Healthy Practicing: The Process

From book "The Perfect Wrong Note: Learning to Trust Your Musical Self" - William Westney

Bring the mind-body system to a practice-ready state

Warm up in a leisurely way; awaken to your body. To make good music, vocally or instrumentally, involves the whole body. Limber up for a few minutes and get your blood circulating - stretch vigorously, do large arm circles, shake out your hands and arms, run in place a bit, flex your spine...

Remind yourself what the instrument feels like. For example, with a string instrument, play some extremely long firm tones in random patterns, savoring in a leisurely way the strength of each finger in turn on the fingerboard, the resistance of each string.

Remind yourself of your general intentions for practicing.

Address the music at hand
Choose a section to focus on - decide exactily where you will begin and end.
Imagine in energetic detail how you want the specific passage to feel.
Plunge in with gusto - no caution!
Observe results closely.
Relax and take a moment to digest.
Decide on the basis of the evidence, whether to repeat the same steps, consolidate your gains, or move on to another focus.

Take a break
Clear your head every twenty minutes or so by getting up and walking around for a couple of minutes. This is a highly concentrated activity and breaks keep you refreshed in body and mind.