music, therapy, and me

I am currently sitting in my sister's old room (now, the guest room), listening to the rain fall and fall. I will be heading back to my place tomorrow, and I am about ready to go home to do things that I need to do back there. I will be heading to a new airport during my trip back to my land, and I am looking forward to some novel things during the experience. I love traveling. I don't much care what the mode of transportation is in my travels. I've driven completely across this country of ours, taken the train from several destinations to new locations, flown all sorts of places - in fact, across two oceans, and been on a boat for several days. I enjoy the process of travel - almost all of it - not a big fan of having to hoist my carry-on into the overhead compartments, but the rest is pretty good. I strive to have a life where I can travel to places I have never been before. I have that sort of life occasionally, and I enjoy it. I am going to be driving to a conference ne...

Today's goal is to finish packing up the living room. I have six days until I close on my new house, and I am not ready to go yet. Fortunately, I have 11 days until the movers arrive, and I am only moving a small way down the road, so I can take some things over in between closing and movers. That's the plan, at least. I am almost finished with the dining room shelves. I keep finding additional books on shelves, but I am almost finished and ready to take the shelves down. Once that is done, I will be able to stack boxes against the wall instead of in the middle of everything. I should also be able to move my coffee table and my loveseat to that area so I can pack up the rest of the room.  I have lots of ambition and very little energy, so this should be interesting. There are so many things that go into being someone moving houses. In my original timeline, all of this happened during one of my breaks from my job, but the universe had different ideas, so now I am doing most of t...

I've been spending some time making things lately...things like file folder activities and sing about mini editions of therapeutic music experiences (TMEs). I have been immersed in the world of digital flattening and clip art collections, so it's been pretty interesting to be making stuff in the midst of my everyday life. I enjoy having a creative outlet that leads me to clinical options and things to do with clients. I have been making things to use in the month of February. I'm getting ready to start my March edition of sing about songs and will be releasing it on the 5th of January. I already have some leprechaun files on my Teachers Pay Teachers store , but I am getting some March Madness files together, and I'll be spending some time thinking about some spring-themed TMEs and corresponding visuals.  Anyway... If you are interested in getting some TME ideas and some visuals to go along with them, check out my store . Everything is pretty inexpensive, but you...

So, if you've been following this blog lately, you know that I am currently trying something new for me - I am starting to use centers as part of my music therapy sessions. This came about because I have large groups of students placed in classrooms that have very little therapeutic rhyme or reason. Clients are constantly changing - kids leave and brand new ones arrive pretty much all the time. We never find a time where we stabilize.  I am trying something different. Two times per month, I am setting up centers for my clients to complete as part of their music therapy treatment. I have three centers - Explore, Listen, and Learn. These titles simply give me a way to indicate where I want clients to go during the session. I also have two different task indicators for my centers - Must Do and May Do tasks. I completed one full round of centers for half of the school last week - the other half will do centers this upcoming week. This is due to the snow day and day off that I too...

One of the WONDERFUL (tongue firmly in cheek, here - lots of sarcasm) characteristics about me is that I am strongly affected by smells. There isn't a real list that I can make of which smells will affect me, but there are many that I know of. Yesterday, I was introduced to a new version of honeysuckle that nearly did me in. I'm not exactly sure how it came in - I think it was brought into the music therapy room by an observer (who stood and talked, loudly, throughout the entire session she was supposed to be "observing" along with the other three people who came in), but I am not sure. All I know is that I could breathe fine when the session started, but when the "observers" left, there was a cloud of honeysuckle smell that permeated the air. I started coughing and couldn't stop. This was the beginning of a process of coughing, gasping, more coughing, more gasping, eventually vomiting, and then collapsing in exhaustion with a tight feeling in my c...

One of my most treasured possessions is an old Boy Scout compass that was my father's all through his Boy Scouting days. It's in really good shape considering that it was my Dad's and that I've got it now. It's probably at least 55 years old and may be more like 60-ish. That compass has moved with me ever since my grandmother died. It has been to California, Arizona, and now resides with me in my current state. I put it in different places and rediscover it every so often. I even have a vague idea of how to use it as a tool for navigation. I spend lots of time figuring out ways to navigate during the course of my job. I try to give my clients the tools that they need when going out into the greater world - social interactions, patience, the ability to ignore obnoxious others, actual map skills, you name it. I find myself navigating through my own social mishaps and situations as well. That may be why I like music as a therapeutic medium. Music is time-framed. ...

Do you ever just go away for a time to find an adventure? I do not. I am mainly a homebody who just sits at home and enjoys structure and routine. Lately, however, I've been craving something new, so I've been moving into adventurous situations (at least, for me!). My adventures this year have included expanding my reading and writing about music therapy, traveling to different music therapy programs, thinking about internships a bit differently, trying to come up with creative ideas, starting up a non-profit organization for music therapists (look up the Online Conference for Music Therapy), and working on my role in the greater music therapy world. This year has been an adventure, to say the least. I am not finished with the adventuring. I am stepping outside my comfort zone yet again. One of my fortune cookies from my latest Chinese food order stated, "Courage is the mastery of fear - not the absence of fear." So, it is time to take another leap into the void...

My life is currently defined by folders. I am trying to be organized in the midst of a minor whirlwind of activity and new experiences, so I have turned to the comfort of folders. You may not be able to tell from this picture, but I have four colored folders that are currently organizing my progress and process.  Why? That's a great question! I am a visual learner/organizer so having different colors helps me to easily and efficiently choose the information that I need at any given time without having to spend much time thinking about the process. How is it organized? The yellow folder (my current favorite color, by the way - it varies between yellow and green) holds my reminders. There is an article about John Dewey, one of my educational inspirations - go immersion!! There is another article about another one of my educational gurus, William G. Spady - go outcomes-based education! There is an article about preparing yourself for professional interactions. The pink folde...

Today is the beginning of my next new adventure. There have been a couple of new adventures this year, including being part of a brand-new organization, going to various and sundry places, and starting to look for a new direction for myself in my professional life. So, since there is a shift in my focus today, I just cannot talk about Wigram and all. This new adventure is one way outside my comfort zone. I am going to a new place, a new atmosphere, and a new experience. I am more than a little bit nervous about this but keep reminding myself that all adventures are learning experiences and valuable for self-growth. No matter what the outcome, I have jumped into this adventure with both feet and an attitude of "here I go!" Self-care plays an important part of what I speak about with interns. Almost every webinar/seminar has an element of taking care of self in order to be better able to take care of others. It surprises me how much we, as therapists, often neglect or ignor...