31st October 2016 - Keep it up

This was a hard week for practice.

On Tuesday I did my mini-tour of Ireland to pick up the flute and Thur/Fri I was away from home for both nights.  Going from work to another house means (for me) I can't practice.  You can't just say .. hi .. yes I'll a have a cup of tea .. but first I have to tinkle on my flute for an hour.

That really presents a problem - not when it's one day but when it's a few.

This presents a few questions.
Is there a 'schedule' to all of this?  Can you fall behind?  How to recover when you fall behind?
How to keep it up?

There isn't a schedule but there is a schedule.  I'm going for a new tune each week.  I'd be disappointed not to keep that up.  It would be too easy to let one week flow into the next without a new milestone.
So really this is about setting a milestone (a new tune) and reaching it.
The achievement of that encourages the next week and not getting it discourages.

How to recover.  My first guess is to do things to avoid falling behind.  After last week I've a few ideas on that.

First - try to conquer the new tune quicker in the week.  Even if it isn't being perfectly played .. even if slowly .. it's better to have the tune worked out on Tuesday night rather than be putting part one together perfectly on Thursday then moving to part two on Friday.  Even if not perfect it's a lot better solid progress quickly than perfect slowly.

Second - if you miss time you have to pay it back quickly.  By Saturday I'd not completed a good practice for three days that week.  I did play each day .. it just wasn't the usual session.  If you're behind pay the time back as soon as you can to avoid the problem getting bigger.

Third -  be ok with it.  If life gets in the way don't worry too much about it.  Just start again.  Don't feel too bad and just start again.

Lastly - whatever happens - keep it up.