We Are All A Work In Progress

Last updated on: September 14, 2024 at 1:36 pm by Kathy King

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We Are All A Work In Progress 2024-09-14T13:36:20-04:00 Kathy King

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“Embrace being a work in progress. Life’s about progress, not perfection.”

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Nothing is ever perfect, but progress can be made

Last year I completely forgot Mother’s Day. I will be honest, I let it slip off my radar completely. When I think of the grand job of being a mother of six kids, I think, “Wow”… we made it. There was never perfection, there will never be perfection but rather, chances for growth. Each day is not a production, but rather an exercise in faithfulness and practice. I hope that I have imparted that to my children. There is no perfect mom, no perfect situation, but rather a chance to learn to be better. To pray more, to be more faithful in your path. Much like playing an instrument it is all about discipline and practice.

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Practicing builds the mind and the muscle memory

When you are playing a piece of written music there are notes on the page that the composer wrote with the intent of melody, harmony, theme, tempo, dynamics and many other musical terms. When you begin a piece you have a little menu on the top left corner of the page. This tells you the key that the piece will be played in, the beats per minute, the time signature and the dynamic (or how loud or soft the piece is played in.) That is just in the first measure before even playing the piece. After that there is the Treble Clef (the top) and the Bass Clef (the bottom hand) with their respective chords and finger patterns that bring the piece together. The key signature can change, the tempo can change at any given moment in the piece. There is so much cause for absolute perfection.

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At first progress was boring

In college when I studied piano, we were expected to practice a minimum of six hours a day. Each block of measures was meticulously practiced over and over. In fact, my professor had us practice a block of measures ten times a piece, if there was a mistake we had to start back over at one until we could reach ten times playing that particular passage perfectly. It was a practice of absolute dedication and routine. The first few times this practice was put into playing it was honestly one of the most frustrating times of playing the piano. You see, I have played the piano since I was seven years old. I was good enough right? The amount of years that had added up were 14 on this instrument. Perfection was achieved, right? The answer was no.

My professor taught the beauty of practice and progress

As my professor taught our class, even the most seasoned pianist or musician can indeed learn more even after playing the instrument for many, many years. This brings to mind how many composers of music in the past spent hour upon hour listening to their pieces, fleshing them out, making them sound the beautiful pieces we know and love today? Now that I have played the piano for 25 plus years the lens of time has lent itself to a great respect for the art. After you have practiced the piece over and over perfection may have been achieve technically on the piece; but then you can bring your own artistic interpretation to breath individualistic life into what was written on paper hundreds of years ago. So indeed, perfection is not what we should long for, but rather progress.

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Progress means we are still learning

Progress means we are still learning. Progress means that we are of the mindset that we can always bring a little more to the table of life, the universe and everything. That young woman who sat in the practice room hour upon hour playing portions of Bach, Beethoven, Chopin over and over until she thought she would scream. Now, she realizes that this progress was all part of the grand recipe of life. Keep working, keep learning. Keep making that progress. You will not only enhance your inner self but you will be an example to others. “Progress means getting nearer to the place you want to be.” C.S. Lewis.