CL039: Blind guitarist Johnny Hiland on living a life without fear

Johnny Hiland is a legally blind Nashville based guitarist and guitar educator. His career started in 2002 and by 2004 he was signed with Steve Vai's Favored Nations label. He has been on stage for Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, Joe Bonamassa and Les Paul. As a guitar teacher Johnny has created guitar courses for Truefire, Hotlicks, Mel Bay and Jam Tracks Central. In this episode of The Creative Life Podcast, Johnny talks about moving to Nashville and how he started to play guitar on a J45 Gibson. He tells us about how his parents were very upset when he left college and also shares with us how Ricky Skaggs inspired him to play guitar. "I've never looked at anything as failures. I've always looked at those as learning experiences." "Be thankful for the blessings that you do have and not dwell on the past failures. We always need to look forward to the future." - Johnny Hiland Johnny Hiland Show Notes: If you don't pay, you don't play (4:48) 24 hour job (6:57) Nashville: Music City USA (8:25) Always saying yes to everything (11:04) Kimi: life partner, best friend and lover (12:50) Losing 14 family members (15:43) No fear (18:54) Starting over (20:15) Kimi and God (22:32) First country band gig (27:30) Vince Gil (28:57) Good managers (39:40) Favorite Tools: Pro Tools Facebook Favorite Book: Relentless by Danny Gatton and Joey DeFrancesco Join James's Facebook fans: https://www.facebook.com/jamestaylordotme LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/jameskirktaylor This is The Creative Life, James Taylor's weekly YouTube show. -------------------- ABOUT JAMES -------------------- As a creativity expert Taylor is a frequent guest speaker at universities and international conferences. He has given keynotes and talks at Apple, Subscription Site Summit in San Francisco, the British Music Show in the UK and at several universities across Europe including University of Dundee in Scotland and University of Macerata in Italy. He is often called upon by media outlets to give his views on trends in creativity and innovation. He has been quoted in the San Francisco Chronicle, Miami Herald, Columbus Dispatch, STV, Business Insider and San Jose Mercury News as well as featured on BBC TV and being the subject of a 30minute program on his life for BBC Radio Scotland. As a host on shows about creativity and innovation he has interviewed legendary investor Maynard Webb (Yahoo.com, eBay.com & Salesforce.com board member) and New York Times best-selling writers Chris Guillebeau ($100 Startup), Rolf Potts (Vagabonding), Brand Cooper (The Lean Entrepreneur) and Ryan Holiday (Trust Me I'm Lying). James is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of the Arts (FRSA). Meet James at http://www.JamesTaylor.me -------------------- ABOUT THE CREATIVE LIFE -------------------- The Creative Life is a weekly self-improvement show full of #motivation, #inspiration, and #creativity strategies with creativity speaker and author James Taylor. The Creative Life blog can be read at: http://www.jamestaylor.me -------------------- SUBSCRIBE -------------------- Never miss a video, and join the Youtube self-help community living the fully creative life: http://www.youtube.com/jamestaylorme