Most of us who become musicians commit to this profession with a naive, unabashed love of the full experience of making music. It takes time for us to realize the realities, both good and bad, of living a life in music.

After finishing school and experiencing the demands of creating a freelance career, I experienced physical and mental challenges that are familiar to all musicians like performance anxiety, physical pain, etc. Although annoying, I would either tolerate the discomfort or wait for it subside and keep going with a persistent optimism about my career. After all, I was doing what I loved.

In 2018, though, things changed. I had a performance that came with plenty of lead time (which is not always the case for freelance work) where I was playing principal. One of the pieces was the Scherzo from Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which includes a top ten, incredibly challenging, excerpt for orchestral flutists

The rehearsal went great and I felt very solid on my way home about the performance the next day. Once the concert began though, I noticed that a little odd. I chalked it up to nerves and tried to ignore it. The feeling grew as the concert went on, and by the time we reached the Mendelssohn, it felt like I was having an out of body experience. I was light headed, short of breath. I was convinced I was floating off the floor and seeing myself from behind. My heart was racing. Was I going to pass out? I could barely get a full breath. I thought there was no chance of finishing the concert - how could I escape and leave the stage?

After the concert was over, several people had nice things to say to me about my playing, and my husband, who had been in the audience, couldn’t tell why I was so upset because nothing had seemed unusual to him.

But I was inconsolable for days afterward. The fact that such a dramatic and completely debilitating feeling of anxiety and panic had crept up on me so quickly and without warning left me stressed and terrified going into every performance that the same thing might happen again. I knew I needed tools so that I could help myself, and I needed to figure out if I really wanted to (or could) keep performing.

Through all of this, it seemed there was nowhere to turn. Even though we discuss performance anxiety a lot as musicians, no one I knew was providing tools to dig deep to the root of it, which can be different for all of us. I needed to know where my physical and mental tension and anxiety were coming from and how work with them. I knew that over the course of my musical life my roadblocks had morphed and changed, and what I wanted were tools that would continue to serve me on what I hoped would be a long musical journey.

How was I going to find those answers? It only made sense to follow my gut. When the world slowed down for the pandemic, I joined a 200 hour yoga teacher training.

I learned about anatomy through my yoga teacher training - how to increase mobility and find freedom in my body when playing. I learned where my physical blocks were. Yoga also introduced me to the power of my breath. You might think that someone who plays a wind instrument would have breath control wrapped, but I had no idea how my breathing habits were limiting me, or how much they could help me find freedom in how I was feeling and thinking.

My yoga practice evolved at the same time meditation entered my life. I’ve always been a worrier, which was made so much worse by the stress of worrying that I might have another anxiety attack on stage. Even outside of music I could worry about most things until I had truly embodied the feelings of what I was worrying about.

Meditation taught me to observe myself. I had always wanted to stop my worrying, anxious thoughts, but now I had tools to do something better - see them as they really were. Impermanent, untrue, and passing. Meditation taught me that strengthening the mind isn’t a mystery, simply a practice.

For years I have approached both my flute playing and my teaching through the concept of building a toolbox. Our box contains our skills - the current state of our fundamental ability to play the flute, as well as our knowledge about the instrument and the music we are playing. It also contains our tools for working on our skills. These tools could include scales, tone exercises, practice techniques, the way we approach performance; all the resources we have for how we approach the music and the instrument.

This toolbox concept has worked well for myself and my students. It creates a sense of self-sufficiency in our relationship to our instrument and the music. When I am faced with a challenge or problem, I can take a step back and sort through my toolbox. What tools might help me address this particular problem? I can try as many as I need, combining them in creative ways until a solution is found. Often, this creates new tools for future needs.

As I started to sincerely work with the physical and mental aspects of my playing, it felt natural to create new toolboxes. Kits with new tools for unresolved challenges. This new toolbox needed to be built around embodiment - the tangible feelings of what I was experiencing. I knew if I could learn to recognize my own experiences more clearly, I could help my students do the same.

The real beauty of these toolboxes, however, is the amount of options they provide us. There’s no promise of an absolute solution - it would be impossible anyway, since what we are faced with as musicians changes so frequently. Rather, these tools promise us the ability to take care of ourselves, and to take care of our musical message. They put us firmly in the driver’s seat of our artistic wellbeing.

Having created a working toolbox for myself, I have a strong drive to help other musicians do the same. We are all unique, and we know ourselves better than anyone else. You are the only person who is privy to the unique experience of your own body and mind.

By building this type of toolbox we are able to get to know ourself in new ways. By considering what was creating the blocks I was up against, I leaned into a new type of self inquiry. I wasn’t looking for what was right or wrong, but rather what was informing my experiences. I was able to find the daily habits that were hindering my performance as a musician.

The same things that help me won’t help everyone else, though, and I think this is another secret to why so many of us become stuck. Our culture would imply that one size fits all, when in reality what we need most is to get to know ourselves and build our toolboxes based on our own personalities and experiences.

My goal as a teacher has always been to see each student for who they are individually. To do my best to understand where they are starting from, where they want to go, and what they best way for them to travel is.

I’m still building my toolbox. We’re always changing, and that’s a good thing. I know that I will need to continue to be attentive and aware of the ways my experience of being a musician (and a human) change over time.

My goal used to be to be a good flute player. Then it was to be a good musician and teacher. Now, my goal is to always have access to the musical skills I have tended so carefully by building creative resilience, and to help others to do the same.