"TO WILL TO BE HIMSELF IS MAN'S TRUE VOCATION"-KIERKEGAARD ° DENNIS B. PLIES ° Professor of Music Warner Pacific College The situation spells bondage. A person wants to do right, obey and learn, but inside there are child voices, often suffocating, pleading for freedom. What a dilemma. Let me illustrate. I recall teaching classical piano lessons to a student from Taiwan. After several weeks of lessons using music by Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms with predictable "good-person" behavior, he asked if I would teach him to improvise. Not to take the place of reading music, he wanted to add this manner of expression. After a few weeks of this element in his lesson, his manner changed. Whereas in classical studies he would place the music on the rack and almost without a greeting begin to "perform," he now requested a discussion about life and music. He said he was confronting some inner struggles via the challenges of improvisation. Adding to his frustration I told him that I knew people who for no other reason than experimentation and adventure would take an alternate route home from their employment. He could not believe that a person would trade a mathematically logical, sane routing for an "inferior" one. I attempted to point out that if the differences in routes were fairly negligible in terms of distance and time, one might choose different ones per mood or maybe for no "good" reason, other than that it becomes a joy, a "kick." In another lesson he talked about the pictures on my wall, drawn by my children. Each week the exhibit changed, but almost all the pictures represented a great deal of expressive freedom. The pictures did not clearly replicate anything, but they were expressions from within, using colors and shapes. He longed for that kind of freedom. He related a story he had read concerning a criminal behind bars who desired freedom, yet could not handle that freedom when he was released. He noted the same struggle within himself, desiring to improvise, yet preferring the safe, successful, "behind bars" style of living. After many months of practicing with a different mindset, he not only gained an improvisational facility, he gained a new life. It transferred to his person. He was totally altered. I tell the story because, as a person making and teaching music, I am confronted constantly with personal fear, which too often interferes with both music-making and teaching. I wish to address this fear, or performance anxiety, as it relates to both classroom and life, and I will draw chiefly from a course I teach called Jazz Improvisation. In this class I observe anxieties at an unusually high level. The would-be improvisors experience an internal love-hate relationship. I see these musicians at a "Y" in their road. Heretofore, the person has used written music as the guide for music-making, possibly for many years, and now instead of rendering what the printed page communicates, he/she desires to make up music while singing or playing. This requires spontaneity and letting 2 go in ways that especially frighten anyone who enjoys control and is generally driven by perfectionism. There is an aspect of jazz improvisation that parallels life. Music-making is rational within predetermined boundaries of time and harmony (vertical columns of sound). In conversation that occurs spontaneously we draw from an accumulation of vocabulary, memories, experiences, and understanding. The same is true of musical improvisation. In fact it can be thought of as variations on the original melody (theme). Improvisation can be likened to the experimentation conducted by a scientist under the guidance of hypotheses. Hence, the creativity is not uninformed, even though it goes beyond the original structure. As teachers of whatever subject and whatever specific course title, we are placed within the physical environment of the classroom as well as the natural boundaries of the subject matter. In this situation we and our students often experience anxiety. For the novice teacher this is especially true. Even the veteran professor teaching a new course, having to "ad hoc it" in the classroom discussion, can experience uneasiness. As a teacher I become anxious that: All learners receive what they need at their level; no one is bored, including myself; all are challenged, myself included; I am perceived as caring for the students, yet not taking responsibility for their lives; and that I receive their care in return. Some of a learner's anxieties might include: Will I be embarrassed? Do I appear as smart as my 3 peers? Can I keep up with the class? Does the professor like me? What will be on the test? Will I freeze up when being tested, not giving an accurate display of my knowledge or skills? It seems apparent that performance anxiety is widespread. If, for example, one determines to have some people over for dinner, it may signal a time to worry and prepare so seriously that the resultant anxiety deters that person from actually extending the invitation. Or, if the person does go through with the invitation, preparation and event, the anxiety and need to be perfect steals the joy of being together. I propose that the desire for approval and acceptance is so strong that it is possible to kill the free and spontaneous stimulus that causes us to initiate an action. Fascination and free response give way to analysis and restriction. C. S. Lewis