Engaging Your Creativity: Making Your Practice Make Music - PHH 126

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Welcome to the Practicing Harp Happiness Podcast. I'm Ann Sullivan, a harpist on a mission to empower every harpist to experience more harp happiness. Over my decades long harp journey, I've had lots of successes and more than a few failures. And I know firsthand what it's like to feel that playing the harp the way you want may not be possible for you. Now, I play and teach all over the world and I know what most harpists are never taught the secrets to gaining the skills and confidence you need to play the harp with beauty, freedom and joy. That's what the Practicing Harp Happiness Podcast is all about. Showing you simple steps to help you play the music you want the way you want. If you're an experienced harpist looking for that next level, or a harp newbie anxious to avoid the pitfalls, or a harpist who just wants more fulfillment and a little encouragement, you're in the right place, my friend. So let's get started. Welcome to the show.

What are the qualities you think you need to be a good harpist? I'll bet every harpist has a different answer for this. Now understand that I'm not thinking in terms of the skills useful to a harpist. Skills like a good ear or the ability to sight read or musicality. Flying fingers, the ability, ability to memorize. I would agree that those are all important to some degree. But today I invite you to consider some of the personal traits or day to day habits that would be useful or even essential for a harpist. Now that idea conjures up a completely different list. Maybe you'd put character traits like determination, perseverance, self discipline and courage on that list. Those would indeed be helpful. So would objectivity, the ability to treat yourself with kindness and grace even when you're struggling. There are other mindset habits that are important too, like a desire to learn and resilience.

Today we're going to explore one of the qualities that I think is crucial to the musical development of any harvest. And its not one of the ones I've already mentioned. It's less a quality than it is an attitude and habit. And it's one that we very often overlook or maybe even discount as something frivolous. If you notice the title for this episode, you know what I'm talking about. I'm talking about creativity. I believe that creativity isn't an add on, it's not an extra. It's at the heart of what we do. And every day, every minute that we play, every moment we play, we're creating something not out of nothing, more likely from black dots on a page. Those dots contain the genetic code for the music, if you will. But without our creative spark, those dots would never come to life. The music wouldn't exist. If we reduce our practice to mere repetition, we've lost our way. If we aren't thinking about and listening to the music we're bringing to life, we're missing the best part of the practice process. And if we aren't taking the extra step to enlist our creative nature in the service of our music, well, we aren't serving the music or ourselves very well. Now, you're probably having one of two reactions right now. Either you're thinking, yes, finally you're speaking my language, show me how my heart plan can feel more creative, or you're thinking, great, this sounds like a good idea, but it feels more like something else. I have to figure out how to fit into my practice. Well, never fear. Today I will show you a variety of ways to make creativity a natural part of your practice habit. You won't have to do anything crazy like light candles and meditate before you practice. Actually, that sounds pretty Zen, doesn't it? But we'll talk about simple ways to engage your creativity in your playing every day. You'll discover a sense of freedom that will make playing and practicing even more fun. And you'll love the change that you hear in your playing too. Now, while we're talking about creativity, I want to remind you about some creative solutions that we're going to be talking about on a webinar that is coming up this week. That would be this Wednesday, October 18th at 7:30pm Eastern. I'm giving a free webinar called Cut to the Time Saving harp Hacks. You need to know now. And of course, when you're thinking about a hack like computer hackers, the white hat ones, right? The good ones, or any kind of hack. It's a shortcut. It's a creative solution to a difficult problem. And that's what we're talking about on the webinar. We're going to be talking about things that cause us problems, problems that we have, challenges that we face in our practice every day. Whether it's trying to put hands together, trying to play fast, whatever it is, and how to look at those challenges in a different light and come up with a different kind of solution. So this is the kind of thing that I like to talk about because unless you've been been through a lot of the harp journey, unless you're really experienced, you don't have the knowledge to create these harp hacks for yourself. You might stumble on something by accident, which is great. You might think you have the right solution to the problem. Well, I'm going to practice it this way and that will fix it kind of a thing. But if you haven't really been there, if you haven't experienced what's going on and discovered these harp packs and worked them time and time again, you can't really be sure that you're working on the right thing. I know that it wasn't until, oh, until I really started teaching that I learned some of the things I really needed to know and learned how to talk about them, learned how to share them with students. So this is the kind of thing that you really want to tap into an expert's brain and, you know, learn from their mistakes rather than have to consistently make your own mistakes. Right. So that's what I'm here for. And that's the subject of our webinar. I'll be sharing some of these solutions that may not be ones you've thought of for some of these problems. And we'll talk about the quickest ways to get where you want to go from where you are right now. So once again, it's a free webinar. You can join us. You can use the link in the Show Notes to register. You'll also find the information@heartmastery.com so you can just sign up and we can send you the PDF webinar guide. All that good stuff. Seven days of a replay for all this stuff too. So that's going to be really great and I look forward to talking with you on the webinar. Remember, if you can't be at the webinar live, that's okay. If you register, we'll still be sure you have the access to the webinar guide and to the replay. But. But I can't send it to you if you don't register. So hop on down to the link in the Show Notes or the link@heartmastery.com and register for Cut to the chase with those time saving harp hacks and we'll work on some creative solutions there. But right now let's get back to talking about creativity in your practice. Now, you might be wondering if you're really a creative person. Well, I know that some people are born more creative than others, or at least with more evident creativity. There are people who do wonderful creations with crafts and the visual arts, and that's certainly not me. I have no skill in that direction at all. But Some people just have very evident creativity. But I think that we all have creativity in us, and particularly those of us who are drawn to music, in music is a creative art. So, please, as we start this discussion, I want you to just go from the premise that you can do this. You are creative. In fact, I found a number of business websites, you know, things like Forbes and this kind of thing, that talk about the characteristics of a creative person. Of course, they're trying to encourage all the business types to think more creatively as they approach their business problems. That might seem so analytical and, you know, perhaps not so creative. However, the creative solutions, the creative characteristics that they talk about were sort of interesting to me. For instance, creative people, according to these websites, are people who like to create the right structure or the right environment for their work. And I'll bet you've put some time and thought into the place where you practice. Yeah, creative people, once again, according to these kinds of websites, work well under pressure, but don't necessarily need a deadline or function even well with the deadline. Okay, that may be you, maybe not. A creative's motivation isn't just for a check the box win. They have a deeper sort of a motivation. I'll bet that's you, right? We're not just there to say, okay, finish that piece, onto the next one. We want to play it, we want to enjoy it. Okay, you're not afraid to be a newbie. You're not afraid to try something new. You know, you can check the box on that one if you like, I'm sure, right? Because you're here, you're playing the harp. That's, you know, at one point, wherever you are right now in your harp journey, at one point you were a newbie. So we know you've got that one covered. And you enjoy change, you enjoy new things, you enjoy growth. Definitely a characteristic of you, I'm sure. Musicians are these people. They are people who like to structure things, who like to make their environment better, make it work for them, enjoying the change, the growth that comes from practice, new things, new music. This is us.

