Musical Mother's Musings

Of Pennies and Promises

Last post I mentioned a phrase used by Charlotte Mason in helping children develop their ownership of an ability: "I promised I'd help you remember."  After one day, I can say I see potential, but I need a LOT more field testing!

New topic: pennies.  Ever cleaned pennies in salt and vinegar?  We hadn't, but were preparing to do so after cello practice. Unfortunately, we hit a snag.

Cello practice didn't go well.  Another one of those bothersome "I can't ever get it right" moments that threaten to sabatoge the whole afternoon.  Tears, reluctance, frustration, stalled OUT.  

"Do you want clean pennies?"

"WHAT??!"

"Do you want clean pennies?"

"Yes."

"How do you clean them?"  

"In vinegar and salt."

"Do you think it's easy on the pennies, or would it be nasty and uncomfortable?"

"Nasty, I suppose."

"So is practice.  But if you want the spot clean, you have to apply some nasty stuff, like drills."

"Hmmmm."

"Tell you what.  I'll put this ugly penny in vinegar, and when you decide you've improved this spot all you can for today, I'll take it out and we'll look at it."

[Now there was a catch.  If he didn't practice long, the penny didn't soak long, and therefore wouldn't get as clean.  Incentive.]

Soon I heard some pretty good practice going on that troublesome spot--much better than we were getting any other way!  After about 15 minutes, he was done, and got to pull the penny out.  It was indeed cleaner, but not as clean as he wanted.  

I love visual object lessons!

P.S.  Improving myself takes some pretty nasty scrubbing and cleaning, as well.  I'm so grateful that I don't have to go it alone.  I've got a Master Cleaner working on me!

"I Promised I'd Help You Remember"

I spent a bit of time today reading a couple of free e-books from Simply Charlotte Mason.  Now, I actually know very little about Charlotte Mason, except that she had a lot to say about education, and that many, many home-schoolers rely on her writings as the foundation of their home-schooling experience.  

I must admit, however, I found some tidbits in these books that gave me pause.  One, from the book Smooth and Easy Days, is the title of today's post.  In a chapter about nagging, the author (who has pulled the best of Charlotte Mason's work into a short, easily accessible format) compares the difference in a child's mind between Mom's reminders (read, "nagging"), and having to remember something themselves.  

As we all know, a child can't remember ever so many things, such as the towel on the floor of the bathroom that should have been hung, or the slippers one trips over in the middle of the living room floor.  Her suggestions?  

1) Choose one area to focus on for several weeks, rather than try to improve everything all at once.

2) Make sure the child understands (simply) the expectations.  (i.e. "I want you to remember something with all your might.  When you finish your shower, you must hang up your towel.  If you forget, I promise to remind you.")

3) Now, when the towel gets forgotten, rather than a) picking it up yourself and huffing about it, or b) scolding the child for forgetting it yet again, you c) call the child in and calmly say, "I promised I'd help you remember."  If that isn't quite enough, pointing to the offending item will usually jog the memory--but you haven't had to say, "Hang up the towel."  Instead, his brain said it; you simply helped him remember.

I'm up for trying it.  And it may be helpful in practice, too.  Perhaps she needs to use a metronome on a difficult spot.  You explain what is expected.  Then you promise to remind her if she forgets.  Then, if indeed she forgets, you don't have to launch into a tirade about how she never remembers (or doesn't want) to use the metronome.  You instead say, gently, "I promised I'd help you remember, and point to the metronome." 

Will it work? I don't know.  I just today read it.  But it might.  And it's a whole lot gentler than the reactions I feel welling up inside me when [yet again] something gets "forgotten."  

Besides, I'd far rather be reminded gently than shamed for forgetting, wouldn't you?

Passion and the Organ Symphony

Thanks to a dear friend, Nathan and I went to the symphony this afternoon, and heard Camille Saint-Saens' Symphony No. 3, the "Organ" symphony.

