Five Things I Learned About Writing from a Bad Bunny Concert

How Bad Bunny reminded me what it means to show up as an artist

I will admit. I missed the live Bad Bunny Concert. An over-zealous purchasing of theater tickets a month ago lead me to NOT be in front of my tv set with every other Latino in the country.

I know. I dropped the ball.

But I caught the stream the next day on Amazon Prime. I dance and swayed and cried. Yes, I cried because as heavy as my heart has been the past couple of weeks, it felt so good to feel joy.

And to remember that our ancestors speak through drums.

As I saw the concert and took it all in, I realized I was seeing more than art, more than the beautiful display of Boricua pride. I saw lessons on how to be an artist. And not just any artist but the artist you (I) want to be.

I’ve been pondering about this very topic as of late. I recently was named as a member of the latest Artist Inc cohort.

Watching Benito do his thing unlocked something important — there’s everyone else’s idea on how to be an artist and then there is the idea that you execute. You can be the kind that makes money, or the kind that makes change. Sometimes you can be both.

Lesson 1: Go Where You Are Celebrated, Not Tolerated

Bad Bunny centers his community, culture and language. He doesn’t need to be in spaces that don’t celebrate it or even align. He’s said in interviews that he has no need to bring his tours into the United States for fear that immigration would be at his shows.

Instead, he did 30 shows in Puerto Rico. He added to the economic base of his island and empowered it. Some artisans made their yearly profit in one night. This is real power. Where one rises, others can too.

As a writer, the spaces, publications, and communities that embrace us, truly embrace us and our voices, are crucial. Too often we are so hungry for publication and to have our words out there that we don’t realize that what we are giving or lending is the very thing we should be protecting — our voice.

Not every paying gig is a good gig. Not every dollar is a good dollar.

Who we are and what we write is more important now than it has ever been.

Lesson 2: Be Your Authentic Self, Unapologetically

Bad Bunny has NEVER ONCE apologized for his decisions when it comes to his art or fashion.

He was his self and when you are in your authenticity, there is never a need to apologize. Ever.

Of course people can choose not to like what he does, but, frankly, those are not the people who would flock to his art anyway. Listen, not everything is for everybody. And that’s okay.

For writers, this equates to writing something that is important…to you. I have heard two trains of thought on this. Some say write for an audience to make money. Others say write the truth and readers will find you. At the end of the day, what can you live with? What is closest to your authentic self. You don’t have to explain or defend your decision. All you have to do is step forward in the truth and proceed.

Lesson 3: You Are Responsible For Your Story And The Love With Which You Tell It

This section should probably also be called “tell the story in any way you so desire”. That’s because the setlist, the stage, the dancers/dancing, the band, Marc Anthony, everything was intentional and it was done and executed with love. And each part was a section of a bigger story of displacement, gentrification and what it means to be Puerto Rican and holding on to a culture that seems to be under attack.

In addition to the live-streamed concert, the residency, the album, there was also a film that he directed dealing with the same themes.

This was a love story albeit not in the traditional sense. This is what people resonated with the most. And all that, every decision, came from the love of the art, the creation, of the island.

For writers, our craft can sometimes seem one note. We tell the stories or write the poems in the same way we always have. We adhere to form or structure and call it technique.

But what if we did something different. What if we told our stories from the center of love.

Love doesn’t always mean romantic or even that all things will be okay. Love means sometimes you allow the story to be tragic, to unfold unexpectedly. Love sometimes means that the poem is a micro essay, or an audio story. Love means that the true form of that short story is a hermit crab, told more in how it visually looks on the page.

Lesson 4: Make Your Own Residency

Look, Bad Bunny ain’t waiting for people. He’s not waiting for a maybe to become a yes or a no to magically change. He’s just going to do the thing. He’s going to figure it out and just do it.

He is in the ask for forgiveness rather than permission camp.

While we’ve already talked about the impact of the residency in Puerto Rico, the residency also proved something that needed proving — you can have a residency outside of Las Vegas and still have it make money. This pushed against the idea that if an artist wanted to have a month-long home for their concert or artistic expression they would have to be in Nevada.

As a writer I have waited for the thing — the publication, the payment, the recognition. While sometimes we just have to, we also have to realize that we have avenues that we can tap into.

This Substack is my avenue. I hope to one day publish my work through this Substack as part of my body of work. I can’t wait to write my first serial series for my paid subscribers, host online writing workshops, create writing classes.

Before Substack, I used my former blog, Writing To Insanity, to publish a week long serial story and had my friends act out key scenes. I took pictures and used them to illustrate the story. I did something similar for Valentine’s Day one year. I also used the blog to do a “blog tour” around the holidays and collaborated with other blogger writers. Each artist offered a new story or poem for the holiday season.

Whatever the ‘what,’ the ‘how’ was always clear— make your own way.

Now, I know I said four things but let me do a secret fifth. Courage.

Listen, it’s easy to sit in a living room and watch a concert in awe. It’s easy (kind of) to write a Substack about it. It’s something entirely different to have the courage to do any one of these things. I have found that I’ve have had to have so much courage lately. Being a creative lately has been difficult and I haven’t been up to writing much lately.

But each of us has to figure out what it means to show up for ourselves and our art. Sometimes showing up means starting three posts in vain. Sometimes it means staring at a blank screen or brainstorming ideas that you know are not going to make it out into the world. It’s getting an idea for a new poem and then being too tired to execute it. Yet, we still show up. We show up to our own stage, build our own residency, create our own lane, and define courage every single day.

So maybe a live-streamed concert is more than a concert, it’s a battle cry or, at the very least, an inspiration. And maybe that’s what Bad Bunny wanted for us all along. Inspiration.