The Mind Over Finger Podcast - 216 What's Holding You Back in the Practice Room – And How to Fix It

Episode Date: February 27, 2025

Struggling to see results from your practice? In this episode, we uncover why traditional practice methods often fall short and how a simple mindset shift can unlock real progress. What you'll learn: The biggest mistake musicians make in the practice room How judgment blocks improvement and what to do instead A mindset shift that makes practice more effective What top musicians do differently to gain an edge If you're tired of feeling stuck and want a practice approach that actually works, let's talk! Book a free discovery call and let's create a plan to help you break through and reach your goals. Book your free consultation with Renée HERE Download the transcript from this episode HERE   Mind Over Finger Click www.mindoverfinger.com/coaching to book your free consultation with me. Visit MindOverFinger.com for my online courses as well as free resources on peak performance. Grab my free workshops and PDF downloads by going to www.mindoverfinger.com/resources. Connect: https://www.youtube.com/@MindOverFinger https://www.facebook.com/mindoverfinger/ https://www.facebook.com/groups/mindoverfinger https://www.instagram.com/mindoverfinger/     THANK YOU: Most sincere thank you to composer Jim Stephenson who graciously provided the show's musical theme:  Concerto #1 for Trumpet and Chamber Orchestra – Movement 2: Allegro con Brio, performed by Jeffrey Work, trumpet, and the Lake Forest Symphony, conducted by Jim Stephenson.

Tell me if this sounds familiar. You show up to practice. You're ready to get to work. You're determined to improve. But things just don't click. You feel stuck on the same issues. You're repeating the same mistakes. And no matter how much time you put in, it feels like you're running in place. That's not just me, right? And when that happens, what do you do? I find that when this happens, because it happens to all of us, we get frustrated. We push harder. We judge ourselves. We tell ourselves that we should already have this figured out, that something must be wrong with us.

But here's what I want to tell you. The issue isn't you. It's not the quality of your effort. The reason you're stuck is because of how you're thinking about practicing in the first place. So if this sounds familiar, this episode is for you. You're listening to the Mind Over Finger podcast, and this is episode 216. Welcome to the Mind Over Finger podcast, where we dive into the world of mindful music making,

peak performance, and crafting a purpose-driven life and career. I'm your host, violinist, certified performance and life coach for musicians, and your guide to unlocking your full potential, Dr. René-Paul Gaultier. Today, we're diving into the power of mindset in practice. And specifically, we're going to talk about the difference between a blocked mindset and a breakthrough mindset. And we're going to talk about why shifting from one to the other can completely change the way you improve, changes the outcome of your practice. We're going to talk about why so many musicians feel stuck, why pushing harder is actually not the answer. And we're going to talk about the shift that top performers make that allows them

to grow with confidence instead of frustration. So I'm going to show you how this applies, not just to practice, but to auditions, to performances, and to your overall growth as a musician. So I think we've all had these days where it feels like nothing's working, like things are off, feels like a struggle. And it doesn't matter how much we practice, we just can't seem to get it right. And when that happens, maybe instead of pausing to figure out what's really happening, I think that we often start to beat ourselves up. We tell ourselves things like, this shouldn't be this hard. What's wrong with you? Why am I still struggling with this? I just must not be good enough. This is what we call a blocked mindset, when frustration takes

over. So instead of looking for solutions, we get stuck in self-judgment. We get stuck in self-attack. We make that mean something about ourselves, something negative. We start to play this blame gain. We see things like, what's wrong with you? Why can't you get this? And when that happens, it doesn't just feel terrible. It actually stops us from improving. Because here's the thing, and I'm sure you've heard this before. Improvement isn't just about effort. The approach is equally important. And when we approach practice with frustration and self-judgment, Our brain literally cannot learn as effectively. Our brain's learning process is disrupted and that makes it extremely hard to improve. And here's why, is that when you blame yourself, when you

attack yourself this way, your survival mechanism kicks in. When something feels hard or difficult or frustrating, the brain perceives that as a threat, not in the physical sense of danger, of course, but as an emotional or cognitive challenge. And this triggers the amygdala, which is the part of the brain responsible for processing fear and stress. So this kicks in this fight or flight response, and it releases stress hormones like cortisol, for example. So instead of focusing on problem solving, the brain focuses on self-protection, which looks like judgment. Sometimes it looks like avoidance, or it looks like shutting down, or it looks like giving up. And the prefrontal cortex, that's the part that's responsible for the logic, for focus, for learning, gets completely hijacked by this stress, by this stress signal.

