Last week I posed a question to my son who works in the field of animation, which I’ll rephrase here.
How can you stay with the tension of wanting to be in a better place and continue to work towards that, and still be present and enjoying where you are now, knowing that you really want more from yourself?
This week I put the same question to my musician son, Meir. He said the following:
“I have the feeling that my art must contain my whole world. As Mahler said, “The symphony must contain the whole world in it.” From an artists’ view, it is very hard to juggle one’s inner intellect- emotions (those emotions which are totally devoted to one’s art) with one’s critical thoughts and blocks that close one’s creativity and devotion to one’s art. Andre Haidu says that it is a musicians’ never-ending fight whether to play what people expect me to play (and mostly what I expect myself to play) or to play what I truly wish to play.
It is a war for freedom, and the freer I am, the more I realize that what is coming out of me is actually my spirit.
It is very hard to get to that point, because I am left exposed. My entire being, including my flaws (that which is hardest for most people to expose) are let out and I feel as if I am standing in the wilderness.
On the other hand, it is a great opportunity to see myself and what is around me in a truer light of truth. When I am in this mindset I can be almost sure a feeling of “not good enough” will come to me because I will always want to get deeper and deeper, and I will also demand from myself to get more and more skills to be able to get there (“you play what you practice”), but together with that feeling, I must not be self-critical of my art because that could make me lose the whole thing. So it’s like walking on a thin thread.”
In the course of our development, whether it’s professional, emotional or spiritual, part of the goal is to develop a healthy attitude towards growth itself.
Both Rafi and Meir have described a helpful and unhelpful attitude towards growth. Basically, an unhealthy attitude according to Rafi is ownership, and trying to impress and compete against others. A healthy attitude is having a conversation with the world through your art and enjoying the experience, knowing that you are on a journey and therefore where you are right now is part of the scenery just as much as what is to come.
According to Meir, an unhealthy attitude is critical, judgmental thoughts and a preconceived notion about what you expect and what others expect you to produce. A healthy attitude is accessing devotional emotions that free your creativity and release your spirit. Meir adds that a fine line exists between the healthy and the unhealthy, since the healthy place brings you to a place of truth, which makes you demand more of yourself and want to keep growing, yet seeing the truth also makes you feel exposed, which in turn again provokes self-criticism.
If Meir and Rafi were in my class, I would ask them what they each got out of what the other said, how it touched them. I would ask them to share, if they felt like doing that, a deeper exploration of how these ideas manifest in their work. We might perhaps take Meir’s quote by Mahler and explore its meaning in light of our experience. Finally, I would have them think about where they are in relation to where they would like to be, not just in terms of their professional development but in terms of their attitude towards the process.
The essence of their words for me is “authentic humbleness” of enjoying your creation as you’re creating it, “making the most” of the moment you’re in and being “totally devoted.” These are not dependent on what you have or have not achieved. At the same time they don’t make you stop demanding of yourself. You demand because you are simply with your spirit.