Mindful Musical Life

Attention

Finding the Right Amount of Effort

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Musician’s are experts at exerting effort. It is difficult to find a more driven and passionate group of people anywhere, but sometimes we try too hard.

In his book, Advice Not Given, Dr. Mark Epstein explains his perception of Right Effort through a Buddhist story about a musician turned monk (Epstein, 123-124). In this story, Sona, an ex-lutist, is struggling in his meditation efforts despite the great amount of effort he is putting forth. When the Buddha hears about this, he uses Sona’s musical experience to help him. Through a series of questions, he compares the strings of a lute to the effort Sona was applying to his meditation, just as a string that is too tight or too loose, one’s effort must also find a balance between too much and too little. This Buddhist parable is a lovely one, and you can watch a nice animated version of the whole story here. 

Often in meditation it is easy to get caught up in trying to “do it correctly.” I have found that musicians are especially primed to adopt this approach in their mindfulness practice. It can be difficult to let go of this striving while meditating, but often when excess effort dissolves one’s meditation practice can deepen.

Applying this idea to playing an instrument or singing, a similar need arises to find a balance between too much and too little effort. As a brass player and teacher, I see this approach all too often in students and professional alike. But no matter your discipline, trying to force something only leads to frustration. In my experience, backing off the effort even by a small amount can make achieving the desired technique or sound come much easier.

It is difficult to describe the difference between too much or too little effort. It might be helpful to think of this as dancing with your instrument, instead of battle against it. When I am trying too hard, it feels like I am trudging through deep mud, but when my effort finds the perfect middle ground, making music feels easy and playing my instrument becomes much more enjoyable. 

Next time you are struggling with a difficult passage of music, a good way to help let go of excess effort is to move your awareness off of the goal itself. I have seen good results with students and myself when the object of one’s focus moves around to different parts of the body while making music. You can also rest your awareness on sensations that are present while playing, such as vibrations, tingling, the rising and falling of the breath, and others. This helps to release some of the effort that might be holding you back from achieving what you were working on. 

Works cited

Epstein, Mark. Advice Not Given: A Guide to Getting Over Yourself. New York: Penguin Press, 2018.

What I learned after 50 days of mindfulness practice

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On April 14th, I had about three weeks of university teaching left ahead of me for the spring term. That included giving and grading finals and final projects, listening to juries, and many other loose ends to tie up. That day I sat for a 20 minute mindful awareness meditation, quickly remembering how helpful that time can be in a busy schedule. Then I did it again the next day. After 20 days in a row, I made the decision to continue this pattern. Some days I did a 30-minute resting awareness exercise, and others were only 5 or 10 minutes of breath awareness, but committing to do something everyday made a huge difference. 

A cursory google search can turn up plenty of research on habit formation, and the importance of sticking with it for a sustained period of time. Most of the findings seem to indicate that a major key to establishing a successful and lasting habit is setting reasonable goals and holding yourself to them for a pre-determined length of time. 

I’d like to add that some flexibility is also crucial to success, along with some self-compassion. Through my 50-day streak, there were days when I was not motivated to meditate, but the knowledge that 5 minutes was still a success was very helpful. If I had held myself to 30 minutes a day, I don’t think I would’ve been as successful. 

After 50 straight days of meditation, I noticed serval things. I was quicker to notice my wandering mind, and it was easier to redirect my awareness to the present moment. This increased level of meta awareness was most noticeable while I was enjoying a walk, bike ride, or some time in my kayak. These activities can present many opportunities for the mind to drift into rumination, when I would much rather be enjoying the present moment. 

Also, I was quicker to notice when my mind would wander while practicing my horn. The thoughts that arose in this situation where usually unhelpful (often negative), and they regularly accompanied a moment of lesser quality in my playing. By noticing these drifting thoughts more quickly, the resulting quality of my practice sessions stayed much higher. 

While formal mindfulness practice every day is not a requirement to gain some of these benefits, my commitment to a daily practice was extremely beneficial. If you are inspired to give this a shot yourself, I strongly encourage you to do so, just remember to show yourself compassion and allow for some flexibility from one day to the next. Make your goal a reasonable one, taking into account your schedule and the amount of time you can commit, and I’m sure you can do it. 

Can Mindfulness Improve Your Focus?

