A screenshot from an internship application video I took last summer, having no idea what the next year held in store. I love how happy and at peace I look while playing and hoping for an internship site to say yes.
As I am writing my last post as an intern, it’s weird to think that a year ago I was terrified that I would never find an internship. I was worried that I wouldn’t become an MT-BC and that all my years of school and hard work were for nothing. At this point in time last year, I had been finished with my coursework portion of undergrad for four months and sending out internship applications for over twice as long. It’s not an exaggeration to say I was starting to feel doomed. Mindset is everything though.
I told myself that everyone moves at different rates and that everyone’s journey is different. This became a mantra I repeated to myself even when I didn’t quite believe it.
The pressure of the imagined timeline
Having a different timeline is hard though. My coursework took me five and a half years. I struggled with my health and couldn’t do the 20 credit hours a semester that my peers were doing. I watched them finish their coursework in four years, and although I knew my circumstances were different than theirs, it made me angry and embarrassed that I couldn’t adhere to the same timeline I felt like everyone else was on.
Even after finishing my coursework, it felt like I just couldn’t live by the same timeline as everyone else. I thought I had secured an internship only for it to fall through. Everything fell through and before I knew it I was back home looking for any job so I could afford rent. I was so sure I wanted to go out of state and that I wouldn’t find an internship in Illinois. I let myself believe that I was the only student to struggle so hard to find an internship. At some point I decided that I was going to get an internship even if I had to go to the other side of the country and it took me a million years. I put all this time and effort into it and it was still my dream so it was going to happen.
Timing
It was good that I was home though. We almost lost my grandpa twice. If I had been out of state I would not have made it back home in time. Sometimes things just fall into place. For me this internship fell into place. I had reached out before while I was still doing coursework and they weren’t taking interns. As sort of a hail-mary I reached out near the end of last summer to see if they were taking any interns and they responded that they were considering it. Obviously it worked out. I thought I would end up here at MTC when I was in undergrad and wildly enough I did when both MTC and myself were in the right time and place.
It has really made me think about timing and opportunities falling into place. So many times in my life I have wanted something so bad and not gotten it only for the right thing to come along later. Coming back around to mindset, I like to look for the positives in the situation and while I don’t believe everything happens for a reason, I think some things do. I think though it was upsetting that I didn’t get to stick to the timeline I thought I was supposed to be living, it happened the way it needed to. Had I forced myself to do 20 credits a semester I would have never graduated or have taken the class where I met one of the most important people in my life. Had I gotten that first internship, I would have been too far away to have come home when I was needed.
While thinking bout this a while back during my internship I wrote some ideas of lyrics to a song that I never finished:
“I thought it was the ticking of a clock, But it was really everything clicking into place. Felt like I was running, running, running. Trying to catch up. Trying to prove myself. Trying to be where I thought I was supposed to be. Every step was a choice Was a battle I fought. I’ve worked so hard. I’ve earned what I’ve got.
No one’s gonna ask how long the journey took. How many losses I withstood. They’ll just see me. That I’m where I’m meant to be. Surrounded by love. That I love me. And I love who I’m going to be.”
Thoughts
None of this has been easy. I have worked my hind quarters off for everything and now I am looking at my last week of internship. If you take anything away, I hope that it is the fact that you are not behind and to not give up. Everyone is on their own time and journey. The clock is not running out.
My super cool, eye-catching marketing material that I made after embracing my creativity.
There are so many things I knew I would do in internship, but to get a contract was not one of those things. Whether I foresaw it or not, here I am in the midst of trying to do that very thing.
Final project
As part of your internship you have to complete a final project. You talk with your supervisors and decide what it will be. I in a moment of “go big or go home'” decided that I wanted to try and secure a contract with a memory care or hospice facility. In my head it sounded easy. You just do it and “bada bing, bada boom” you’ve got a new contract you’re in charge of. I was not thinking of any of the middle steps in that moment.
Breaking it down
Once I was getting closer to having to do it, it started feeling like a herculean task. What part of the elephant do I take a bite of first? That is when I met with Katey, one of my supervisors and the business owner. We made the giant task into smaller bite-sized tasks. We started with the endpoint of what I wanted and worked back from there. I quickly realized that I wildly underestimated how many calls and emails I would have to make and just how much socialization I would have to do.
Acquire a contract with hospice or memory care for 1:1 sessions.
