This morning is an attempt to relax in the moment, despite the pressure of the week that I'm in the midst of. We are in contest season, and by we I mean me (me and my stressed-out snarky alter-ego) and by contest season, I mean that joyous series of weeks for high school choirs and young musicians beginning after the return from Christmas break and continuing through early March. I, being the silly superhuman accompanist I estimate myself to be, stupidly decided at the beginning of the calendar year to take on not only the contracted school I already had been playing for since the beginning of the academic year, but also my own high school of origin to help them out for five weeks or so starting in February. And let's not forget to mention that I also decided to take on the accompanying position for a Lutheran church in the Lake St. Louis area. Long story short: contest season for 2 schools + Lent preparation for 1 church = welcome back from the dead, O ye maxed out college Katie. I'm supposed to be taking a break from the kind of stress I was under while in school, right? Unfortunately I have to relearn the lesson of overcommitment about once a year... apparently it hasn't completely sunken in yet...
Last fall my friend Christine said something that really struck me and has stayed with me, simply because I've been wrestling with it's truth and simplicity for the past 7 months or so... when I came back to St. Louis, she and I were talking about graduation and the future, etc... anyway, she said something to the effect of this (paraphrase): "You're done with school, Katie... now you can start settling into your life and becoming the person you were meant to be." At the time, I listened but blew it off in my mind as just a non-musician's perspective on life. But her words stayed with me longer than I would have liked... in my mind, I wasn't done with school. I was simply in another interim period, waiting til I would go back to school again in another year or two. But you know, after killing myself for 6 years, I'm starting to realize that I'm not exactly ready to jump back into battle again. This realization has been growing within me for the past couple of months and I've been supressing it like crazy: "No, Katie. Stay focused. Keep going. You can do it. Another year and then you can audition again. And then it's just two more years and you'll have your masters and THEN you can be done for good... maybe." Anyway, what I've come to realize is this: the game zone mindset is extremely wearying. I'm so tired of pushing myself. I've pushed myself since as long as I can remember... to the point of questioning my overall life goals of excel, excel, excel. I look around at my friends and family and I look at my schedule which has me working six days a week, sometimes seven days a week and it's not even the schedule that really bothers me so much as the lack of grace I give myself. No relief. Keep going. Stay focused. Push, push, push. If you're not pushing forward, you're falling backward...
... it gets old after a while. My heart is tired of my own self-imposed pressure cooker.
And really, when it comes down to it, it's just another area of my life where God is revealing to me my lack of functional belief in the grace of the gospel. Because if I really believed that my self-worth wasn't determined by my vocational progress or educational advancement or ability to accompany and perform without making mistakes, but rather an honest belief in the knowledge that my self-worth is determined by the person I am in Christ, then I wouldn't be pushing myself in such unhealthy ways to constantly do more and be a better pianist. I could just accept myself for who I am as a person, allow myself to believe I'm a good musician, do my job to the best of my ability, and let the rest go. In fact, if I actually believed (aka functionally believed) what I say I believe with my mouth, I could probably allow myself to finally settle into the roles I've already carved out for myself here in St. Louis and just enjoy living for once, not really worrying about when I'm gonna go back to school: what a concept! Christine, my dear friend, you were right after all... my life has just been getting in the way of actually living.
... I miss my friends. I miss my family. Halley recently got engaged and I wanna have the time and energy to help her with wedding preparations. I started dating someone and all I want anymore is to be with him and have fun...
Six years in the MU School of Music taught me so so much about what it means to be a good musician and a good pianist. I miss school dearly. And I miss my friends in Columbia a lot too. But my life is here now and I'm not in school anymore... and I don't have to go back for a while if I don't want to. It's time for me to (finally) learn to embrace this new phase of life... the one where I love what I do but at the end of the day, my job is still just my job -- it doesn't define me as a person. It just accentuates who I already am, the Katie Beth who doesn't have to be or do anymore than she already is, who's loved unconditionally not only by Christ, but by a host of family and friends as well. Maybe the path to true contentment begins with letting go.
