DECISION + ACTION = RESULTS - a new Habit
Five Minutes is better than No minutes is our motto for the year.
Becoming an accomplished musician takes practise and organisation, especially when it has to fit into our overall lives of work and study.
To do this requires creating new habits. If we want to improve our skills as a music student, or in anything when need to make some changes and to make the changes we have to make the DECISION to change.
DECISION - ACTION = RESULTS
Often we have heard this before but we don’t change anything. Why? Well there could be multiple reasons - but essentially as human beings we are driven by needs that we are not even aware of.
Our minds can be divided into two parts. The Thinking Mind and the Emotional Mind or the Conscious mind and Unconscious mind.
The Thinking Mind is where we store information, use logic and reasoning. When we are presented with new information - we consiously know that we need to create new habits to achieve different results.
However, at the same time often our subconscious - feelings and emotions often hold us back and are the real drivers of the decisions that we make, decisions that we make unconsciously.
I’m no good enough
It’s too hard
I get too nervous and scared
what would my friends think
What if a make a mistake?
Being aware of our unconscious thoughts and feelings can help in understanding how and why we do and don’t make changes.
Making small changes and create new small habits can help us go down the path of change and success.
Being organised, or having some type of organisational system is a good place to start.
A system that suits our daily, weekly, monthly and yearly life. Some people will use:
diary for every day
a whiteboard that lists the weeks and what is due
monthly calander where all school, work, sport and family commitments can be seen in advance for the month
Apps like:
TODIST is great because you can sign-up and list and date daily tasks where you can have reminders and prioritise when things are due. I especially like this one because it send you a message everyday either by email or on your app and lists a what tasks you have due. This is particularly helpful when you have a lot of projects happening at once.
Calendar Task is an app that opens on your desktop with the monthly calendar in the background. This is great for having all your tasks at your fingertips and a good reminder too.
Evernote - another app where you can plan ahead and take notes
Goodnotes - is a great App for note taking - planning which you can use with your Apple Pencil. Lots of functions which make it easy and pretty for you to organise your notes. There is also a template for Manuscript paper if you wanted to scribe some music notation down.
It’s really important to have some sort of system so that you can start planning and doing early all the practice and study needed to do well. Without it most poeple become overwhelmed and give up because it is just too hard.
So let’s make the first decision this year - to be organised. Take the time to reflect on what things hold you back and make the start to change this year.