I learned the piece in college, under the baton of my first orchestra director (a very special man to me and my family).  Nathan heard the work for the first time today.  It was rewarding to share it with him, and see him fall in love with it.

The conductor, Mei-Ann Chen, was really a pleasure to watch.  She conducted for the sake of the orchestra, not the audience (in other words, not a show-woman), but it was our benefit to watch her.  She was clear, very interpretive, and passionate about what she was doing.  And the orchestra was right with her.  The collaboration was intensely powerful.

This is what we do it all for.  The hours of practice, the tears and cheers--it's all for this. No--not for a symphony job (a different topic altogether!), but for the passion of it.  Whether in symphonic form, chamber music (my preference), solo work or education, it is the passion which is the end game. Technique without passion is meaningless.  (Conversely, passion without technique isn't so pleasant. . .)  Life must have passion, and one's heart's work must utter forth from the very fiber of one's being.  

Whatever your avocation is, search out the passion in it, and foster it.   When you share your passion, the entire world is enriched.   Thank you to those of you who shared your passion with us today, and made our worlds come alive!

Life Lessons #1: Consistency

In the last post I mentioned that one of the greatest benefits of practicing a musical instrument is the life lessons the child learns. Here's to the first: consistency. (Thanks to this "Juggling Motherhood" blog post for the picture and some great thoughts).

One of our goals this semester with practice is to establish routines and habits, the first of which is actually doing the practice. . .every day!

Of the 15 possible practice days this month (we were out of town for the first week), Nathan has successfully practiced for 13 of them--all three instruments.  That, in our home, is an accomplishment. They have not been perfect practices, but they have happened.  Every day.  [And, for what it's worth, I've been practicing every day, too!]

Why is it so hard to practice every day?  For my son, it's partly just being young, and partly ADHD.  Consistency is especially difficult for someone with ADHD, because their minds don't "hook in" to importance.  For them, things are worth doing if they are novel, challenging, exciting, or urgent (none of which really describe daily practice!), but not important.  So, the daily routine of actually getting the instrument out, repeating scales for the umpteenth time, drilling the same ol' shifts and tuning troubles--all of this is part of a difficult pattern to establish.  It's hard enough for a mature, "neuro-typical" adult.  It's more challenging for a child, who can't see the future benefits.

Why is consistency important?  Because one of the most empowering abilities in life is to perform daily the mundane, but necessary tasks.  Building those habits and routines give us tools to perform at a greater level of achievement.  And the other (perhaps greater benefit) is the self-discipline to stick to something even when it's not new, exciting or creative.  It's easy to start a plan, and much, much harder to see it through when it's old and boring.  Conquering ourselves, and inertia, gives us an internal strength that benefits us in many other situations.

Habits can't be formed without consistency.   According to many sources, 28 days is all it takes to create a habit.  [I found this TED talk to be very inspiring on just that topic.]  We're half-way through our first 30 days, and getting stronger.  You can, too!

What habit do you know you really need to form?  Exercise? Devotions? Journaling? Dishes? There's a good reason you haven't yet formed it, but perhaps that reason isn't as powerful as you give it credit for.  Put your mind to it, for 30 days, and see if you haven't made headway in creating a good habit.  Be consistent--do it every day. The self-discipline alone will give you mental/emotional muscle.

Consistency: creating habits with daily tasks--life lesson # 1, brought to you by music lessons.

 

 

It's Going to be Okay

For Christmas this year, my son (the only one in the house with any money!) went all out, and bought a Willow Tree figurine for each of us.  The one you see here is the precious gift I received.  Precious, because he gave it out of his heart, and also precious, because of what it stands for.  

You see, part of our package of challenges is a tumult of emotions.  When my son is fighting a food allergen, the emotional upset is tremendous--feeling worthless, desperate, anxious, panicky, out of control, and angry, all bundled up together.  It's hard to watch a nine-year-old fighting all that.  

When it's combined with the natural issues of young boy-hood, and amplified through the lens of ADHD, things get pretty ugly sometimes.  

