Using Values and Unchanging Principles #values #principles #purpose #selfimprovement

I'm not an artist, at least not your creative painter or amazing animator or a profound sculptor. I did study music though, and studying music for two years as a music major helped me to understand that there are a number of core foundational principles. I like to call them core principles. These are unyielding rules and restrictions that will lead to success when followed and utilized, or failure when ignored and flaunted. One of these rules is the rule that all athletes and musicians come to know very well after hours and hours of practice and rehearsal or workouts. Muscles matter, and muscles don't just matter, they really matter. The time that it takes to build and establish muscles in whatever capacity the muscles are needed is not something that can be cheated or circled around. For example, my freshman year as a music major, I wanted to put on a recital as many musicians do. I prepared for hours and hours and hours in the practice rooms, spending the necessary time, as I thought, to develop the muscles necessary to perform the music I had selected in a professional and uplifting way. I probably spent between four and six hours per day for several months in a cramped little cinderblock practice room in the basement of the Yut building on the campus of Central Missouri State University, practicing my brains out. And I enjoyed almost every single minute of it. I really did. Even though I'd spent what I thought was the time necessary to build the muscles, I hadn't spent enough time to build the muscles necessary for the type of high-level recital I dreamt of. Now don't get me wrong, the recital was a success, and I felt like everything went very well, but I did not have the muscles, the chops, the embouchure necessary to play all the high notes, and with all of the volume I had hoped and practiced for. I had to adjust some of the phrases during the recital to take the sections of the recital down an octave, so that I could finish in a way that was appropriate. For the muscles necessary, at least for the muscles that I really needed to play up to my potential, it would take years of practice rather than just the months I'd invested. So here is the foundational principle. This is the rule. This is the value. Muscles take time to build. For a young freshman trumpet player, a few hundred hours of practice is a great start. But to get to expert level, tens of thousands of hours are necessary. Values. These are things that are unwavering, unchanging principles. Principles that are proven time and time again, but not in the popular court of public opinion. Although we do see many of these values and principles demonstrated, or the lack thereof, and displayed in the public, but they are proven in the lives of people willing to adhere to them, to test them. These individuals prove their values, their principles, in their own lives. They prove them by their life choices.