So the big moment has finally arrived. As you take your place on stage, ready to play the repertoire that you’ve practiced diligently for months, the nerves really begin to kick in, and your thoughts begin to race. What if I screw up? Did I practice enough? Wait – what’s the first note? Did I turn off the iron in the hotel room?
Inexperienced performers often succumb to the pressure of such a situation, and, not wanting to make the audience or audition panel wait, rush into their performance without taking the time to settle down and get focused. This can lead to some rough sailing in the early going, as they stumble into the opening and need a few moments to play themselves into a more comfortable state. One might be able to get away with this in a performance, but not likely in an audition or competition.
More experienced performers are less likely to rush into a performance – but some take too much time and end up botching the opening anyway.
What? Taking too little time leads to mistakes and taking too much time leads to mistakes? Argh!
So what is the ideal amount of time to have between the moment you are finished tuning/adjusting your instrument and the moment you produce your first note?
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Have you ever heard the phrase “perception is reality?”
I read a book the other day in which the author described one such experience. During a ride on the subway, a man and his young children entered and sat down near him. The children were yelling, being rowdy, and disturbing the other passengers, while the man stared off into space, seemingly oblivious to their antics and rudeness. After he had seen enough, the author asked the man if he might do something to control his children’s behavior. The man looked at him, apologized, and explained that they had just come from the hospital where his wife had died about an hour ago, noting that he wasn’t sure how to deal with this and that the kids probably didn’t know how to handle it either.
Imagine you were this author. Can you imagine how quickly your feelings would have shifted from irritation to compassion?
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Here’s something to try the next time you’re in a toy store and have access to an inquisitive 3-year old kid and some electrician’s tape. Tear off a big long piece of tape and use it to mark off a circle on the ground, about 3-feet in diameter. Put the toddler in the circle and see how long it takes for him or her to wander out of the circle.
5 seconds…maybe?
Ok, try to gently steer the little one back into the circle. What happens?
If this child is anything like most, the harder you try to get the little bugger back into the circle, the more he or she resists. Unless, of course, you know the trick (more on this later).
So how does this relate to you and performing at a higher level?
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One of the first things I typically do on an airplane is look for the SkyMall catalog. I’ve never actually purchased anything from the catalog, but it’s always fun to see what new cool overpriced and unnecessary (but still tempting) items might be out there. Sometimes I’ll even rip out a page and take it with me. After all, you never know when you might need a $120 portable reclining laptop desk, right?
This is probably how most people browse through catalogs. However, I once met a person who did the opposite. Meaning, he would browse through the catalog, item by item, and put a big “X” through each item that he didn’t want. Yeah, if this doesn’t sound like much fun, that’s because it isn’t. Try it sometime.
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Jesse Jackson once said “If my mind can conceive it, and my heart can believe it, I know I can achieve it.” Though I’m not sure how I feel about the Dr. Seuss-like rhyming scheme, I like this quote, and it’s consistent with both sport psychology research and what other highly accomplished individuals have said themselves (e.g. “If you can dream it, you can do it” ~Walt Disney).
‘Tis all very nice of course, but many of us run into a brick wall which prevents us from getting to the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Where is this sticking point?
Getting your heart to believe.
How do we get ourselves to wholeheartedly believe something that is not (yet) true? How do we get ourselves to believe that we could make a living as a musician, or become principal bass of the Boston Symphony, when right now we are something less than that?
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