Of course, because practice is so big a part of our lives, and something that takes self-discipline (almost impossible to tap into when the above-mentioned forces are at play), practice becomes the staging ground for trouble.

Easy answer? Drop the instruments.  Of course.  If the practice is the issue, than nix it!  But that logic is faulty for a couple of reasons: 1) because the practice really isn't the issue--it's only the place where the issues come to the front, and 2) because taking the music from my boy would be akin to taking the football from Tim Tebow.  Every child needs music--mine lives and breathes it.  [and 3) these practice sessions give us valuable practice at working through negative emotions, rather than caving in to them. VERY important.]

This is a topic we've struggled with for years, literally.  But there is a new (?) tool that has been helping all of us--"It's going to be okay."  Really, when you're panicking about anything, what is it you want most to know?  That this isn't the end of the world.  That beyond this, life will get back to "normal", that it's going to even out, settle down, resolve at some point.  This desperation will not be perpetual--there is another "shore" to the river you're struggling through.

That's why I love the figurine.  It depicts a little boy, wanting desperately the reassurance of his mother, yet partly turned away, and hands-in-pockets, trying to maintain that sense of self he is working so hard to develop.  It's a little boy on the brink between independence and reliance, needing Mommy, yet beginning to handle life's problems on his own.

It illustrates so beautifully the role a mother has in a growing child's life.  It's going to be okay, son.  You're growing up.  Life is throwing you more challenges.  It's asking more of you.  And right now, you feel entirely inadequate.  But it's going to be okay.  We'll get through this together, not as the mommy-carrying-baby, where she's doing it all, but as two individuals helping each other.

This practice stuff?  We're practicing music, yes, learning the skills on the instrument.  But much more, we're practicing heart-tools: self-discipline, courage, facing fears, stick-to-it-iveness, embracing challenges--all those internal skills you'll need in the real world.  We're practicing independence and dependence, self-awareness and other-awareness, self-critique and how to receive other-critique.  We're practicing getting through tough spots and celebrating victories.  We're rehearsing getting through the difficulties to find the joys beyond.

Yes, my son, it's going to be alright.  You're going to get through this.  Hang on.  Don't give up.  Don't quit, whatever you do.  Because, on the other side, it'll all be worth it.

And, son?  I love you.

Happy New Year!

Dear reader,  

It has come--that day we all dread, yet hope for.  The one which marks the end of what was, and the beginning of what will be; the day that draws the line in the sand, over which we must step if we will continue this journey called life--the first day of the new year.

Oh, it's inevitable enough, and really, in all honesty, not so special as it seems.  Why, the sun rises and sets 365 times every year, and one more day can't be that important, can it?

Each day is only as important as we make it.

January 1 gets a lot of attention (importance, some would deem), by virtue of our reckoning of time. For how many thousands of years have cultures marked one specific day as a day of new beginnings?  And why?  Just as one cannot find a starting or ending place on a perfect sphere, so our days, in the endless cycle of seasons, really could start or end at any point.

But we, in our human finite-ness, have a need for newness, for second (or third, or fourth) chances, for fresh starts.  And so we cling to this "new day" with an imbalance of hope, of longing, of desire for something better.  (Who ever writes a New Year's resolution that will decrease their quality of life?!)

We look for new beginnings, because we need them.

Today, we began again.  A new year.  In the words of hymn writer Brian Wren, 

Is this a day of new beginnings,

Time to remember and move on;

Time to believe what love is bringing,

Laying to rest the pain that's gone?

How can the seasons of a planet

Mindlessly spinning round its sun

With just a human name and number

Say that some new thing has begun?

Yet through the life and death of Jesus

Love's mighty Spirit, now as then,

Can make for us a world of difference

As faith and hope are born again.

Then let us, with the Spirit's daring,

Step from the past and leave behind

Its disappointment, guilt and grieving,

Seeking new paths and sure to find.

