I like the quotes that Larry Dillon posted on his blog here regarding what it takes to build expertise. At first I was a little confused by what seemed to be contrary assertions – “automaticity is central to the development of expertise”, and “the key challenge for aspiring expert performers is to avoid the arrested development associated with automaticity” – but a moment’s reflection led me to realize the point: that we need to both cultivate and transcend the “automatic” - as performers, obviously, but as composers as well.