Just Sit in the Chair

If you have a goal of practising music or making art more often, you need to be able to train yourself to be able to hop to it even when you don’t feel like it. A big part of doing this is to just sit in the chair. It’s the cornerstone habit behind most work.

For a guitarist the chair is like a mat to a yogi. Ideally you would be able to play guitar in any chair, but the problem is that if I play guitar on the couch it often gets uncomfortable quickly. And if I choose to do laptop work at my kitchen table without the wireless mouse, the same thing happens. So there is definitely a purpose for training yourself to go to your mat.

Where is your chair located? For me the chair that I sit in when I play guitar is in a closet. So I have to pull it out. Now I don’t have to necessarily play guitar when I sit in that chair, especially if it’s been quite a few days that I haven’t played. In those moments of creative stasis, the Most Important Action (MIA) is to get that chair out of the closet and master that skill alone.

After that has been established, I would say the next most important action is to be able and sit there without tension. We carry so much tension with us to our chairs and mats. However you let tension go is up to you, but the most common way is to take a few breaths and relax.

You might think this is nothing to celebrate but it is! Instead of being in this chair you could be on a couch watching Netflix.

After the habit of sitting in the chair is mastered, you may move on to other small actions such as picking up your instrument, or playing just one note.

The thing I like about this method the most is it doesn’t rely on any grand vision boarding exercises. We are moving towards action. Removing the air in the jar between you and the inner critic as much as possible.

So the next time you’re stuck, and it’s been a few days since you practiced anything, sit in the chair.