It was a small but enthusiastic crowd. Parents gathered proudly, watching their children’s recitals. I was there with friends, not particularly invested, just enjoying the moment for what it was.
After the applause settled and the room quieted, another young musician walked out, took his place, and began to play. The piece was executed cleanly, confidently, each note landing exactly where it should.
And yet something felt off.
Not wrong in a way that would draw attention. Not enough to disrupt the performance. But there was a cadence that didn’t quite settle. It didn’t flow, and it didn’t resist. It just hovered somewhere in between.
It was, in a way, perfectly wrong.
I’ve come to recognize something similar in photography. A style of editing that develops not because it’s chosen, but because it’s repeated. Sliders pushed a little further each time. Not to get attention, but sometimes because of a lack of it.
Staring at a single image for too long, it’s easy to lose any real sense of where it started. What once felt like refinement becomes exaggeration, and after a while, the difference is harder to see.
Practice has a way of reinforcing whatever is repeated. Not necessarily what is right, but what is familiar. Over time, that familiarity can begin to feel like correctness.
The result can look convincing. It can even feel complete. But there isn’t always anything underneath it to return to.
It’s becoming clear to me that practice makes something permanent. Whether that something improves seems to depend on whether anything in the process asks us to change it.
I’m starting to think it’s not enough to practice the action itself. I have to practice refinement as well.
P.S. I explored a similar idea in Conversations with Light.
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