Imagine sitting down at your piano, putting your hands on the keys, and starting to play. Many piano students think that it takes years of study to be able to do this. They are completely wrong!
To learn to play what you feel, you don't need to know a lot about harmony or theory. All you need to be able to do is these two things:
- Think you're good enough.
- Think you already know enough
There are thousands of classically trained pianists who can play Rachmaninoff and Bach, but they can't play in a poetic way. Why? Because of the two ideas above! It's not enough to know how to play the piano.
For example, many people who want to be writers know how to make an interesting plot and how to write a story, but they won't be able to write that story until they stop criticising themselves and believe they are good enough to do it.
The same is true of music and all other forms of art. I can't tell you how many times I told myself the above two sentences because I really wanted to get over my fear of being able to play the piano and make music. I wanted to be able to play whatever I felt like playing at any given time. But this was hard to do as long as something inside me kept telling me I wasn't good enough. And believe me, we have all heard these voices in our heads at some point.
I eventually stopped needing other people's approval and realised that I was more important than the music. I found out that I knew more than enough to play the piano than I thought. I also came to think that I was good enough and that nobody knows everything or is a "perfect" player.
