Consistency, Motivation, and Dedication - it’s not what you think!

Over the last decade and a half of being a teacher, I have noticed that these words are often used together. And while that makes a lot of sense, some students have also used them against themselves to their detriment. And I am not excluding myself from the people who have used these words in this way!

Here's an example of that - "I'm feeling so frustrated about my lack of consistency. I just don't know why I'm not motivated enough to practice. I think I just can't dedicate myself to singing"

Or

"I think my motivation to practice is low, so I'm not able to be consistent. I think I just don't have time/energy/brain space to dedicate to practice"

Or

"I'm not like a dedicated singer or anything. I just practice when I have the time, which is usually not super consistent. I just don't feel motivated to practice daily as my energy takes me elsewhere."

Do these sound familiar?

The idea behind this thinking is that motivation is driven by dedication, which then leads to consistency. What happens then, is a rumination on the past lack of practice which indicates to the singer that they are not motivated or dedicated and therefore one starts to beat themselves up about not practicing. Which eventually leads to quitting because they think they aren't a dedicated singer. A side effect of this entire cycle, is that the more you quit practicing, or quit singing, the more daunting it is to come back to it because the singer has reinforced the belief by letting singing go, that they are not dedicated. And around and around we go.

So what do we do about this?

What if we turned that around? What if we stopped thinking about the past when we haven't practiced and assigning judgement to that past? What if we began with consistency instead and using the past purely as information to develop just a little bit of consistency in the future? It has been said that consistency is the foundation of motivation. If one is waiting to be motivated to practice, one can wait forever, or it can be short lived. 

My personal trainer often says, "there will be days that going to the gym can be a total grind - but accepting and doing what you can that is the key to developing consistency. And oftentimes, those days are the days you end up making a huge leap in your lifting/skillwork/running distance etc".

One of the key things is realising what consistency looks like for you and managing your expectations on what you can focus on and what your desired outcomes are. 

Maybe you are working up to your midterm exams and have only 10-15 mins a day Monday to Friday and you can practice for one longer session on a Sunday evening. And maybe your core goal for the next couple of months when your calendar is this full, is to develop your register transition. 

Maybe you have a really busy work month where you have no time except to come to class - believe it or not, this is also fine!

That's where the practice calendar comes in. And that's one of the things we'll do in these mandatory progress check-ins. We look at the time you have available to you and build a calendar of manageable practice tasks together that is aligned with your goals. 

This prevents frustration.

This is motivational.

And this means you are dedicated.

Not every week is going to look the same. And not every singer has 3 hours a day to spend on it. That is life. And your music is a part of your life and is meant to give you meaning rather than frustrate you or make you feel like you are not a singer. You are a singer. 

See you all in class!

All my best to you lovely and consistent singers out there!