It makes it hard to think critically, and it makes it really difficult to make adjustment. And it really impacts the neuroplasticity. Neuroplasticity is really important because it's the brain's ability to form and strengthen new connections. And that is, as you might guess, essential for learning and improvement. When we practice, our brain is constantly rewiring itself. It constantly reinforces what works and it discards what doesn't. But judgment stops this process. So when we focus on negative self-talk instead of what I would call constructive exploration, the brain strengthens the wrong neural pathways. So it associates a skill with failure and stress instead of progress. This makes mistakes feel threatening, right? It causes

hesitation. We start to overthink. We get really tense. And all of this blocks learning and it makes it hard to execute with ease. Instead of adapting and improving, we reinforce these fear-based habits and that really slows down your progress. So you see how that works. So what are we supposed to do when this happens? What we need to do is intentionally shift our mindset from judgment to curiosity, to objectivity. We go from judging to assessing. And that's something we talk about all the time inside of the Music Master experience. This importance of self-compassion, of self-assessment versus self-judging. Because assessing implies curiosity. And when we shift into curiosity, everything changes.

Instead of seeing challenges as a proof that we're failing, we start to see them as information. So instead of shutting down when something isn't working, we start asking, what else could I try? And this is what high-level musicians do differently. They don't practice with judgment. Well, maybe they do, but not all the time. A lot of times they practice with curiosity. And curiosity is really the key to breaking the cycle. And if you don't believe me, look it up.

This is backed by science. Research shows that a curious mindset activates the release of dopamine. and dopamine is as you might know it neurotransmitter that reinforces these positive behaviors these things that we do that are good for us and it helps drive focus and curiosity and improvement and all of this enhances motivation and learning so when we shift from what's wrong with me to what's happening here the brain moves from a defensive state to a problem-solving mode. You can see how what's wrong with me is a personal attack. It's a judgment. And what's happening here is more objective. We are looking into a situation.

So this is one, as I said, one of our core mindset inside of the Music Mastery experience, because it is crucial in moving forward, in saving time. So when you're curious, you start experimenting and that strengthens your ability to think with more flexibility again we get that neuroplasticity but we also get so many more ideas to solve our problems and it allows us to adapt so when you feel like things are not working and you get curious you receive solutions another beautiful thing about curiosity is that it reduces stress literally when you're curious instead of frustrated your cortisol levels drop and your brain releases more dopamine the chemical that fuels motivation and reward and maybe the most important thing is that curiosity

re-engages your prefrontal cortex, the part of your brain responsible for focus. That's the part that recognizes patterns. It's the part of your brain that makes decision. So in other words, when you choose curiosity, you're not just changing your mindset. You're rewiring your brain to learn better, to problem solve faster. And then you can really start to make real progress. So I love the show Ted Lasso, which by the way, if you haven't watched it, you absolutely have to. It's my prescription, the prescription from Dr. Gauthier. And one of my favorite scenes is from season one, episode eight, when Ted is playing darts. And there's this moment where he pulls out a quote that hits just like lightning. He says, be curious, not judgmental.

And that's exactly the shift we need to bring into our practice. When we're judgmental, there is so much we don't see, right? Ted talks about how when people are judgmental, they underestimate him. And that's exactly what happens with us is when we're judgmental, we underestimate ourselves. We underestimate our abilities, our capacity, the things that we can do and where we can get. Judgment will hold you back as curiosity will propulse you forward. Let me give you some examples. Let's take two musicians practicing the same tough passage.

So let's say you have a blocked mindset. You would say something like, why can't I get this right? I've practiced this a hundred times. I don't know what to do anymore. Maybe I just don't, I just don't have what it takes. Like, I don't know what to do. When you adopt a breakthrough mindset, you start to tell yourself things like, hmm, okay, well, that was interesting.

