Time to Get Back to Basics

Every so often I start to feel that I am making my life as a music therapist too difficult. I get involved in reading complex ideas, new thoughts, and layered theoretical proposals, and I start to get bogged down. My "woulda/coulda/shoulda" goblins start to go in my head - "You could be doing so much more for your clients." "You should be everything for everyone." "You would be so much better if you only did this and this and this." I've learned, over the years, to realize that these thoughts mean something very important for me - 

Time to get back to basics.

I can tend to get a bit too wrapped up in thinking, especially when it comes to my job.

When this happens, it signals that I'm losing track of what makes music such a strong therapeutic medium. I'm starting to think more about what I should be doing rather than taking notice of what my clients are doing with and through the music. I have moved too far into think mode and too far out of therapy mode to be truly effective.

So, what do I do when this happens to me? I go back to the beginning.

I have a couple of really important music therapy texts - they make up my history of music therapy and have been with me from before the start of my professional career. These are my basics. These are the first experiences that I had with music as a therapeutic medium, and they help me remember the most important things about being a music therapist - music and people.

I know that that idea is simplistic - being a music therapist is about liking both music and people, and wanting to help through music - but that really has to be at the core of a music therapist's philosophy. If you aren't interested in music or people, then don't try to be a music therapist. You will be miserable. If I forget the reasons that I do this, I will not be as effective as I could/should/would be.

I have some time off coming up soon. That time off will include some work (at my part-time job and on my website), but there will be lots of time for reading through my first music therapy resources. It will also be a time for refreshing my ideas about what music therapy should, can, and will be for my clients. There will be graphic organizers, time to make music, and other blog posts that come out of this process, I am sure!

Now, this doesn't mean that I will stop thinking, reading, and trying new things, but it does mean that I need to take the time to assimilate the new ideas with the old familiar ideas. I've done it before and will do it again because it's part of my process as a professional.

It's time to get back to my basics.