Mission Possible – Achieving Your Personal Best

“To err is human […]”

Pencils have erasers, computers have auto-correct, and pianos? I have yet to find one with a delete key. Only in science fiction are scientists able to turn back time. Here, in reality in the 21st century, pianists do the equivalent of walking the high-wire, juggling, and reciting poetry all at the same time –without a safety net, no “re-do’s” permitted. This form of exceptionalism for musical performance shows that we are in denial about our human nature.

Let’s be honest

When your best friend forgets your birthday, your house pet knocks something over, or ChatGPT provides an incorrect answer (quaintly referred to as a “hallucination”), we show understanding, even if we are upset about the outcome. We have empathy for ourselves for everyday mistakes – when we spill a cup of tea, misspell a word, or go into the other room and forget why.

However, when we hit the wrong key or experience a memory lapse when playing the piano, our reaction is disappointment, frustration, or even anger. And we remain stubborn, unwilling to lower our expectations of ourselves, although we are quick to console others in the case of sub-optimal performance with the words “no one is perfect.”

Facing reality without sacrificing standards

David Sternbach, professional cellist and psychoanalyst, once pointed out:

A major league ballplayer with a .300 batting average may be a star; however, no audience would tolerate a musician who missed 7 out of every 10 notes. Probably no other pro­fession involves the combination of these particular stress factors (Sternbach, 1993, p. 284).

Why are we, then, so unforgiving when it comes to our own music-making? Why do we cling to the belief, that “we are only as good as our last concert”? How have we allowed a fear of failure to create a phantom than haunts us during every performance, whether if it’s for a dear friend or on a stage in front of a sea of unfamiliar faces?

With a better understanding about our own fallibility, insights about the science of mistakes, and more self-compassion, we can stop wasting time looking for blame or engaging in self-flagellation. Instead, let’s invest our energy in a personalised recipe for performance success. Honesty with ourselves won’t lead to compromised standards of perfection, but instead to mental strategies and practice methods that allow us to optimise our musicianship.

Over three hundred years ago Alexander Pope wrote An Essay on Criticism with that now famous line “To err is human, to forgive, divine.” It’s never too late to learn from these wise words.

Thought exercise “locus of control”

A. Make a list of least five recent experiences you had with mistakes. Describe what happened first, and then assign the event to one the following categories:

1. It was a matter of skill and I just didn’t do well.
2. It was a really difficult task and beyond my control.
3. I didn’t invest enough effort, and could have done better.
4. It was one of those cases, where one is either lucky or not: I had no effect on the outcome.

If you have more a’s and c’s than b’s and d’s, then you could prosper more, if you add more self-compassion to your life.

B. Make a second list. This time, think about at least four really good and at least four pretty bad things that have happened to you this year. Then label each experience as a matter of luck or of fate.

If you have more good things associated with luck and bad things associated with fate, here, too, you might be better off if you reframed those labels. Fate can bring about both good and bad, and luck can be applied equally to all sorts of experiences. This means both taking more responsibility for one’s outcomes as well as being more relaxed about things beyond your control.

More to explore…

• The book Fluke. Chance, Chaos, and Why Everything We Do Matters provides “[…] a provocative challenge to how we think our world works—and why small, chance events can divert our lives and change everything, by social scientist and Atlantic writer Brian Klaas” (excerpt from the Amazon review).Klaas, B. (2024). Fluke. Simon and Schuster.
• A recent article about self-compassion is available as a free download from https://www.frontiersin.org: Walton CC, Kirby JN, McKenzie S, Gao CX, Purcell R, Rice SM and Osborne MS (2025) A preliminary investigation into self-compassion and compassion-based intervention for mental health in the performing arts. Front. Psychol. 16:1512114. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1512114

Note: Both Graham Fitch and one of the main authors of the above paper, Margaret S. Osborne (Australia), will be at the international and interdisciplinary symposium Art in Motion 2025. The Drive to Thrive in Munich, Germany, in mid-May!