Reminded to Take Things Easy On Myself and Just Breathe at Times

I have a mantra that I say to myself before sessions that I just know are going to be a challenge for me and for my clients. It is a prayer, but it could also act as an affirmation if the person offering the thought does not believe in a deity or any sort of spiritual concept. Mine does start with an acknowledgement of my creator, so feel free to use this or scoff at it or change it to fit your belief system in any way that you need or want to. Here it is:

"God, help me to be the therapist that these clients need in this moment."

Variations include the following:

1. God, help me be the best music therapist I can be for these clients right now.
2. God, help me find the way into relationship with this group of diverse clients. 

So, this mantra is something that I sit and say to myself on Tuesday mornings before my contentious group of young men who are "too cool" for following directions and doing work. Well, some of them are that way. Others are eager to engage and participate in music and making music with each other and with me. The "too cool"-ers just disturb as much as they can to prevent others from engaging, and it frustrates all of us. I digress - I use this mantra (in one of its variations) to center myself before the session even starts. Once the session is going, I have no time for spiritual reflection, so I find that it helps me more prior to the session.

Here is my routine.

I sit on the floor in my spot in my quiet music therapy room for between 10-15 minutes before the first session of the day. I have already corralled all the materials that I am going to use in my sessions and have arranged them for easy access, and I start to center myself into my next role - therapist. I sit and strum the guitar (to warm up my stiff and aching fingers and to also check the tuning), and then I spend some time thinking about the upcoming session. I breathe in and out in a purposeful and rhythmic manner, and I close my eyes to review my mantra. In between inhalation and exhalation, I think my mantra prayer. I continue this for as long as I need to or until something comes and shifts my attention (often it is an intern joining me for the group session).

This is the way.

Just to clarify - this is MY way. You can do it however you want, but this is my way of centering and moving into a space where I can engage in client interaction as much as I am possible of doing in that moment.

I wrote a post earlier this week about my feelings of burnout and my yearning for a snow day escape. Just so you know, it hasn't happened yet, but I am feeling less yearning today. I am still feeling the burnout things that I talk about with others, but I was reminded that I have had two significant losses in my life lately that are probably contributing to my current feelings more than I think that they are. An interesting thing about grief is that while it is pervasive emotionally, I don't always link other things that I am feeling to my current state of grieving. I try to think that I can compartmentalize all of these things into neat little boxes - EVEN THOUGH I KNOW BETTER THAN THAT! Feelings affect everything including how I feel about my work and about where I want to be. I appreciated the reminder that there is more to this than just burnout from my job. I am not the same person that I was two months ago.

I am going to spend my time before sessions this morning in my routine - materials, tuning, breathing, mantra - the groups that I have today are less stress-inducing for me than the one on Tuesdays, but there is nothing wrong with striving to be my best for all clients. 

I am still investigating my feelings of burnout in my job, but I have now fine tuned my vision a bit to investigate what is grief and what is job. This is going to be an interesting time of reflection and introspection and growth.

Perhaps this is part of my word of the year - Deepen. Could be.