We live in very fluid and evolving times and it feels like many people are in search of comprehensive support and guidance. Many of us are looking for new ways of living which honour a rich understanding of life and what it is to be human but which don’t shy away from the modern world, new innovations and new understandings. Many of the supports and institutions which we relied on in the past are changing or disappearing and people are often turning to older, time tested traditions and/or newer, often scientific understandings.
My approach to mentoring focuses on a few key pillars which we can discuss and work on.
1. Joy and enjoyment
Something I’ve been exploring and thinking about increasingly is the importance of joy and enjoyment. Generally in the West we come from a culture that has valued the work ethic above most things. Work and activity is very important of course and can provide fulfilment and many benefits to the rest of society. But sometimes it can create imbalances such as for those who work too hard and don’t take enough care of their own health or who work hard and become so narrow focused that they end up acquiring a huge share of what might otherwise be available for others to work for.
In some spiritual traditions there seems to be an understanding that underneath all our desires, our true essence is something like pure joy. (The idea is something like, when a desire is fulfilled and longing is temporarily suspended, we come in direct contact with our true essence of joy and therefore we think that it’s the fulfilment of the desire which has brought us joy when really it’s the cessation of longing that has allowed us to experience our fundamental nature.) Indeed many traditions even claim that the ultimate aim is to realise this true nature and experience uninterrupted joy.
Perhaps an alternative perspective would be that we are here to experience all the contrasts of a physical existence and the ups and downs of experiencing joys in many different manifestations and forms.
One of the challenges I’ve found as a piano teacher in recent times is that my interest has shifted towards encouraging people to experience more joy and less towards the mechanics of jazz piano and improvisation. I still enjoy making music and performing as a jazz pianist sometimes but generally I find it more interesting and fun to explore creativity more freely and follow different flows as I feel directed to at different times.
2. Exploration
Many of these topics are connected and interlinked and one of the ways that I think we can experience more joy is to give ourselves permission to explore more. It can often feel like we’re facing a competitive world and especially in music and art we have to become the best and specialise or else we’ll never ‘make it’. On the other hand, if we force ourselves to do things which we don’t feel inspired and excited to do, it can create negative feelings and frustration in our body when we force ourselves to work at our craft for the sake of ensuring that we’ll be successful enough.
Generally my encouragement is for people to explore music, explore jazz and jazz piano, explore art, explore creativity. Try different things, composing, improvising, solo creations, group creations, electronic music, different instruments, different styles, different techniques or other art forms. Try to follow your inspiration and excitement. I’ve generally found that when I was really focused on a grand goal like becoming a great jazz pianist, although it furnished some fruitful results, it can embed a degree of tension, frustration and disconnection into the relationship with the activity. Over time, I’ve found it more preferable to focus on the inspiration and excitement of trying new ideas and experiments with music or outside music which for me at least, feels like it brings more stimulation and joy into my body and the relationship with whatever activity I might be exploring.
3. Creativity
Again, creativity is strongly connected to exploration. One thing I’ve often found is that some people can feel blocked about creativity because we’ve grown up with certain ideas about creative geniuses in our culture.
From my understanding, it’s a completely natural state for the mind to come up with new ideas all the time. Indeed, most people are still living in a paradigm where the mind is coming up with an unlimited variety of how we might be in trouble or how there might be danger lurking round the corner. But when we can learn to assuage those ideas and calm the mind, we can focus on putting it towards more creative and positive use.
The other element is that, the mind is naturally very creative and constantly asking, ‘what if this’ or ‘what if that’ or ‘what would happen if’ or ‘imagine if’ or ‘what if I combined x with y’. But we also have a judgemental element that says ‘no that won’t work’ or ‘ no, that’s not good’ or ‘no, I would need this and this first’. One concept I like to work with here is to try and separate the two, generate ideas vs. using discernment to decide what is worth pursuing or worth keeping.
I also like to compare it to evolution. Instead of waiting for the muse to strike, it can be useful to generate a large range of creations and output and then decide what’s worth using and keeping. It’s generally better to try something and create something and get the creative juices flowing and then bring in the element of selection and discernment later. In other words, generate a fair degree of variations and then use the element of (natural) selection/discernment.
4. Play/playfulness
Another element which can be integral for creativity is play/playfulness. When I was studying jazz piano, I was often quite scared of doing improvising badly or getting in other people’s way. One day, I was in a group lesson and having a go at accompanying in a jazz setting and I was explaining that I found it difficult because I felt like I was getting in the way, knowing that when you accompany you’re supposed to be supporting the soloist and not being the main voice. But it meant that instead, what I played was unconfident and hesitant which ended up not being good accompaniment in a different kind of way. My teacher told me to accompany in the worst way I possibly could, break all the rules of ‘good’ accompaniment and this completely freed me up to try all sorts of different things like playing loud and discordantly. On paper it should have sounded bad but in reality, it added all sorts of interesting colour, vibrancy and confidence to the music.
Creativity needs this kind of atmosphere of play where people feel free to try things, experiment, fail and learn from failure. It’s totally natural for children to play and try things and we tend to assume that it’s not something adults are supposed to do. But actually, playing is so important for creativity, trying new approaches, creating lightness in an environment, not allowing things to become stuck and stagnant and making all sorts of aspects of life light and fun.
5. Permission (to do what excites you)
Often people know that they really want to be doing something exciting and creative and adventurous but society has generally impressed upon them that they’re supposed to be living in a certain way or that it’s hard to make a success of the things that they really want to do. Often the only thing that is needed from a mentor is permission to do those exciting things and try out those new inspirations. Often we sort of know that this is the path that we should be on and that will bring us more fulfilment but we just need that little push or encouragement that yes, I can do this and it’s ok to try and it IS going to reap benefits at some point even if it’s not in the short term or the medium term.
To compliment this, sometimes we also need some nuanced and more wide ranging direction that yes let’s do those exciting things but let’s also consider some wider implications. Do we need to do knuckle down and push hard towards our goals, do we need to take on some other work to support our passions or do we need to consider some wider responsibilities within society.
6. Goal setting and projects
Generally, I find that people are used to a very goal oriented approach to life and are used to working towards becoming a better musician or artist by working in an incremental and compartmentalised approach. But some people on the other hand, are naturally more creative and more exploratory and I find that I can provide more useful guidance for such people by encouraging more structure, more goals and step by step development. Equally, over time, my students can become familiar with more exploration and creativity and then it can be helpful to reintroduce more goal orientation and working towards completing small projects.