Naming my greatest fear, because then I’ll have to admit it, won’t I?
Originally asked
Vanity Fair, to its interview subject, The Proust Questionnaire
The exact prompt is fixed in Vanity Fair's Proust Questionnaire and independently sustained in The Guardian's The Q&A over multiple decades.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, June 2016 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 266 →That I can’t write.
Collapse of the imagination.
I am petrified of bikini waxing. I had a very bad experience in 1978.
More from Yo-Yo Ma
View profile →But part of practicing to me is actually an active enjoyment. When people ask, “How much do you practice and do you like practice?” Well, I think it’s always getting your mind to go from “I should” to “I want.” It’s like the magic button that only you can locate. When you’re doing the “should” thing, time happens very slowly. Ugh, I’ve been practicing forever! Fifteen minutes. But when you want to do something, an hour has passed. Your control of time depends on whether you should do something or whether you want to do something.
Those times when I feel equilibrium, maximum consciousness, and clarity.
While I’m on stage, you are all my guests, because that’s sort of the unsaid agreement. While you’re my guest, if something bad happens on stage, I often think of Julia Child, “Oh, the chicken’s fallen on the floor! Yes. Oh, well pick it up and put it right back.” And you know what? Everybody’s with you. […] So whatever you practice for on the engineering side that fails is all right, because we have a greater purpose. The greater purpose is that we’re communing together and we want this moment to be really special for all of us. Because otherwise, why bother to have come at all? It’s not about proving anything. It’s about sharing something.
My inability to keep track of personal possessions.
Mr. Rogers lives on. There’s so many legions of people that grew up with him, and they’re still in a way growing up with him. He, of course, was a minister. ... And the children of the show, in the neighborhood, are his ministry. And what a beautiful thing that is. So I, to this day, when someone says, “What are you most proud to have accomplished?” I am so proud to have been a part of that.
Perfection is always a desired goal, but it cannot be a primary goal. Expression has to be the primary goal, because otherwise, there is no need for an actual person to be there.
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