Meeting with admin
FAQ
Program Plan
How much is going to cost
How is it being paid for
What materials are being
Expectations
Documentation
Explaining benefits
Data
Outreach to hospice/memory care company
Email exchange
Written email part
Who is this person
Pdf with information (marketing assignment)
Initial eye catching – sell yourself
Data
Memory care/Hospice
I chose this as my final because I really hope to one day work with older adults in both memory care and hospice. A majority of the contracts at MTC serve children. I love working with children but older adults has always been my jam. Not to mention the idea of bringing in a new contract and helping MTC expand was a pretty cool idea.
While in college, I worked as a student music therapist at a nursing home. It was so special to me. I loved every minute of it. I loved it even when I was in full PPE because of COVID. The same goes for when I go the opportunity to do my practicum in hospice. I fell deeper in love with music therapy in those places.
Following the plans
Starting is the hardest part. Having the first thing I needed to do be create marketing materials made starting even harder. As I mentioned in a previous post, I did not consider myself to be creative. Even now, my first reaction is to say that I am not creative. I draw stick figures. After a lost attempt on Canva and a small breakdown, I accepted some help and stopped overthinking it. I even began to have fun with it. I went so far as to even make a second flier. It also helped lead into the next part.
First contact
At this point in time I had already done research on different memory care and hospice facilities in the area and made a list of my top choices. I then had to draft an email. Lucky for me, I had a really cool, eye catching flier to do the talking for me.
In my planning, I had not taken into account the fact that I needed the email addresses of the activity coordinators which was not included on any of the websites. That’s where all the calls came into play. I had to call each facility and ask for the contact info. Most of the time, I was forwarded to the activities director who I then had to ask for their contact info since they didn’t have much time to talk. I definitely felt awkward, but I put on my big girl pants and pretended to be the most confident businesswoman version of myself.
Meeting preparations
After writing and sending the emails, I had to wait and after days had passed I sent follow-up emails. While waiting, I had to prepare for any meetings I would hopefully have. I met with Katey again and we discussed potential questions that may come up. She threw all sorts of questions at me so that I wouldn’t be caught off guard when it came to the real thing. I felt so prepared.
The day came. I got responses and meetings and calls were set up. I now find myself on the other side of these meetings waiting for any news of a potential contract. Even if nothing comes from this, I have done so many things outside of my comfort zone. I have done it once so it won’t be so scary to try again in the future or to just to keep trying.
To wrap up my final project, I will put all my correspondences with facilities together along with a sample session plan. I can’t believe that is what I have left of my final. Something so big and scary is so attainable and close now. As I wrap up, I can’t help but to think of everything I have accomplished in my time as an intern.
A picture taken at the beginning of my journey here at Music Therapy connections. I have learned so very much.
In my last blog post I reflected on growing. This week I want to reflect on learning and lessons that I have gained during internship. While creating this week’s blog, I struggled with figuring out what to write about and found myself not feeling completely done with what I started in my blog post two weeks ago. Going into my last month of internship it has been feeling hard for various reasons, so I wanted to focus on what I have learned and achieved in my time so far.
The importance of mindset
My entire life I have been a worrier. If given a situation, my brain would find all the ways it could go wrong before thinking of one positive thing that may happen. Even after finding multiple positive things that could happen, I focused on the bad. I was conditioned by life to assume the bad outcome. Life is different now. My circumstances are different. Why am I still choosing the mindset that every outcome will be bad?
We create and invite in what we think. You might be thinking ‘GraceAnne, you are sounding a little bit like a self-help book’. My only reply would be ‘Yes, I have been reading one and this resonated with me’. If I enter every situation anticipating the bad, I will only ever see the bad. I liken it to when you come across a word you were unfamiliar with and now you see it everywhere. It’s not that every book and sign added that word overnight, but that you are now conscious of that word.
It is my choice whether or not to focus on the bad even after I have come up with all the positive outcomes. I know that one does not just wake up and stop thinking negatively. It takes time and the conscious decision to do so. This week, I have been asking myself does worrying about this help me or change the outcome or does it just use energy.
Today, I talked with my coworker Jess and she gave me some advice that she used in her last month of internship. Create a sticky note wall of all the positives, all the wins from the day. Any win, no matter how small. Choose to focus on and acknowledge the positives.
The art of doing things outside of your comfort zone
You may not be surprised to learn that I don’t like doing things outside of my comfort zone. However never leaving your comfort zone is not conducive to growth and learning.
Without leaving my comfort zone, I would not have found out that I love teaching lessons. I wouldn’t try anything new with my clients. I wouldn’t have gotten this internship.
This week, I worked on going outside of my comfort zone in a different way than usual. Making calls was not in my comfort zone. Can’t it be a text or an email? Do I really have to call and talk to another human being? Oh, the horror. If given the choice to make a phone call myself or give someone my entire bank account to do it for me, it would be a tossup . Being that I can’t pay someone to make phone calls for me and that even if I could, I need my money to be alive, I made my own phone calls this week. It turns out that a part of my final project requires me to make phone calls. Having no other choice I did it and I survived.
