The Hidden Fuel Behind Sustainable Practice as an Adult

Jaymie’s Story

I have loved working with Jaymie on both voice and piano, and when she shared how lessons and classes impacted her, I really wanted to share her story with my current students and you, dear reader.

If you’ve ever felt like you “didn’t practice enough,” you’re a “bad learner” or “lazy student” because you missed practice this week, “you didn’t practice the right things,” or “you practiced but you’re not good enough yet,” you’re not alone. Every musician encounters these self-judgments and feelings. While they are tough, they do not have to be baked into learning and practicing, though many of us don’t know another way. 

Jaymie’s story with piano began like many adults: early childhood lessons driven more by expectation than personal desire. As a child, piano felt like something assigned rather than chosen. Later experiences ranged from uninspiring instruction to fear-based teaching, where technical correctness overshadowed enjoyment. While these experiences built some skill, they also created stress, perfectionism, and the sense that music had to be “earned” through performance. 

Everything shifted when Jaymie encountered a more balanced teacher who blended structure with curiosity and encouraged playing music she actually loved. For the first time, piano became connected to joy, emotion, and self-expression rather than obligation. That spark stayed with her, even through long gaps away from the instrument. 

Years later, Jaymie told me that my Austin adult piano group class helped reignite her relationship with piano in a completely new way. Instead of pressure and perfection, she experienced music as exploratory, low-stakes, and enjoyable. Group piano felt refreshing because students were immediately making music together rather than endlessly preparing to someday make music. 

One of the biggest breakthroughs came around perfectionism. Jaymie described feeling frozen by comparing herself to a past “better” version of her playing. If she couldn’t play at that level immediately, it felt safer not to try at all. In one lesson, I invited her to experiment with a radically smaller and kinder approach: sit down, play just three notes, notice how you feel, and allow that to be enough. Sometimes three notes became ten minutes. Sometimes it stayed three notes. Either way, it counted. 

Another important shift came when we explored how much self-worth had become tied to one difficult piece of music. I asked her who she would be if she never learned that piece. The question helped create space between identity and performance. This shift helped untangle piano from self-worth. Instead of asking, “Am I good enough?” the question became, “What feels enjoyable about this that I’d like to explore more of?  What feels interesting to me today?” 

That self-compassionate process unexpectedly led to more progress, not less. Pieces that once felt impossible started making sense naturally through consistent, low-pressure returns to the instrument. 

Jaymie also realized that music doesn’t have to be perfect to be meaningful. She shared a moment of practicing messily at home, laughing through mistakes and enjoying herself, when her boyfriend walked in and said, “Wow, that sounds great.” It was a powerful reminder that joy, presence, and energy can be felt by others even when the notes aren’t flawless. 

Today, piano has become something deeper: a form of embodiment similar to dance or voice. Rather than evaluating herself from the outside, she’s learning to experience music from the inside — through movement, sound, feeling, and connection. What once felt like pressure now feels like reclamation. 

This is something we now purposely walk through in class: what fuels your desire to play piano? What kind of fuel are you using? Is this a fuel you’ll enjoy using for the rest of your life? 

As both a teacher and performer, guilt, shame, and self-worth being tied to “how well I did” or “how much I practiced” were not sustainable fuels. The fuel to practice had to be just as enjoyable as the outcome of achievement. 

For some, they’ll start piano class and know how to access the most sustainable fuels for practice growth, have few external or internal obstacles, and move along swimmingly.

That’s not the majority, though. You will get busy, forget to take care of what lights you up, come back to class, remember how much you love it, and find your way again. Each time, the ability to recognize your innate desire to create, to learn (or whatever your fuels are), becomes easier and easier to access. 

And when you see a singer or pianist with breathtaking skill, you’ll often notice what they aren’t listening to: what the audience wanted, what their most critical self wanted, or what the past voices of their parents wanted. Their secret is that they listened to how their own mind, heart, and body wanted to make music — and kept going in those directions. This is the practice. 

Jaymie’s story reflects what many adults discover: progress that can continue indefinitely doesn’t come from self-criticism. It comes from curiosity, consistency, and permission to begin imperfectly. Piano can become more than a skill — it can become a relationship with joy, creativity, and self-trust. 

I’m not interested in getting a result out of you at all costs. I’m interested in us collaborating so your relationship with music, creativity, progress, learning, and your ability to enjoy being alive continually improves over the course of your lifetime. 

And this seems so obvious in hind-sight: turns out the musicians and singers with longest successful careers were the ones who practiced from sustainable, enjoyable fuels.