Please, as we start this discussion, remember that you are creative, all right? But creativity isn't just a quality. It's a skill. It's a process. It's something you can learn to be better at. You can develop it, you can practice it, you can make it a habit. Now, you know, this isn't something that you have to, you know, take time to do every day separately. But I want you to realize that there are ways you can bring more Creativity into your practice, and that's going to help your music. It's going to keep your mindset free. It's going to enhance your musical expression, it's going to enhance the flow of your music. All of these things will come from reminding yourself to engage your creativity. After all, practice is something that often stifles creativity. I mean, think about what we often do in our practice. It's about doing it over and over again. It's about making it right. It's about.

Putting the right fingers on the right strings at the right times, playing the right notes. It's about making all those things work. It can be a very detailed process. It can be a very energy absorbing kind of a process. It can really be frustrating at times, certainly can it? We all get there, but it can really feel like it's sapping the creativity. And there's that moment, I think, when we realize that we're so involved in the doing of it that we've actually forgotten what the point of it is, that we're so busy struggling with notes and fingers and everything else that we forget we're supposed to be making music. And so our practice can often get in the way. It doesn't need to, but it can. And so having some ways to remind yourself, to get out of the frenzy of doing and to stay in that place where you can be calm and creative and enjoy the music while you're practicing, that's so important.