speaks of this reality, "The more lucidly we think, the more we are cut off: the more deeply we enter into reality, the less we can think. You cannot study pleasure in the moment of the nuptial embrace, nor repentance while repenting, nor analyze the nature of humour while roaring with laughter."1 I tell my improvisation students to be the process, to be as spontaneous as possible. Once we have determined the structure within which we play, we need to become a child, uninformed by inner or outer judging. To be in the moment obviates simultaneous self-evaluation. In fact, to the extent we get involved in "playing," we personally get "lost." Alto saxophonist Lee Konitz proposes a 4 multi-gradient system of lostness. Interviewer David Kastin summarizes this concept: "The first, and most important, level is the song itself. It then progresses incrementally through more sophisticated stages of embellishment, gradually displacing the original theme with new ones. The process culminates in the creation of an entirely new melodic structure." Konitz calls this final level "an act of pure inspiration."2 Whether one is the instructor or student, the player or listener, the joy of being "inside" a class period or a song is a powerful experience. When students comment at the end of a class about how rapidly the time passed, I receive this as a compliment, for I have been able to lead us into common process/play/involvement, hence a "lostness." In order to think this way about a classroom situation or a piece of music, we must be concerned not only about what we do, but how we do it. Or, to hear this from a different context/person-D. Elton Trueblood: " . . . the central experience is universal. The theology is really secondary and exists only as an intellectual structure, which men employ in order to make sense out of the experience."3 The very ability to improvise, teach, and be creative stems from our free will. With this freedom we become sensitive to problems, we search for solutions, and then we communicate the results. Sometimes during this process we are tempted toward rightness instead of true righteousness. Whereas rightness tends toward moralism-a consciousness of being good-righteousness means genuineness, trusting the 5 spirit rightly related to God through faith. We cannot defend what we are doing at the same time we are expressing freedom. In order to accomplish creative results we must break free of any concurrent external and internal criticism. However, critical evaluation after the fact would be invaluable. To exercise freedom is to determine what we want and then to give ourselves permission to do it. This requires choosing the tough road of vulnerability, which may seem like death, yet it can be a journey to life. "Whoever loses his life for me will save it" (Luke 9:24 NIV). As children we would not have learned to walk had we feared falling or being hurt. After each fall, we eventually got up and tried again. Each fall taught us something that moved us closer to our goal. Wanting to walk has to be a more important drive than pretending we can walk in order to feel more comfortable in delusion. Wanting to be who we are, finding our expression, must be a very high priority. This human freedom flows out of our trust in God's protection. Desiring progress and growth in our life necessitates vulnerability, requiring an emptying, a confessing of fear and ignorance. Simultaneously, because of opening the doors, we can be, we can choose to express from within, and hence we can give/love. This stance permits disappointment, failure, and pain. In light of these characteristics we often restrain ourselves, desiring sustained comfort. But, as clinical psychologist Larry Crabb says, "Self-protection and love are opposites. Since love is the ultimate virtue, self-protection is the ultimate 6 problem."4 By applying Crabb's model to the original story about a student struggling with a safety versus release mode, we can note the outcome of self-protection as a doing or a goodness function. An alternate behavior would reflect trust and love. These traits would translate into the freedom to be, to enjoy, and to be concerned with excellence for the sake of quality alone. In a self-protection mode we are not truly free to teach, learn, create, improvise, or love. Our motivation or purpose will be primarily to protect rather than learn and express. Concern with being an effective teacher or improvisor, i.e., to "pull the wool" over enough significant eyes are conditions of bondage. If a student is content to get satisfactory grades and graduate with no interest in developing a true love of learning, he/she loses and the teacher really does not have a learner-student. Externally, it may appear that the student is "good," but internally, it may be just the opposite. "Double-mindedness," says Kierkegaard, "is an attitude of willing the good for external reasons: desire of reward; fear of punishment; approval of others. Only the man who wills the good unreservedly and for itself alone really draws near to God and makes it possible for God to draw near to him. And only then, i.e., as God draws near to him, can a man, by God's power, become single-minded and pure in heart."5 As a teacher, I desire students who are free within. As a teacher, I believe I am more effective to the degree that I am free within. Having approached this plight from a 7 