To Stay or Not To Stay, That was the Question

Last year at this time I was struggling. A lot. So much so that I invested $10k in an agency to help me find a job outside of education. I just couldn’t do it anymore. Years 33 and 34 nearly broke me.

We were back in the building after 18 months of online teaching and everything was supposed to be “back to normal.” But it wasn’t and I found myself in a really sad and dark place.

A week before schools shut down at the beginning of the pandemic, I finished my manuscript for Love the Job, Lose the Stress, and as we found ourselves thrown into everything that came with teaching during this time, I felt like a fool for having written a book with a title like that!

I found myself no longer loving my job. It wasn’t the stress that was the problem, it was that I found I’d lost my joy in the very thing that used to light me up. Being in the same space where I’d had decades of growth and incredible memories became a different place after Covid disrupted everything. I found that just walking into my bandroom became a trigger for sadness, grief and despair.

The trauma of teaching during the pandemic is real. In my work with teachers who are in the same situation, they are trying to figure out if they should stay in the profession or if it’s time to find a new path because they’ve felt this same struggle.

I knew that if I was going to successfully go into a non-educational field, I would need help with everything from getting my resume updated so it resonated with companies for whom I wanted to work to preparing for interviews and getting clarity with the kind of role I was seeking.

I found a company that specializes in career transitions, made a huge financial investment and dove in to the process with the intent of finding a job that would allow me to walk away from teaching and into something where I could once again find joy and purpose.

I diligently showed up to all the coaching calls. I did the homework. I spent a lot of time asking myself hard questions. I began to get clear on my goals and narrow down the kind of work I needed to do in order to thrive.

And then I found it.

The result wasn’t at all what I expected. After all, when I dropped that kind of money, I fully anticipated I’d be making a change into a corporate role working year-round at something like education or performance travel, curriculum design or arts advocacy.

The process I was going through helped me gain clarity on my goals:

Find a role where I could have a positive impact on others
Make a difference for youth who have experienced trauma
Make at least the amount I was making in my current teaching role
Have generous time off
Love what I do

Once I got real clarity on my goals, I found the perfect role that fulfills all these goals (and more) and it wasn’t at all what I expected it to be.

The job that came to the surface for me showed up because it checked all the boxes in my goal list:

I make a positive impact on others
I work directly with youth who have experienced trauma (pandemic and more)
I make the same amount of money I made in my former role
I work 183 days a year
I LOVE what I am doing – it’s fresh and new but still familiar

It feels so good to *thrive* in the classroom again!

After gaining clarity on my goals by working with someone who guided me through the process and helped me identify the right choice for me, the answer became crystal clear.

Last June I was shocked to find myself asking my middle school feeder director if he’d switch jobs with me. I realized that I still found passion and purpose in teaching music, but all of the additional evening and weekend commitments that go with being a high school band director, expecially since the pandemic hit, no longer brought me the joy it used to. I needed the connections with students and being a teacher is in my blood, but after 35 years of doing this work, it was time for a change, and the change that turned out to be right for me was literally right under my nose.

Since making the decision to swap jobs and move to the feeder middle school, I’ve found renewed happiness in my life’s work. I truly thought leaving teaching was my only option, and for many people that is the right choice, but for me, going through this process guided me to the right place for me to be.

Are you at a crossroads? Are you questioning whether or not you can or should continue down the path of teaching or pursue something else in order to find your joy? Do you wonder how you’d even begin looking for a job outside the education field?

Well, I invested a lot of time and money in figuring out how to find a role that is right for me and I’m sharing what I learned with you!

Join me for Should I Stay or Should I Go? Gaining clarity and making a plan for career fulfillment. I’ll host this informal session for free and share a few key things I learned from my $10k investment to save you some time and money!

At this interactive discussion on Thursday, January 6 at 4:00 pacific time, you’ll learn:

How to identify whether your current situation is a healthy and appropriate place for you to be
Important timeline and steps to take to transition from teaching to another career
How to edit your resume so it appeals to employers you’re targeting
How to get yourself out there on LinkedIn and other places where you can be discovered

Sign me up!

As a FREE BONUS, attendees will receive a copy of my “teacher” resume and the “corporate” resume created by the company I hired so you can create your own resume by translating your teacher skills into verbiage that resonates in the corporate world. (Save yourself thousands of dollars by using this tool!)

