Incremental progress is the goal

When I think about practicing an instrument I often think of people that practiced for many many hours a day. 7, 8, 10 hour practice sessions. That’s what comes to mind. I’d never be able to do that. In college I was able to practice 3 to 5 hours a day, but now I have lots of other stuff going on, where that becomes less manageable.

I’ve also learned a bit about practicing since then. Practicing for 3 hours can be great … only if you continually do it. Practicing every day or every other day is more important than the total time of your practice sessions. If you only practice once a month and practice for 10 hours that won’t be as useful as practice every day for 20 minutes. By the end of the month you’ll have practice 10 hours, but doing it every single day will be more useful than one large practice session.

Make your goal incremental progress. Continual little steps. Rather than large steps.

Practicing every day, even if for only 5 or 10 minutes. That’ll help more than large practice sessions that are much more spread out. You’ll get rusty. You’ll need to review ideas you’ve already worked on.

Practicing regularly will keep everything fresh.

ISJ