This Has Been a Good Week

This really has been a good week. I have felt happy, calm, and stimulated by my thoughts and ideas. The conference last weekend tired me out, but I think it also reminded me of the parts of this job that I absolutely love. It also gave me an excuse to sleep the rest of the weekend. Maybe that should be part of my self-care plan from now on - intellectual stimulation from people who are somewhat like-minded about things and lots of time to sleep afterwards.

I have felt a bunch of calm since I decided not to propose any type of presentation at the national conference this year. I have been trying to come up with presentation ideas that don't bore me to tears, and I've been coming up with absolutely nothing. I realized that I was putting pressure on myself for something that ABSOLUTELY nobody cared about EXCEPT FOR ME! I mean, most of the people who will attend the conference this year will not miss me at all. That's okay, and to be expected. I will probably have some pangs about not presenting when the time comes, but I will also enjoy getting to go to presentations (or not) and I will be thinking up new ideas for my own presentations later on.

The silly thing is that I came up with 16 new modules for my Continuing Music Therapy Education courses that I offer through my website. They just flooded out, and now I am in the process of outlining those modules so I can get the course live and available to music therapists from all over! I may not have any presentation topics in my head, but I do have continuing education topics churning around in there.

I did a little watercolor painting this week as well. Not as much as I would like to do, but a bit. I have a half-finished tree painting sitting on my desk waiting for some detail work. Meanwhile, the dishes are piling up, I still haven't cleaned out my car from conference (still lugging all my paper stuff around), and I really need to put the clean laundry away so I can walk through the hallway without stepping on the t-shirts. It has still been a good week.

For some reason, my mood is elevated even through the things that really upset me last week. We've also had a beautiful glimpse of spring this week, so I think that the combination of sunshine, blue skies, intellectual stimulation, being around other music therapists, exhausting myself through doing things that I love, and then sleeping until I could sleep no more worked wonders for my mood and my energy. I still go to sleep way earlier than I really should, being a grown-up and all, but my attitude is much better this week than it was last week at this same time.

Thank you, music therapy friends!

As I was encouraging other music therapists to actively vision what they want for their lives, I started my own vision board. I am starting to figure out what I want for myself, and I'm going to spend time trying to make my vision for the next quarter a reality. I'm going to make a pocket-sized vision board to carry with me and to remind me about what I am working towards.

I hope that you have also had a good week. If your week has been less than stellar, please know that there are good weeks ahead. I always need that type of reminder when I am in the doldrums or the depths - there is something better ahead.

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