We are at the time of year when teachers need to think about next year’s contract. Right now there’s time for you to look at your options, but soon you’ll have to sign a contract and be locked in for another year. Or you need to get some clarity on what you want and take the steps to make it happen. I can help.

If you’re like a lot of the music teachers I’ve worked with over the past several years, you’ve been through a LOT of changes and now is the time to pause, reassess and move forward in a way that supports your mental and physical health.

I hope you’re happy and fulfilled in your current role, but if you’re not and you’re wondering what to do next, you should come to this conversation.

With you on this strange journey –

Lesley

An Exclusive Offer for Music Educators

I know there’s not a lot of Music Conducting going on right now, but I’m stoked to find out my book is a #1 New Release in the Music Conducting category this week.

Our jobs as music educators involve MUCH more than conducting ensembles. In today’s music classroom, we must find innovative ways of addressing our students’ social and emotional needs so they stay connected with us, with one another, and with the content we are teaching them.

But that can feel like an impossible task during a pandemic when NOTHING is normal or easy.

As many music teachers are finding out, trying to teach ensembles during a pandemic leads to frustration on everyone’s part. I’m hearing from teachers all over the world who normally have incredible engagement from their students but are discovering that having kids practice scales and songs on their own or work on music theory or other activities just isn’t drawing students in and they are struggling to hold their programs together.

The stress that comes with wondering if your students will register for ensemble classes next year is keeping many music teachers awake at night as they watch the enthusiasm and energy that normally is present with their students and them dwindling with each passing day.

I am grateful to have had the opportunity to simultaneously edit this book and shift from in-person band directing to online music education all at the same time! It gave me LOTS of opportunities to practice identifying and meeting my students’ social and emotional needs in an uncertain environment and design my curriculum (and this book) to meet the SEL needs of students – regardless of our current situations.

I’ve learned a TON through the process of writing and editing this book and refining what I am doing with my students. I’d love to share my tips with you so you don’t have to start from scratch.

When we do return to in-person teaching and can safely make music together once again, it will be more important than ever that we’ve already taught the skills that are so inherently addressed in our ensemble settings so students have an environment conducive to their growth as artists that is supportive and nurturing.

Teaching “online band” isn’t something I ever envisioned, but here we are.

I dedicate this book to all the music teachers out there who are creating and teaching and loving and inspiring students to express themselves through their arts in spite of the circumstances in which you find yourselves.

The work you do matters.

May you experience more joy and less stress for you and your students through your music journey this year and for years to come.

This situation is hard, but it is temporary. Music may be the only thing some of your students find solace in right now.

See the source image — FREE gift for Music Educators

As a special gift to music educators who are working tirelessly to teach in ways we never could have imagined, I offer a FREE sneak peek to my new book. May you find an idea or two that helps you navigate the strangest time in education ever.

Thank you for being a music educator.

Music Education 2.0 – Ready or Not, Here We Grow!

Music education has been my whole life. I love my career. And now EVERYTHING about what I’ve done for over three decades is completely different.

How on earth do we serve our students and sustain our programs in the middle of a pandemic?

I’ve seen so much change during my years as a teacher. Technology and society have caused our kids to grow up faster than they were physiologically programmed to do, and the impact from all the stimuli on their ability to function in this world is huge.

For the first thirty-one-and-three-quarters years of my career, there was a lot that changed, but nothing like what happened when the 2020 pandemic hit the planet and, at the speed of light, uprooting everything we ever learned about teaching. Suddenly, in what was going to be my final quarter of teaching, I found myself, along with every other teacher in the U.S. and beyond, completely reinventing how I taught as the world came to a standstill and schools were shut down across the globe. I had to learn to teach high school band online!

The first few weeks of the abrupt transition from face-to-face teaching to the isolation of being quarantined and figuring out how to meet the emotional and educational needs of my students was daunting.

As we started working through what it would look like for us to continue our band classes without being together, I came to realize that the daily practices and protocols I established with my students (who often come to class with challenges like anxiety, depression, and difficulty focusing) as a way to help them focus and be present for class were even more important now.

The daily practice we did in one another’s presence every day – taking four minutes to do breathing and relaxation together – up-leveled our in-class experiences because of the way it synchronized all the students each day, which caused our rehearsal time to be at least three to four times more productive than in the past. I knew that since our routine had such a positive impact on our ability to bring sixty-plus teenagers together and get them focused when we were in person, it was critical that we continued to practice that same routine when we were isolated and experiencing heightened anxiety and trauma. The ritual of getting our bodies and brains to relax each day before we started class was more important now than ever.

