I was having a conversation today about practices. What is a practice?

Many years ago, I read a book by the canceled thinker Peter Sloterdijk about humans as the animals that practice (meditation practices or contemplative practices). Even earlier than that, I read the very personally influential book - Philosophy as a way of life by Pierre Hadot.

What is a human? Someone who thinks and speaks lives in a community uses tools, etc. Yes. And a human is someone who practices.

But what do we practice and why?

Practicing an Instrument

I have been trying to learn a piece of music for classical guitar for at least a year.

Maybe I exaggerate, but it has been a long time. Why so long? Because I have not been practicing this piece. Malcolm Gladwell and others have written about the relationship between expertise and practice (or repetition). But what practice does for me reminds me of why I love to play music.

Practicing an instrument reminds me of who I am.

Practicing Wu Ji

This past winter I got really into a form of Chinese internal martial arts (if we can call it martial arts) - called Wu Ji - standing pose.

You stand for at least 20 minutes and notice yourself. There are ways to stand more or less in alignment. In Wu Ji, we do not adjust ourselves externally but internally. We focus our intention, attention, the location of our eyes, and our breath.

As we adjust, the inside and the outside change.

Practicing Writing

Here with these atomic essays, I am practicing writing.

I have been writing since I was little, but I never considered myself a writer. Although I attended a snooty prep school, some people were writers and people who were not. I was not. Please don't feel too bad; I got to be an artist.

But practicing writing for me is about telling myself who I am - someone who enjoys writing and learns about herself and what she thinks by writing and connects with other people through writing.

F*ck 10000 hours

Wow, I am really against those 10000 hours this week. I just learned that about myself by writing this essay. I value virtuosity and excellence. These qualities are a natural flowering of doing what is in your heart to do, and practicing that. But honestly, practicing to become an expert or elite is cr*p.

We practice, so our insides match our outsides. We practice so we become integrated individuals. Humans are practicing animals because Epimetheus did not give us the night vision of a cat or the olfactory sense of a dog. Our instincts and our biology do not predetermine us.

Practicing is a way of life. We can decide what we practice and how.

If you like this, sign up for my newsletter - https://therewrite.substack.com/.