Lecture: Stress and Focus

On the questionnaire, you are asked some questions about the concepts in the lecture or on this page. Before completing the last 6 questions, please do a focus exercise atleast 4 times in one week.
On this page, there are three exercises to try, including two audio focus exercises made by Adwin Konsten, one on breathing and one on walking.
Please try these and choose your favorite one,and do it at least 4 times this week, before answering the last 6 questions in the questionnaire.

Concepts from the lecture:
Stress
Stress reactions are built in to our mind and body to protect us. Yet they can be activated at unhandy moments causing tension that can disrupt us from giving our best performance. Studies show that short-term stress not only charges muscles with extra tension, but also can alter the chemistry of our bodies, changing the balance of our hormones temporarily. Running on our nerves over longer periods can tire us out.

The stress hormones are meant to help us in a crisis, and, if they do not cause us to stiffen unnecessarily, can improve performance. We do not need to be afraid of what we feel. In fact, experienced musicians say that a bit of nervousness before a performance is to be expected and improves their playing. So, in this case, stress helps focus. It only becomes a problem if the stress reactions affect our functioning, our playing or singing. In those moments, stress gains the upper hand.

That’s why a healthy communication between mind and body is essential for performers to master. Science has now proved that we can learn to maintain our balance by practicing over time. There are thousands of apps for mindfulness, meditation, yoga, tai chi, and other forms of body/mind practices, some better than others. How to choose? At school you are offered courses in these topics and lessons in the Alexander Technique, which also address these issues so important to musicians, who use their minds and bodies in their art.

In this lesson we learn something about the nature and origins of stress, the importance of self-monitoring and social intelligence, how repetition is required to learn new habits, and the effect of positive or negative feedback on our performance.

We are very lucky as musicians! Music itself has a meditative, coordinating quality if we are calm enough to be open to its message. It gives us a reason to focus, something outside of ourselves to strive to meet, and motivation to learn more about the relationship between music, mind and body.

Remind yourself, through this link, of Why is stress management useful?

Watch this short film about stress:
The fight, flight, freeze response

Social Intelligence:
The basis of social intelligence is being able to monitor and take care of yourself and others. In this film, you can learn about what being mature in this is like. You will need to watch this film and refer to it in your answers to the questonnaire.
20 signs you are emotionally mature

In order to practice lowering stress, focusing or monitoring ourselves we need to practice. Watch this short film on the nature of education:
Why We Only Learn When We Repeat

Self-fulfilling prophecy
How we perform and learn can be affected by what is expected of us, by ourselves and by our teachers. In this film, you learn about a study done in the 1960’s and repeated many times in may settings. It tells about what happens when a teacher thinks a student is a “late bloomer.” A late bloomer is someone who seems not to be functioning at a high level in their learning, but blooms in time to be a excellent student. If teachers are told (randomly) that certain students are late bloomers, they treat them differently. The study shows that this changed treatment actually makes students do better, and score higher on IQ tests.
The Pygmalion Effect and the Power of Positive Expectations