You are disarming a bomb. There are two wires and you have to choose which one to cut. The bomb is ticking. It is so old, it isn’t even digital and the incessant ticking is annoying you, as a bead of sweat drips off your nose and onto the convoluted mess of wires. You have figured out that the two wires you have separated from the mess are the two possibilities. Still, you have to make a decision before the time runs out. You have a blue wire and a green wire. If you cut one, the ticking stops and everything is all right. If you cut the wrong one, the ticking also stops but the bomb explodes, vaporizing your head and sending your soul to who knows where. It is a tough decision, to say the least. It is actually the decision of your life. Your training did not prepare you to make this decision. Wait a minute! Green is usually a ground wire, but this bomb may have been built by a madman. Maybe he used a green wire to throw me, you think.
Have you ever been in this situation? This is the old “fork in the road but no road sign” problem. Which way do you go? Sometimes you don’t have enough information to make a good decision. Sometimes you don’t have the right tools, such as a compass, in the fork in the road problem. In most situations, you can gather information and make an informed decision. If you want to make an intelligent decision, you should not only gather information, but also check out the track record and the statistics of success that lie along that direction you will take.
When you make a firm decision, you cut off all other possibilities. A “cut” made in surgery is called an incision and the word incision is related to decision. So, you had better be certain, informed, and intelligent with your decision or you will suffer the consequences. With the right decision, you will reap the reward.
In the 70s, I had three touring bands. In one of these was a trumpet player. A nice guy but he was barely adequate, bordering on inadequate. He was a decent amateur more than he was a pro. Yet, every day he practiced diligently and consistently. He wasn’t on a plateau. A plateau may be temporary. He was hitting a ceiling and never did break through. Why? Whatever he was practicing was either the wrong thing to practice or he was practicing it the wrong way. My lead trumpet player offered to help him but he refused his help. I had to let him go and replace him with someone who could handle the demands of the position. My standards were very high and I could not compromise them because doing so would weaken the band musically and would demoralize those of us who were at the standard that we knew would lead to success.
As a singer, for many years, I practiced the wrong things and the results were: I had a limited range, I strained, I sometimes lost my voice, I had to “sing below my break”, and I couldn’t get rid of the break in my voice. During the eighteen years I lived in Las Vegas, I had friends who were singers. While I was singing in a show, one of my singer friends introduced me to a singing teacher and she taught me the right things, the right way and I handled my issues. The success of handling this and the freedom I gained were a million times better than the frustration that I had all the years prior. My musicianship was more than sufficient to keep me working professionally but I wanted to do more and my head was up against a ceiling until I learned to demolish the old habits which held me back for too many years.
