A Failed Time Lapse and the Truth About Growing

There is a jacaranda tree in my street I used to climb when I was a kid. It was a familiar landmark on my walk home from school, and it used to fascinate me watching how it changed with the seasons and the years. For a period, I tried to take a photo of it from the same angle every few days I passed it, hoping to compile a time lapse, but I must have abandoned the project at some point. Perhaps because the day to day progress was so slow and unremarkable that I lost interest.

That's the truth of growth though. From one day to the next, change is imperceptible. But when taken from a distance, remarkable observations can be made. If I dig up one of those old photos and compare it to the tree today, I'm sure it is greatly changed.

---

I saw a different, younger jacaranda tree on a recent walk through my streets. She was short, reaching her branches to one side, with a handful of blossoms and leaves. She seemed unsure of herself. A bit scrawny. Blind to her potential.

Having watched the tree in my street, year upon year, I see what she can't. I know that she will keep blooming, season after season, until she realises it is natural for her. Until it becomes expected, and not a sought after event. She will become older and wiser and her branches will one day be heavy with flowering. And that will not be unusual. It will not be unexpected. It will not be effortful. The blossoms will appear year upon year because they are part of her, part of the cycles of her growing.

But for now, for her, it is a treasured thing, a thing that feels rare and special and like something she needs to hold on to and reach for.

I know it is who she is.

---

Perhaps she looks at the gum trees and wishes she could also reach the sky to touch the stars. But that feels like far too improbable a thing to grow into. So solid in their footing, it’s hard to imagine they don’t just start out with thick trunks and established roots.

But every tree is a sapling at some point, no matter how formidable it grows to be. Even gum trees have beginnings.

---

I suppose what I'm trying to say is that sometimes we need to trust the process. To look to those ahead of us not in despair but in hope that we will grow to stand among them in our own small way. To look back to our sapling beginnings and smile at the flowers that have already graced our branches. To revisit the abandoned time lapse project of our own growth with a wider perspective to see how much we've already grown and changed. And to trust that our roots will keep strengthening and our branches extending towards the sun.

The Mindset of an Athlete: 5 Takeaways for Composing

This year I've set myself a goal to be able to do a pull up... By writing that, I have at least made myself accountable to my past self and maybe a non-zero number of people who read this. Keep reading to the end to see a photo of me practicing on the stairs in my house (yeah I should probably get a pull up bar or something... naahhhh it's fine).

I started strength training about a year ago. Growing up I wouldn't say I was a particularly sporty kid, but I appreciate moving my body more and more with each passing year. When I saw some videos online of badass women doing weights training in the gym, something about it drew me in.

Ok, I'd be lying if I said I didn't want to feel just a little like some of my favourite characters in films, tv shows and games. I wanted to feel that strength in my own body. Once I started, I discovered there were so many other things I loved about it. It's almost meditative, a rest for the mind while putting strain on the body, feeling powerful, exerting effort. It feels good.

Going into the new year, I've been thinking a lot about the mindset I want to cultivate in my physical training, as well as in my composing, and I've been struck by how applicable the one is to the other.

Previously, I've focussed on developing the mindset of an artist. For this I refer you to an excellent book, 'The Artist's Way' by Julia Cameron, which started that journey for me. It speaks of the need to rediscover childlike joy, freedom and trust in creativity and lose a lot of the self-consciousness that many of us develop into adulthood. I highly recommend it to all creatives, but especially to those that feel blocked by fear and doubt. This is something I revisit often and should be the starting place.

But, holding all that in one hand close to your heart, I think it is important for those that want to establish a creative practice as part of a career to hold in the other hand a mindset that has more momentum and focus.

And so, here are 5 principles from physical training I see translating to composing.

The Athlete Mindset: 5 Takeaways

1. Take Rest Seriously

Athletes know that rest is important. The proof is irrefutable. When you don't get enough sleep, when you don't take days off from training, your body just doesn't perform to the same level.

A while ago I had a realisation that now seems obvious to me but wasn't until that point. For a long time I didn't think about the mind like I thought about the body. The body obviously gets tired. You can't run a marathon and then expect your body to do another one straight after (ok, maybe some people can, but I don't know if they're really human), and yet we often expect that of our mind. We expect to be able to constantly stuff new information into our minds, to be mentally productive, to be engaged, to be switched on.

In the book 'Stolen Focus', Johann Hari talks about the importance of mental rest through mind wandering for cultivating focus and creativity. This quote hits home: "In our current culture, most of the time we’re not focusing, but we’re not mind wandering either. We’re constantly skimming in an unsatisfying whirr."

When I rest my mind, when I allow it to wander, to be idle, to simply observe the world around me, it is allowed to process and reset and I am refreshed with creative insight and the ability to go back to my work with focus.

For me, this looks like at least one day a week where I'm not composing, learning, or doing any work. Just resting. Because otherwise, I know that burnout isn't far away.

2. Train Regularly

Like I said, I've been strength training for a year now, but I haven't been nearly as regular as I would like to be. The thing about strength (and any athletic ability) is that without consistent training, you lose ground. It isn't a one and done thing. You can't expect to train for a year, stop, and keep all the progress you gained.

