Inspiration, Motivation & Productivity

[AdnanBelushi]

Hey there,
I would like to share my personal life experience and I hope I inspire a few and make their confidence higher than mine. The topic I want to focus on is "hard-work"

I was born in an Iranian family in the United Arab Emirates in mid 1980's and I have 11 siblings from the same parents. My father retired when I was 16 and he decided to leave the family and live in Iran for rest of his life. I was 7th kid in the row so at that point we were 6 sibling still in school when my dad had no job. Emirates laws and regulations around citizenship are not the similar like many western countries. You do not become a citizen even if you have born there or have lived for a long time. This made it hard for my father to stay in the Emirates anymore and live on pension, we got no support from the government and my mum was just a house wife. I came from a very poor family, uneducated parents and 9 siblings shared one room every night of all my teenage life.

When my dad decided to leave, it was a new chapter in our life. We didn't have the financial support, my mother was not educated and never worked all her life but for her it was very important to keep the kids in the Emirates so they get education and at least learn a bit of English. For the last 4 years of my schooling...I lived in the Emirates illegally because my father couldn't sponsor the family anymore, my mother worked hard as a labor and did textile work and fed us all the way through. We never had internet or any access to the real world so we didn't know what was going on except watching MTV all the time and waiting for that Michael Jackson video to show up.

When I finished school, my mum found a way around sorting out our illegal visa issue and I soon had my 1st job 130Ks away from home. I hated it. It was hard work, I slept in a room with 3 other guys on bunk beds, I had to support my mother and little siblings and myself. I never went to University but that was life to me. In 2007 I got hooked up with an online DJ software and started playing music and 1 year later I decided that I want to be a DJ.

But there was a problem, I couldn't be a full time DJ because in the Emirates you can't live their without a job unless you are a citizen so I can't quit my job. I started learning how to DJ part time after work hours and in the weekends ignoring my friends and girl friend at that time. One year later, I got hired by a Kiwi and I changed job. We soon became very close friends, he understood my problems and my challenges and my dream of becoming a musician. By end of 2008, I wanted to live Emirates and migrate to a new country so I can work towards getting a new passport, find a new home, focus on music production full time and with a better passport I can travel and tour. That was my long term plan and I knew exactly what I wanted in life.

6 months later, I heard from a DJ competition that brought all the Middle East DJ to battle it out in 3 days. I have never played in a club, I sent my demo tape, I went to perform..I was amazed I made it to the semi-finals and every thought I was a pro..haha. Nobody believed that this was my 1st performance. Soon I had my 1st residency and not long til I land my residency with F1 Grand Prix. Yup I just made it sound so easy but it's not. It was all that hard-work I have putting since 2007, remember the late night after work sessions, the sacrificed weekends and ignoring my girlfriend? The crazy thing about the whole experience was the Kiwi guy, he was my no. 1 fan, he loved my music, my personality behind the DJ booth, he came to my first gig and we started building a great relationship because he respected me for my hard-work, looking after my parents since I was 18 and being very passionate in life.

Another chapter started in my life, the Kiwi guy inspired me to go to university and study management course so I develop my knowledge. I love studying, I came 3rd in my final high school exams in the region with 20,000 students. So I enrolled and finished a Post Graduate diploma in Management. I was like FML now I have to spare my music production time with studies that demanded 20 hrs a week but you know what, I did it. I worked hard for it.

Things start to take a serious turn....The Kiwi guys is leaving Emirates to go back to Emirates and offers me to come along...I am blown away, it was my dream 2 years ago...my mum is not happy for me to leave, brothers thing I am doing something stupid...leaving my friends and girl friend behind but here I am sitting in this park and telling to myself...mate this is your chance, take it. AND....I did. I left everything moved to New Zealand. Every body thought I was crazy.

New Zealand was hard to start with but very quite which means I had a lot of time to make music, I have been here for 2 years working because it takes 2 years to get residency. Guess what..I got it 2 weeks ago, now I am planning not to work anymore and do music full time, release good tracks and tour. A dream I had in 2007 is finally taking shape. Finally I have a track that impressed Laidback Luke...

