Sentimental Sunday: This Is the First Time This Has Happened - Sentimental Sunday on a Sentimental Sunday Post - #3360

This has never happened before, but today's selected post is a Sentimental Sunday post. Post #3360 was written on October 1, 2023, and it was all about a post I wrote back in 2011 (there is a link in post #3360 to the original post). Rough weeks happen, and they tend to happen quite often at my job. They seem to be happening more often these days, so it is nice to be reminded that things really haven't changed much - I might just be more attentive to the continuing issues of the people that I work for and with right now than I have been in the past.

All of these posts are concerned with figuring out what I need to do to engage my clients in their music therapy treatment process. I still struggle with this with some of my clients, but those clients are the ones that do not engage in any sort of education with any sort of enthusiasm, so I know that music therapy is not the only thing that they hate about school, but it still bores into my brain.

I want people to love music and music therapy and me. I do. It is something that is part of who I am as a therapist for the population that I work with daily. I do not like it when people do not like me. This complicates working with humans as I am not everyone's cup of tea. I tend to engage in severe self-criticism and self-recrimination when someone doesn't like me, even though my rational brain tells me that not everyone will. My emotional brain craves acceptance and just falls into my old patterns of trying to make myself into someone that is liked - even when it is not healthy for me.

Right now, I am watching an artist who is having an anxiety attack on YouTube. She is experiencing imposter syndrome and does not really know what it is she is experiencing. It is interesting that she is talking about this as I am reading through past thoughts about not feeling like I can control what is happening in my music therapy sessions and wondering if I need to be in control (the answer is that I do not have to be in control, but the expectation for myself is still present...). I am listening to this vlogger with her doubts and questionings and her statements that she does not feel that her success at the moment is sustainable.

I often feel that way as well. I can say that I feel less that way now than I did even four years ago. I don't know if I am becoming lazy or disillusioned or am just plain old tired about trying to be better and more, but I am not as consumed about these things now. I am tired of making plans and goals that do not interest me just to feel guilty about not achieving. This is one reason that I selected my word of the year to be "play." After several years of focusing on things that I have not achieved, I am not focusing on growth or development. I am focusing on things that make me feel good and give me joy. I am doing things that are fun. In the second month of this year, I am feeling better about what I want to be doing with my life, but I am still fighting my goblins (shoulda/woulda/coulda) as I sit here and think about my future - both near and far away. 

I am in a place in my professional development where I feel like I am not experiencing much that my clients do for the first time anymore. Does that make sense? Even the clients who are openly hostile are similar to clients I have worked with before. I have changed significantly in how I respond and what I am able to do with my aging body concerns, but not much of human behavior is surprising to me these days. I continue to strive to be a responsive therapist to the people entrusted to my service, but I do not find much that is new to me. This may be why reading these particular posts helps me to remember that I tend to be a more successful therapist when I pay attention to what the humans sitting in my groups are communicating to me rather than trying to make them fit into my plans.

How does this work with my themes? Sometimes it doesn't, and I focus more on my students' needs than the plan. Is it essential that my clients hear a clarinet played or is it more important that we provide an outlet for their big emotions? I think you know my answer to that question.

I do not have an easy answer to the things that I wrote about in 2011 and again in 2023, but I know that my attitude has a big part in how I evaluate the success or failure of my sessions. Right now, my attitude is not the best when it comes to work. There are so many things happening that have a direct effect on what I do with my clients that I have absolutely no say about. Yet, the things that occur affect me more than the people who are making the decisions. There continues to be a disconnect between the administration and the direct care staff members, and as a school employee, not a facility employee, I am not considered at all when decisions are made. None of my fellow school employees are considered much in decisions made at the facility - it's not just me. My attitude, affected more by the things happening around me than the clients, can make or break client interactions and session strategies.

As I move into the next week, I am going to try to remember that my attitude has lots to do with how my clients respond to music therapy. I have no strategy for music therapy sessions this week. I will by the time my first clients enter the music therapy room tomorrow, but I am not thinking about it at the moment. There are so many other things that I have to think about between now and then that my brain is not occupied by what I am going to do in music therapy tomorrow.

Attitude can make or break a session.

I think that will be the message I take into the week with me. See you tomorrow?