Thursday, April 23, 2015

Grace Notes

I have an actual, genuine fear of falling into laziness. Maybe that's why I am always running just one more race or finishing just one more craft project or reading just one more positively-terrible-but-critically-acclaimed novel. I know how very capable I am of giving up or quitting or binge-watching Netflix rather than doing something useful with my life. And so I go and go and go and have a difficult time resting or being still. I enjoy being busy and productive. I thrive on the pressure to be successful and to learn and grow and be more than I already am. I have a deep, physical and spiritual hunger to live life loud and cannot bear the thought of settling into a boring existence.

This tendency (or personality flaw, if you see it that way) is three-fourths good and one-fourth deleterious. Especially lately when I read all the music therapy blog posts and tweets that I got connected with when I was in undergrad. I recognize that all the successful music therapy giants in the field are trying to be motivational when they say things along the lines of "you just have to work hard!" and "anybody can start a music therapy business!", but for an overdo-er like me, it makes me feel as though I have fallen into laziness and failure since I am a year into being board-certified and yet am working at a school as a paraeducator rather than as a music therapist. If I wanted to be a successful music therapist like the rest, it seemed as though I should buckle down, go forth, and conquer all the clients and solve world peace through drum circles and relaxation techniques. Instead, I took a job as a para and spent my first two weeks at this job feeling all grumbly inside, mourning that I wasn't getting to work with music therapy and fearful that my life had become directionless and overwhelming. I hadn't even allowed myself the chance to try a new career path in special ed before dreaming and scheming for where I should go next in order to follow the ultimate music therapy career path.

But the truth of the matter is....my life path of moving to a rural Kansas county just does not match up with the "typical" music therapy career. Heck, my life path doesn't even resemble anything of which I ever dreamed.

And this week, I decided that this is ok. I have decided to give myself some grace.

The fact is, I am 24 years young. Yeah, I'm not where I want to end up. I may not plan on being a para forever, but for this season in life, I need to allow myself time to be still and to grow. Before focusing on my career dreams, I need to discover who I am in the present time. I need to learn how to be a supportive wife and how I fit into the community as a new Kansas citizen. I need to find a faith community where I will be deeply connected with other believers and can be supported in my relationship with Christ. I need to learn what my ministry is and how I can fulfill my spiritual gift of loving others deeply and completely here in Emporia. I need to connect with others in friendship and sharing life. In regards to career dreams, I need to figure out where my passions lie and where I should focus my music therapy efforts before jumping the gun and accepting a job to which I will only give half of my heart (and for a girl who's really just in love with the human race, choosing a population to serve is tricky enough without also having to figure out all these other life things!).

In short, I have a lot of things I still need to figure out right now.

And someday, I will be able to focus on once again being a "real" music therapist. But for now, I realize that I have to be still for awhile, I have to learn to be more human before I can learn how to fully be a professional MT-BC (Even as I write this, I feel fear that other professionals in my field will judge me, saying that I am a quitter or that I am not living up to my potential. But there I go, allowing myself to feel pressured to be and do more. It's a vicious cycle).

As I have been processing all of these epiphanies this week, I have been thinking about grace notes in music. For you non-music folk, grace notes are essentially little tiny notes that ornament the actual notes in the musical piece. They aren't always essential to the chord, but they help to emphasize or bring interesting aspects to the notes that are already written on the page. I feel as though my decisions to take the time to learn to be still and to allow myself grace are kind of like grace notes in music. The days of my life right now may sometimes seen non-essential and like mistakes, but in reality, in view of the bigger picture, they are working to ornament my story with beauty, shaping me into who I will become down the road and helping me to uncover the confidence and passion that already reside in my heart.

So I trust that someday all the "notes" of my life will come together to create a beautiful song. And I am choosing to give myself a little grace.


*Grace notes are the tiny notes with dashes through them pictured here




1 comment:

  1. Sometimes, when we run through life too fast, we miss the scenery. Love you!

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