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After spending a few years practicing mindfulness I noticed a dramatic change in the quality of my performance. Overall I was making less mistakes on my instrument, which led to a more relaxed feeling on stage. Looking more deeply at this phenomenon, I realized that a majority of the mistakes I typically made were a result of a focus. I knew there were collations between focus and mindfulness, but in what specific way?

In a study by Antion Lutz et al. (2009), a team of researchers looked into the effect of mindful meditation on focus. The two practitioner groups were assigned varying levels of a daily attention meditation practice, such as breath awareness, and participated in a barrage of tests to measure focus before and after the study. After three months, both meditation groups saw a marked increase in their ability to sustain focus through the tests. Additionally, the amount of energy it took these participants to sustain their focus was reduced, indicating they had an easier time with high-focus tasks. 

This last result should especially grab the attention of performers. A long piece in a recital, or lengthy orchestra concert can leave us feeling drained. Besides the physical exertion of performance, there is a heavy mental taxation. As I mentioned earlier, I think most of my mistakes in performance come from focus—either it wasn’t aimed in the proper direction, or there wasn’t enough left in the tank. I can deal with a bit of physical exhaustion toward the end of a performance, but if my mental strength wanes, I notice a more substantial drop in quality.  

Next time you are practicing your instrument (or while performing if you are really brave), notice when your focus veers away from the task at hand. You might notice yourself thinking of what groceries you need to get, or an awkward conversation you had recently. Make a note of this. You might be surprised how often you could be more engaged in the moment of music making. 

Lutz, A., Slagter, N. B., Francis, A. D., Greischar, L. L., Davidson, R. J. (2009). Mental Training enhances attentional stability: Neural and behavioral evidence. J Neurosci, 29(42), 13418-13427. doi: 10.1523/jneurosci.1614-09.2009

Exploring your relationship with performance anxiety

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If you asked most people,  “How’s your relationship with your performance anxiety?”, you would not expect a positive answer. We often see our P.A. (performance anxiety) as a combatant that we need to force away in order to perform well. 

Peter Lin and colleagues (2008) organized a study to measure the effects of zen meditation on anxiety and musical performance quality. They recruited interested music students from the Manhattan School of Music, the Teachers College Columbia University, and Mannes College of Music in New York, and set out to study the effects of meditation over an eight-week period. 

But what if we could change our relationship with performance anxiety, so that we didn’t feel like it was a battle for supremacy? Wouldn’t it feel so much better if we weren’t in a constant battle with a part of ourselves?

All of the students performed in a public concert before the study began, and again after the eight weeks. Their musical performance anxiety was measure after the performance, and their quality of performance was measure during the concert by designated judges in the audience. The group that was One group of students were taught meditation techniques, and were instructed to practice different forms of meditation for twenty minutes a day on their own. They additionally met for an hour a week as a group for guided meditation sessions. At the same time, the control group got no meditation training. After all of that, here is what the researchers found. 

You might expect that the meditation group experienced less anxiety during the final performance, right? You would be wrong. They reported feeling more their anxiety more vividly after regular meditation. 

As you might guess, this went against the original hypothesis of the researchers, which hoped to see reduced anxiety after the meditation training. But what was exciting was that the overall performance quality went up, as well as a change in the way the participants related to their anxiety. 

In the non-meditating control group, the sensations of anxiety resulted in adverse psychological reactions such as, “I feel my heart pounding which means I am not going to play well.” The meditators, however were able to accept the resulting physical manifestations of anxiety without adding the psychological reaction, and were ultimately able to “channel the elevated state of arousal to a more focused attention on the complicated task at hand – the performance” (Lin, 2008). 

So what does all this mean? 

When committing to a regular meditation practice, part of what you are learning is how to gently direct attention on mental and physical states without becoming attached to the emotions or feelings one might experience. Through this training, the musical meditators were able to observe their anxiety from a distance, having the experience of “I am noticing anxiety,” rather than, “I am anxious.” This might seem like a small difference, but as supported by this and many other studies, this change can make a huge difference in our relationship with performance anxiety. 

Lin, P., Chang, J., Zemon, V., & Midlarsky, E. (2008). Silent illumination: a study of Chan (Zen) meditation, anxiety, and musical performance quality. Psychology of Music, 36(2), 139-155.