Drum Science

I was reading Jon Acuff’s latest book “Quitter” today, and one thing that really stuck out was something that I’d heard before, and that really resonated with me today for some reason. His point was that quality is secondary to quantity, which is especially relevant to practicing a musical instrument. It is far too easy to get caught up in the perfectionist mindset. By focusing too much on quality in your practice, you may become paralyzed to the point of giving up. By shifting your focus towards quantity of practice time, you give yourself permission to grow slowly and make mistakes, two things that are key to mastery. Without making mistakes, there is nothing to improve, and improvement is the object of mastery.

As far as drums go, I’ve found that my hand technique is definitely a limiting factor at the moment in my mastery of the instrument. Tommy Igoe’s “great hands for a lifetime” dvd has been helping me a lot in really dialing in my hand technique. With consistent practice I think following his program will translate to some serious technical progress.

On the fitness side, I have been working out of a sort of RKC program minimum, which consists of  kettlebell swings and turkish get ups as the meat of the program, plus some various joint mobility and flexibility exercises that I feel are helpful. The turkish get up is really an excellent exercise for shoulder health as well as hip functionality, two things that I need a lot of work on, especially on the left side for some reason. The kettlebell swing is an awesome full body ballistic movement and is a blast to perform.

On the nutrition side, I’ve been doing the paleo thing with pretty fair compliance, for a while I was still having a pizza every other week or so, but each time after eating a pizza I’ve felt so terrible that I’ve decided to stop with that altogether. For a once in a while cheat meal I might have some ice cream or some french fries or something but I’m gonna stay away from the bread products, I just feel better without them. I tried some coconut milk in a smoothie I made today, and it was not bad at all. Its got a ton of calories but isn’t really all that filling… very curious.

I’ve been working out of the Total Immersion book and dvd, trying to teach myself to swim better, so far it has been rewarding if not somewhat tedious, but reading the total immersion book is very inspiring. The book goes into great depth on the process of skill acquisition and mastery as well as how important technique and efficiency are to swimming, apparently swimming is 70% technical fluidity, and the book details how to retrain your nervous system and your body to be more fishlike in the water, “reshaping the vessel” is more important than just putting a bigger engine on a boat that is non hydrodynamic.

So that’s what has been on my mind tonight, hey hey!