pedagogical viewpoint, I now wish to explore the issue from a theological standpoint. The Christian faith addresses the universal desire for acceptance and approval. We are meant to be free in Christ. We struggle with our lack of freedom as we see our own foibles. We also find ourselves with mixed motives. My personal belief is that our need to express is ultimately more human than our need to be approved. I propose three primary categories as roots of performance anxiety. They are pride, guilt, and fear. According to Vernon Grounds, Pride is an exaggerated and dishonest self-evaluation, a (sinful) self-evaluation which I want people to accept despite my full or semi-awareness of its falsity. I want people to notice me, admire me, praise me, envy me, flatter me, and idolize me. Pride is therefore a refusal to be myself before God, the self I actually am, the self God created me to be, the self God wants me to be, but the self I do not want to be.6 Scripture further describes pride: "For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly" (Mark 7:21-22 NRSV). "The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. Pride and arrogance and the way of evil and perverted speech I hate" (Proverbs 8:13 NRSV). In fact, pride-a preoccupation with one's own wisdom, accomplishments, power, abilities, reputation, or possessions-is idolatry. Pride's hindrance to performance freedom is real. If we are to let go enthusiastically and teach with abandonment, we must be free to release the gifts within. 8 To the degree that pride is limiting, humility allows us to be all that we can be. Instead of being repressive and cautious, the performer who accepts him/herself is expressive, outgoing, spontaneous and confident. If spiritual pride demonstrates itself in an attitude of superiority over others or the need to be more than we are, we will need to do well in order to overwhelm others, instead of being well, which is born out of healthy understanding of self-love and God's love. If in the classroom a student is preoccupied, not with learning, but with coming across as someone who is not a dunce, then this preoccupation will preempt any actual learning. The learner who is so concerned for peers' and instructors' impressions will be focused only on performance for approval rather than love for participation. The need to do well leads to another root of performance anxiety-guilt. No matter how much we try, we cannot do well enough. Hence, I propose a shift from doing to being. Instead of guilt, grace. Frederick Buechner pens it this way: The grace of God means something like: Here is your life. You might never have been, but you are because the party wouldn't have been complete without you. Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid. I am with you. Nothing can ever separate us. It's for you. I created the universe. I love you.7 In improvisation we tend to start out with our focus being the fear of mistakes. We are trying desperately to be careful and precise. And yet, that is the opposite of what a great performer, improvisor, or teacher is all about. An 9 experienced music improvisor would say there is no such thing as a mistake. You just use a mistake to create something even more scintillating. As in speaking, it is the thought being communicated that counts, not whether one stumbles on a word now and then. We need to learn to be content with our creatureliness-with the limitations of being human. In guilt, the emphasis is on the "shoulds," hence the doing. In grace, the emphasis is on acceptance, hence the being. Knowing I am accepted by God I am free to accept myself in spite of my failings. Who I am is determined by learning God's love, believing it, and living within it. In such trust I am free to do, aware of imperfection. I can then be free to express, interpret, and let go; not so if I am striving for approval. In Paul Tournier's words: For true guilt is precisely the failure to dare to be oneself. It is the fear of other people's judgment that prevents us from being ourselves, from showing ourselves as we really are, from showing our tastes, our desires, our convictions, from developing ourselves and from expanding freely according to our own nature. It is the fear of other people's judgment that makes us sterile, and prevents our bearing all the fruits that we are called to bear.8 Closely resembling the theological understanding of human freedom is the outlook from psychology. I now speak more from that angle as I continue the quest toward understanding the dichotomy of control and letting go. Paul Tournier believes that guilt leads to fear and back to guilt, via anger and crime. He sees this as a cyclic concept. In this model I am reminded of Jesus' relating 10 anger to crime, that in our anger the crime is committed (Cf., Matt. 5:21-22). In essence Tournier is saying that we are afraid because we feel guilty. We are accusers because we are accused, and we are accused because we are accusers. Since we are aware of how we automatically rate others' performance, we surmise, rightly so, that they are rating us too. Such evaluation cripples, but it is how we tend to live. Fear of criticism stifles spontaneity; it prevents us from expressing ourselves freely. In a musical improvisational learning experience the emphasis is to "play what you hear, not what you think." That same principle can be translated to apply grace into the realm of