Communication and asking for help
A big point of growth and learning has come in the form of me working to better communicate. Is it something that I am still working on? Absolutely, but I have also come a long way. In my worrying and perfectionism, I thought I had to do everything alone. I thought I had to fix the problem before anyone noticed and just hope that they didn’t bring it up. With previous experiences and my own conditioning to assume the worst, I curled up with my head as far down in the sand instead of communicating.
I am definitely not a master communicator by ay mean, nor have I gotten it all figured out, but I continue to work to do better. Communicating make me a better professional, clinician, and coworker.
What matters at the end of the day
I love myself, quirks and all. Being myself has made me a happier person and a better clinician. I trust that I am good at what I do and that I have or am gaining the skills I need to do so. As my internship goes into the last month and it feels like we have entered crunch time and are diving into the details, I am imploring myself to remember what matters most. I enjoy what I do. I am doing my best for my clients. I like who I am.
Photo evidence that we all grow. We grow taller. We grow wiser. We grow older. We grow everyday.
Reflecting on my time thus far at MTC, I would say that the word that best describes my internship has been growth. You might be thinking, ‘It’s an internship; I hope you are growing.’ Everybody grows during their internship. Going into this internship, I knew that I would grow. Growing is uncomfortable. Trying new things is scary. Taking any step outside of my safe little bubble feels like being asked to go skydiving. Growing has been frustrating and difficult, but also rewarding and hard-earned, too.
Lately, the word recontextualizing has been popping up a lot in my life. What is recontextualizing? What does it mean to me? And what does it have to do with growth?
Definition of recontextualizing
If you ask Google, to recontextualize is to consider the matter from a new or different context. To me, recontextualizing can be a lot of things. It can be choosing to find the positive or something I can learn from in the situation. It can be not overthinking or looking at something with such a black and white perspective. Most simple of all, it can be taking a step back from the situation in order to see it objectively.
Recontextualizing in my life
Last week I was having a rough week. I just could not catch a break. The funny thing is, now a week later, I can’t even remember everything that the week was so hard. All I could think was that it was an awful week and that I felt cursed. I felt like I had somehow offended the universe and offset the balance of things. Do I believe that I was actually cursed or that I was manifesting for bad things to happen? No. I do believe that our brains are great at finding patterns, whether they exist or not. I was thinking negatively, so the negative instances felt bigger.
My computer shut down, and I lost all my progress on my marketing assignment. Cursed? Maybe. Or maybe it was a chance to grow.
Maybe I just needed to view it from a non-cursed feeling viewpoint. My supervisors told me that maybe this was a chance to start over and approach the project with less overthinking involved. My first thought to that was “that’s baloney”. That thought was quickly followed by “they are asking me to think less about a creative project. I am not creative”.
Creativity
That is the sentence. I am not creative. In fact, I feel like a very uncreative person. Creative and artsy to me is coloring a picture that had the lines and image added far before it came to me. That is concrete. Research is concrete. Making an eye-catching marketing material from scratch so that I can hopefully set up a new contract for my final is pretty far from concrete. I have aphantasia. I cannot visualize. I have no idea what I want or what I think it should look like. Just let me stick to my research and data and spiral… spiral…. spiral.
What does it mean to be creative? Does creativity only pertain to art, and in this case, graphic design? Aren’t I creative in other ways? Haven’t I written my own music? Improvised within a session? Made music from nothing every day? These thoughts had no choice but to permeate in my brain as my supervisor stared me down and made me repeat that I was creative. But she and my brain (later) were right. Recontextualizing my definition of creativity changed the answer to whether I found myself to be creative or not. I may not be painting any masterpieces soon, but dang, did I make a good Canva marketing graphic.
Difficult conversations
I have to recontextualize after difficult conversations. As an intern, there are times when my supervisors and I have to have harder conversations, where constructive criticism is given. It is hard not to take everything personally, to not feel that every criticism is a personal failing on my part. You may think that sounds dramatic, but it is true for me. I have been working really hard to take a step back and to look at the situation objectively. To listen and go over what was actually said and not just what my feelings and brain heard.
New experiences
I didn’t realize how much I recontextualize in my life outside of my internship recently. I struggle to try new things, especially foods. When at a restaurant, no one is surprised when I order my safe foods. I’m lucky that most restaurants I go to, I can order a salad or chicken or a burger, but when that’s not an option, I get super anxious. Two weeks ago, I was almost in tears when my boyfriend said his family made summer rolls. I couldn’t just leave after they graciously made food. I started to spiral. I’d never had Vietnamese food before. What if I didn’t like it? What if it were a ‘bad’ texture? I wouldn’t have anything else to be able to eat, and then my blood sugar would get low and spiral… spiral….. spiral.
