Have you ever looked at your closet full of clothes and said, “But I don't have anything to wear”? Maybe you've looked at that big stack of music next to your harp and said, “But I don't have anything I can play!” I don’t know which is more frustrating.  Actually, I do.

When we spend hours, days and weeks practicing a piece of music, and it still doesn’t get to the point where we can actually play it for someone, it goes beyond frustrating. How is it possible for some people to have hours worth of music that they can play and others don't even have a single piece?

I remember how shocked I was the first time I realized how common it is for dedicated, hard-working harpists to have nothing ready to play. I was teaching a workshop and talking about what to do when you finish a piece and getting a roomful of blank stares. I asked the question, “How many of you don’t have a piece that’s finished right now?” and about 80% of the students raised their hands. Until then it had never occurred to me that so many people would be stuck in practice mode and never experiencing the joy of playing.

So rest assured; if you are one of those harpists with nothing to play, you are not alone. There are plenty of others just like you. But I would love to change that for you, starting today.

When we think about goals for our harp playing, we most often include as a goal a piece that we want to learn to play. We imagine ourselves playing it beautifully with confidence and musicality. Every time we don’t finish that piece and take it to that point of seemingly effortless expressive playing, we disappoint ourselves. It’s another goal that is left unaccomplished. 

On today's show I'm going to tell you about 3 factors that might be causing you to miss those goals you set for yourself, that are keeping you from finishing your pieces. These sneaky factors can cause those pieces to just stay in limbo rather than being pushed all the way to the point where you can truly enjoy playing them. And of course, I’m not going to leave you without a plan for success. I’ll give you a remarkably quick and easy three step fix.

Now there are specific practice techniques that can help you finish your music but that's not what we're talking about today. On this show you're going to learn how to set yourself up to finish those pieces  - or achieve any goals for that matter - and why you might be actually sabotaging your efforts instead of allowing yourself to make progress the way you want.

Links to things I think you might be interested in that were mentioned in the podcast episode: 

• Register for our free webinar, 3 “Good” Practice Habits That Are Keeping You From Playing the Way You Want and How to Break Them
• Related resource: Make Success a Habit with this Simple Formula blog post
• Harpmastery.com

Get involved in the show! Send your questions for future podcast episodes to me at [email protected]

LINKS NOT WORKING FOR YOU? FInd all the show resources here: https://www.harpmastery.com/blog/Episode-070