Now that I am back to giving individual piano lessons, I hear myself saying something to students, so much so that it has become as a mantra: "Think your way to it". This is interesting, as it is exactly the opposite of what I (also) preach constantly, in terms of genuine expression. Unless it isn't. Or to connect both sides of the equation, a thorough grasp of something is necessary before you can see beyond your thoughts in order to access it more deeply, and for it to become "second nature". So we practice, with deliberate intent and specific goals, and (most importantly) slowly. Practicing slowly is something that most every piano student hears, repeatedly, and most every piano teacher stresses. For me these days, however, "think your way to it" often replaces the admonition to slow down, both to students, and to myself. Not to slow down for the sake of being slow, but for the sake of being in control. And as much as you want to play something the way you feel it should sound (or, correctly, want it to), what you feel won't take you there. At least not until you are fully in control of both the mental and physical the processes of pulling it off. Put another way, for it to become a part of you, or for you to become one with it, you need to internalize it deeply, rather than simply being something that you are able to recall. Chick Corea would make a distinction between students memorizing something and knowing it; explaining that memorizing involves maintaining something in your head that you can later access, but "knowing" is a deeper place, with no conscious thinking required. When you truly know something, you have moved beyond thinking it. It has become as a part of you. When you know, you know. And it's not what you think.   ;)