All right, so what does creativity in your practice mean? I'll bet that just thinking about making your practice creative might scare some of you. You know, does it mean that you have to make stuff up, you have to improvise, you have to dress up, you have to tell stories, you have to, you know, I don't know, weave, I don't know what it is. But creativity in your practice doesn't have to be something that is outside of your practice or outside of your comfort zone. I mean, if you like to improvise and make stuff up, go for it. That's your personal creativity in your music. But if that's not you, that doesn't mean that you're not creative. And it doesn't mean that you can't put more creativity in what you do, that you can't engage your creativity in your practice. I think properly done, there is a balance between the experimentation and the playfulness that we associate with creativity and the discipline that we associate with practice. Certainly practice requires discipline, but that doesn't mean that it should exclude that sense of playfulness, that sense of Fun, that sense of experimentation. We need to bring that musical side of ourselves that loves music, that is energized by music and that feels it in a deeply personal way. We need to bring that to what we do. And I find so often that when we're stuck in our practice, when we're least energized by it, when we're most annoyed by it, it's at those moments when we've been most ignoring what we love about music.

Music isn't about playing something five times, 10 times, 100 times until it becomes correct. Music is about making music. It's about communicating a feeling, communicating a mood, communicating something through these beautiful tones for us, the beautiful tones that the harp makes. It's about that communication and it's always about that we practice and we do those repetitions so that we can make our communication more powerful.

How's that for a different look at things? It's not so that it could be right, it's not so that it could be perfect. It's so that our communication could be more powerful. And that's in the service of creativity, that's in the service of music. So always maintaining that balance between the joyful energy that we associate with music and the rigorous detail oriented work that we associate with practice, maintaining that balance and seeking the balance rather than more of one and less of the other. We want them balanced, seeking. That is where you're going to find the most, dare I say, harp happiness, and where you're going to experience less of the frustration, more of the progress and more of the music. So let's see just how creative you are. I have a few of the qualities of creative people, sort of the signs of a creative mind. And I'm going to go through those and just see which ones of those resonate with you, which ones of those feel like they connect with you or you connect with them. You don't have to have all of these, of course, to be a creative mind, but you'll notice that quite a number of them apply to you. So just think about them for a second as I go through them. So here is the first sign of a creative mind. And that would be be that you are an observer, you notice things, you like to notice things. You look around you, you listen around you, you observe. Number two, you are disciplined. Number three, you have a strong sense of independence, but you enjoy the energy of collaboration. So that you like working on your own, but you love working around other people too.

Number four, you are intuitive.

Number five, you have the ability to adapt to changing situations. You have flexibility.

Number six, you have a sense of playfulness and fun.

Number seven, you are curious.

Number eight, you are reflective. You like to consider things, understand them. Okay. Number nine, you are experimental. You like to try things. You're a what if kind of a person. And number 10, you have a strong inner motivation.

It's an interesting list, isn't it? Lots of different things and things that seem somewhat contradictory, you know, is being disciplined, being creative? Well, yes. Or working on your own, but also working with others. There are things that just seem contradictory, but that's because we all experience creativity in different ways. And it's a good thing too, right? Otherwise, the world would be a pretty boring place if we all were the same kind of creative. So when it comes to the prompts for creative practice that I'm going to share with you right now, they're different, some of them. You're going to wonder why on earth I would have thought of that. But somebody else is really going to love it. And there are going to be some of these that you think, wow, that would be interesting. I'd like to try that. That somebody else somewhere is going to say, that's not for me. That's not how I. That's not how I roll. And that's good. You pick ones that work for you. And please, as we go through these, don't think these are things that you have to do. These are ideas. These are things to sort of spark your own creativity, to think about how you can bring this kind of mindset to your practice so you're not just stuck in the doing, but you're going to help yourself create more music. These are the kinds of techniques that can help you get away from the note, note, note, note, measure by measure of feeling that we have when we sometimes practice and get to that musical big picture. The place where things flow, the place where the music has dimension and direction.

And these will help you get there. If you've ever been stuck trying to say, well, this piece just won't come together, it's not always the technique of it that won't come together. Even if it seems that way, sometimes it's just flipping your mindset a little bit. And so these creative prompts might help you do that. And if you do one or, you know, one of these kind of regularly and switch it up, do different ones. If you make it a habit to bring that mindset to your practice, you will find it easier to do, and you will find everything moves just a little bit faster and is a Little bit more fun. So let's start with these prompts for creative practice. Believe it or not, I've got 10 of them to share with you. The first one's pretty easy. It's pretty simple, and it's one we don't often think of in any. Pick any piece, any piece that's on your music stand right now. What's your favorite part of it? Is it a measure? Is it a single chord? Is it a phrase? Is it a part of the melody? What's your favorite part? Why do you like it? Whatever that favorite moment is, play it just a few times just because you love it. Just savor the moment. There's nothing wrong with that. You know, you don't always have to practice just the stuff you can't do. Practicing the stuff that you love can be really fun.