creativity. Grace is for the humble, not for the self-satisfied. Or, putting it Buechner's way, "pride is a sin when, instead of leading you to share with others the self you love, it leads you to keep your self in perpetual safe-deposit. You not only don't accrue any interest that way but become less and less interesting every day."9 "To be faithful to oneself would mean to be always like oneself in all circumstances, in the presence of any interlocutor."10 One must trust one's own being, not relying on the doing aspect for "points." In another way of expressing this thought, it requires a decision of humility to accept the self as equal (in being) to others. No person is better or worse than another. Differences do not make one person better than another. Fear/dread is another root of performance anxiety. At first instinct freedom can seem glorious, but I believe we 11 identify with the psalmist's experience, "The snares of death encompassed me; the pangs of Sheol laid hold on me; I suffered distress and anguish" (Psa. 116:3 NRSV). In a book entitled, Anxiety and Fear, Charles Stinnett Jr., discusses Kierkegaard's viewpoint regarding this dichotomy. Dread, a much employed concept by Kierkegaard, accompanies freedom. And dread is answered only in faith. Struggle, as noted by the feel from the psalmist, is the cost of self-knowledge. In Stinnette's words, "The dignity of man and his misery have the same root-his radical freedom."10 Like the student in the story, we wish to be free, but we are not relishing the opportunity to appear as a fool. The fear and dread are monumental. The duality we feel as we wish to appear better than we are speaks to our simultaneous ability to grovel and to soar, to be both worm and eagle. This is the dilemma that produces dread and bondage. We are caught with an unfree relation to evil and to good. Although God's love is free and unconditional, we try to win His approval by what we do or give, which demonstrates our lack of trust in Him. We show that we are guilty of sin at its deepest base, thereby disclosing that we dread God's love, the love freely bestowed on us. As an improvisor, or as a teacher or student, do I fear making a mistake, making a fool of myself, or being rejected? Is it like the Garden of Eden revisited? Might freedom for good and evil be a way to view improvisation? The subsequent dread that ensues is in possibly choosing wrongly, or, to use a modern idiom, blowing it. 12 Summarizing the roots of performance anxiety I posit that the movement from doing to being is primary in all three-pride, guilt, and fear/dread. From pride's need to do well we can relax in a state of humility or poverty. Guilt stems from doing wrong whereas grace states us as accepted; hence, faith, hope and love represent our being. Our temptation is to substitute performance for grace causing us to be restless in our achieving instead of resting in our believing. Instead of uptightness due to dread, we can move toward liberty. Our conflict as voiced by the original story moves toward resolution when doing gives way to being, demonstrated by an attitude of acceptance. This acceptance reflects the position simply to be, to face the reality of pride, guilt, and fear. Instead of struggling with the facts, we live within them. We become in charge not only of what we do, but of who we are. This moves the story's depiction of bondage toward a picture of freedom. The fact that the student in the story wanted to explore another type of musical territory speaks to the human need for childlike freedom. In short, we need to decipher and acknowledge our concomitant needs for logical and intuitive expressions. In order to free ourselves from destructive doing not rooted in being, we must deal with guilt, a culprit in itself and a product of pride and fear. In pride we are saying we do not accept ourselves, hence we feel guilty. Fear and dread regarding our freedom cause us to question each thought and act, feeling guilty because we do not measure up to the standard. As a means for dealing with the 13 roots of performance anxiety, I will use Tournier's fourfold procedure as an organizational tool: 1) acceptance of my responsibilities, 2) recognition of my guilt, 3) repentance, 4) receiving God's forgiveness in response to my repentance. Accepting my responsibilities, step one of Tournier's solution, proposes an extraordinarily mature stance. Guilt refuses responsibility and passes blame. In Guilt and the Christian, Jeffrey G. Sobosan dissects the Garden of Eden scenario, pointing out Adam and Eve hiding. When questioned by God each claims it is "not my fault." As a result of this awareness of irresponsibility, they feel guilty. "The individual has not accepted accountability for his deeds but has tried to attribute it to others."11 Note the state of tension or anxiety over our unresolved conflict. Heretofore we had self-love and peace, but we are now out of relationship with our God due to lack of taking responsibility for our actions. Being pure in heart activates our obeying (doing), not to avoid punishment or to gain reward, but because we want to. "Guilt begins in love, is impossible without love, and paradoxically is only cured by love," says Edward V. Stein.12 Phrased another way, Rebecca Propst adds understanding to Stein's seemingly outlandish words regarding love being tangled with guilt. "Grace comes from our focus on God