Christ is alive, and goes before us

To show and share what love can do.

This is a day of new beginnings;

Our God is making all things new.

 

You know, better than anyone on this earth, what you want made new.  But God, greater than our understanding, and more intimately acquainted with ourselves than we can know, offers to make new what really matters.  All the issues we discuss via this forum, all the concerns of your home and hearth, all the issues in your personal life, your family field, your work and community, will be best served if we first allow our God to start today, this week, this month and year, to make us new.

Happy New Year!

Christmas for Musicians

I've been a musician all my life.  And ever since I could play "O Come, Little Children," Christmas has been the busiest season of the year.  I married a professional musician (worse yet--a conductor!), so our married life as well has always revolved around rehearsals and performances.

Now our son has joined the ranks, and he too is learning the pleasures and pains of being a Christmas musician.  As soon as Thanksgiving is past (and sometimes before), the rehearsals and performances seem to multiply like proverbial rabbits.  

This time of year is so great for grandparents with video cameras, and so hard on young musicians.  There seem to be Christmas concerts at every school, church and the occasional run-out to a nursing home.  And if the youngster is in a youth orchestra or children's choir, it's busier yet.

A few words of advice (which I will try to follow!):

1) Cut some slack.  For us, since we homeschool, we are making the choice to back way off on the school work.  We a few specific assignments yet to finish, and when they're done, so are we.  If you can't cut back on school, perhaps you can on chores or other expectations.  

2) Allow practice times to include the extra music, rather than heaping it on after the normal work is done.  Lesson material may not be as well prepared, but your child will be!

3) Make sure Christmas has some fun down-time as well.  Even a few minutes outside making a snowman does more to fill love-cups and memory banks than you might imagine.  Take a little time and do something special.

4) Along with the fun down-time, be sure your child has some personal quiet time, or quiet time with Mommy.  Snuggles and softness may be more necessary after being in high-stress, exciting situations.

5) Allow for the late nights and the unusual schedules.  In the next few weeks, we have rehearsals almost every evening, and several of them will run late.  We'll be sleeping in, to compensate.  And try very hard to keep meals as regular, simple, and nourishing as possible.  Keep healthy snacks handy for those breaks between rehearsals and performances

6) Watch the health.  Sweets, lack of sleep, and being around lots of people mean lots of exposure to and breeding ground for germs.  Take extra care to give your child enough water, Vitamin C and other helpful supplements, and be proactive about any symptoms that do show up.

7) Expect more tension and irritability--and plan to be more patient and forgiving than you may normally.  It's a marvelous time of year, but very overwhelming.  

8) Use your "NO" card. Occasionally, you may need to turn something down, just because it's one too many.  If your daughter is part of a seven-performance run of Nutcracker, dragging her to a party the evening afterward may be one thing more than she can handle.

If we aren't aware of the toll the holidays take on our children (especially the performing ones), we will be surprised by what appears to be regression--collapsing into temper tantrums or sobbing heaps at the most inopportune times, grousing about things that they normally enjoy, sassing, whining, all those irritating habits we thought they had grown out of.  It's stress, overload, and under-rest.  Just being aware and taking a few precautions  will help the holidays be "merry and bright." 

Happy Holidays!

 

Questioning

I'm close to finishing a delightful and inspirational book by Mark Buchanan, titled The Rest of God.  In today's reading, Mr. Buchanan is exploring the notion of a curious God, one who likes to ask questions, and suddenly, I found a piece of parenting advice!

I have read a number of parenting books which recommend giving the child choices, or adapting your way of communicating to better fit the style/needs/abilities/developmental age of the child.  But I have often wondered what God, as the Heavenly Parent, would do with a child caught misbehaving.

How did I miss it all these years?  There it is in, in the opening chapters of our world's history. Adam and Eve have disobeyed.  God said, "Don't eat."  They have both eaten.  And God knows it.  He is intimately aware of their choice and their behavior. 

