Efforting

I meditate.

Sometimes I love it. Sometimes, it feels like absolute torture. I haven't done it for very long, and it took me a long time to decide to start.

Maybe that all sounds crazy to you. Maybe you are thinking, "who has time to meditate?" or, "that sounds awful!" Sometimes I have those thoughts, too. It can still seem crazy to me to spend time getting to know my mind - shouldn't I already know it based on the amount of time we spend together?

But, when you start thinking about the speed of our every day lives, the amount of information we process, the expectations we have for ourselves (we all have at least one constant, nagging self critique....why isn't my waist smaller? why don't I speak up at work? why I am so bad at xyz?). it makes sense that we might not be super in tune with ourselves. 

I think we could all benefit from a daily dose of meditation.

There's so much to unpack about understanding the difference between thoughts and facts or how we allow our feelings to run over us repeatedly day in and day out, but one of the concepts that has recently thrown on a hundred lightbulbs for me is what's known as efforting. 

This particular idea of effort vs allowance is something I picked up after reading (and re-reading) The Mindful Athlete by George Mumford, and then more recently, from doing a guided meditation also by George Mumford on the Ten Percent App (I would highly recommend both the book and the app).

Sometimes concepts take a few iterations to stick.

As musicians - or anyone in a highly self-driven and competitive field (this absolutely includes being a student!) - we are constantly self-critiquing. It's how we get better, and it's important for continued independent musical growth. However, I know I am not the only musician that has gone so far down the rabbit hole of self-critique that you can't get back out, even (or especially) when you are in the middle of a performance. 

So recently, as I was doing this guided meditation, George was talking about pushing yourself through something because you believe you HAVE to do it, even if it's not working. You're pushing through because you want the end result (that you actually don't even believe you will reach) so badly. He calls this frustration and discomfort that we create for ourselves "wrong effort." Wrong effort lacks sensitivity toward yourself - it's when you are just trying too hard.

Here's what he said that completely smacked me over the head: "When your energy is driving you to the point where you are always looking to see how you are doing, you're not present to what you are doing."

All of the performances where I struggled for an entire concert to forget that one note that was a little out of tune, or cracked, or was just wrong came racing back. Times where I couldn't think about the phrase because I was stuck thinking about how that breath I just took wasn't as good as it was in practice, and any experience where I couldn't turn off the thoughts that are meant for the practice room were suddenly vivid in my mind.

You could also just as easily apply this to the way our culture has us comparing ourselves to others constantly. 

We are not meant to think about how all the time.

Now, I certainly haven't mastered the application of allowance over efforting, but I do know that the way I can get better at this is by working on my mindset. Creating a right effort is creating spaciousness in my attention and allowing the thoughts of how to flow like water. To allow them to come up, and then also consciously allow and encourage them to move on. 

What I'm learning most through meditation right now is the importance of creating space - creating awareness without attachment. I have a long way to go, but in just two or three months of consistent practice, I already see the impact in both performance and every day life. 

Have you ever considered effort vs allowance in your own practice and performance? In what ways are you efforting?