Voices Inside (Everything is Everything)

Have you ever noticed that when it comes to life lessons, sometimes once isn't enough?

Sometimes you have to revisit a couple variations on a theme before you can move ahead.

That may have some bearing on why I've been contemplating the art of listening lately.

Whether the source is internal - voices inside - or external, it can be tricky to determine who to listen to, and when to listen to them.  Often the challenge is to determine whether the inner voice is your intuition, or your inner critic - the guy/gal who often cuts you down, or fills you with fear and doubt.

Voices Inside (Everything is Everything): 

Props to the Donny Hathaway original, but I especially like this Derek Trucks Band version

Around the time I was in second or third grade, I took violin lessons for all of about 15 minutes. I have vague memories of learning that perennial favorite: Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.  I dimly remember narrow little  masking tape stripes across the neck of the instrument to help guide me in finger positions.  I do know I really enjoyed the smell of the rosin, as well as the act of putting it on the bow.

And I remember with acute squeamishness, the horrific sounds I made (or so it seemed) as I went through the earliest stages of learning an instrument.  There really is nothing quite like a beautiful instrument like a violin being played very very badly by tiny little hands.

I know that I found it difficult at the time, and that I never got to the point of quite 'getting it'.  Since  I never quite felt comfortable with the violin, I think I internalized that and decided that if violin was hard, then music was hard, therefore I couldn't do it.  There were probably a couple botched and panicky violin recitals mixed in, too, just to solidify the idea.

The end result: for all of my adult life, I've always said - aloud and in the privacy of my own head - that I can't play music, I'm not musical, I don't have that kind of talent.

I can't, I can't, I can't.

One of the benefits and the joys of aging, whether gracefully or rebelliously, is that you can teach yourself to override that inner critic, the one who says that you can't, or that you won't be good enough.  Sometimes it takes big life events to shake things up, sometimes not.

In my case, a relative lost his battle with cancer right around the time that I was hitting my early forties and was flirting with my own midlife crisis. Suddenly time really did seem short and capricious, and the idea of taking chances was much more important than concepts like being 'good' or 'bad' at something. 

It doesn't have to take something so dramatic though; all you really need is to find the desire to try something new, whether it's music or something entirely different.

Change your way of thinking about yourself relative to your creative pursuit.

Become a student.

Find a teacher, or a couple of teachers.

And  remind yourself that as a student, you're not supposed to know it all, and do it all perfectly yet.

Allow yourself the luxury of making big, gorgeous mistakes along the way, because you'll learn as much from them as you will from getting it 'right'.

And then take the time to congratulate yourself for trying.

And tell that bitch of an inner critic to shut up!

 Once I blocked out the critical voice, I opened myself up to taking chances.

I'm working on learning how to learn - I'm finding ways to practice  that set me up for more success and more ways of feeling good about my practice sessions. 

Some days, it's nearly impossible to tap out the tempo with my foot and play at the same time.  It's taking a long time to learn scales, and to learn the notes on the fretboard.

But I'm making some slow and steady progress.

I like the good feeling I get when I learn to play a riff in tempo, or I learn a cool new technique like popping the strings.  And I'm learning to find the humor in the learning process too. The first time I was able to tap out the rhythm and come in on an upbeat, all I could think of was Steve Martin in "The Jerk".

I suspect that learning to play music is going to take me a little longer than some people, but that's ok.  I'm prepared to enjoy the journey as go.   

There are some wonderful guidelines to tapping in to creative thinking, here .