Wiggly Diva Lessons

I recently started teaching voice to an adorably driven first grader.  This girl has plans.  She is going to be a singer.  She wants it with every fiber of her little being.  She is also six.  This week our lesson fell on a gloriously sunny day.  It was warm, the air smelled like flowers, and her friends were playing right outside the building.  We could HEAR them.  We were plugging along with scale warm ups and pitch matching exercises, and I could see the slight sway of her body intensifying, her little hands moving like trapped birds at her sides. 

“Miss Shannon, I can’t!” she finally bursts.  “I’m too wiggly!” 

I bit my lip to keep from laughing, and sent her out to check in with her mama.  I listened at the door as her mother gently and firmly told her that she didn’t have to finish her lesson, but that if she wanted to continue with lessons, she needed to stick to it.  Plus, she only had a few minutes left, and then she could go out to play.  Little Miss trudged back in and stood solemnly by the keyboard.  Wanting to reassure her, I pulled out some teacher-y wisdom.

“Sometimes it is hard to work on stuff, even when it is something that you want to do very much.” I tell her.  “That doesn’t mean that it isn’t important to you, just that it can be hard.”

Looking for a way to make our last five minutes more engaging, I made up a simple tune and asked her to help me write lyrics for it.  We ended up with a sweet little song about spring, and she left our lesson smiling.  I, on the other hand, was feeling a bit sad. 

I saw so much of myself in her wiggly, six year old struggle to stay the course when sunshine and friends were calling.  Listening to her mother’s loving insistence, and watching myself find a way to make our work a celebration of sun and spring that honored her desire for play, I was deeply stricken.  I couldn’t help but compare it to the way I talk to  myself when my mind has the wiggles, when I want to do pretty much anything other than set pen to paper and keep my promise to myself.  Let's just say it wasn't a pretty comparison.  I would never treat one of my students the way I treat myself, and that made me wonder. What would it look like if I was gentle, but firmly insistent?  What would it feel like if I told myself that YES, this is hard, and that doesn’t mean it isn’t important to me?  What might happen if I found a way to make my wiggles a strength, to make my work a celebration of the shiny things that pull at my thoughts?  At the very least, I will have been kind to myself.  I might also find it easier to get through the minutes required to stay faithful to myself.  I might even create something worthwhile from my struggle.