Keep Going.
Just keep your eyes on where you want to go, you got this.
This essay first appeared in Issue 36.2 of the GIA Quarterly magazine.
We had a big win this summer, my daughter and I. She’s just started the second grade, and for the past couple of years she watched as more and more of her classmates speed through town on their big-kid bicycles. No more three wheelers, no more training wheels. It was her turn.
It took lots of convincing, lots of stops and starts in our cramped driveway. Lots of tears, frustrated exchanges. So many “big feelings,” so many falls. She’d always try to divide her focus on a perfect placement of her feet on the pedals while wrestling the handlebars to point the front wheel in a straight line. Since she was a little baby I’ve watched her tackle new hand-eye coordination tasks, I watched her first sit on her own, then crawl, then take first steps. Soon she was running, jumping, skipping. I knew she’s get there eventually, I just wasn’t sure how high the tally of skinned knees and scraped palms it would take before she’d experience the freedom of the wind in her hair with a new level of independence unlocked.
So, just a couple months ago, we took a walk down the street to our neighborhood church parking lot, giving her the space she needed to give it an honest try, unencumbered by the limited square footage of our home space.
I expected many more falls, so I knew we’d need a good pep talk before launching on the open blacktop. “Listen, Ava. You are so brave. You are a good kid. You can do this—especially if you don’t just stare at your feet; you gotta look out in front of you, keep your eyes on where you want to go, not just where you are right now. You got this.”
Yes, I cried. Partly because she didn’t fall again, actually—she took the advice and looked straight down the lot and didn’t stop, just kept looping around and around in circles, giggling and yelling “I’m doing it! Mom! I’m doing it!”
Some of my tears are surely borne of the bittersweet feeling of my little one growing up, the mix of sadness and pride at her ability to not need me so much anymore. Nothing could have prepared me for the constant balance of grief and gratitude that is the gift of motherhood. But the surprise to me was that a healthy dose of those tears were simply because this was the metaphor that I needed to hear. “Just keep your eyes on where you want to go. You can do it.”
Taking the long view
At the risk of over-explaining the gift that this symbolic language is to me, I want to offer it to you, too.
As musicians and directors, the best evidence of a job well done is when the people in the pews get to take for granted the time we’ve spent preparing it. The faithful gathered--lost in wonder, awe, and praise--needn’t consider the long rehearsals, the plunked-out harmonies, the carefully discerned texts and pairings. But take any one of those elements away and surely the floundering of chaos takes us out of a prayerful mindset and instead directs our attention only toward the perils and worries of this current moment.
Of course, sometimes we do fail. We do fall. Our human condition reminds us again and again of our fallibility, our imperfections. Sometimes, we struggle to get out of the rut of a tense relationship between liturgist and pastor. It consumes our energy as we wait on baited breath for the other to make yet another mistake, another gesture or phrase that makes us clench our teeth and roll our eyes. Sometimes, we are overwhelmed by the realities of “not enough”—too small of a budget, too few in the choir, too many demands. Enter any social media group for sacred musicians and see the lamenting of these realities articulated, then throw in the contentious debate about whose style or genre reaches God’s ear first. It’s overwhelming. It’s a mess.
God sees us trying, sees us wrestling with those pedals and handlebars and daily labors that are all necessary ingredients to keep our music programs in balance, to foster accessible, sung prayer as we aim to communicate with our Creator with our whole mind, body, and soul. We need those foundational efforts of honing our craft as a return for what we have been given. We need the long hours of practice, the organization of schedules, the attempt to collaborate, even disagree, with others who do this holy labor alongside us on our parish staff or within our social groups and organizations, though I think we could all agree that the eye-rolls and condescending comments are proof that the spirit has more work yet to do within us. But it’s that long view that will really let us fly—the reassurance that we are children of God, on a journey toward heaven, toward home.
You got this.
Throughout the Gospels, Jesus always looks up from the messiness of temporal coordination and instead points us toward what is ahead, inviting us to do the same. Indeed, this holy work is full of entanglements. So many things are endlessly vying for our attention, seeming to threaten to throw us off course if we don’t keep our focus on a single issue. There are so many voices haunting us, whispering our imperfections at every turn, making us question even our own value or worthiness of this task in the eyes of God. It is often not a question of if we will become discouraged, but when. How long before we give in, or give up?
But, humor me. Go into the church. Look up. See your altar, your table. See the aisle is clear. Hear the echoes of voices that have long ascended these rafters, raising our most sacred human experiences back to the one who gave us light and life since the beginning. Let nothing stand in the way of our bold procession toward this foretaste of the beautiful Kingdom that is ahead for us, that abundant and perfect justice that is already and not yet a joyful reckoning where all wrongs are made right. Don’t miss the long view toward this table while we’re too busy worrying about whether or not our feet are placed perfectly on the pedals.
Because Jesus says, “Listen. You’re so brave. You’re so good. Pick yourself back up, scraped palms and all. You can do this—just keep your eyes on where you want to go. You got this.”