Kids are constantly told to “sit still and be quiet,” yet they’re never really taught how to harness their energy and social reflexes so they can actually sit quietly and focus their attention. Guess what happens when you actually teach students how to physiologically reset their bodies and brains so all of the restless energy (side conversations, excessive physical movements, difficulty focusing, inability to pay attention or remember) gets out of their way and they are able to start with a clean slate? It’s truly remarkable. It’s how we are biologically programmed to function at our best, so why not work with nature and teach our students how to tap into this? Once you do, you will be blown away at the changes: the ease of teaching, the attentiveness of the students, the retention of content, and a million other positive changes that take place as a result of taking the time to teach students this critical skill.

Teaching kids to get into this learning state is no different than teaching them technique on an instrument. It’s muscle memory – that is all. By practicing scales slowly, you train their muscles to respond in specific ways. The more you repeat patterns, the easier it is for them to execute those patterns and the quicker their responses become.

The same goes for teaching kids to settle down. Once your students practice a relaxation routine on a consistent basis, their bodies learn to be still because the muscles learn how to relax. Their brains are no longer in hyper mode; instead, they respond to this practice by learning to let go of the drama and other stuff floating around in their heads and become cleared out for whatever content or concept you want to introduce.

You have an incredible opportunity to help your students not just be successful musicians but to be exceptional human beings. Music teachers change the world. We are arguably the most influential adults on the planet. We have kids in our classes year after year after year. We watch them grow up. We are the only adults they see that frequently, sometimes even more than their parents, see them. So, we have important work to do – and we need the stamina to do it.

That’s where this book comes in. If I learned about the power of teaching this skill before diving into content with my students, I could have been a healthier and more effective teacher from the start. Instead, I spent the first three decades of my career teaching the way I was taught, actively handling classroom management and correcting behaviors instead of giving my students the skills to self-regulate so I could focus on teaching. It took a lot more energy (both physically and mentally) to teach when I didn’t have a daily routine to get everyone relaxed and focused.

For most of my life, I didn’t know how to relax, and teaching was a hyperactivity for me. I did it well, but managing all the components of a huge music program required active work, both mentally and physically. Even teaching classes took a lot of energy. Corralling the energy of sixty kids an hour, day after day, and motivating them to meet my goals was exhausting. Once I learned the power of teaching students to relax and settle that energy down before starting to teach class, everything became so much easier for all of us.

I’m a much more effective teacher now. Instead of force-feeding kids everything I believe they should know and feel, I facilitate their abilities to tap into the music and hear the message it has for them. I learned how to help them go from states of stress – where learning is difficult, if not impossible – to a place where their brains and bodies are receptive and ready to learn, remember, and recall what they’re discovering. It sounds like a whole new way of teaching, but really, it’s not. It’s the way we were programmed to learn.

When we teach students how to get into a learning state, teaching and learning become so much easier, leading to less stress for you and your students.

This process can be used by children of all ages and across all socio-economic statuses, cultures, orientations, and marginalization, including over-achievers and AP/Honors kids. In fact, it’s often most effective for the kids you’d least expect.

Just like a carpenter needs the proper tools and high-quality wood and a plan if he is going to create a craftsman-style piece of furniture, teachers need tools to do their jobs well, too. One of the most powerful tools a teacher has is being able to guide their students into a readiness-to-learn state before delivering content. This one simple step has more impact on every aspect of student growth than any other pedagogical tool I encountered in the more than 30,000 classes I taught over the course of my career.

This book is my way of sharing what I learned so other band directors can do the important work of teaching in a way that is easier and more effective for them and their students. I want to support them in their efforts to be positive role models and mentors for their students. I want to work with teachers who realize that our roles include shaping kids into responsible and respectful human beings through the magic of music education. It takes a lot of stamina to do this year after year, and I am here to share strategies that support dedicated music teachers who are called to change kids’ lives for the better.

Under the best of circumstances, teaching is stressful and exhausting.

After our 2020 health crisis, it’s going to be even more so, and unless you have a plan in place for how you’ll help students cope with the strange new world in which we live, it’ll be overwhelming and daunting for you and your students.

