Attitude of Gratitude - HOW-TO Develop a Growth Mindset
Whether you’re at the beginning of your musical journey or somewhere in the middle finding your way, you should know AND expect certain aspects of music to be easier than others. No matter where you are finding yourself in music these days, hopefully some of the thoughts in this post will help guide you and provide some insight into having a growth mindset.
The journey usually starts out with excitement and a thirst for wanting to always improve. For some fortunate individuals things just “click”. For the majority of us, things take a little longer to digest and understand. Whichever category you fall into just know that there will be bumps, detours and sometimes even roadblocks along the way.
And that’s OK!
This sh*t is hard!
If it was easy, everyone would give it a go (and succeed). There are about 8 billion people in the world, less than 1% of those people are musicians! Think about that, you are one of those people! And that is the first thing in this post to be grateful for everyday!
So we’ve established that you are a part of a very, very small group of people that is able to create this wonderful art we call music. From my experience teaching (and with myself), people tend to give up too soon when attempting to learn something new and unfamiliar. This is a critical point in musical growth. Mastering something that we have little or no prior knowledge of. It’s just like that first time you’re introduced to the Pythagorean Theorem, World War II or even what a verb is (I’m still not sure I know that last one, haha!).
How are 3 ways that we can keep some perspective about our musicianship and know if we are truly improving? I’m glad I asked :)
Keep a journal
Set goals!
Practice patience
Keeping a journal
Some of you might automatically think, oh a “practice journal” which is a great thing to have and I highly suggest starting one if you don’t already. A practice journal can help keep you organized and consistent with each session.
Why stop at writing down what tempo you got “Giant Steps” at or how far you got in that Joshua Redman solo transcription?
Here are some thoughts on what you can add to your practice journal that will not only help with your musical growth but also your ‘growth’ mindset.
Set your intention - before you even blow a note or play a string/key. Try writing down what your intention is for the practice session. What do you want to accomplish today? How do you feel? Are you focused or do you have too much on your mind?
This might determine what you want to do. I know I’ve had days that instead of wanting to focus for 30 minutes and fry my brain even more after a long day. I just wanted, scratch that, needed to just play tunes and let off some steam. Take a minute to think and write down your intention for the practice session.
Meditate - now I’m not asking for you to get into Sukhasana (sitting yoga pose) and spend 10-20 minutes focusing on your breath (although this is a great thing to do if you have the time). I’m simply asking for you to take a minute and think about your intention you just made for yourself. Visualize the practice session and focus on being present so you can take away as much as possible from it.
Set goals!
In all parts of life; personal, career, financial, and yes musical, it’s important to have goals. It’s even more important to write these goals down. If you were my 5 year old daughter you would ask, but why? (Yeah, she’s at that phase.)
Writing goals down helps keep you accountable for wanting you to complete them. Goals are one way of keeping us motivated. It’s like when you have a to-do list and you cross something off of it, doesn’t that feel good? It feels that way because you worked at it and accomplished it. I would also say, why not!?
Even if you are playing music for fun I’m sure there’s some drive or goal attached, it’s just human nature!
If you’re new to goal writing, here are a few tips…
Try to make SMART goals
S - Specific (what do you want to accomplish, I want to play altered dominant scales in all keys)
M - Measurable (how can you measure it, I want to play altered dominant scales in all keys at 120 bpm)
A - Achievable (are you able to attain this goal yet, I want to play altered dominant scales in all keys at 300 bpm, if you’re a beginner paying at 300 bpm might not be achievable…YET)
R - Relevant (how is this relevant to your playing, I want to play altered dominant scales in all keys at 120 bpm so I can freely use it in the tune “What is This Thing Called Love”)
T - Time-bound (when do you want to accomplish this goal (days/weeks/months), keep ‘A’ in mind. I want to play altered dominant scales in all keys at 120 bpm so I can freely use it in the tune “What is This Thing Called Love” in 3 weeks)
Once you have some written you might notice different timeframes, these are commonly known as long-term and short-term goals. If the long-term goals seem REALLY far off, try making ‘micro’ goals to get to that one BIG long-term goal. Think of it as rungs on a ladder, each rung gets you closer to the top. WARNING: Never stand on the very top of a ladder, unless it’s a metaphorical one. :)
Practice patience
Lastly, as I said before, “This sh*t is hard!” It is! Which is why it’s more important to not get too upset when things aren’t clicking. The brain is beyond fascinating, but one of the things that I find interesting is how certain things “stick” and other things just don’t no matter how much you practice. The brain is constantly working on things, when we are practicing, when we are not practicing, when we are sleeping, etc. So when you start learning a new concept make sure you are patient, you can even tell yourself, “self, this is brand new, give it some time to stick, allow my brain to fully understand what’s happening”. Now this full understanding should be happening in a few different ways, you might be thinking of individual notes, you might be analyzing as a chord or chord progression, most importantly though, you should be hearing it. Being able to hear new concepts is the best way to get them to “stick”. But again, this takes time, so be patient.
So make sure you are practicing SLOWLY!
Slow practice is the best way to hear what you’re playing and gives you (your brain) enough time to fully absorb what is happening. Here’s an example of how I might add something new to my practice routine in an attempt to eventually get into my improvisation.
Day 1 - Play SLOWLY through the new concept (no metronome) in ONLY 1 key. Really focusing on the sound that I am hearing. Expect to not sound great at first, play slow enough so that you minimize or have no mistakes. Maybe 10 minutes of my practice session.
Day 2 - 12 - same as Day 1 just a new key each day. So you can see it takes me almost 2 weeks to get through this phase.
Day 13 - 24 - now add the metronome at a SLOW tempo, maybe 60 or slower depending on how the exercise feels. Still 1 key a day.
Day 25 - 36 - Bump up the metronome, still 1 key a day. By this point you shouldn't be thinking of notes, you should be hearing them and are able to anticipate what’s coming next. Remember to minimize or eliminate mistakes. If you are making mistakes you need to SLOW DOWN!
Day 37 - 48 - Bump up the metronome again. Now you’re at a pretty decent tempo and things are flowing. At this point you might be able to fit in 2 keys per day in that 10 min allotment of time. You can see we have now spent almost 2 months on this one exercise. You are building patience and consistency in this new technique.
Day 49 and beyond - you can keep upping the tempo and pushing your limits. One other thing I like to do as a challenge is to change up the original exercise. At this point you have some mastery of the exercise in all the keys. What else can you do? How about changing the rhythm? Maybe make it into an odd meter exercise? Your only limitation is your imagination! So have fun creating something new that YOU like.
You might notice some changes outside of music when you start practicing patience in your practice sessions, which could be a good thing. Maybe not getting upset in traffic or thinking of ways that slowing down can help you in other ways. I’m just saying, there are other benefits to having patience in your musical life, and that’s a good thing to notice!
Some final thoughts…
Since I don’t know how to end this post and I’m not a writer following any rules, I wanted to mention a few more things that I thought might help.
Things to remember…
DON’T compare yourself with others - this is YOUR journey, no one else's so don’t worry about what other people think or do. In the same sense, this is your journey so it’s your responsibility to make things happen. Do not blame others if things don’t go your way, think about what YOU can improve next time, what would you change, ask yourself “did I put enough work in?” (if you need to ask that though, we both know what the answer is).
FOCUS on your own growth & journey - see above :)
Say “thank you” to your instrument - why not show appreciation to the thing you love and spend some much time with?
Have fun! (if you’re not, change something!)
Until next time…
always positive, always progressing!
Later!