And I'm wondering, why is that shift not feeling right? Like, I'm going to play it again. I'm going to see. Okay. What about my hand position? Hmm. Okay. How are my shifting fundamentals? Is there anything important that I'm forgetting? Do I actually know what I'm playing? Right? So for us string players, like, do I know the notes? Do I know what position I'm supposed to go into? Are there any string crossings? Maybe the problem is not in my left hand. Maybe the problem is in my articulation. What did I do in the past to fix something like that? Maybe I can slow all of this down. Or maybe the problem is I've practiced it too slow and what I've practiced doesn't translate in tempo. So you see how when you're in breakthrough mindset, you get curious, you ask

questions, you explore, you experiment. So one approach is going to shut down your learning and the other will open doors to solution. And I saw that in real life happen. I had a client a couple of years ago who was preparing for an audition. She was really struggling with a particular excerpt. And every time she played it, she would get really tense. She would always miss that one shift and she got really frustrated. And at first she was in a blocked mindset. It was so obvious. She kept saying things like, I just can't do this. This is not working. It never worked. I don't know what to do. So we started to work on it together and we flipped the approach. We went from judgment to curiosity, from judging to assessing. And we worked on the excerpt together

and I guided her on how to go from judging to getting curious. And we experimented with a lot of stuff. And we really paid a lot of attention to what she was telling herself, the words she was using as she was talking to herself. We made sure that the language remained neutral, that it remained objective, and that it remained productive. So she tried a bunch of stuff, but already by being in a more positive state of mind, things started to click into place. It's not that she couldn't do it, that she didn't have the skill to accomplish it. It's that the judgment was so strong, it was completely blinding her to finding the ways that would make it work for her. So we worked on it. And when her audition came, she walked in, felt confident, not because everything

was perfect, but because she knew how to stay engaged, how to problem solve, and how to adjust in real time. And that's the difference between a breakthrough mindset and a blocked mindset. That's what a breakthrough mindset can do for you and it's going to work for you. so let's recap if you've ever felt stuck if you ever felt frustrated or you feel like you're spinning your wheels in practice remember this being judgmental is going to keep you stuck and being curious is going to set you free and the key isn't to practice harder it's to practice with the right mindset. So pay attention to the words you're telling yourself. Do they sound harsh? Do they sound judgmental? Or are they objective? Are they light? Are they curious? Maybe even

playful? So here's my challenge for you. Next time something isn't working, catch yourself before frustration takes over. So instead of thinking, I'm terrible at this, ask yourself, what's one thing I could explore? Maybe you'll think it. Maybe you'll think I'm terrible at this. If that's the case, catch yourself. Totally okay to think that. This is a pathway that has been used a lot, so it feels very comfortable. So you might be thinking that very quickly, I'm terrible at this. When that happens, flip it. Ask yourself, what's one thing I could explore? And that one question could change everything. One of my favorite sentences is, what else? What else could I try? What else can I see? What else can I find?

so flip the script go from judgment to curiosity and if you're ready to take this work deeper and if you want a practice system that's going to help you improve faster feel more confident and walk into performances knowing you're fully prepared this is exactly the kind of transformation i help musicians create inside the music mastery experience I teach a complete system that takes the guesswork out of practice. So instead of feeling stuck, you know exactly how to move forward with confidence and clarity. That's what we do inside the Music Mastery Experience. So if you're curious about that and what that would look like for you,

go to mindoverfinger.com, book a free discovery call, and let's start building a practice strategy that's going to work for you. So that's what I have for you today. Thanks so much for spending this time with me. Keep going, keep growing. And remember, every challenge is an opportunity. You just have to stay curious. À bientôt.

And there you have it. Thank you so much for spending this time with me today. If you enjoyed this episode, I'd love it if you'd share with your friends and colleagues. Take a screenshot, post it on social media and tag me. I'm mind over finger everywhere. I always love hearing your favorite takeaways. And if you're ready to take your playing career to the next level, I'd love to invite you to join the Music Mastery Experience.

This is my signature group coaching program where we're going to dive deep into building your confidence and mastery and set you up for success and fulfillment in your life and career. You can find all the details at mindoverfinger.com. While you're there, check out the free downloads and online courses available to support your journey even further. And don't forget to subscribe to my newsletter so you never miss an update or a tool to help you thrive. Again, thank you for being here. Until next time, much love and à bientôt.