Dimming the Spotlight: The 3-Step Survival Process After Failing Your "Big Moment"

 

If you didn't already know it, guitar lessons are a perfect metaphor for life. As a guitar teacher, I started to notice that my students. (even my best ones) repeated the same cycle of being thrown off by one mistake.

 

Little by little, I came up with a 3-step framework for anyone to follow:

 

1. Admit what happened. Before you fix the mistake, you have to own the mistake, which is your first (and hardest) obstacle to conquering the mistake.

 

1. Focus on the root cause, not the first cause. When you are ready to solve the problem, it can be tempting to chase the first solution that pops in into your head. Hold off on that tendency until you know what's going on.

 

1. Take it in. Once you are ready to take action, don't just complete it. Log what happens into your brain. Use that knowledge so you can prepare for this potential "problem" in the future.

 

As a result of taking these steps,  my guitar students have a stronger performance because they have a stronger knowledge of how they perform when things go wrong.