that story in a very public way in the past and been met with such loving and open arms from the kind souls who took the time to listen- but it didn’t feel good to have to relive my story, which is admittedly a hard one, in front of a camera or in writing.
My story, in all of its glory and harsh detail, exists in my music (which can be found on socials and under my old artist name “Logan Smith”). I write about it every day and I don’t hold back in that medium. I’m very honest there because that is the safe place in which I choose to tell my truths.
If I were to sum up what you could expect from that, I would say you’ll hear a lot of vulnerability through the lens of indie folk pop music. I spent the last 7 years trying to identify and refine what my sound is and the lens through which I wanted to navigate that. I have finally landed on something that feels right to me; a world that feels like I feel. It excites me to have finally arrived at that place and to get to share that with people in the very near future as I’m currently working on my debut project.
Being “Charlie Archer” is a new chapter that has given me a lot of license to send caution to the wind and be present in my craft and expression. I do have so many stories to tell and I do hope that when I’m ready, you’ll take the time to hear them.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
I could think of three things that made a huge difference but the best advice I can give is this: don’t ever be the smartest person in the room and make sure you put yourself into a lot of rooms!
You can read all the book and watch all the tutorials you want. Nothing beats witnessing someone who is really good at their job actually do their job. Experience beats book smarts when it comes to art. Be a sponge and be kind and be fun to be around and don’t be the smartest person in the room!
What do you do when you feel overwhelmed? Any advice or strategies?
Touch grass! Be outside. Sit for an hour or two. Don’t listen to music or doom scroll, just be. Do this every day for a week and you’ll experience a clarity you never knew you were missing. We get so caught up in the fast paced life that we all know today. Sometimes we forget to sit and listen to the wind for a while.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: instagram.com/thecharliearcher
