music, therapy, and me

It is Sunday again, and I have a little bit of time before I have to head out into the time change world to try to sing enough to lead worship this morning. It is time to see what past me has to say to present me. I plugged in the number of posts that I have written on this blog about music, therapy, and me (3,393) into a random number generator and then started up the generator. It spat out post #2117 , so I am taking a glimpse back to February 27, 2019 .  Oh, February. It is usually the month where we get the most inclement weather. For it being the shortest month in duration, it always seems like the longest month of the year. This year was no exception. I was not looking forward to anything about February 27th - it was a Wednesday. It was a 12-hour day. It was a possible inclement weather day after a series of inclement weather days. I was not happy when I was writing. One of the things that I am noticing more and more about myself and about the people around me is when we get ...

Wow. Today's look back into my thoughts and blog posts has hit me hard. Check out this post from July 14, 2011 to see what I was thinking and writing about back then. It is definitely a concept that I am still living, thinking about, and trying to figure out - 12 years later... The past week was a difficult week - seems like the same sort of week that I had back in July 2011. This time around, I don't think that I did anything wrong. The students that had a bad time in music therapy came in that way - they had decided that they were going to hate every single thing that they were provided before they even knew what was g oing on. There isn't much that I can do when students are bound and determined to hate what we do - I believe that music therapy is most effective when the client is interested and invested in the process - when clients are unwilling to participate, then are the things that happen in a session actually therapy? My intern is going through this situation wit...

I fell down about a week and a half ago. I was walking on my stairs and wasn't holding onto the banister and thought that I could bend down and pick up something that was on the stairs without doing anything, but I slipped. As I was falling, all I could think of was that I did not want to die on my stairs. All my sister would be able to say was "I told her so" during her grief process. Everyone would be mad at me, so I was able to avoid hitting my head completely. I did twist my foot someway and ended up chipping a big piece of my ring toe off the base of my phalanx. My Physician's Assistant referred me to the local orthopedist for a consult. I have been breaking bones in situations where I had been only spraining things. I fall down lots. Since I am breaking chips off bones on what I feel is a regular basis now, I am determined to get to the bottom of what is happening to me. It is probably a lack of calcium since I do not drink milk. My grandmother had pretty bad os...

It is Thursday again, and I am sitting at the computer, thinking about the quotation that I have in my small quotation box. "Patience is also a form of action." ~Auguste Rodin Hunh. Patience can be action.  Isn't this especially true for a therapist?  Therapy isn't something that happens immediately. Therapy isn't a bandaid, it is a long process of work and reflection. It can't be rushed. Have you ever come across a client who expects that a song will cure them of their ailments? When they start to realize that therapy is a long-term commitment, they are no longer interested. In this world of instant gratification, two-day shipping, and online shopping, I find that we, as a society, really don't have much patience anymore. I'm good at being patient with my clients, but I am not as good about being patient with myself or with my co-workers. Yet, time after time, being patient has proved to be the right way to do things. I just don't rem...