"In America we do not have a sufficient soccer culture. Our players see less and read the game below the level of their European counterparts. The Europeans and players in other environments see the game everyday and on every sport highlight show...they see the game LIVE. They become students of the game and have a level of sophistication that American female players are not even aware of. This must change! We need to indicate to our programs and coaches developing players that seeing high level games (women and men) and watching high level games on TV is absolutely necessary as part of their development scheme."

I started to play the cello when I was six. At that time, I didn’t choose it. My mother did. Eventually, three years later, I realized that, first of all, it was something that I loved. I realized that I couldn’t go through a day without thinking, doing, making music. This is one of the basic principles that I state: that anyone who can go through a day without wanting to be with music or hear music or make music is not supposed to be a musician.

I believe that to be valid for every single profession. If you can go through a day without wanting it or thinking it or living with professionalism in the profession that you are in, you are not supposed to be in it.

It wasn’t important to me as a boy, nor did it ever become important to me, to be recognized as No. 1 or No. 2, because it is a nonsensical listing. Always, I tried to do the maximum with what nature gave me. What is necessary in my profession is no different from yours.
I forgot anything else that existed in the world. There was no music, no parents, no girlfriends, nothing but concentrating on the game.

This is what seems to be the problem, looking at all my students, in the studying process: to have the willpower, the ability to concentrate. When I go on stage, nothing exists but that piece of music that I’m playing or that objective which I set for myself.

Discipline means concentration, and concentration means discipline. Discipline means that you have a routine that you follow with total conviction of priority. Is the priority to win alone, or to do the best one can do? We must have total conviction that we want to do it, not just when the chips are down but at all possible times. The practice is just as important as the moment when you are in front of everybody.
The only difference in our professions is that when the game is over, the score sort of unquestionably shows whether you succeeded of not. That’s a little bit different for us.

But the self-respect is no different. Whether the audience cheers or not, it does not mean anything. If I know that I have done well, whether they liked it or not is not important. Did I do the best I could under the circumstances, with total concentration and dedication to the cause at that moment?

Discipline means to learn everything that helps us to the maximum performance. Where is the parallel, the musical parallel to basketball?
For a lifetime, we develop skills, so as to find the proper note. That’s why you train for a lifetime, to find the basket.

As a cellist, when you are six years of age, eight, twelve, you have to practice three or four hours a day just to obtain the basic skills and the strength in your hand and your arms and muscles, because you do need considerable muscle power. We are hitting strings with the fingers sometimes at the speed of two thousand notes per minute.

There are people who can shoot successfully eight times out of ten in practice. To improve on the percentage, you must consciously know what part of the body functions how. This requires the thinking process. It doesn’t mean just that you are following the instructions of the coach. Eventually you must use your own brain: Why does it work? Why is the coach right? Until the individual discovers it for himself, it is never going to result in consistency.

The word consistency is the key. You have to do everything that we mean when we speak of professionalism. I’m not talking about being paid for something. The professional is the one who is consistent at a higher level then anybody else. And anybody else is called a dilettante. Dilettantes can sometimes succeed in doing things marvelously well. Sometimes. But they are not consistent.

I spent a lifetime trying to understand the underlying basic principles that make it possible for someone to use body, arms, and then the head. I find that the underlying principles are the same. When I watch you guys, sometimes I notice that artistry and grace are involved, and the fluency of motions that we are doing in music. How to improve it and to make it consistent is what we are all trying to get in every field. That’s where the brain process, analysis, and the total dedication, total priority for the game, in preparation as well as while it is in progress, and then discipline that is required.