Why is it that even after learning how to practice years ago, I feel I’m still faltering in my practice and attention to detail now? I’ll use the example of playing piano in this article, as that is the most applicable to me for practicing.
For the first 6 years of playing piano (ages 6-12), I was able to improve through God-given skill and consistent practice. My practices were not very long (20-30 minutes), but I did it every day. It was a part of school, so my work for the day wasn’t complete until I had practiced.

For the next 4-5 years, I had to go through a phase where merely practicing consistently wasn’t enough. I had to up the amount of time spent practicing (1-1.5 hours per day, sometimes 2 hours), but that wasn’t enough. To get to where I wanted to go, I had to learn how to practice. If I had to describe it now, I’d say that practicing is deliberate, focused time spent on a specific subject, with a goal in mind that you are aiming at. This means that playing through a piano piece is not the same as practicing it. Drilling a specific part of a piece is practice. After learning this and the improvement that came along with it, I assumed I knew how to practice and implemented it regularly.

Now, my piano habits are different. I still practice for about the same length of time, but I only have a lesson every two weeks instead of the weekly schedule used previously. Now, when I come to my biweekly lessons, my teacher finds that there are details that I had missed. This includes everything from missed notes (which are common) to dynamics, cleanliness, and pedaling. Why is this, if in theory I’m still practicing the same amount of time and (hopefully) the same way. My working theory is this: what if the reason I thought I knew how to practice before was because my teacher was pushing me in how to practice? What if the motivation and attention to detail were coming from her (particularly the latter), and now that I’m much more left to my own devices to practice my standards have dropped, assuming she’ll help me along as she always has, and that the piece come to the level that it always comes to before a performance? I felt very motivated to achieve back when I was more seriously pursuing the instrument, so perhaps part of this hypothesis is wrong, but I think there is at least a bit of truth in it. It would help to explain why things have executed more sloppily in recent days. Another aspect to this could be that I don’t know how to hold myself to as high a standard as she has held me to. It’s not just because I’ve become lazy, but also because I’ve never had to stand on my own two feet to perform at a high level before.

What is to be learned from this? I must learn to apply the same practice for myself that had been applied for me out of necessity before. I couldn’t meet the standards set for me without this type of practice. Since becoming a moderate to advanced level pianist, it’s been difficult for me to find the proper motivation to succeed. Is success defined by the people impressed? Although many find it tempting to say yes, the bar must come from elsewhere. Success should be defined by the level of excellence achieved. Excellence trumps popularity. If the first 5 years involved consistent practice, and the 5 years after that involved learning what deliberate practice is and how to do it correctly, perhaps the next 5 years of learning to practice and succeed involve me learning how to apply this standard of success because it’s the right thing to do. Not living up to my potential is possibly the worst thing I could do, so playing well (but not excellently) is still failure. Excellence is hard to achieve, but the fact that I’m capable of achieving it means it is my duty to aim at excellence, even if there is no motivation put on me from outside sources. Laziness should be no excuse.

Achieving excellence requires diligence, hard work, and a system. Most of the practice in my life has had its goal defined the moment I sat down to practice; “What should I work on today?” I must now instead have defined goals for the piece I’m playing and know what it will take to achieve them. This includes a timeline for adding in complexities to the piece. Perhaps I’ll analyze it first, then learn notes, then add in color, dynamics, and pedal before learning the notes is complete, and then before those are at a high level begin recording myself and memorizing (I had grown the habit of waiting until a piece is near performance level to begin analyzing myself, which I don’t think is a good strategy). That’s just an example, but it nicely outlines the type of thing I’m looking for. A practice schedule for the week may also be helpful, but I’ll need ways to implement it properly. Previous attempts that this have failed because they didn’t provide much value. Another fault in my practice is that it is easily interrupted and distractible. This is another thing that will have to change. Finally, I’ll need a consistent way to review my progress myself, not just by my teacher. Audio recordings are helpful, but a list of things to listen for is also required. Waiting for issues to jump out at me won’t be enough.

These are just my current thoughts on how to improve my attention to details. I don’t plan to implement these things immediately. I need to keep iterating on my thoughts to find the proper strategy.