Zen and the Art of Life
By Douglas Pettway
19 September 2008
As a bass player I had struggled with the worry and fear associated with making mistakes while playing in front of others until I met Victor Wooten. For those who do not know, Victor Wooten is considered to be one of the elite bassists in modern music and is, not coincidentally, a phenomenal teacher. I was lucky enough to attend a meet-and-greet with Vic wherein he also performed while he gave us his philosophy on music and life. So much of what Victor said can be considered transcedentally relevant to all of the art world no matter what medium our expressionism takes.
The point I am trying to make here relates to making mistakes and dealing with how others interpret our art. While we were discussing music, we were really talking about art and life. He addressed my fear of making mistakes by saying, and I paraphrase here, that we all make mistakes even while speaking even though we have been talking for nearly all of our lives. Some of us have lisps or sometimes our brains get ahead of the sounds our tongues are trying to make but we keep going. We work to correct those mistakes but we never give up or be defeated by the mistakes we make lest we give up all meaningful communication and expression.
What I gained from Victors lesson was the idea that we all learn how to talk at a very young age because we are immersed and surrounded in vocal language. Speaking in and of its self is an artform that we learn to help us communicate our thoughts and emotions. The very same can be said about music/photography/sculpture/painting/etc. We have to learn to communicate in our other mediums just as we do with language.
Victors comments really put me in a contemplative mood wherein I discovered more about myself and my capabilities. I still make mistakes but I am far less concerned with them now. These mistakes are my learning tools and I no longer allow them to inhibit me and consquently the capacity to express my thoughts and emotions through art is finally beginning to show.
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