I don’t really know of any other way to do it.
Prepare to perform a piece of music well, that is.
When I first became an accompanist, I thought that there must be something that I didn’t know, some secret or trick-of-the-trade that I wasn’t privy to. I was determined to find it.
But it turns out that there is no secret, there’s only practice.
This is the only way to prepare a piece well. Practice.
Again and again and again.
This is how to do anything well, really.
Want to perfect your tennis? Practice.
Your jump shot? Practice.
Your writing or painting or macramé?
Practice.You are what you repeatedly do.
Again and again and again.
This is why people who keep a gratitude journal are, well, more grateful. They’re not just born Pollyanna’s. Not genetically predisposed to see the glass as half-full. Well, okay, maybe some of them are, but not all of them.
The truth is that gratitude, when you practice it, changes you. It changes the way you think and feel and see.
Your gratitude “muscles” get stronger, so to speak. You begin to become sort of an expert in being grateful, only your expertise isn’t something you market. Rather, it’s something that makes your day better, every day.
And there really isn’t any other way to do it. No trick-of-the-trade. No secret. Nothing complicated, or difficult to do – just take a few minutes each day to notice blessing, gift, grace.
Notice and note.
Capture grace with pixel and camera for your thanks-giving, or speak it into an audio journal, or do the old pen-and-paper practice.
Just practice.The more you notice your blessings, the more blessings you notice.
Practice noticing grace and gift every day or every Monday or every third Thursday if that’s all you’re able to do just now, and soon you’ll notice that you’re noticing more.
That you’re thanking more.
That you’re grateful more.
Gratitude changes you because the more you notice grace and give thanks for grace in whatever way you choose to give thanks…the more you notice grace.
Until noticing grace and counting your blessings becomes as second-nature as that fugue you practiced a million times until it was ready.
Finding something to be grateful for becomes something that you just do, because you’ve done it before.
Again and again and again.
Until, finally, it has become who you are.
~xo,
LuAnne