Therefore, it's more important to think about building an ongoing habit than reaching a goal. While you may set milestones along the way, consistency is the foundation that will allow you to pass them.

Having a habit setting approach over a finish line approach is about learning to enjoy the process. The doing of the thing. Because that's the substance of it. The day in, day out routine built into your life.

I've tried talking my family into trying strength training with me, and some of them have, but it doesn't really appeal to them (I don't blame them, I'm definitely the weird one). For me, I've come to love it. I want to be in the gym. I'm motivated to go. I enjoy it when I'm there. I've learned to love the process.

When it comes to composing, I've often found myself cycling between periods of all consuming focus or complete avoidance. There is a friction in starting, and then momentum once I get into the groove.

Which brings me to 'Grease the Groove', a concept in physical training that refers to building strength by focussing on regular repetition of a movement rather than maximum effort or load. For example, every time I walk under the stairs near my room at home (as you'll see below), I try to lift myself up or do a reverse pull-up. Just one. It doesn't need to be strenuous, but over time I've noticed I'm getting stronger.

In composing, greasing the groove looks like building a habit of showing up. Of building strength in overcoming the friction to start and facing your fears of inadequacy. This is where the childlike, explorative mindset of The Artist's Way is helpful, replacing fear with excitement for the unknown.

And then, get lost in the enjoyment of the process. As they say, make it about the journey and not the destination. And once you get there, pick out the next spot on the horizon to move towards, because an 'arrival' is missing the point.

3. Train Intelligently

I am by no means a strength training expert - in fact not even close. And part of that is due to my haphazard approach to it so far. I've had a loose structure, but not really a solid strategy, which means whereas I was improving quickly in the early stages, I'm now mostly in a holding pattern of keeping the progress I've made.

An important part of making progress in strength training is progressive overload: the idea that with consistent training you slowly add more weight to your exercises, which increases your strength.

Similarly as a composer, if I'm not learning and stretching my skillset, I can stagnate. Even if I'm writing consistently, my pieces can start to all sound the same. And if I am learning but not applying in an intentional way, like doing random exercises in the gym, I won't get the most value out of it.

I've learnt a lot about 4 part harmony writing in university, and written out many an exercise, but only on rare occasions have I intentionally applied this knowledge to my composition process. Often I opt for a more chaotic approach that can lead to poorly written, weaker harmonic movement.

I'm not saying you should always compose with a rigid structure, but rather there are compositional tools that take conscious attention to learn how to apply. It can be useful to set a focus like 'in this piece I'm going to aim for more colourful orchestration using woodwind textures' and really hone in on up-skilling in that particular area, applying your learning.

It's a balance - of course sometimes you need to just give yourself free reign.

4. Push Beyond Your Comfort Zone

When I first ventured onto the gym floor, it was definitely at the edge of my comfort zone. I had no idea how to use any of the weights or machines, but I didn't want to seem like I didn't know what I was doing and I didn't want to ask for help. I'm sure everyone has the same feeling at first. I downloaded an app to show me how to do certain exercises and use the machines, and I gradually built up a plan of exercises to do. I'm now at the point where I feel very at home on the gym floor.

Except there are still machines and equipment that I've never touched. It's more comfortable to stick to the exercises and equipment you know than return to that feeling of uncertainty in learning something new. When you stick to a familiar routine for too long, your body gets used to it and your brain switches off. By shaking it up every so often, you'll challenge your muscles in different ways, which can help break through a plateau of progress and avoid injury from overuse of a particular movement.

In composing, I've found that staying in my comfort zone can lead to complacency in my creativity. Interesting results more often come when I'm challenging myself to use styles or methods at the edge of my comfort zone.

5. Get Back Up

When you keep at something, you will make progress and push beyond your current ability. The key is not giving up. The journey will always have peaks and troughs, and an upwards trend may only be seen clearly when stopping to take stock of how far you've come.

I've wanted to be able to do a pull-up ever since I started strength training. I still haven't done a single one completely, but I haven't seriously trained for it. I use the assisted pull-up machine at the gym on and off. Some weeks, if I've been consistent, I'll be able to take a bit more weight off the assistance, which feels great. But other weeks, if I haven't trained in a while, I'll have to put it back on, which can be discouraging. But I haven't given up.

With composing, I've also had ups and downs. I've had times when I've been really proud of music I've made. I've had times when I've spiralled into comparison and despair at the distance between where I am and where I want to be. I've had confidence in my skills one day and doubt the next. Sometimes composing is easy, often it's not. But through it all, I am determined to stick with it, because the alternative, giving up, is far worse.

Growth is not a straight line and creative careers in particular are long, scenic journeys through mountain ranges and valleys, deserts and rainforests. The important thing, as Dory would say, is to 'just keep swimming'.

So there you have it. 5 principles from an athlete's mindset that you can apply to composing. This year I'm going to try applying all of these insights to my training in both my body and my creative practice. And hopefully by the end of the year I will be a better composer than I am now, and I'll be able to lift my chin above that stupid metal bar and feel slightly more badass.

Not an ideal setup...