But unlike me, a human parent, God doesn't come in, raging.  He doesn't turn his back and ignore it.  He doesn't lecture, belittle, or remonstrate.  The first thing He does is to ask questions.  

"Where are you?" (as if He didn't know!).  "Have you eaten from the tree?" (Ummm, why would He be asking if they haven't?)  "What is this you have done?"

Imagine.  You have found the cookie jar with the lid off and empty, crumbs lining the path between kitchen and bedroom, and a significant lump under the bedcovers.  You have a choice.  You can tear off the covers, confront the miscreant, and declare your authority.  Or, following the example of the Heavenly Father, you can ask questions.  Standing at the doorway, you call, "Darling, where are you?"  "Have you eaten the cookies?" "Do you know what it is you really did?"

Why is this better?  Because, as Mr. Buchanan points out, questions develop relationship.  I can talk all day long, and you never really have to respond.  You can stay distant, reticent, only loosely connected.  But if I ask a question, it hooks you, draws you in, and demands interaction.  A question sets the stage for communication unlike any other form of verbage.  

By asking, "Where are you?", God allowed Adam to choose to come forth.  He didn't yank him by the ear out from under the bush where he was hiding.  He didn't pull Eve from behind the tree by her hair.  He waited, allowing the sheepish, guilty parties to take a step toward him.  

By asking, "Have  you eaten from the tree?", God gave Adam and Eve room, space, to explain themselves.  To be true, they took that gift of space and turned it into a blaming session, but how much kinder to give that space, than for God to begin the interaction by blaming and accusing them Himself.  [There is a reason that the devil is called the "accuser of the brethern"--he accuses, not God.]  In His infinite wisdom and gentleness, God allows Adam and Eve to bring the facts to the table.

In asking, "What is this that thou has done?", God brings to light the scope of their choice, again without the yelling, lecturing or sternness that so often characterize my interaction with my child.  While each of us can interpret the tone of voice according to our own beliefs, I see nothing in God's words, in His questions, that suggest to me anger, harshness, or irritation.  While He has every right to "give them what-for", that is not His way.  Instead, He invites interaction, encourages relationship, even at this crucial moment when Earth's purity has been sold for a taste.

If the Heavenly Father could approach our mis-behaving first parents with gentleness and a question, perhaps it is an example I should heed.  Perhaps, questioning would do more to bind my son to me than any amount of heavy-handed wisdom.  

Labels

Thanks to a dear friend of mine, I'm into a new book, in hopes of finding some answers to our struggles about practice, home-schooling, and life in general.  

We have a marvelous life, but it is frequently intersected with tempers and tantrums, touchy-ness, and general low-level trauma, much of which I cannot find a reason for.   The two reasons I am aware of (although not sure how to deal with them entirely), are brain allergies (food sensitivities that affect the emotions), and ADHD.  But as to which affects what, how to balance, whether to compensate or to medicate, how to nourish body and soul and assist in a well-balanced heart I do not know.

So off I go, in search of answers, into another book on parenting.  This one is Raising Your Spirited Child, by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka.

I have read the introduction and the first chapter.  

Point number one: I have it good.  I do not have a child who screams for 20 minutes because there's a thread hanging down inside his clothing.  My son saves his temper tantrums and troubles for home, not abroad.  My child is sweet, sensitive, and intelligent.  Many of the parents Mrs. Kurcinka has worked with struggle with much greater needs than ours.

Point number two: just becuase you don't have it bad, doesn't mean you don't have it.  I cannot (dare not) spend my life comparing my child with others.  My child has needs and issues (and because he does, the whole family does), that must be addressed, even if they don't win the "how bad can it get" contest.

Point number three (and the most important one so far): Don't use labels to define the child.