All right, number two, what about partner pieces? This is a whole different idea. But think of two pieces, you know, that are not necessarily obviously related but that you feel go together in some way.

Play them as one. Play them like one right after the other. Or maybe mash them up, right? Mashups are all the thing right now. So, you know, maybe. Maybe sort of weave them in and out of each other, but play them back to back. Think about the quality that links them in your own mind. I mean, maybe they don't go together for anybody else, but maybe they go together for you, and that's enough.

But it's interesting. Play with that. And the thing is that if you like the way those pieces go together, somebody else will too, and you can share them, and they'll be just as interested in it.

Okay, prompt number three.

Think about the favorite people in your life, right? Your spouse, your children, your parents, whatever it is, your best friend your. And choose a signature piece for them. I mean, what piece do you know that sounds like that person to you? Can you pinpoint why it feels like them, why it sounds like them? And then, of course, you get bonus points if you have that signature piece and you've played it and you record it and send it to them. Just saying, you know, this reminded me of you today. And so I thought I'd send it along.

Now, that's something that's sort of like the partner pieces. It's a little bit outside your daily practice, but it gives you a new way to think about music, doesn't it? But here's something that you can do absolutely any day when you're practicing. Put a beautiful picture or a picture of a piece of art, something or other on your Music stand while you play your warm up or your daily exercises.

Sometimes you can even use those little, those pictures that pop up on your computer desktop daily, you know, and it's like, ooh, isn't that a pretty picture? Well, look at that picture and let that give you a mood for your warmup or your exercises. It's interesting. If you have that picture in front of you, it will change how you play. So take a moment to think about.

How it has changed your tempo, your tone, your mood, and then think about a way that you could incorporate that particular mood change or whatever it is into one of the pieces that you're practicing that day. And then try a different picture on another day. But you'll find it brings a whole different aspect to your warm up sort of interesting. Once again, you can observe. Here's another tip. Choose a daily word before you begin your practice. Just a simple word, not a task. You know, it's not like, you know, elbows up. It's not a criticism, but a word that describes a mood or idea. It could be something like playful, since that's a word we're using a lot today. It could be something like creative. It could be joyous, it could be calm, it could be peaceful. But think about a word that describes a mood or idea. Reflect on that word just a little bit before each piece in your practice. How does it change your practice of that piece? If you're thinking about the word peaceful before you start practicing a particular piece, does it make you feel differently? Does it make the way you play the piece somehow different?

Something to think about.

I guarantee you will notice something. You'll notice a change. Now here's a different kind of idea. This is about the idea that you can sometimes discover more.

By taking something away, by adding a constraint.

The famous fashion designer Coco Chanel was known for her idea that after you were fully dressed, you know, you had on all the, all the pieces of your outfit, all the accessories. You just looked at yourself in the mirror and took one of those away.

And this is the same sort of idea. How could you make your music say more with less? Like maybe put in less practice time, maybe a little less speed. Play it at a slightly slower tempo, maybe remove a few notes if you need to. But it doesn't have to be less. Just think about the constraints. What would happen if you didn't do so much rubato? What would happen if you took this away? Or what would happen if you did more of something? Maybe make that a constraint too. But if you put a specific restriction on your playing of that piece that day, how could that make you do more with the music? Something to think about. It's an interesting experiment. Let me know if you try it. It's one of my favorite things.

Here's one. ABC repetitions. So if you're repeating a passage three times, we're going to use the letters A, B, C and find a word or an idea or a prompt for each repetition that starts with that letter. So your first repetition, A, maybe you're going to make this particular time you play the piece or the passage or the trouble spot even, you're going to make it airy. And then the second time, maybe, let's see, that's B. Maybe you'll make it bold. The third time is C. Maybe you'll make it calm. Or if you like, you could make C correct. If you want to do another repetition, that would be D. Maybe you could make it double tempo. Ooh. Or maybe you could transpose it to D major.

