Back to Reality.....

It's time to face the fact that summer vacation can't last forever. The mornings of sleeping in are slowly coming to an end. The lazy days of relaxing on the couch while mindlessly watching television are a thing of the past. Now my thoughts are turned to organizing classes, reviewing literature, writing articles, and advising students. Students will begin arriving on campus next week for band camp; classes begin on the 24th.

It seems as though there is so much work to do to get ready for the fall. I find myself constantly adding new items to my to-do list because I can't afford to miss a step. If it were just the responsibilities of teaching classes, I think I would be okay. Currently, it's the items associated with my personal life and health that are demanding my attention. Everything is getting done.....slowly, but surely. I've just had to give myself permission to let things take a little more time to do than I normally anticipate as I continue to regain my energy and strength.

I suppose I've stalled long enough! It's time that I get "back to reality" and mark a few more things off my ever-growing list.

The Next Chapter

If you are a regular reader of my blog, you probably know that I began a three month sabbatical from my church job in April. This time allowed me to address some things that had long been ignored. As the sabbatical began to come to an end, I realized that I needed to make some significant changes in my life. As a result, I notified the church earlier this month that I was resigning from my positions as director of music and children's ministries.

It certainly wasn't an easy decision to make. I am passionate about music and children. I have enjoyed fourteen years of service to this local congregation and consider its members to be my friends. What it finally came down to was a certainty in my core that the time had come to leave. I'm not going to publicly explain the reasons behind my decision here; I will simply state emphatically that I have absolutely no doubt that I have made the right decision and am content, happy, and at peace, resting in the favor of my Heavenly Father. It's a wonderful feeling!

What does the future hold? I'm not entirely sure. That's a lesson I'm learning right now.....stepping out in faith and trusting God to provide. There are no exciting announcements to make. As of now, I'll continue teaching students at Mid-South Community College and working as staff pianist at Union University. There are some other teaching and performing opportunities in the works, but it's a little too early to tell about them since the details are still being finalized. Resigning my position was a huge financial hit, but I finally had to admit to myself that happiness was worth far more than a paycheck.

Change is never easy, but it's often the very thing necessary to bring about growth. Right now I'm enjoying rediscovering my love for the piano, exploring God's Word with new eyes, and looking forward to whatever the future may have in store for me. I invite you to follow along as I continue to share the stories of my adventure of simply Livin' Life......the next chapter.

Reclaiming My Voice

Here's a little secret....I enjoy blogging.  I like writing about my life and things that are on my mind.  It's been a while since I've written anything here though.  Why the delay?  I became more concerned with other people's opinions rather than exercising my own voice.

Today I began to think about my neglected blogs and decided to visit them and see if I had happened to have any visitors recently.  Imagine my surprise and happiness to learn that both Livin' Life and Collaborations have been seeing a decent amount of activity despite the lack of new material.  I finally took the time to sit down and see if I could recall why I stopped writing.  As I began to reflect on the circumstances causing me to stop writing, I realized that I allowed other people to make a decision for me that was not theirs to make.  I finally came to a position with which I am entirely comfortable.

I am not an authority on every subject nor do I claim to be.  I do have opinions (just like you do).  I also have the same right to express my opinion freely.  As we all know, opinions are like noses and belly buttons;  everyone has one!  (Of course, there are also OTHER body parts everyone has that I chose not to mention, you dirty-minded people!)  Most of you have never seen my belly button. I don't mind showing it to you, but some don't particularly want to see it either.  The same applies to my opinions.  I'll continue to express them for my own personal enjoyment.  Read them if you want to......ignore them if you want to.  It really makes no difference to me.  Just don't attempt to make them say something that isn't there.  If you care enough to enter into a mature dialogue regarding a topic, ask and I'll be happy to make my view clear and listen to your respectfully presented opinion as well (after all, that's one of the strengths of the blogosphere).

So starting today, I reclaim my voice.  Don't want to read it?  Move on!  You won't offend me at all.  Think I'm full of hot air?  Visit elsewhere and find another windbag that is more preferable to you.  If you think something here is directed at you, recognize that it probably is not.  Honestly, if you're even on my radar screen and I have something to say to you, you'll be told about it.  Those who know me best will attest to the fact that I am generally not one to mince words.

That felt good!  Now I can move on and begin exploring my mind again and continue Livin' Life!

By the way, here's the picture I ran across earlier today that is the source of the belly button reference.  (Want to make sure I give credit where it's due since I'm not the originator of the comment!)

Where in the World Have You Been?

Now that school is out for the Christmas holidays and my world has finally slowed down a bit, I began to reflect upon the past several months and sadly realized that I had not been blogging AT ALL!  I was frustrated that I had let another project fall by the wayside again, but thought that no one had actually noticed.  I was pleasantly surprised to find that I was wrong when a friend gently asked last week why I had stopped writing.  That became encouragement to get back at it and provide some explanation of what has occurred that hindered my writing.

In August, I was thrilled to hear of an adjunct position at Union University in Jackson, Tennessee as staff pianist.  I applied for the position and was honored to be hired.  What I imagined would be a slow start at a new job turned out to be a baptism by fire into the music department.  I'm loving it and wouldn't have it any other way.  Last semester, I played for 17 voice students each week while maintaining my own private piano students, my teaching at MSCC, and the church job.  Needless to say, my schedule became more hectic and I found myself having to let some things go.

One of the first things to hit the skids was my writing.  The addition of driving another 150 miles each week and needing to find more practice time simply meant that blogging was not an option.  I had to play catch up a bit -- learning new repertoire and figuring out how things were going to work at Union.  As the semester went on, I discovered that 2 of my private lessons each week were becoming a source of extreme stress.  These students were unable to come to the church where I am basing my studio teaching and opted to have me visit them in their home (for an additional charge, of course).  Suddenly I found myself at the mercy of their schedules as well as the challenge of getting to their house on time for a single lesson.  Since neither of the students were progressing as well as I had hoped, I determined that these students were not providing me with musical rewards and that the income from these lessons was not enough to justify the scheduling dilemma they presented.  With some sadness, I notified the students that I would no longer be able to teach them.  This was more difficult than I had imagined since they represented some of the first students I had taught in my piano studio.

Now you know where I've been and why my presence in the blogosphere has been missing.  I intend to begin writing again and sharing with anyone that wants to read it, but I don't anticipate as many posts as I have written in the past.  My plan is for one post a week on each of the blogs.  When time and inspiration allows, I'll do more.  I hope you are as excited to have me back in your world as I am to be back.

Kennith