With the help of my boyfriend, we recontextualized the summer rolls. Summer rolls are made out of rice paper. Well, I have had rice before. I have had rice noodles before. I’ve had shrimp before. I’ve had carrots and spinach before. Something that was so scary wasn’t so scary anymore.
Growing
Recontextualizing has been a tool to aid in my growth this last month. Growing is more than just trying to find the positives each day. I don’t believe in toxic positivity or that we all have to be positive all of the time. Growing is showing up and trying. It has only been six months, and I have so much more growing to do, but it’s good to acknowledge all the growth I have made.
Growing is hard. Growing is not linear. Growing takes time.
GraceAnne
The doorway where my grandparents kept track of my siblings’, cousins’, and my height over the years of my youth.
A sneak peak of me playing Like A Dino! I have been playing it all week and telling anyone who asks that it’s homework.
This weeks assignment was to find five iPad apps that are appropriate for clinical practice. I wanted to share what I found with you. Maybe the five I found seem like a stretch to you. Maybe you never thought of using that app that way or even at all. It was a fun assignment. I had no idea what apps were even out there as I scrolled through the app store. I went down many rabbit holes and had to start off with what apps do I already use with clients.
So why write about this assignment? Getting out of school, I never thought about using my iPad in sessions outside of using it for chord charts. In my internship, using games like SoundForest or writing a song with a client on GarageBand was super foreign to me. Maybe it is foreign to you too. Maybe my exploration can be of use to other interns and professionals.
Without further ado, here are the five apps I found.
No 1. GarageBand
Summary
GarageBand is an app for making and recording music. It has so many options that it is almost overwhelming. It offers a wide array of instruments to choose from, as well as the ability to directly record piano, guitar, and bass and plug in music and instruments from external apps. Melodic instruments have the options of chords or notes. You don’t need to know how to play in order to play the instrument on GarageBand. In the settings you can change the chords. Moving up and down the chord changes the voicing and a visual auto play knob adds more complexity between chord changes. Drums has a drum machine, acoustic drums, and a beat sequencer. All these instruments and voice can be recorded onto tracks that can be layered and played together. Once recorded, you can balance tracks and add effects.
Clinical use
GarageBand can be used with clients to write music. You don’t have to know any chords or actually play those instruments in order to play them on GarageBand. This makes songwriting easier for clients. Clients can use the chord function to create a chord progression. These same chords/notes can be used across instruments to add layers to the song. Clients can also use the note function to add complexity and a melody. On the note function, you can change the scales from chromatic to pentatonic or whatever is best for your client. Clients can also create their own beat, whether for their song or just to enjoy or dance to. Writing music is great for areas such as self expression, autonomy, and emotional processing. GarageBand gives them the ability to truly lead the songwriting.
Drawbacks
While I love this app, there are so many options from instruments, sounds, chords, scales, and beyond. It is easy to get decision fatigue and feel overwhelmed. Even spending days tinkering around, I have not tried even half of the options and am still feel like I am getting the hang of the basic functions. It is definitely a step by step process that requires patience.
No. 2 The Lyrics App
Summary
Staying on the topic of songwriting, The Lyrics App is another tool that can be used. The app allows you to write down lyrics and record a melody in the same place without having to flip between pages. For each line of lyrics you write, you can record a melody. A feature of the app is that it allows you to click on the word you have written and choose rhyme or thesaurus. When choosing rhyme, a list appears of words that rhyme with the one you have highlighted. When choosing thesaurus, a list appears of synonyms for that word. A play button at the bottom of the screen plays all the recordings in the order you have them and the clipboard icon copies all your lyrics. Lines/sections of lyrics can be moved around without having to rewrite or rerecord.
Clinical use
This app made me think specifically of a client I saw during practicum at WIU. She loved to write songs but never remembered the melodies she created and lacked a piano or the musical knowledge to notate the melody. When we did spontaneous songwriting in that group, I did not have a piano to notate the melody the group came up with. This could be used for songwriting with a client. In a setting where self-expression and emotional processing is the main goal, songwriting can be very helpful. Clients can process and express themselves through the lyrics they write. This app lets you record so you can hear how different melodies sound before choosing one to notate. It also can help clients by giving rhyming words and synonyms to choose from. I could see this being used in a mental health setting.
