How much time per day we should spend practicing for optimal performance is a popular point of discussion. But when was the last time you had a conversation with another musician about how much time per day we should spend sleeping for optimal performance?
According to sleep researchers such as James Maas of Cornell University, optimal mental and physical performance is not going to happen when we are in a sleep-deprived state. In other words, we are failing to tap into our potential, and unable to play or perform at the level we are capable of reaching, if we are not getting enough sleep. And believe it or not, the vast majority of us would be classified as sleep-deprived. In fact, most of us don’t even know what it feels like to be fully awake.
So how many hours does the average person need to be capable of peak performance?
I’ll tell you in a minute, but first, how can we tell if we are sleep deprived or not?
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You may remember the article on Centering, where I wrote about left-brain and right-brain processing differences, and how these differences often dictate success and failure in high-pressure situations.
Watching a video about neuroanatomy and hemispheric lateralization is not most folks’ idea of a good time. However, I recently came across a video which does a tremendous job of explaining the essential keys. I promise you, it’s worth it.
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I’ve been told that there are two basic strategies for cultivating a weed-free lawn. The obvious method is to go around with a bottle of weed killer and kill all the weeds you can find. Of course, what you get then is a bunch of dead brown spots with little patches of sad-looking grass filling in the gaps.
The other method involves working to encourage the grass to grow healthier, stronger, and thicker, which eventually will crowd out the weeds and leave less room for them to grow. In all honesty, I’ve yet to see evidence of this strategy’s effectiveness in my own yard, but I really like the metaphor so humor me while I stick with it to make my point.
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It is said that legendary pianists Rubinstein and Horowitz hated practicing. Rubinstein simply didn’t like practicing for hours on end, while Horowitz supposedly feared that practicing on pianos other than his own would negatively affect his touch. Their solution? A healthy dose of mental practice.
Though many of us may never be legends, mental practice is something that all musicians can absolutely benefit from, regardless of skill level.
Have a concert coming up that you’re not ready for, but too tired to practice? Want to practice but can’t, because of a flare-up of tendonitis or a bad cold? Practice rooms full? Instrument in the shop? Too early/too late to practice? Only have 15 minutes, so it’s not really worth getting your instrument out of your locker, finding a practice room, and getting set up, only to have to quit a few minutes later?
Sound familiar?
Sure, but just imagining yourself playing can’t be the same as real physical practice, right?
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We are typically led to believe that being “nervous” is a bad thing. Indeed, most of the advice I’ve ever heard has been aimed at reducing anxiety. Over the years, I tried everything I could to get rid of the unpleasant feelings associated with performance anxiety. I tried eating bananas, drinking chamomile tea, imagining the audience in their underwear, sleep deprivation, practicing more, taking various supplements, and even trying to convince myself that it didn’t matter how I played. None of this, of course, took the anxiety away or did much to help me perform any better.
From my work with sport psychologist Dr. Don Greene when I was a graduate student at Juilliard and my own doctoral training in performance psychology, I’ve come to understand that anxiety itself is not the problem. The problem is that most of us have never learned how to use adrenaline to our advantage. By telling ourselves and our students to “just relax,” we are actually doing each other a disservice by implicitly confirming that the anxiety we feel is bad and to be feared. I soon learned to welcome the rush of adrenaline and to use that energy to power my performances, and to perform with more freedom, conviction, and confidence than I ever imagined possible.
The big question, of course, is how do you transform anxiety from a liability to an advantage? Before we talk about this, we first need to understand some basics about what happens to our mind under stress.
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