Sometimes I wonder what funny creatures we humans are. We have all these contradicting tendencies that live side by side in us. Sometimes one of them comes out and wins. At other times everything in us is pulling in different directions so we are not moving at all.
As musicians, we are always trying to be better than we were the day before. Music is an ideal. We know, we will never ever be able to reach this impeccable perfection, this big absolute. But we put our heart and soul into being the best possible version of ourselves.
This makes us great critics. We are actively investigating and looking for all the mistakes and flaws we make. We try to proactively improve everything connected to our art in every way. We are musical improvement detectives at work!
On the other hand, we like to ignore existing problems, that everybody can easily see and hear, except from – us. The elephant sits cozily in our livingroom and we try to not see him, when we sneak around his big belly.
When I catch myself doing this, I have a feeling that we humans do this to not lose the ground under our feet. I mean, there is SO MUCH that can be improved in about we do!
And this is not limited to music. We could be better house cleaners, better cooks, better parents, better husbands and wifes, better whatsoevers.
The ground opens up and we look down the abyss of disorientation. The shrouded dark of getting lost lurks down there.
So next time you experience the interesting ignoring thing – smile at yourself.
You are a true hero, protecting yourself from the darkness of being lost in I-could-be-so-much-better land. This is a nasty place, no one wants to be there.
Celebrate your detective work and the elephant, als long as there is still enough space to sneak around him… ;o)
With so much love,
Anselma
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