wondering how many people are on this list, who do also need an daily “flute fix” because otherwise they don’t feel well, cannot function properly and feel they have not lived?
how long should you have been playing to fulfill your needs?
I need one hour minimum but two is better 
then you can make me do anything if you ask me afterwards…
berti
Hi Berti,
unless I’m sick or too worn out by pure physical exhaustion, I feel the urge to play every day. 45 minutes is about my minimum, but 2 hours can fly by on the weekend like nothing.
The days I don’t play I tend to be rather cranky…
Eric
I feel the urge to play someting everyday, but not always a flute. Sometimes it’s a whistle, sometimes an ocarina, etc. Some days a play a bunch of different instruments and other days I play just one.
Yes, every day. I managed to spend some time in Duke Gardens playing yesterday. (A really nice botanical garden in Noth Carolina) It was fantastic except for the fact that it was packed with picknickers and other folks.
Yes
Yes. As a matter of fact, I’m going right now to spend my lunch (half) hour doing just that –
and phooey to the passers-by and gawking onlookers whilst I disappear inside my little cone of blackwood …
i can’t think of a better way to exercise than playing flute, it gives me good grounding!
Very true for me Berti.
I used the flute to help me quit smoking 2.5 years ago, and it has accepted its role with zeal. I think it’s the whole hand/mouth thing.
So, it’s everyday, twice a day, or I get cranky.
Byron
ditto the lunch-hour practice~ everyday for me unless im doing errands on lunch, then i play at home later.i get a full hour… i’ve been caught whippin it out at stop-lights for a quickie if i catch something good on WFUV radio.
(man, that didnt quite sound right 
)
I dunno that I’d say I need a fix every day. I’m still on a pretty steep learning curve, though, so I feel that I’m backsliding every day that I don’t play. In addition to that, I do feel a real desire to play. Pretty much of the time. I find myself looking forward to it at work (no playing at lunchtime, that’s running time, which is a real need for a fix), wishing I’d gotten in some playing if I haven’t by bedtime, and generally enjoying the hell out of it whenever I am playing.
I’ve had a little hand pain the last few days, so I’ve been playing small-holed flutes. Just picked up the Hammy. First sound out of it, I felt like I’d been using a boy for a man’s job. (For those of you not used to the idiom, I just mean that the Hammy has a much bigger sound than my Rudall-based flutes.) The Hammy simply kicks ass, and I still feel like I haven’t gotten 10% of its capabilities.
I don’t play my flute but about every couple weeks. That’s probably what’s “wrong” with me. Hah.
I try to get in about two hours a day minimum but can easily get five in- if I don’t practise I feel like I’ve let myself down.
Does a junkie need a fix everyday? Silly question, you will have to pry this flute from my dead hands! That is how I taught myself to play the flute, not having a teacher I had to set regimen that every day I will work at it and practice for good or bad as it may be at that time.
Now I practice the minimum of one hour a day, some mornings when I start work in the afternoon I will practice three hours, not including my lunch hours outdoors at work when the weather is good.
I believe that with any art form, the amount of practice or actual playing/painting/writing etc. you do will only make what appears to be easy to do i.e blow into a stick of wood more of a piece of art.
MarkB
Yes, I do need a fix every day. If I don’t get it, due to tiredness or extenuating circumstances, I become hyper, distracted, and prickly. I begin to have obsessive thoughts about getting to a flute and/or what I can do to have a flute-like experience.
It is nearly the same “need” as the “need” for an endorphin fix from exercising.
It’s impossible to distinguish it from the “need” to meditate, and on days when I’m happy with my practice, I’m unaware of the passage of time, so I suspect that I’m meditating a la flute or very close to it.
ahhh that sounds so very familiar peggy!
but as for the link with meditation that is not as weird as you might think as the breathing is very the same as in meditating…some people on the forum some time said that meditating did help their flute playing as you get some more breath control (if I remember properly)
greetings
berti
I play other instruments, but flute seems to inspire my musical imagination more than any other. I do want to play every day, and have been lucky enough to be able to do that so far.
Playing a musical instrument is an great vehicle for meditation. The overall goal of meditation is to be completely in and aware of the present moment with no distractions. That’s also a great description of a musician in the zone completely lost in the music.
Bob