If you have a routine that already works, then now is the time to reevaluate it and see what you might need to tweak in order to meet the new needs of your students. Most of them will be affected by everything that happened as a result of the pandemic, so teaching-as-usual will be anything but usual. You know your students and community best, so you can use this book as a guide to help you assess and possibly redesign what you do in light of our new normal.

If you don’t have a routine you use to help your students overcome the distractions of life so they can focus in your class, then I’m especially glad you picked up this book! Now’s your chance to practice some new skills that will help you and your students get the most out of your classes in spite of the added stress, anxiety, depression, and more they’ll be dealing with.

This book outlines the process I designed and implemented in my classroom and is set up to help you create a plan to successfully teach music to students who will be forever changed after this worldwide shift in education and life as we once knew it.

My work with my students always comes from a place of love. As I came to what was going to be the end of a long and fulfilling career in music education in June of 2020, I found myself being called to stay in my classroom and community a little while longer. I see the writing on the wall and know there will be massive shifts in everything we do as educators now, so I made the commitment to remain with my students and walk beside them on this journey. Providing them with the stability of our routines together during a time of upheaval and uncertainty is essential not just for them but for me, too. Now more than ever, they need to continue to practice what we were doing every day in class – relaxing amidst the chaos.

Because my students and I learned to make our classroom a place where we decompress together every day, I know I will have the stamina to be present with them as we adapt to our new ways of doing things. Even though we will all have more reasons to be distracted with each passing day and the rapid changes taking place to education and we will undoubtedly experience plenty of stressful situations, we will forge ahead with our daily routine that allows us to settle into an hour of magical music-making together, where we can put our worries and distractions on the back burner and use music as a tool to help us cope, heal, and express ourselves.

This book is the culmination of my life’s work and shares the most powerful wisdom I gained from my decades of experience as a busy band-directing mom who managed to build a successful band program in spite of a million obstacles. My wish for you is that you will find it to be instrumental in helping you be that badass band director you were born to be so you can be there for your students for a long time to come.

Check out a FREE SNEAK PEEK of Love the Job, Lose the Stress: Successful Social and Emotional Learning in the Modern Music Classroom now!

FREE SNEAK PEEK

Summertime, and the Livin’ is Anything But Easy Right Now. What are YOU doing to make sure you’ve got the stamina to make it through a school year like no other next year?

You’ve spent the last three months learning all kinds of new ways to deliver instruction and teach in a distance learning environment, despite never having experienced this as a learner or having been trained how to deliver all your content in new ways – and you made these changes overnight.

While you somehow got through the most surreal educational (and life) experience, you may be looking back at what you’ve learned and now have more questions than answers as we move forward.

Now that school has ended for this year and you’ve had a moment to take a breath, you may be wondering, “What in the hell am I going to do next year?”

How am I going to teach? Will I even have a job? How do I deliver content and realistically meet all the guidelines and expectations without spending 10 hours a day this summer rewriting my curriculum and planning for multiple types of teaching platforms and situations? How can I balance my family and professional lives when I don’t even know how classes will be structured? I’ve never been trained for distance teaching, and I’m not sure how to adapt my performance-based classes… there’s so much to worry about!

To order book from JW Pepper, click this link

As educators, we tend to be organized with plans for every contingency that could come up. But in a pandemic and during a time when there’s so much anxiety about what school will look like in the fall, the time we normally take during the summer to relax and recharge can easily be hijacked by stress and fear of how to teach and support your own family in a sustainable way.

Are you going to spend all summer worrying about next year or would you rather spend it making sure you’re ready to face whatever comes at you without the stress, anxiety, and exhaustion taking over?

It’s possible to use the next few weeks as a time to rebuild your own toolbox with skills you can use to keep yourself in the best mental and physical space possible so you have the stamina to do this important work.

Don’t waste all summer trying to figure out where to start. Jump to the front of the line by figuring out how to recharge by identifying your own current mental and physical health status so you can determine what you can do to take care of your own needs so you can support your students, family, and yourself in the upcoming year.

Where do you even start when it comes to figuring out what is creating the most stress for you so you can begin to figure out how to address it?

I’ve designed an assessment to help you do just that!

Check out Moffat’s Mojo Meter for Educators. This quiz will help you identify the very things that are keeping you from being able to truly relax and recharge this summer.

