Why I read Twyla Tharp's "The Creative Habit" again and again

I know I’ve enjoyed a book when I read the acknowledgments. I’d say it’s the equivalent of licking your plate clean at the end of a meal. And I know I really enjoyed a book when I find myself quoting the acknowledgments to friends. At the end of “The Creative Habit,” Tharp thanks her “trainer, Sean Kelleher, the only person who can make me do what I don’t want to do.”(1) I laughed out loud at that line, and think of it often when a yoga instructor tells me to stretch more in a pose or when my teachers tell me to practice arpeggios.

It’s a funny line in a book that is all about overcoming fears and bad habits in order to accomplish your own personal creative goals. The book is about such personal work- finding self-discipline isn’t something that someone else can do for you. I can ask my friends to remind me to practice, but they can’t make me give my maximum focus and curiosity, which is what growth requires.

I get in practice slumps sometimes. These are times that I don’t see progress in my playing, or times I don’t think anyone cares about what the third Bach Suite means to me, or that other interests or short-term goals keep me from feeling connected to my music-making. When that happens, I turn back to the Creative Habit.

It’s no cure-all; reading about doing something is not doing it. That being said, it’s a book of exercises and ideas that brings me back to the basics of what we must do as musicians. Show up, put in the work, learn as much as we can, and see if we can use any of that knowledge to work better.

I would recommend checking this book if your library has it or you see it at a local book store. There are a billion books on how to be creative or innovative or whatever other adjectives are hip now in b-school, but the premise of this one is basically “do the thing.” This is usually exactly the advice I need.

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(1) T. Tharp, The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life (Simon & Schuster, 2009), https://books.google.com/books?id=UR10E4QU_7IC. p.245.