In other words, it's time to examine the words I use in defining my son.  In my childhood home, we were taught not to call people names.  In fact, there are times I have trouble "quantifying" a problem, because I don't want to resort to name-calling.  But nonetheless, I do, at least in my mind, have words I return to consistently in times of trouble.  Words like "slow-poke," "stubborn," "attitude," willful," "unreasonable," "whiney."   Mrs. Kurchinka strongly suggests that these words, spoken or silent, do much to define how the child views himself, as well as how we view them.  To quote:

It's very likely that if you too have experienced these emotions, you have not found a friend to share them with.  You've kept them to yourself, suffering alone.  Thinking that your child was the only one who could be demanding, stubborn, picky, nosy, noisy, and all those other rotten names, making you wonder what you were doing wrong.  You might find the labels so uncomfortable that you have never spoken them, not even to yourself.  But they lurk in your subconscious, influencing how you feel and how you act.  They undermine your confidence as a parent and your feelings toward your child.

Hmmm. . .I think she's hinting at truth.  We have enough negative experiences that we categorize them together in little ugly boxes in our hearts, and when these things happen again, they fit right in with the past, reinforcing the name on that box: stubbornness, impatient, manipulative, etc.

In response, she challenges us to turn those boxes upside down and rewrite their labels:

If you look closely, you'll see that the lousy labels often reflect strengths that are being overused.  Find that strength and name it.  For example, with a little guidance, aggression can become assertiveness.  Obnoxious behavior well managed may be dramatic.  

And she continues, with examples such as these:

        Nosy   can become    Curious

        Demanding   can become    Holds to high standards

        Argumentative   can become    strongly commited to one's goals or views

        Picky  can become   Selective

        Whiny   can become    Analytical

Now, for me, and I'm sure for some of you, this feels like a real stretch, even an exercise in hypocricy.  (I'm supposed to call sin by its right name, not excuse it by some smootly pasted excuse!)  Yet, I think she does have a point.  If we dwell on the negative, negative will abound.  If we can look for the blessings hidden within, they may actually show themselves.  

So, for the next couple of days (I'm not committing too far into the future, because I'm human, after all!), I'm going to really pay attention to the words I think, as well as the ones I say.  After all, it can't hurt to focus on the positive, and live without the labels!

Making It His

Daddy's been practicing with Nathan lately.  That's a good thing (though a hard one for me, because it feels a bit like defeat).  Daddy (being a professional musician, but not a string player), has some different takes on things, and that's also a good thing.

Nathan is getting ready for his violin Suzuki Book 5 recital (this Sunday, November 6, at 6:00 p.m., in case you can come!).  It will be so good to be past book 5, especially since he's been working on book 6 now for almost 4 months.  But the "old" pieces have been "boring," as in,  "I already know these, so why do I have to practice them ??"  Try as I might, I couldn't help him see that amount of polish he needed to do.  That's part nine-year-old, and part ADHD (I've already gotten to the bottom line, so why go back?)  He does play them well, but I still hear room for a lot of improvement, and so we would go rounds about it.  We weren't getting anywhere positive, and actually slipping the wrong direction, toward discouragement.

Prince Charming to the rescue!  And his take on it was, "Nathan needs to adopt the pieces as his own, to experiment, to play with them."  So that's what they've been working on, and I see a big difference!  Now, even though the notes aren't perfect, the heart's there.  There's musicality.  There's ownership.  There is even musical growth!

Since they've been practicing when I'm out of the house, I can't report on how this miraculous transformation has taken place.  I just know it has.  I see it in the lessons, in the little practice I get to see, in the reading sessions, in the whole demeanor.  Now, there's more freedom, more experimentation, more understanding.  And the love is coming back.  

My "technician's ear" still hears notes that aren't in tune, rhythms that aren't exact, tone quality that could be better.  And those need work, not excuses.  But even if we got every one of those perfect, the result wouldn't be complete.  It was time, yes, for Nathan to take the pieces on as his own, to crawl "inside" them, as it were.  But I wasn't able to help him with that, and I have to accept that as being okay.  I can help him in ways my husband can't, and now, he has helped in ways that I couldn't.  

I'm grateful.