I hope you find the few minutes you invest in taking this assessment to be helpful in identifying what you need to do for yourself in order to support everyone else through this journey.

Peace-
Lesley

Is This the Summer You Finally Figure Out Your Work/Life Balance So You Can Survive Next Year or Are You Going to Wing It?

The challenge of not knowing what to prepare for when school starts in the fall is stressful. Stress contributes to all kinds of health problems, both physically and mentally. I know this from first-hand experience.

Are you prepared for whatever comes your way or are you already envisioning the 14-hour work days that involve Plans A, B, C, D and more? Will you have the energy for your own family while teaching in person and/or remotely while also monitoring students’ health and safety?

How will you keep yourself mentally and physically fit so that you can handle all of your responsibilities at school and at home without collapsing?

If you aren’t sure if you’re prepared for the challenges of having a healthy work/life balance come September, check out my Music Teacher Mojo Meter. This quick self assessment lets you get a snapshot of your readiness for teaching during a pandemic.

By asking yourself these questions, you can easily identify where your strengths have been and what your biggest obstacles will be moving forward. You can’t fix what you can’t identify.

Music Teacher Mojo Meter

Summer is the perfect time to invest in YOU – and this summer is the most important summer to put habits in place that will support you in the upcoming school year. We’ve got important work to do – and we must have the stamina to be able to do it!

I hope my Music Teacher Mojo Meter is a helpful tool in helping you figure out what you can do to support yourself through this stressful time.

With you on this journey –
Lesley

Today Was My Final Evaluation, and I Ended Up In Tears.

It’s my 32nd year of teaching, so this shouldn’t have been a big deal. I’ve been through dozens of these and had no reason to believe this would be any different other than the fact that it was taking place online due to the pandemic.

Mr. Peters and I met on Zoom, and after exchanging pleasantries, he screen-shared my evaluation form.

There on page six he had a running narrative of what was going on in the classroom:

T askes Ss to raise their hands if they had a trill at the end.
T: …We don’t breathe before the deedle-eedle-eet – that would sound silly… I want you to hear the melody and realize how hard it is at this speed, because they have to take in gigantic amounts of air in…
T: Keeping a beautiful tone at all times, you’re doing a nice job keeping long phrases – keep doing that.
T stopped Ss playing just after a measure.
T: I’m going to show you what I heard and then I’m going to show you what I want.
T demonstrated the measure using the piano, tune with different fingers coming in at slightly different times vs. all simultaneously. Told Ss to “Lock in even better… nice and together.” Acknowledged when she heard the improvement she was looking for.
S took responsibility – “I know what I did.” T thanked him, moved on.
T: I loved that we didn’t all start our articulations the same and that you eventually came together!

As he scrolled through a couple more pages of that narrative, I saw in front of me what an ordinary day used to be like in the band room at our school. Oh, the things I took for granted.

I was reminded of the sense of accomplishment we’d feel when we’d woodshed a passage and finally master it. Or the wave of emotion that would sweep over all of us when we’d executed a passage with exceptional passion. Or the simple thrill of watching that third clarinet player finally get over the break without alarming the rest of the band with horrible squeaking.

All of the seemingly ordinary things we did every single day at school seem so much more significant now that we have been away from our kids for a couple of months. I long for the days when we could high-five ’em as they walked in our classrooms and then settle them in for 55 minutes of music and memory-making.

As I read the narrative of what happened in my classroom during wind ensemble on that ordinary day in November, tears poured from my eyes as it finally sunk in just how precious that time together had been. Those days in our classrooms did so much more than just teach kids how to play songs. Through the process of developing as musicians, I watched them grow up. I watched them overcome personal struggles and challenges. I grew to love them not just as music students, but as humans. We’d become a family and suddenly the pain of being ripped from my band family was really raw and all I could do was cry.

I am sad for so many things that we’ve lost as a school, community, nation, and world. I worry about the future of everything from education to survival and more. And I wonder how I can continue to be a band director and serve my students in a post-pandemic world.

I don’t have all the answers, but I know it’s up to me to do a few things:

Identify the core values and concepts I am charged with teaching my students
Figure out how to deliver that content in a safe and meaningful way
Implement strategies that will help me sustain my own mental and physical health so I can support my students for the long-haul

If you are a music teacher who is looking for strategies to support the long-term survival of your music program and sustainable ways for you to balance work and family lives while you do this important work, then I invite you to do a self-assessment that can help you identify your readiness for what lies ahead. It will help you ask yourself the questions you need to face as you plan for what’s next.

