Meet Lara Hoffman

We recently connected with Lara Hoffman and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Lara, really happy you were able to join us today and we’re looking forward to sharing your story and insights with our readers. Let’s start with the heart of it all – purpose. How did you find your purpose?

I’m very drawn to this question, but have rewritten my answer several times because I have always found this difficult to talk about. As someone who has struggled with the concept of life even having purpose, I think maybe the best way for me to address this question is to talk about two philosophies that have helped me think about purpose.
Logotherapy, developed by Holocaust survivor and psychotherapist, Viktor Frankl, theorizes that humans can cope with the suffering of living as long as they have a sense of meaning and purpose and that each human must define meaning for themselves. When I was a teenager, my parents forced me to transfer to a prep school my sophomore year. The three years spent at prep school were probably the hardest of my entire life. Up until that point, I hadn’t experienced much adversity, and suddenly I was thrust into an environment where I felt devalued and resentful, only exacerbated by all the fun hormonal changes. At the time, I aligned with nihilism, thinking nothing had any purpose, as a defense mechanism against how much pain I was feeling. However, those years crystalized that artistic expression brings me meaning above all other things. I completely devoted myself to acting-performing in every Shakespeare and musical theatre production, singing-participating in multiples choirs and taking voice lessons. Also, by spending lunchtime in practice rooms instead of going to the cafeteria, I started playing piano and writing songs, and since then, songwriting has remained as my purpose.
Another concept that has resonated with me is the diamond vehicle (vajrayana), a Buddhist approach meaning to take the result as the path. I first discovered this philosophy in Pema Chodron’s “When Things Fall Apart.” The diamond vehicle emphasizes being present on your journey, not trying to escape reality, but to dive deeper and deeper in. This concept reminds me that the search for purpose is never-ending.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

In 2020, I started releasing music under the moniker, eggcorn. Though I had been writing and performing songs since high school, I hadn’t focused on producing them and used songwriting more as a therapeutic tool, which also led me to pursue music therapy. Creating eggcorn symbolized a deeper commitment to my career as an artist. In 2022, I released my debut album, Your Own True Love. Because this album used a lot of electronic elements and was mostly played and recorded alone (except for songs where my partner played bass), it was another challenge to then reverse engineer a live show with a band. My approach to forming the band was to explore a more organic sound and ask my friends to play with me- swapping synths and programmed beats for violin, viola and live drums. For the last couple years, we have been playing throughout the Bay Area and gradually recording full-band repertoire, which has been such a rewarding collaborative process in contrast to creating YOTL.
In October, I released a song suite, “Caterpillar/Butterfly” alongside my first music video! It was a blast to produce these two intimate piano and vocal songs with my friend and recording engineer who helped bring the metamorphosis concept to life.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

It sounds cheesy, but I think focusing on the love I have for my craft as opposed to whether or not I’m making something “good” has been a useful mindset. I know I have an innate calling to create and the only way to get better is through doing (and what does “better” even mean since art is highly subjective?!)
If you find yourself getting hung up on not liking the music you’re creating or feel like you’re in a rut, I have found that participating in a songwriting community (e.g. School of Song is an amazing online school that hosts workshops with different artists) or going on an artist retreat can be renewing and inspiring. What’s so cool is there’s always something new to learn in your craft! Try to focus on that love of learning and find supportive environments with people who are also passionate about what you’re passionate about.

Secondly, as someone who has had mental health struggles, I have found that going to therapy and working as a music therapist has also helped me a lot with increasing awareness, having compassion for myself and others, and building coping skills.

Thirdly, my affinity for spending large periods of time by myself is a skill that has impacted my trajectory a lot. At times my introversion is beneficial (e.g. I can work on one part of a song for hours) and other times it is limiting (e.g. I avoid reaching out to others). I’m not sure if I have much advice on how to improve this except to notice if you tend toward introversion or extroversion, and try to challenge yourself toward finding a balance that will help you achieve your goals.

Okay, so before we go, is there anyone you’d like to shoutout for the role they’ve played in helping you develop the essential skills or overcome challenges along the way?

The first person that comes to mind is my partner, Kyle Stringer, who also plays bass in my band and has been instrumental in my starting to record and release music as eggcorn. When we first hung out in 2018, he asked if I wanted to do some singing for his music project, House Plants. Then we fell in love and have continued to support each other musically since! Kyle and I are very different as musicians and humans, so we tend to help the other person in areas that the other has focused on less. For example, I tend to just want to write songs, but Kyle has inspired me to think about how I want instruments to sound, how I want the song to be sculpted. He introduced me to using guitar pedals and connected me with really talented mixing engineers. Throughout my life, I have struggled with reaching out to people I admire, because I think, why would this person have any interest in talking to me? Kyle is less bashful about this and has a lovely way of approaching people that feels very respectful; he constantly encourages me to put myself out there, send the email, shoot my shot… I joke that I may have never released anything if I hadn’t met Kyle and maybe I would have found my way there, but honestly it’s hard to imagine doing this without him.

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Image Credits

Robinson Kuntz
Lee Streitz

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