The Encouragement of Light
I continue to discover the infinite ways our relentless focus on correction and criticism is not only shattering the hearts of our precious children, it’s specifically KEEPING them from being that “best“ those endeavors are intending to help them be.
It’s also what plants perfectionism in our hearts.
It doesn’t matter if you don’t actually expect your child to be perfect ... When there is correction (and likely punishment) for every mistake, there is NO other lesson they can take away than that mistakes are not allowed, and perfection is required.
Children do need to learn not to touch a hot stove.
Not to run into the street.
Not to hurt others.
They do not, however, need to learn that mistakes are not allowed.
And, by the way, you cannot teach them not to hurt others - or anything else - by hurting them.
Punishment is retribution - it is not teaching.
It does not teach us to make better choices.
It teaches us to carry our bad choices forward into every moment.
It teaches us that our bad choices are WHO WE ARE, making it infinitely harder to make better choices.
It’s also absolutely not love.
Our whole paradigm of punishment, from little ones to the criminal justice system, needs a fundamental shift.
Now, though, I want to talk about Sunday morning.
I had honor and privilege of singing What the World Needs Now.
Love, sweet love.
On that song and another, standing with some of my favorite souls singing harmonies that were so beautiful they took my breath away, I was once again reminded that I have the ability to make up harmonies on the spot. Not only that, but to instantly fall into sync, matching the tempo, phrasing, dynamics, and vocal quality of whomever I’m singing with.
It is completely effortless for me.
Effortless.
I showed up having no idea I was singing that song, and never even having heard the other one we did. I just walked in and pulled it out of thin air with no effort whatsoever.
Here’s what I discovered that day:
Since it’s effortless, it feels like it must be worthless.
WORTHLESS.
This is what we learn when the voices who matter relentlessly focus on fixing what’s wrong with us, rather than encouraging what shines in us.
We learn that if life isn’t hard and laborious and terrible - if we’re not working ourselves to death to constantly "do better" - we’re lazy and offering nothing of value to the world.
I lost count of the people who came up to me that morning, saying that I have such a beautiful voice and how much they love hearing our harmonies.
The dean of the Vanderbilt Divinity School thanked me for my voice - and my ministry - saying that our music is one of the best things that goes on there.
It absolutely is, and let me assure you that that’s because it is beautiful and true and alive.
Not because it’s perfect.
It’s not.
Clearly I am offering something of value to the world ... By doing something that is a complete joy, and is as effortless and necessary to my life as breathing.
By doing something that is not a gift everyone possesses, as I found out one day in the studio with my favorite artist and human!
“I don’t have your magic harmony gift,” he said ... One of my favorite things anyone has ever said to me.
He does not have my magic harmony gift.
And I don’t have his magic melody gift.
So, would my time and life be better spent struggling to correct and improve my lacking melody writing skills - arriving at a mediocre level at best - or simply breathing effortlessly, and creating beauty and joy for myself and those around me?
This consistent focus on areas where we struggle and what we’re getting wrong - the unintended consequence of a paradigm of correction rather than celebration - keeps us from giving to this world all our beauty.
It keeps us from even KNOWING we have beauty to give to the world, because we learn from that constant correction that we’re fundamentally wrong.
That we are never enough.
I promise you: It is really, really not necessary to correct - or even mention - the vast majority of mistakes our precious children and those around us make.
Doing so - in addition to being 100% pure control - does nothing but plant the curse of perfectionism in their hearts.
Make no mistake: It is a curse.
While it feels to many of us like perfectionism is a gift that helps us strive to be our best, what it truly does is keep us from EVER being our best, because we’re afraid to make mistakes.
If we don’t color outside the lines, we’ll never know where the lines are.
We’ll create far smaller pictures and lives than we’re capable of.
I love these words ... Nearly as deeply as I love the soul who painted them for me:
I am so grateful to the voices and hearts I get to sing with every Sunday ... Those who from the moment I arrived nearly five years ago - timid and hiding in the back - have simply INVITED me to offer up what’s inside me.
INVITING me to make up lines of harmony with my voice and my flute, but never, ever forcing or pressuring me to do so.
Offering absolutely nothing but unfailing kindness, encouragement, embracing, and celebration of whatever I offer up.
Without one single critical or correcting word.
The beauty I was able to offer up on Sunday is the direct result of that light of encouragement.
It turns out that our voices are much less beautiful when we’re apologizing for being in the room.
When what we offer up carries a timid “I hope this is ok .... “ with it.
THAT is what’s born of criticism.
Hiding our light.
Not excellence.
My heart is infinitely grateful for the voices I choose to allow in my space these days.
And even more grateful that I get to make music with them.