rather than ourselves."13 Our freedom to live responsibly to our acts, even our mistaken ones, demonstrates our greatness, our ability to be sons and daughters of God. God's witness to 14 this model was Jesus, a nonstop demonstration of grace without any regard for our worthiness. In Matthew 9:13, Mark 2:17, and Luke 5:32, Jesus was saying, "I have not come to call the righteous but sinners (the godless people)." David A. Seamands say, "The basis of salvation is not achieving but receiving, not perfect performance but trusting faith."14 Grace alone is the basis of our relationship to God. Again, Propst reminds us that "true Christian spirituality, however, is to meet Jesus, crucified and risen, and thereby to face ourselves. We face our dark areas and our shadow side even while in the presence of the risen Christ."15 Recognizing our guilt is Tournier's second step in guilt solving. He says, "The nearer we get to God, the more we experience His grace, and the more we experience His grace, the more we discover faults in ourselves which we did not discern before, and the more we suffer from them."16 When the cock crowed, Peter became aware of his denial. He went out and cried (Matt. 26:15). We are continually within threat of some cock-crow which will plunge us into embarrassment, showing what fools we are, or how fooled we are. Steps three and four have to do with repentance and forgiveness. Repentance is a route. God's unconditional love is constant. Whereas guilt and inferiority deal quantitatively in the realm of doing, causing people to compare and judge, repentance is a common (communally acknowledged) awareness of the qualitative human weakness, 15 the real inferiority, and subsequently brings people together. Instead of judging myself and others I determine to forgive myself and others. Why not? God is forgiving repentant persons. In this forgiveness there is freedom and joy. Within a supportive, nurturing context I can push the student. In fact, I must prod students to be all they can be-responsible to assignments, punctuality, and to classmates. As a teacher I can demonstrate grace by creating a safe atmosphere and simultaneously holding students to their word. Frederick Buechner, in The Alphabet of Grace, says: "Perhaps there is no gift more precious than the gift of spontaneity, the ability of certain men and animals to act straight and fresh and self-forgettingly out of the living center of who they are without the paralyzing intervention of self-awareness."17 Having taught improvisation toward the perspective of losing the self, not censoring the expression, but trusting from the inside-out, I offer these comments from two students: This class has definitely helped me with chords and feeling secure in whatever I play, knowing that there is no right or wrong way to jazz. The class has immense value in the area of personal growth. I learned much about myself, who I am and what I can do. The method by which the class was taught, encouraging experiential learning and emphasizing authentic self-expression, I learned that not only am I free to be myself, but that it is valuable to be authentically me. Music becomes a vital mode of self-expression, free from perfectionist standards and expectations. Rather, a class taught like this confirms the realization that life is a process of growth and discovery. Thus, it becomes 16 important to be myself rather than to be perfect. Through this class, I have been greatly aided in learning self-acceptance. The word that best describes my response to this class is freedom; freedom to be who God wants me to be(come) and freedom from standardized expectations to which we are socially conditioned to respond and strive to achieve, to the detriment of our self-esteem. References 1C. S. Lewis, God in the Dock (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1970), p. 65. 2David Kastin, Down Beat (Chicago, IL: Downbeat Music Workshop Publication, 1985), p. 55. 3D. Elton Trueblood, The People Called Quakers (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1966), p. 69. 4Larry Crabb, Inside Out (Colorado Springs, CO: Navpress, 1991), p. 184. 5Quoted in John A. Gates, The Life and Thought of Kierkegaard for Everyman (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1960), p. 125. 6Vernon Grounds, Emotional Problems and the Gospels (Grand Rapids, MI: The Zondervan Corporation, 1976), p. 65. 7Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking: A Theological ABC (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1973), p. 34. 8Paul Tournier, Guilt and Grace (San Francisco: Harper & Row Publishers, 1958), p. 17. 9Buechner, Wishful Thinking, p. 73. 10Charles R. Stinnett Jr., Anxiety and Faith (Greenwich, CT: The Seabury Press, 1955), p. 62. 11Jeffrey G. Sobosan, Guilt and the Christian (Chicago: The Thomas More Press, 1982), p. 25. 12Edward V. Stein, Guilt: Theory and Theraphy (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1968), p. 14. 13Rebecca L. Propst, Psychotherapy in a Religious Framework: Spirituality in the Emotional Healing Process (New York: Human Sciences Press, Inc., 1988), p. 26. 14David A. Seamands, Healing Grace (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1988), p. 117. 15Propst, Psychotherapy in a Religious Framework, pp. 26-7. 16Tournier, Guilt and Grace, p. 41. 17Frederick Buechner, The Alphabet of Grace (New York: The Seabury Press, 1970), p. 35. 17