Music Performance Anxiety - It's Time to Face the Music
Introducing: The Music Performance (Anxiety) Workout MPW
The Musician Coach
is a coaching site for musicians with activities in areas such as music performance design and music performance anxiety to support you in making and meeting personal goals, regardless of what type of musician you are, or how music fits into your life. Weekly articles and activities provide a coaching mindset for cultivating bravery and encouraging the small steps that can have big impacts on your life journey.
The Music Performance (Anxiety) Workout
provides articles with coaching activities specifically for practicing the art of performing for optimal experiences, and are based on the following performance anxiety concepts:
1. There are no quick fixes for music performance anxiety, and practicing for performance should be a part of the daily routine.
2. Shortcut, quick relief approaches are mostly attained at a cost - the loss of authenticity.
3. Anxiety is individually constructed, and reducing anxiety involves working towards self-discovery (listening to your inner voice), autonomy (reducing the effects of outside noises coming at you), and presenting yourself authentically; all while continuing to hone your craft.
4. Working towards one's mental and physical health in parallel with developing specifically musical performance skills is essential for exceptional performance experiences.
5. Cultivating a good heart and approaching performances as a communal exchange of energy is practiced for optimal performance experiences.
Music performance anxiety is a hurdle experienced by just about everyone at some time, at least in our society. From a very young age we are encultured to connect judgment with music through our social groups and institutions, and there is not a single article, book, class, workshop, website, drink, food, or pill that can undo this enculturation for you. Lessening anxiety comes from changing your perspectives.
Working through anxiety that is keeping you from putting your best self forward involves creating a habit of daily practice for developing you and how you view and experience the world around you. It is not difficult work, but like any practice, it takes some dedication and persistence. However, the time and effort can be enjoyable.
Consider this quote from Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s 2001 book Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience.
To overcome the anxieties and depressions of contemporary life, individuals must become independent of the social environment to the degree that they no longer respond exclusively in terms of its rewards and punishments. To achieve such autonomy, a person has to learn to provide rewards to herself. She has to develop the ability to find enjoyment and purpose regardless of external circumstances.
Anxiety is individually constructed. So even though the symptoms can be similar, what is at the root of music performance anxiety is different for every individual. This is why performance anxiety is still an issue. If reading a book or research study could fix it, then everyone would read the book and it would be fixed. However, any given advice is a reflection of how the author views and/or experiences music performance anxiety. Even research is conceptualized and presented based on personal experiences because we are social and can't remove ourselves completely from our experiences.
This is why a coaching approach is essential for working through music performance anxiety, and why I became a professional coach…
to work from the individual's point of view. Â A coaching experience is led by the person being coached based on a philosophy that one knows themselves and their needs better than anyone else can. A coach works with a client to help the client find their own path.
The Musician Coach brings a coaching experience to you in weekly activities to experiment with as part of your regular routine. Depending on your individual sources of anxiety, some activities will speak more to you than others. Spend time with the activities that you connect with and disregard the others that may be more applicable for someone else. Â As you develop, previous exercises that you discarded may become more relevant with time. Â
Introduction Week Activity:
I leave you this week with just one question to ponder as you consider joining us in The Musician Coach: Music Performance (Anxiety) Weekly Workout:
What would you rather receive from your audience?
Praise or gratitude?
Share your thoughts by leaving a comment:
I hope you will join me here again next week.
In my heart I know I would prefer gratitude, but there are days when I know I am approaching the performance like a job, and I inadvertently miss that part. I am looking to focus more on my gratitudes and sharing that experience rather than it feeling like a job.
Gratitude!