Hello everyone! All the best and thanks for stopping by!
Music is a beautiful thing. And I love to learn music (most of the time).
There’s plenty of ways to learn music. But this article looks at learning music from a self-development standpoint. And moreover it looks at learning music from the fundamentals of self-development, as posited by Steve Pavlina in his book, Personal Development for Smart People.
This article is a work in progress that I started writing several years ago. I am not an expert on the subject but have written my current thoughts. Please feel free to come to your own conclusions.
What I wrote in 2011! I am adding to the article and editing it, too in late 2020
Table of Contents
About Personal Development for Smart People by Steve Pavlina
This article is based on some of the major ideas discussed in a book entitled Personal Development for Smart People (affiliate link to Amazon).
The book suggests that aligning oneself with truth, love and power results in a meaningful, beautiful, good life.
Steve Pavlina suggests that to grow as a person, one should align oneself with truth, love, and power. He states (in the book) that after reading probably 100s of books on self-development, he found 3 common themes that all the books had in common – truth, love and power.
I guess you could say that author, Steve Pavlina, is describing the metalanguage of personal growth, or the fundamental “particles” of personal development.
Steve argues that personal growth is fundamentally a combination of truth, love, and power. So far this idea holds true for me (and still does in 2020)! I received a copy of the book with the implicit agreement that I’d write something relating learning music and personal development. It’s a very good book. I believe that aligning one’s self with truth, love and power contributes to meaningful, beautiful, good music, and is a great way to improve other parts of one’s life.
The 3 main parts to self-development
Truth
Truth is truth. Perception. Awareness. Feeling. Discovering. Open-mindedness. Everyone has their own way to perceive and understand truth. Listen.
Love
Love is love. Of self. Of people. Of nature. Good intentions. Higher goals. Kindness. Compassion.
Love is connecting with someone, something or yourself in a positive way.
On a side note, I always like to remind myself that philosophy is the love of knowledge (which is sort of another way of saying truth)
Power
Power is empowerment of self and others. The ability to do what you want. To have your own freedom. To be strong and healthy. True power does not corrupt a person because to be corrupted is to lose one’s power and to succumb to forces that are destructive of one’s self.
Learning music in alignment with truth, love and power
Based on the Steve book, I think it’s possible to look at learning anything and/or becoming better at any skillset through the lenses of truth, love and power. He suggests that the combination of truth, love and power actually lead to the greatest personal developments.
Therefore, let’s look at how truth, love and personal empowerment can help one to learn music. And become a “better” (maybe more realized would be more appropriate) musician. And create beautiful music. And to experience amazing life and music. And to share that with others!
In short – the relationship between learning and self-development seems like something that exists, since when you learn something you are developing yourself. So therefore:
To learn well means to learn with truth, love and power.
So here’s some ideas/brainstorms/observations about truth, love and power in music! Please let me know your thoughts, ideas, comments, and questions by leaving a comment below or contacting me. Thanks and all the best on your musical journeys!
Truth in learning music
To understand something is to see, hear, feel the nature of some thing. Three big truths/realizations that I encounter in learning guitar and music are:
- technical knowledge
- knowing ones current abilities and their limits
- being aware of the musical situation
Technical knowledge (in this case) means knowing how to tune your instrument, to play in time, to play harmonies and melodies, etc.
If you understand and admit your current abilities and limits, you can better express yourself in the moment. And it’s the first step to improving what you don’t know how to do.
A lot of people don’t want to admit they can’t really play something (myself included). Instead of admitting the truth and then truly learning it, they just keep making the same mistakes.
Being aware of the current situation requires a person to be in touch with the current state of the music. I think this means grooving, listening to others, listening to yourself. Most importantly, being in the flow of the music.
Wanting to improve but not knowing how
Most people realize when they can’t do what they want or they didn’t play how they wanted. They may get frustrated with themselves and their perception of the current situation.
Just because someone knows what they want to do better doesn’t mean they know how to actually do it better. But it’s the first step to getting there. Once a person admits they don’t know something, and that they want to learn, well then they’re ready to learn.
