Overcoming fears

I wish that there was a special formula for exactly how to deal with fears. We deal with this daily. It is quite easy to let our fears get in the way of success.

I deal with many fears daily as a musician. Most of them are over such little things, but fear magnifies and makes them seem so much worse than they here. This is a recent experience I had: I have always had problems with memorizing music, but I still signed up to do the concerto competition. I didn't expect to make it to the next round of the competition because the concerto I was playing (Rodrigo concerto mvt. 1) is SO hard. It wasn't clean or even up to tempo. It was probably at least 10 clicks slow. The second round of the competition was in my jury.  --a jury to a non-music folk when a musician prepares 2 pieces and some technique to be played in front of the professors in their own respective instrument family. I play flute and that is a woodwind. The professors for flute, bassoon, oboe, clarinet and saxophone all listen to the performer and grade them on the performance.  They chose me as one of the 3  woodwinds to go to the next division. I wanted to win because I would play with one of the top orchestras at BYU. I had been sick the 2 weeks previous to the performance and it grieved me. I couldn't practice even though I wanted to! I felt as if I could faint every time I stood up. I also kept thinking about how the last time I memorized something and performed it that I completely forgot the Griffes Poem after the 3rd page. It was a miserable five minutes... I felt embarrassed. It was so hard to memorize.. Ever since that experience, I have played something memorized only once. That was two years before and it was a VERY small song (literally like 4 lines). I barely made it through that. I could barely even play the Rodrigo well for my jury. How was  I expected to play something memorized when a) my instrument isn't required to memorize at every waking moment and b) I am HORRRRIBLE at it with bad experience baggage??!!! I saw a quote at my grandmother's house during Christmas break when I found out that I had to memorize the concerto. The quote was meant just for me. I know she had it up for herself, but it was there for me in my time of need. The quote said: If you don't know how to do something, then start trying and then you will learn  That was not the exact quote, but it was close to what it said. I didn't know how to memorize. I attempted to memorize at every opportunity that I had. I would sit down and learn the exact notes and say them to myself over and over and over again. I would play it without the music and figure the notes and resort to the music if there was no other way. I continued to practice it in sections. I listened to recordings * without actually playing along because they were WAY too fast. I prayed a lot.-- I DO believe in God. I know he listens to our prayers and knows our desires. We just need to ask. I asked for help all the time. I just kept having that quote in my mind. Every single time I had doubt, I would get to work.  As time passed, I started to have it memorized. Whatever I was doing helped. I continued to play for people and really tried to know how each section went and some of the patterns. I played the concerto for as many people that would listen. I played for at least 10 people. --That helped. I would take note of the sections I messed up on and practiced, practiced, practiced !  The hard part for me at the time was not necessarily the mental game. I had plenty of problems with that, but I have an auto immune disease that really makes my body tired. Playing the Rodrigo uses all my strength. It would put me out for the day by working to hard on it. It takes a lot of air and concentration. That piece has so many notes my mind even was tired! I kept having so many doubts about playing it because I was so tired. My body was tired. I had no control over it. No matter how much I wanted sleep to rid fatigue, it never left. I also had my recital coming up. My teacher didn't allow us to play concertos on our recital, so that was outside of my recital repertoire. Because of the lack of strength I had, I couldn't practice more than 3-4 hours a day. I SO desperately wanted to do more, but I couldn't. I did the best I could. That was really all that mattered. When time came to actually compete, I didn't want to. I hadn't been feeling well because of the flu that I had been given during Christmas. I could name a bunch of things my body was experiencing that made it tired.  I knew that I wouldn't die during this experience even though my mind kept telling me I may. My mind played so many tricks on me. I kept being told that I was not good enough, the concerto wasn't good enough, "You don't have it memorized. You are going to forget every note. Why are you doing this to yourself??!", "You are not one of those good musicians. You are mediocre." It was horrible. I almost emailed my teacher and told her that I couldn't do it. I almost let myself do that...  I competed. I didn't play perfectly. I walked out on stage played a flute notes, tuned, and announced the piece I was to play. My judges were 2 band directors and the top orchestra director at BYU. I felt pretty comfortable because I had worked with 2 of them. I still was nervous. I didn't want to make a fool of myself. I didn't feel like they would understand what I was going through in my mind and in my life at the time. I feared failure. I started to play and surprisingly it was going okay. I was a little frustrated at how hard the high notes were to get out due to a spring breaking a few days before. I just kept going. At a few sections I had a few different notes leave my mind and muscle memory, but I kept going. I never forgot where I was. I got through the piece.  After, I didn't feel like I was going to win. I knew I did the best I could. I was SO glad it was over and I was and still am proud of myself for doing what I fear so much. I made it through the experience. I know God helped me. I put forth the faith and he did the rest.  I am still a little sad about how my body is so weak and  I didn't do as well as I wanted, but I accomplished something that day: I accomplished a great fear. I didn't let my mind overcome me. It almost did. I almost let it take over my thoughts and make me quit because I didn't think I could do it because of the fear I have a failing. I am still working on this, but I can do hard things. I know that I get adversity when I want to accomplish great things.