If you truly want to be happy during winter, though, this is the wrong approach to the season. Changing your mindset can do more than distracting yourself from the weather.
It turns out that in northern Norway, “people view winter as something to be enjoyed, not something to be endured,” says Leibowitz, and that makes all the difference.
Excerpts from The Norwegian Secret To Enjoying A Long Winter (Fast Company)
Why write about Nordic winters? Because exactly the same mindset shift is what you need to do more than “endure” the rehearsal process.
For the typical ensemble, less than 5% of the time together is spent in performance; the rest is rehearsal time. That’s a smaller percentage than the Norwegian summer!
If your mindset is to simply endure the rehearsal process to get to the fun of performance, you are liable to have a pretty unenjoyable experience in the ensemble.
It’s my sense that most successful performers take as much or more pleasure from rehearsal as they do from performance.
Don’t endure rehearsals–enjoy them!