Letting Go & Moving On

::::::Dearest Blog Readers::::::

Can you forgive me for my absence?? It has been so long since I posted! Over the past two weeks, I have had many blog ideas come into my mind, but nothing has really stuck. I personally do not like blogs that contain filler, so I choose to only write about a topic that I really feel very strong about. I kept wondering when the right topic would enter my mind... on my long runs, during lessons, jamming with friends, writing songs... it's been busy to say the least! I have missed corresponding with blog readers and sharing my journey with the world. Luckily, the new blog topic came to me yesterday during two different situations. The topic is Letting Go & MOVING ON.

By "Moving On," I do mean in life, but also in music. Dedicated readers know that I am going through a huge transition in my life & learning how to adjust to a totally new lifestyle. As always, the parallels between music and life's challenges are becoming more and more obvious to me. Yesterday, while jamming with my friend Racheal's band, we noticed after each take that we all independently pointed out our mistakes. David, the drummer, said, "Well, that's what rehearsal is for." In other words: get over it. Ha! How simple but necessary to remember. We cannot get stuck in our musical mistakes, especially when we are practicing!

Music and life provide many moments where we can choose to stay stuck in the sadness, dissapointment, fear, worry, regret or we can move on. In Pema Chodron's book "Taking the Leap" she describes a study that finds that the average amount of time we are truly experiencing an emotion is only one and a half minutes. The rest of the time we spend worrying is a result of repeating a story in our heads, basically trying to stay stuck in that awful feeling.  At some point, we have to make a choice if we will stay stuck in the negativity, or if we can move on. Moving on isn't easy, I know. Especially when your heart is beating really fast, and your face is getting red with anger. There is a big temptation to stay in that feeling, but what good will it really do? I had a challenging moment like this yesterday.

At the retirement home where I host my recitals, I was gathering my students in the TV room like I always do. I turned the TV off and a very crabby old man yelled at me. The ironic thing is I was about to do a calm-down breathing session with the kids to help them relieve their nervousness. I calmly told the man I would turn it on after 5 minutes of talking with my students. He didn't want to hear it. He kept yelling at me. I was completely shocked. I couldn't believe someone would yell at a teacher right in front of her students. That made me angry, but I kept thinking about the example I was being forced to set right then and there. When I realized that this man really wanted to keep yelling at me, I decided to ignore him and I instructed all of the students to turn their attention to me and I made eye contact with as many of them as I could as we silently waited for him to stop yelling. It was the worst timing ever. The kids were already freaked out about performing and now this man was yelling at their teacher! They had looks of worry on their faces and that made me angry at this man. I was not feeling compassion for him in that moment. Not at all. The kids were there to do a service! I couldn't believe it.

I was very upset, but I had to gain control as fast as possible because I did not want them to start a show feeling upset and scared. I asked all of them to take 5 deep breathes with me. By the time we finished, one of the dads had an employee come to quiet the man down. I tried to stress that we were all there because we love music and we want to share, but I could tell they were all discouraged. It was hard, because so was I, and whatever I feel, they feel. I didn't know what to do, so I had them all go into the living room where we perform and sit in their designated area. I asked a friend if he had any suggestions for getting them to shake what had just happened. He told me to keep encouraging them. I realized that I had to let it go. Right there. I had to just drop the shock from my system and move on as fast as possible. So I went over to them and looked at them all and said in my most relaxed and joking voice.... "Man that was awkward!" They laughed and I felt relieved. I told them how much they mean to me and that all week long I had looked forward to this recital because I am so proud of them.

Racheal opened up the show with a beautiful song she wrote. This was the best way to transition into the show. It ended up being out best recital yet. Everyone seemed to feel good afterwards, and I was so, so, so proud of them.

Yesterday taught me to let things go as fast as possible. If you don't they will continue to influence the rest of your experiences, and who wants that? In music, the show MUST go on, so we simply have to shake things off, like crabby old dudes bullying a teacher. We can't carry it with us if we want to perform well, whether that performance is on stage or in life. Here's to letting things go, and moving on!

At My New Place

Jealousy

Jealousy sucks. Whether it's coming from you or someone else. Jealousy is one of the worst human experiences we have to deal with. If you are feeling jealous, you have to figure out why, and do something productive about it, or if you are like most people in this world, you act out in nasty behaviors in order to punish the person you are jealous of. Most of us are guilty of doing the latter. But what if someone is jealous of you? The other day, one of my most talented students was acting very shy about performing in the school talent show. Now, this is a kid who can play 3 instruments well, sing, dance, and basically excel at everything. On top of that, he is so sweet, so of course he is adored by all of his teachers, including me! He performs at the retirement home with me, and when he starts to play, everyone runs in the room to see who is making such amazing music! So when he said he didn't want to perform, I knew something was up. Turns out, there is a bully at school who is jealous of his talents. Ah. Ok. That made sense to me.

My first reaction to this was irritation and anger. Not at my student. At the bully. At the jealousy. What can my student do? Nothing, really. You cannot control someone else's jealous feelings. Jealousy stems from insecurity, and that is an internal problem. We had a very long discussion about how important it is to stay true to yourself and never let anyone else's insecurities stop you from doing what you love. By the end, he said he would think about performing. I'll take it. Much better than the beginning of the conversation.

It really made me think about jealousy in my own life. I am so jealous of the singer Adele right now. She is so amazing! The way she sings so freely. I want to be like that. But I try to remember what my best friend told me the other day... that there is room in the world for everyone, and that jealousy only holds me back. I think about how it feels to be jealous whenever I sense jealousy coming from others.

When I was performing a lot of shows in the North Florida music scene, I remember feeling like there was an unspoken competition between the (very few) female musicians. When I was there, I could count on one hand how many local female singer-songwriters were opening for touring bands. At the time, I was taking a lot of Women's Studies classes in college, participating in Take Back the Night rallies, going to Lilith Fair, and basically being a very loud cheerleader for women in music, so the thought of other female musicians being jealous of me bothered me a lot. If they could have seen inside my mind, they would have known that I was only excited to see more women rising up to represent music. But, like I said before, you cannot control how other people feel.

If you want to be a musician, or any kind of artist, and you begin to excel, you are going to have to experience jealousy from others. This is a fact. How will you deal with it? Will you let them succeed in destroying your dream in order to make them more comfortable? Or will you stay true to who you are and what you are meant to do in this lifetime? Will you continue to keep them in your life even after experiencing their jealous feelings over and over again? To me, letting jealousy get in your way and letting jealous people stay in your life is a form of self-sabotage. I learned how to let jealous people out of my life long, long ago. This is a difficult life, and you need to be surrounded by people who support you and lift you up.