Drawbacks
It really delivers on what it says it will do, but it took poking around and maneuvering on my end to find and use the rhyme and thesaurus options. I also wish the app had a place where you could notate the melody after recording it or at least include a piano function. Besides those gripes, it is very straight forward. All the creativity in this app is in the lyrics you write.
No 3. Launchpad
Summary
Launchpad creates a backing loop. It has more than just drum sounds. Opening the app, you choose a sound pack/mood. Each sound pack has eight columns with six options each to create your music. The first column is different drum loops. The second column is percussion loops. The third is bass. Columns four through six are different melodic loops. Column seven and eight are different sound effects. You can only choose one loop in a column at a time. The loops are different in each sound pack. Within the app you can change the tempo and key and record when you like what you have. You can also pay for and download individual loops in order to create your own sound pack.
Clinical use
Similar to options on GarageBand, clients can make music with the touch of a button. This app requires less musical knowledge than GarageBand and creates music more realistic in EDM, rap, hip-hop, and lo-fi. Once recorded it can be plugged into GarageBand where you can add other instruments and tracks. Because it has buttons in a column it could be more accessible to clients than GarageBand. I could see using this app with one of the high schools I see to create a beat to add to a song or just to stand alone. I previously used the beat maker on GarageBand but they said it didn’t have enough of a hip-hop sound.
Drawbacks
My biggest issue with this app is that the music can only be in a minor key. Maybe major keys aren’t as common in the genres of music it caters to, but I would love to have the option. I also wish you didn’t have to pay for as much as you do on this app. While a lot is free, a lot of options are not.
No 4. SoundForest
Summary
Similar to a beat maker, SoundForest has four beats per page subdivided into sixteenth notes. Rather than normal drum sounds, it has different nature and animal characters, each with their own unique sound that you can place on the screen. The lower you place it in the column, the lower the pitch. You can add multiple to the same column. The characters and sounds change depending on the environment. Using the bar at the top you can speed up or slow down your song. While you can’t change the rhythmic value of any of the sounds, some are longer than others.
Clinical use
In a group setting this app can be used to work on waiting one’s turn, respecting the choices of others, as well as emotional regulation. It can also be used to work on musical skills such as subdivision and rhythmic notation. This app allows clients to create music without getting too technical and still being fun and gamified. The characters also correlate with the environment which opens up to some academic skills of where mountains or giraffes are found, while still making music. It can be adapted in many ways. In HTDA, I used this app as a fun creative way to work on rhythmic notation and turn taking.
Drawbacks
My only gripe is that I can’t change the note value. I would love to be able to make sounds last for a half note or a whole note instead of trying to imagine that it is. I also wish that the columns had lines to show the breakdown of the four pulses per column. Every time I add a sound, I hope I eyeballed it well enough for it to land in the beat I want it to.
No 5. Like A Dino!
Summary
A musical game that requires you to move the dinosaur across the screen to catch blocks of his neck to make him taller. The falling blocks are tied to the rhythm and usually the pitch of the background music. Each block is a note of the music. Long notes are long blocks. Short notes are short blocks. Lower pitches are farther to the left and higher pitches are to the right. As you progress the music gets faster. It starts at 1x speed and then gains .1x speed each round. As you make it through the rounds you unlock new music. You have three tries/mistakes before the round starts over. When mistakes happen positive affirmations pop up on the screen.
Clinical use
My first thought when looking at this app from a clinical perspective was that it could be used to target fine motor skills and motor planning. To move the dinosaur, you have to use one finger and drag the dinosaur back and forth across the screen. As levels get faster the harder it is. To up the difficulty, clients could use different fingers. Being in a game format and on the iPad could serve as a motivator for kids. I think this app could also help with understanding musical skills. Like a piano, the lower notes are on the left and the higher on the right. There is also the visual of long and short blocks to go with the auditory of long and short notes.
Drawbacks
I wish you could add your own music. This would be a great way to include client preferred music. I also wish you could choose what speed to play it on. As you progress through the level, it gets faster. It would be cool if you could choose to stay on 1x speed or 1.3x speed.
Honorable mention- Easy Play Piano
An app made by a music therapist. It consists of a diatonic scale set up as color-coded bars that is easy and accessible for everyone. In the settings you can change the key. Cool app for melodic improvisation with any age without having to know pitches or transport anything and easy for anyone to use and make a sound with. They also have an app that is just the C pentatonic scale set up the same way.
Drawback
I wish I could go back and forth between the diatonic and pentatonic scale on the same app as well as change the sound beyond the piano.
Wrap up
I would love to know if you would use these apps and how you would use them. Would you use them similarly or in a way I couldn’t even imagine? I would love to know. What apps do you use and recommend in your clinical practice?
