I got a drum 🪘
Embracing the joy of making music and moving imperfectly.
This morning I arrive in your inbox from my local Yellow Brick Coffee shop where before sitting down to write, I escaped into the restroom to dance to the cover-mashup below when it came into my earbuds.
Why? Well, because I had to. I mean, listen to it! You’ll know what I mean. I first feel the beat in my shoulders, like I’m attempting to shrug off whatever might get in the way of my having a lovely day. From there the song makes its way down my spine and by the time the chorus hits I can’t help but sashay my hips and throw my hands in the air like I’m dancing under a rainbow.
That’s what it’s like to be in my body when the right song comes on. It’s one of life’s great small joys!!
The other reason I’ve escaped into the privacy of a blessedly oversized single stall bathroom is because if I expect words to come down on pages, they have to come not just from my brain, but also my whole body. Still waters don’t run deep. This is a truth I’ve come to embrace over the years and it’s why I’ve designed the weekly classes as part of Practice Not Perfect to go in this order of operations:
Music
Movement
Meditation
Journaling
When my students reach the journaling portion of practice, my hope is that their words flow from a healthy, running stream of clarity — rather than a shallow, murky pond or a dry riverbed. The other great thing about this design is if there are parts of your body or shapes/movements that can’t be accessed for any reason, the music can move through all the same to help you notice sensation.
Music has long been the foundation for how I design my yoga classes and sequence the postures. There was a time when I felt unsure about this, like it undermined “the seriousness” of my instruction. I’d wonder why I spent hundreds of hours learning about yoga when evidently it was all about my Spotify curation? But time after time, the most common feedback I would receive from students after teaching was either a) What was that one song…? or b) I loved the playlist!
I would overthink this. I would think, is that really all people got out of practice? What about the stuff I was saying about ahimsa…what about the pranayama? But after a decade of teaching, I started to embrace that one of the things I love most about my favorite classes and instructors is, not so surprisingly, what my students seemed to enjoy most about mine: the vibes.
I find so much joy in preparing for class to create an experience of what feels like effortless synchronization between movement and the music. But doing so is not actually effortless. I spend hours carefully developing playlists to accompany the practices and all of this effort is worth it when students share how much it helps them. (In fact, one student who recently signed up for Practice Not Perfect told me in a sweet note that the last series re-ignited her appreciation of music and inspired her to find more ways to bring it into her life. The best!)
Over the summer, I took a course called CHANNEL with writer Jocelyn K. Glei that was all about connecting to your creative life force. At the time, I was feeling stagnant and dissatisfied with my day-to-day life, how little I was prioritizing the act of creation, and how blocked I felt by my concerns over the end-product of my creative pursuits.
During one of the exercises, I had what Buddhists might call a satori — a moment of illumination — as we were visualizing our ideal creative space. My mind’s eye painted a space surrounded by a canopy of lush trees, with various areas where you could paint, bookshelves lined with journals, and pieces of exercise equipment like bands and balls and yoga mats….and then: my body eventually relaxed. And when it did, I noticed there were also instruments, drums specifically, and I imagined myself playing them.
Listen, I don’t know how to play the drum. But in my visualization, that didn’t matter. I felt connected to a rhythm and some kind of primal force.
Then the exercise ended and I thought to myself, huh…cute…drums. I wondered if perhaps I should get one?
About a week later, I went with a friend to a sound healing-yoga nidra session. It was held in the home of an intuitive/healer and afterward she did some readings of what she had picked up on from each of us in the room. I won’t try to recite the entire reading, but the first thing she mentioned was that for me, she saw a huge tree with deep roots and a large canopy. The next thing she mentioned was that she heard a drum beat (and she described the pattern of the beat). She asked if I played the drums. I told her “no,” but inside I was like: lol, seriously?! 🤯🤯🤯
I don’t mess around with universal signs, so last Saturday, I walked into a local used instrument store called The Folk Shop and found my way to the djembes. They all looked about the same, just with different paint colors. I bashfully tapped on one as one man adeptly strummed away on a banjo, and a young girl charmingly played a violin a few feet away. You know, actual musicians. This was the most unpretentious store ever, but I couldn’t help but feel inferior.
How would I decide which one to get? A part of me actually thought it might offend someone if I played an instrument for which I had no skill, so I walked to the register and asked for help. She told me that they have Thursday evening African drum classes (again: 🤯) and I could rent one there if I didn’t want to buy one right away, or I could also buy one and bring it. She told me how their drums were built by a man from Ghana who supplies their shop and taught me a way to position it (tilted at an angle), which resulted in a deeper bass sound when beating on the center. There were five djembes in the store, and I asked her how I should choose.
She just goes: “Try playing them and you’ll feel which one is yours.”
This blew my mind. The translation: risk the fear of looking silly and you might find something that feels right.
So I played them all and eventually got to the one that was “the one.” I know it makes no logical sense, but this drum was truly the most fun for me to play. It felt bouncier, like it moved with me. It felt good. Who knows why? Who cares! Vibes!
When I sat down to write today, I thought I would write to you about the healing power of music and moving to it, and drop some cold hard facts about the science of music therapy and why what music does to your brain is kind of like being on feel-good drugs, but without the drugs part.
But then I listed to a song, and this became a story about a time I bought a drum and took it home to play it and that I am probably very bad at playing it, but that it makes me happy. If that is the genre of flow and spontaneous clarity you could use in your life this fall, I encourage you to check out Practice Not Perfect and let me know what you think (we started the week of the fall equinox on 9/21 and go thru the winter solstice on 12/21).
Wishing you the boldness of defying the lie that says end-product matters more than creative process. May you always risk imperfection in the pursuit of fun.
I’m off to go play my drum now.
Upcoming Offerings
Begin 2024 with an Intentional New Year’s Retreat | This is a very exciting announcement! Catherine Andrews of
and I are hosting our fourth retreat together from December 29-Jan 1, in western Maryland (just outside of Washington, D.C.) The retreat will accommodate up to 15 people (11 spots remaining). If you’re looking for a booze-free way to start your new year with like-hearted women while casting a vision for the year ahead surrounded by forest in a cozy cabin with a fireplace and daily energizing movement, restful yoga nidra and insightful workshops, this is for you! 🏚️Practice Not Perfect, Fall 2023 | As promoted above, transition from fall to winter with weekly, accessible self-regulation practices featuring movement, meditation, and guided journaling. All set to music that will make you feel great! This will be my last virtual class offering for the year. ♫
I love this, Kelly!