Picking Up the Pieces: A Piano Practice Journal

I mentioned yesterday that life has been hard lately. It is due to a number of things. One of the results, or one of the causes, maybe, is that I have been so angry lately. Furious. Bitter. I honestly feel like I hate everyone. I don't, but there are times when I just want to start screaming, or beating my head against the wall, or throwing plates at the wall. There are a few things that help. Exercise is one, so I've made an effort to hit the gym most days since I got home from North Carolina. And, of course, there is piano. Whether I'm just moodling (musical doodling) on a chord progression or drilling a tricky passage, piano helps me to take my focus off my anger. If I can get some piano time and some exercise time into a single day, then I'll likely make it to the next day without feeling like my head will explode. But then there is another thing that makes me really angry: when I'm playing piano and someone in the family yells at me to "turn it down" ...

Life has been really hard lately. I'm not going to go into details here ... it's just been really hard. Following our 10-day vacation, I ended up having to be away from home for another week due to a family emergency. I got back last Thursday, worked from home on Friday because I was still a wreck, and sort-of recovered over the weekend. I'm still so tired--exhausted, really--and just when I think I can take a breath, something else happens to amp up the stress and anxiety levels. It also hasn't been a great month for piano. I got back from vacation on July 30, ready for a productive August, but I had to leave home after several jet-lagged recovery days. Oh, and a friend of mine visited for a week, which was great, but that also meant I didn't practice much. All in all, it's been nearly a month since I've had a good, focused piano practice. I was able to practice a little on Friday, but I found myself at a loss. I was in kind of an "Okay, now where was ...

I have been dealing with a lot of anxiety lately. I've had issues with the depression in the past, but anxiety has never been that much of a problem for me ... until now. Some of it has to do with work stress, some has to do with money stress, and some is just plain old life stress. While the cost of piano lessons adds somewhat to the money stress, the escape of practice and the anticipation of the next lesson have helped me make it through these last few weeks. I'm finding that I tend to hit a low point on Wednesday evenings. Let's see why: On Tuesdays, I have a full day of work, including a required meeting at noon. On Tuesday evenings, I am the leader for a combined Tiger/Wolf/Bear Cub Scout Den. On Wednesdays, I have a full day of work, including a required meeting from 12:30 to 2:00. On Wednesday evenings, I volunteer to teach a pre-school class at church. On Wednesday nights, I have choir practice. So, as you might imagine, I can go two days without touching...