In other words, one should be glad that one can see what can be improved. And once you know how to improve something you actually have to improve it.
Acting upon one’s knowledge can take a lot of skill and personal empowerment, too. You need a place to practice, preferably without distractions. You need the time and energy to focus on practicing, too. Finding practice space/time may sometimes be easy to find, but the actually act of learning may sometimes prove challenging as well.
How Being Truthfully can help you learn faster
Here’s an example of how truth applies to learning:
Say you played a song in 5 (like Take Five). It didn’t work out so well because you have never played in 5 before.
- Realizing the situation – you realize you could play in 5 a lot better.
- Figuring out solutions – you decide you are going to practice with a metronome in 5 and also along to songs in 5 to get better.
- Taking action – you actually practice what you have been planning to practice and you practice for 10 minutes a day for a month
Just in terms of learning music, being able to understanding where you are and then how to get to the next step can sometimes both take a great understanding of music. And the beauty of learning is that then you’ll also learn how to learn better in the future, too.
Learning from the Greats, Teachers, Friends, Oneself
Finding a teacher who has already experienced learning what you want to learn may also be an important part of anyone’s musical journey. For me, I’ve sorted learned things “on my own”. But I haven’t really invented that much about music. I’ve simply learned ideas from others. Great musicians on records. Teachers. Videos. Friends who play music. Of course, I have to make all those ideas my own in order to play them. But my point is that most everyone learns from someone else, rarely is a person truly self-taught.
Love in learning music
Love learning music! And intend to send out good vibes through music, since music is vibrations anyways! Enjoy the musical journey!
Find out what music you love and seek to learn it.
When one plays, try be in a state of lovingness.
Be compassionate with yourself.
Some things might take time to learn.
Send out love into the world through your instrument.
Don’t wait until you feel you are technically proficient to send out the love, just send out the love and let the other stuff follow.
- Practicing Gratefulness (as a musician)
- Lead with Heart! Verbal Cues to Improve (Guitar) Posture
- Kindness in Learning Music
Power in learning music
Imagine the feel and sound of great music in the present and future.
And value all of the important elements that better prepare you to create good music. Enough sleep. Good food. A clear mind. Exercise. A commitment to playing from your heart.
Use self-discipline to work on the musical problems that you encounter. The conscious effort of developing one’s personal strength so that one can better learn and play music. Continually striving to express your ideas.
To dedicate time, energy and mental focus to music, and the continual process of learning and developing musical knowledge, skills and art all require different degrees of personal power and freedom.
I see power (in the context of truth, love and power) as the engine that powers the boat that takes you on the journey. Love is the rudder that guides you in the right directions. And truth is the compass and binoculars that allow you to see where you are and where are going.
Examples of How Personal Empowerment Helps in Learning
Here’s some more concrete examples that may require empowering oneself in order to learn more deeply about music:
- To go to a concert, but in order to get to the concert, you must overcome all sorts of obstacles. Maybe the cost of the ticket, transportation, other commitments. Sorting all this stuff out so you can see your favorite band/show requires skills but all elbow grease and self-determination.
- Creating an album. Staying the course (or following the course) to get to the studio and put together all the parts. All this takes many things. But it does take a musician who has the power to make it happen.
- Overcoming a possible blocking point in technique. This can require great patience and understanding. But all a lower level of simmering energy where the musician know when to revisit the challenge, but also the energy to (over time) build up enough practice dedicated to melt the problem spot away
Conclusion – Practice Makes Progress!
Truth, love and power are important aspects of life. I’ve learned a lot by thinking about anything related to learning, growing and developing by trying to understand how my current challenges relate to truth, love and power.
May we all find the strength to overcome our fears and doubts so that our beautiful music flows freely.
This article talks about truth, love and personal power. But I haven’t even spoken about courage, unity, and authority. And finally intelligence. Courage is the combination of love and power. Unity – truth and love. And authority – truth and power. The combination of all three, according to Steve is true intelligence.
To read more about some of the general ideas discussed above, go to stevepavlina.com.
Thanks and best wishes.