If You Can Take That First Step, You Can Surely Go Further

While there are people who say "I want to do it someday" but never actually start, there are others who quickly buy the tools or sign up for a class and start right then and there. What is the difference?

I wanted to tell you to "get on stage sooner"

The other day, I published my first book, "A Guide to Continuing and Improving Musical Instruments for Working Adults: From Building a Practice Habit to Deepening Musicality" (hereinafter referred to as "this book"). It is released as a Kindle e-book, and I have also written some behind-the-scenes stories in a bonus article titled "Production Notes".

The purpose of this is not to promote the book, but to talk about an important perspective that occurred to me while writing it.

In this book, as one of the important ways of thinking for improving on an instrument, I suggest that you stop dreaming of "wanting to play in front of people once I get better" and instead, once you can play a piece all the way through, just take the plunge and get in front of people at that point. Suitable venues for this include recitals for piano students and their families, or open mic events where you can freely bring your instrument to a cafe and play in front of a microphone.

In these places, everyone understands that "sometimes you make mistakes." There are other beginners there who have just started playing, feeling the same nervous excitement as you. Since you aren't charging people high prices to listen to your performance, there is no need to be overly sensitive about making mistakes.

Even so, you will likely be extremely nervous at first. Your fingers might even shake. That is perfectly fine. The teachers who teach at music schools, and the people performing happily in front of others at events without any hesitation, were surely the same way at the beginning.

About the existence of people who will accept you

A lucky coincidence played a role in my reaching the idea of "getting in front of people sooner." It was that I was blessed with very warm relationships within an Irish music community near Nagoya. There were many people who helped me when I was a beginner, such as incredibly skilled musical friends who would play with me, and cafe owners who loved music and would offer me performance opportunities even though they knew I was an amateur. I still have nothing but gratitude for this.

There is a fact that people are surprisingly kind, and this is probably the same in your surroundings. However, since this also involves the coincidence of encounters and environment, I am not going to say that everyone can receive the same level of support.

Even so, I feel that the importance of having the courage to step out in front of people cannot be ignored. Besides music, there are people who express themselves in various ways, such as writing or drawing illustrations, and "in front of people" in these fields in this Reiwa era mainly means activities on the internet. There are people who see your work through social media and the like, and if things go well, some of them will become your fans. Being published in commercial magazines that line bookstore shelves or releasing a book under your own name is a story for a little further down the road.

Becoming a professional in any field is less about the level of the creative expression itself (though that is necessary) and more about choices in life. Whether you can become a professional or not is not the kind of thing that passes judgment on you when you truly feel you want to do something.

If you play an instrument, you will make musical friends to play with, and there will be an audience that enjoys listening to your performance. If you draw illustrations, people who like or share your work on social media will appear, and you can connect with friends who love drawing so much they can't help it.

Wouldn't you want that? Naturally, only those who have the courage to take that first step can obtain it.

Those on stage are not special people

If we think about whether or not one can take that first step, what separates it?

Honestly, I don't know what this is either. Personally, I think it doesn't matter how I am seen by others, what they think, or what they might say. What I want to do is far more important.

However, there are things inside me that I "know logically I shouldn't worry about, but I can't help but worry about anyway." If there is a feeling of embarrassment about showing others what you have done, or a fear of failure or criticism, then that is a real thing for that person. If you tell someone who is afraid that "it's not scary," and they could easily dismiss it, no one would have a hard time.

Even so, I think there is something that can be said by someone who has actually seen the world beyond that. It is the feeling of "Oh, is that all it was!" People who do things in front of others are not special people. They just worked hard, accumulated experience, and at some point, gathered the courage to step onto that stage. This is not much different from what you have actually done in your studies or work.

Many of the people reading this article are likely working adults. Remember your job hunting as a new graduate. Weren't you extremely nervous? Weren't you crushed by anxiety about the future every day? Even so, you accomplished it. You can do it once you try. Even the ordinary middle-aged men and women you see at the station have all gone through that.

Of course, there will be failures. And that hurts quite a bit. You could even say it hurts a lot. I don't intend to lie to you here. Even so, it is something worth doing.

"Nothing is ever wasted" is not just a platitude.

Just as I used the example of a very ordinary job search to think about "what you really want to do," human life experience can be applied in many ways depending on how you think about it.

For example, speaking about myself, when I think about "doing something in front of others," a 2x2 matrix is formed by online vs. offline and hobby vs. profession. When I learned programming at home in my teens, it was an online x hobby activity, but this changed to offline x profession when it became my job as a systems engineer. The music activities I started after becoming an adult fall under offline x hobby. And now, I am seriously engaged in writing like this, and since I was able to publish the first book I mentioned at the beginning of this article, this is an area I am currently trying to establish in the online x profession domain.

These experiences are all connected within me. If you think about writing and programming, you could say, "They actually have commonalities in terms of organizing and describing thoughts." However, playing an instrument doesn't seem particularly related, does it? Even so, when viewed in the broad category of working hard to master something, it is definitely connected. Each of these things had a first step. And now, for me, they have all become very ordinary things, no different from drinking coffee every day.

The perspective of a 2x2 matrix has come up now. This is also a way of thinking that often appears in business books and the like. This is common knowledge for people who work with their heads, and I think I learned it in a textbook on business administration or a similar field when I was a student, but I can't remember exactly. Now, this is useful as a tool for what I really want to do: "conveying something to people." Not as a special tool, but as one of the very natural tools, just like using the Japanese language.

Nothing is wasted. This is not a forced connection. I truly believe that.

That was a long story! Let me summarize!

I feel like the thread of the story has scattered a bit, but this is what I want to convey. Let's start early. People who have stepped out in front of others are not special; you can do it too. Let's be brave. Nothing you have done will be wasted.

In the end, the message I want to convey through my writing is just that, and I just keep writing by connecting it to individual themes such as instruments, work, or topics of human relationships and psychology. The world is complex, and nothing is simple and clear, but there are not that many things that are truly important.

Did you feel anything? Please do it. I am rooting for you. Let's do our best.

One last word. If you buy and read the book linked at the beginning, I will be incredibly happy! (It was an advertisement after all!)

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