Now you must be thinking why did I write all this? My point is, there are a lot of people who are born with a great passport and just have all the time to focus on music and get ahead but some like me work hard to get a passport and find a new home and still focus on Music. The things is....it doesn't matter what obstacles you have...if you have the inner desire and passion for it and you work hard you will crush them all and win.

I should use the above as my bio LOL...Thanks for reading

[Sebas]

nice story man. I guess the quote from steve jobs "So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future." is the most important sentence to summarise this story.

[Rasta Eddy]

Thanks for sharing AdnanBelushi!

[oohh]

Pretty serious story, but nice to see you're doing well now. Hope your family is living a better life too.

And since you're Iranian: Dastane khoobie bood! And khodafez.

Well, can we make a Farsi part of the forum now?

[MidnightChemist]

This is the best thread I have read in a long time.. I've had a bit of a mental block with the production and thought I would clear my head.. been meaning to join this forum for a long time and this is one of the first threads I've read. Thanks for the inspiration all! I hope this spurs some more creativity for everyone! Cheers from Canada

[Sebas]

[Sebas]

[IamChuck]

After watching this my life really has changed. Really good tips for your workflow from MR. Ill Gates. Now im for about 80% faster in my studio and ideas just flow by itself.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVQ8c19u ... e=youtu.be

[Mick]

After watching this my life really has changed. Really good tips for your workflow from MR. Ill Gates. Now im for about 80% faster in my studio and ideas just flow by itself.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVQ8c19u ... e=youtu.be

The part about having your phone with you interested me the most, I was watching the video whilst tweeting which didn't help, I get distracted to easily

[AdnanBelushi]

Hello everybody,
Hope you had a read of my previous post and I am glad to hear from a few replies that it has been very helpful. It's just those little things that you have and others don't help you stay motivate and never give up.

What's the most common advise you ever hear from a DJ/Producer in interviews or when asked in person? NEVER GIVE UP is the best advise you can ever get.

What does it mean? Well, it simply means if you are passionate about something so much, it will drive you to work hard to achieve it, that passion will deliver a journey I call "Baby Steps" and every step is an accomplishment. When you take your next step and you fail, don't give and look back at the previous steps you have taken and succeeded because no matter what, that's the best self motivator which will allow you to try a 100 times to achieve the next baby step and succeed.

Here is a personal example from my career - My latest single is getting support from Laidback Luke, MC Flipside, Christian Luke and more. It's called "Monsters Never Hide". Check it out on my SoundCloud page - http://soundcloud.com/adnanbelushi . From achieving this baby step, I have been asked by MC Flipside to remix one of his new tracks and I have got a remix request from Ministry of Sound. What is next? who knows!

Please keep in touch with me on Twitter. My user name is @Adnan_Belushi

I will leave you with a short clip and thanks again

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOlTdkYXuzE

[Mick]

Hello everybody,
Hope you had a read of my previous post and I am glad to hear from a few replies that it has been very helpful. It's just those little things that you have and others don't help you stay motivate and never give up.

What's the most common advise you ever hear from a DJ/Producer in interviews or when asked in person? NEVER GIVE UP is the best advise you can ever get.

What does it mean? Well, it simply means if you are passionate about something so much, it will drive you to work hard to achieve it, that passion will deliver a journey I call "Baby Steps" and every step is an accomplishment. When you take your next step and you fail, don't give and look back at the previous steps you have taken and succeeded because no matter what, that's the best self motivator which will allow you to try a 100 times to achieve the next baby step and succeed.

Here is a personal example from my career - My latest single is getting support from Laidback Luke, MC Flipside, Christian Luke and more. It's called "Monsters Never Hide". Check it out on my SoundCloud page - http://soundcloud.com/adnanbelushi . From achieving this baby step, I have been asked by MC Flipside to remix one of his new tracks and I have got a remix request from Ministry of Sound. What is next? who knows!

Please keep in touch with me on Twitter. My user name is @Adnan_Belushi

I will leave you with a short clip and thanks again

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOlTdkYXuzE

WOW, congrats! I remember seeing your tweet to luke a while ago about your post on here. Good to see your doing well