Finding motivation to practice

[antonino]

I just wanted to know how many other people dealt with being motivated to practice the piano.

I'm not sure how many of you may be able to sympathise with this situation:

Basically I've played piano for about 10 years in my youth and then sporadically when I pursued other hobbies.  About a year ago I bought a grand and have been taking lessons each week which has focused on both jazz and classical.  My teacher is amazing, has played piano for 60 years and is proficient in both these areas and still performs.  The type of musician I am envious of... being able to improvise on anything, replicate the styles of all the various jazz artists... I could go on and on.  I am VERY fortunate to have such a teacher.

But then for some reason whilst I have sudden spurts where I'll sit down at the piano for  a couple hours and then sometimes I'll go a week without doing anything.  And every time I walk past the piano I know I should be taking advantage of this unique opportunity.  I know once I sit down I will practice but for some reason I don't ACTUALLY sit down.

I get easilly distracted by some tv show, or jumping on the computer and reading through say this forum, or get pre-occupied.

I KNOW I love piano, I get so much enjoyment out of playing, I have the ability and good hands, heaps of time at my disposal to practice but for the life of me why can't I just be motivated to take advantage of it all?

I get frustrated with myself because I don't do it.  I really want to be an accomplished piano player.  It's like I have this lazy disease that stops me.

Am I alone in this?  Have you guys had spells like this?

Do you guys think that finding the motivation to practice is a big thing among a lot of musicians...?

Maybe one for you teachers out there "Do you get questions from your students about how to be motivated to practice?"   What do you tell them?

Look forward to getting my head around this and getting input from those with some experience or knowledge about this.  I feel like if I could find out some way of solving my situation with lack of motivation I could make some really good headway!

[rc]

Hey Antonio, I know exactly what you mean   Lately I've been wasting so much time when I could be practicing or anything more productive than watching TV or surfing the net.

Two approaches that have worked for me in the past:

- eliminate distractions.  This was an accident really, I moved out and didn't have a phone, cable, internet, car or even stereo.  Boy was I productive!  Without any input all my mind could do was create output.

- discipline.  Just getting to the piano seems to be half the battle, once I'm there it's easy to spend the hour practicing.  Clear goals help, broken down to weekly goals.  An upcoming performance is the ultimate motivation for me, because to perform is the whole point of it all.

With the goals it's important to see how the small immediate goals of the week and the practice session will add up to the longterm goals of being an excellent musician.  Does your teacher know what your goals are?

[mad_max2024]

rc is right

I often feel the same way as antonino, I have periods when I am extremely interested in piano followed by weeks when I am distracted by other things and really dont feel like practicing.
Setting small but specific goals really helps a lot in those times.

If you just sit at the piano and play the music not really worrying about improving one section or another, you will eventually lose interest after playing once or twice.
If you set up a small goal like improving this or that section today or bringing it up to XX bpm speed, it will be a lot easier to concentrate in that specific goal and keep playing until you reach it.

Eliminating distraction also helps, I really hate distractions while I am playing and always eliminate as many sources of outside noise as I can.
I sometimes even throw my sister out of the room lol 

Of course, I am talking about classical training, where you have to practise technique and be very attentive to detail.
I don't really know what happens in Jazz

But you are not alone, I would bet everyone out there has those problems.
It's hard to keep an interest in any specific thing for a long time, there are always periods of time when you just dont want to do it.
We are all human 

[amelialw]

I agree too. Discipline is the biggest factor. Just practise consistently everyday for a fixed time and you'll get used to it. Listen to lots of piano music too...

[guendola]

I like the idea of setting small goals. Right now, after a break of about 20 years, I am quite enthusiastic but I know from experience, that this will fade away sooner or later.

So I'll start setting small goals for the next time whenever I am done practising. I hope it will create a small pressure similar to "I must see this TV show" and the like.

[valor]

Whenever i see a good pianist playing that motivates me to play alot.

[allthumbs]

I too have experienced what the other posters have mentioned from time to time.

As I got older, I have developed the discipline and motivation to practice hard, but what is causing me to flag in practicing at the moment is that I've outgrown my piano severely.

It just doesn't inspire me when I sit down to play it and in the last few years, it doesn't hold it's tune as well as it should. I find myself spending more and more time tuning the damn thing in between it's bi-annual tunings.

My teacher says I definitely need a better instrument at my level.

I just hope I can rectify this soon with a new and better instrument.


allthumbs