{"id":46898,"date":"2019-01-22T08:00:44","date_gmt":"2019-01-22T16:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.classicalguitarshed.com\/?p=46898"},"modified":"2020-10-22T03:55:40","modified_gmt":"2020-10-22T10:55:40","slug":"tq-henry-miller-destination-perspective","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/tq-henry-miller-destination-perspective\/","title":{"rendered":"Henry Miller on the real payoff of quality musical practice"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tuesday Quotes<\/a> are short explorations of music, life, and the daily endeavor of practicing classical guitar. Enjoy!<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cOne\u2019s destination is never a place but rather a new way of looking at things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Henry Miller<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

Someone (Einstein or Drucker?) said, \u201cNot everything that can be measured matters, and not everything that matters can be measured.\u201d<\/p>\n

We choose benchmarks or events to measure our progress – learning a new and harder piece of music. Getting our scales up to a given speed. Playing a performance or special event. These mean to mark the path forward.<\/p>\n

But why do we want these? What\u2019s the real payoff?<\/p>\n

Our real goal is not to play the hard piece. It\u2019s to play beautifully and enjoy our daily progress. It\u2019s to feel a sense of accomplishment and personal mastery. Fun and joy are nice as well.<\/p>\n

Since what really matters in our music cannot be measured, we substitute something that can: benchmark achievements.<\/p>\n

Benchmarks are tools to mark progress. But they can also become idols – they represent \u201cthe thing\u201d, but are not themselves \u201cthe thing\u201d.<\/p>\n

The problem arises when we forget what we want. When we focus only on an \u201cidol\u201d, we miss the mark.<\/p>\n

We strive more to learn the hard piece<\/a> than to develop the skills we need to make the music we want to make (focus, awareness, clarity, consistency, etc.).<\/p>\n

We try to game the system to get to the prize. But the prize here (the benchmark) is not the real prize. And when we reach it, we don\u2019t feel as fulfilled as we thought we would.<\/p>\n

So how do we keep our eyes on the right prizes?<\/p>\n

We slow down. We continually search for the meaning of \u201cquality\u201d and raise our standards to meet it. We celebrate small improvements<\/a>. We focus more on \u201chow\u201d than \u201cwhat\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tuesday Quotes are short explorations of music, life, and the daily endeavor of practicing classical guitar. Enjoy! \u201cOne\u2019s destination is never a place but rather a new way of looking at things.\u201d Henry Miller Someone (Einstein or Drucker?) said, \u201cNot everything that can be measured matters, and not everything that matters can be measured.\u201d We choose benchmarks or events to … <\/p>\n

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