“Conscientious Practice” is when we practice movements in a deliberate way, repeatedly. By conscious, repeated practice, we internalize the movements and they become second nature. This is what we strive for as jewelers because we want to not be able to think about most of what we do so we can concentrate on the design of what we are making or repairing.
By always taking practicing, a little every day, even for a few minutes we become better jewelers and better people. This can also be called deliberate practice.
It ties into making sure your practice is teaching you and not hurting your skills. Make sure you take the time to slowly practice a movement or process using the correct techniques. For instance, if you practice sawing metal, polishing, engraving, making bezels or settings, but you just slap things together, you are teaching your mind that this is the way things should be done. you will build habits that lead you to fail.
By “Conscientious Practice” I mean working on learning the correct skills so that later, in my case 4 decades later, you are not struggling to unlearn bad habits. It is easier to learn a good habit in the first place than to unlearn a bad habit at any time.
Follow this link to view a short video about how I start every workday. Just a little practice makes my mind right to get positively going for the day. Not fancy with headers, intro screens, or music. Just an off-the-cuff video about how and why I start the day.
it may seem like I am talking as if working on jewelry is almost like meditation and in my opinion, it is.
Working on jewelry is a way for me to learn patience (after 40 years I am still working on that one), give me time to think, and overall improve myself through the process of making beautiful things for others.
I have not found much outside of martial arts that speaks about “Conscientious Practice” but the ideas in martial arts about slow movements that teach you to internalize a movement are the same thing I teach.
In the movie “The Karate Kid” What did Mr. Miyagi mean by wax on wax off?
“Wax on, wax off, wash the floor, paint the fence were all methods of teaching muscle memory. Mr. Myagi was teaching Daniel repetitive motions through mundane chores so his body would react almost on instinct.”
We do the same with practicing the basics every day in jewelry. So stop and look at your bench and think about “what can I learn today?”
