Building Good Body Habits Through #musclememorymojo
HOW is it October?? I mean, this year has dragged on INTERMINABLY, and yet also appears to be moving at the speed of light. We’re a month into the return of the “school” year, and supposed [?] normalcy…so here I am, posting up on my blog about some thoughts I’m having about muscle memory and body habits…this little blog-a-roony is actually #5 out of a 6 part mini-series I’ve been hosting on my FB and IG channels - this is a subject that is easier to talk about on a video than it is to write about in a carousel post, so I dived in. If you want/need a refresher? Hit up Video #1, Video #2, Video #3 and Video #4 on Facebook…and let me know what you think!
So, today’s installment is all about some interesting little #morselsofmojo I’ve discovered on this subject. I’m sure many of you reading this have, even peripherally, come across information about building, breaking and maintaining habits sometime in your life. You’ve probably even heard that magic number - 10,000 hours is what you need [more or less] to become an expert in anything you do - this was put forth by Malcom Gladwell in his book Outliers: The Story of Success. Now, I won’t deny that conscious, consistent practicing of anything is what gets you better at it - I think we can agree on that! But this 10,000 hours is a myth. If you’re interested in debunking it, head over to this blog, who wrote about it better than I ever could! 6 Seconds - The Emotional Intelligence Network. I’ll wait…
So, having read that, we can understand that: “one of the biggest flaws of the 10,000 Hour Rule is it focuses on the amount of time spent practicing, and not the quality of that practice – and not all practice is equally helpful.” Spending 60 minutes a day strengthening a bad habit that ultimately doesn’t serve us anymore is of much less use than 10 concentrated minutes spent conditioning a GOOD habit that moves us in the directions we want. Ultimately, we cannot get away from the fact that if we want to improve our singing, then we must practice good, consistent body habits so that we can develop the muscle memory necessary to create an instantaneous response when we sing. There are so many things happening when we sing, but when we practice these elements consciously and deliberately, we can train our body to do them without thinking about them, smoothly and easily.
It would be so wonderful if we all started with a clean slate, but the reality is, we are all bringing old habits and mindsets of one kind or another to our singing. This might be because we never actually thought of how to take a proper breath [because, why would we if no one ever spoke to us about it?!] so our bodies came up with a sequence of events that worked, optimal or not; or because we cultivated a habit that did serve us in the moment, but due to changing circumstances [different rep, fach change, etc] it no longer is optimal. Being open to the possibility of changing and then being observant AS we change, and cultivating the best possible incarnation of that change each time we sing is what will get us where we want to go. Mindfulness. It’s what’s up!
So, what’s your habit? What do you notice? What’s one thing you can observe and modify? And if you want some help - reach out! I’d love to help you find YOUR unique voice!