So this is an interesting thing, right? Just bring some more mindfulness, some more intention and some creativity to those simple repetitions. Okay? I still have a few more for you. Try setting a musical goal for your practice, rather than a process goal so that we're not going to set a goal, that is, how many times you're going to do something or how correct something is going to be. But instead we're going to think about the goal for your practice of your piece that day. Deeper dynamics, maybe, or longer phrases or more flow or more rubato, or a more relaxed tempo or a more definite storyline, whatever you want to think of. But set that musical goal. Not that quantitative.

Yes or no, black or white, right or wrong kind of goal will help keep your focus in the right place on the music instead of just on what you're doing.

Here's another one. You could name the sections of your piece. Now, I know we, you know, we like to practice in sections, and we often number them. I number mine, usually 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. But what if instead of naming the sections of your piece or instead of numbering them, you decided to name them? You could name them characters in a story after characters in a story. For instance, you could, if you had seven sections in your piece, what about the names of the seven dwarfs? Or you could, you know, choose names of characters from your favorite book or movie. Or you could theme them. They could be different kinds of animals or fruits or colors or cities. You could alphabetize it if you wanted. Right? But think how much more attention that will Bring to what it is you're doing, you'll pay more attention to those sections, like Guarantee, you know, I mean, how funny to think about, oh, I've got to repeat that, you know, dopey section again or that Sneezy section to go back to the Seven Dwarfs. Or maybe you're a Winnie the Pooh fan and say, I've got to practice Piglet again.

It's going to be a whole different level of understanding of your piece, and it's going to help keep things light so that when practice threatens to get just a little bit too strenuous, you know, I mean, how. How seriously can you take your practice if it's, oh, no, I've got that Eeyore section to play again today. Okay, all right. And here's the last one I want to share with you.

Indulge in a no harm, no foul practice session. So in this kind of practice session, it's going to not be about fixing things. Whatever happens, happens. You're not going to have to fix mistakes. You're not going to have to admit to mistakes. You're not even going to have to repeat anything if you don't want. It's like a get out of jail free kind of practice session. You're going to play. You're going to look at stuff, but you're not going to do that. Double down on all the really hard, picky stuff. Let yourself reconnect with that bigger picture, with the music, without worrying about those mistakes. If you want, you can consider it like the. The Bob Ross school of painting, right? We don't have any mistakes today. We only have happy accidents. So I want you to send your inner perfectionist out for coffee and just enjoy the music that you're playing that day. Hmm. Okay. So that was a very wide variety of ways you could bring more creativity into your practice session. Now, you must admit, I got a little creative thinking about some of these, because it's not like there's a dictionary of these things, but if I could think of these, you can think of ones that will be even more fun for you. Remember, we're looking for things that bring that sense of fun, bring that love of music to your practice. Because when you're bringing it in your practice every day, it's going to be baked into your music. And it's going to come across when you play that music, whether you're playing it just for yourself or for somebody else, it's going to be in there. You won't have lost that joy of music through the hard work of trying to make it right and practice it. And I think that that's the biggest benefit that we can get from any of these little techniques or strategies or just from reminding ourselves that music is why we're doing this. So hopefully you have taken some of, some of these ideas and thought, okay, I could try this one, I could try that one. There's going to be something that appeals to you. And as I said, take these ideas and run with them. Make them your own. Figure out some other ones. And I guarantee that the more you work at engaging your creativity in your practice, the more ways you will find to engage in and the more fun your practice will become. And isn't that a huge win? So when we're talking about creativity, we're also talking about creative solutions to those problems that we face as harpists. And that's my cue to remind you to sign up for the webinar coming on Wednesday. That's the Cut to the Chase webinar, and we'll be talking about creative solutions. So you will find the link. It's a free webinar. You'll find the link to sign up for that in the show notes or@heartmastery.com and I certainly hope to see you on that webinar. Next week on the podcast, we're going to be talking about setting a practice schedule that will stick. Now, don't misunderstand me. I'm not just ignoring the creativity sort of aspect of this again and going back to that, you know, practice schedule. But when you have a practice schedule that you can rely on, you have the mental energy to be creative and calm and focus on your practice. So we'll be talking about ways you can set a practice schedule that will stick next week on the podcast. Until then, remember, every day is a day you can add more harp happiness to the universe, to your world, and to your spirit. And all you have to do is play. Thanks so much for listening and I'll see you next time.

Thanks for tuning into another episode of the Practicing Harp Happiness podcast. I release a new episode every Monday morning so you can hit your practice week running. Until then, remember to practice your harp happiness every day. See you next time.