We have important work to do, and I, for one, plan to be ready to serve my students in spite of the obstacles that will arise as we get closer to September. Budget cuts, loss of performance and trip opportunities, and the fear of the unknown can be crippling – but our kids are counting on us to be brave, step up, and be there for them.

Take five minutes and check-in with yourself using this self-assessment. The peace of mind that comes when you get the clarity you need to take the next step can make the difference between stepping into the next few months in fear or with purpose. I choose purpose!

Self-Assessment for Music Teacher Readiness-for-September

How Will We Sustain Ourselves, Our Students, and Our Programs During and After This Pandemic?

Are you a “Type-A, super-organized, ultra-planner” who is used to being in control kind of teacher and now feels like a fish out of water as you undo all of your spring events, plan new activities for distance learning, and try to figure out what next year might look like for you and your program?

This is a pretty unnerving place to be, especially for those of us who like to plan in advance and be prepared. How can we possibly do that for our programs when we have no idea what next year might look like? How can we offer music classes to students and grow our ensembles when being socially distant might mean limited in-person classes and activities next year?

Now that the initial shock and disbelief that our in-person school year ended in March has worn off, many of us are beginning to wonder how we are possibly going to be able to do our jobs when school finally does resume. There are so many unknowns about what education will look like that it can be paralyzing, frightening, and extremely overwhelming to think about. And when we consider the impact all this can potentially have on our music programs, well, it can be downright discouraging.

I remember the same kind of feeling after 9/11.

I was just starting my 14th year of teaching. As a parent, I was scared about what this tragic event meant for my own kids’ future. My girls were 4, 8, and 12 at the time, and in order for my husband to remain employed, he had to transfer to a different work location, making his commute three or more hours per day. I found myself with very long days that started with zero period jazz band classes and ended with evening activities, trying to balance the extra parenting responsibilities I had while my husband was commuting. As a teacher in the changing landscape of education after that event and the stressors that came with it, I really struggled to keep it all together.

Fast-forward 19 years. Ready or not, as a result of this pandemic, we are at another major changing point in education. Having experienced teaching and parenting after a major event that impacted life as we had known it before, I am prepared to share what I learned through my personal story so other teachers can skip a lot of the growing pains and be the teachers, parents, and partners they want to be and come out stronger on the other side.

Educators are natural leaders. Being a leader at a time like this requires vision, passion, and stamina. Being a leader during distance learning while juggling your own family, limited access to resources, and sketchy internet can be incredibly challenging. But as music teachers, we are not intimidated by challenges. In fact, we often thrive in situations that seem impossible to mere mortals.

If you are a music teacher with a vision of helping your students be the best version of themselves through the magic of music education and you want to be a leader who does that in spite of the circumstances, then I want to invite you to check out my new book.

In my latest book, I share all kinds of strategies and resources that will help you do this important work efficiently, with greater ease, and with less of a drain on your energy. Having taught more than 30,000 classes in my career while raising a family of my own, I’ve walked the walk and am delighted to be able to pass on what I’ve learned.

The book will be published next month, but YOU can get a FREE advanced copy of the ebook NOW and get started on tapping into strategies for your long-term stamina as a music teacher!

If you read it and find it helpful, I’d love to know. In fact, if you send me any feedback before May 4, I can include it in the eBook that will be published next month on Amazon! I would be really grateful for any reviews because that will help me get it into more people’s hands, and that was the whole reason for writing it in the first place. 🙂

I’m really grateful to Dr. Tim for his enthusiastic support. I put a sneak peek of his foreword below so you can see for yourself if this information will be helpful for you.

In-person teaching will one day resume. It will look different than what we’ve known it to be. We can either wait and see what happens, or we can be the leaders and visionaries who use our platforms as music educators to shape the future of music education.

Our students are counting on us, so let’s do this!

FREE Advanced Copy eBook!

Foreword

by Dr. Tim Lautzenheiser

Lesley Moffat’s newest book, Love the Job, Lose the Stress, redefines the term “self-help.” Her first best seller, I Love My Job, but It’s Killing Me, awakened us to a new landscape of personal and professional sanity. This latest-greatest contribution offers a tried-and-true blueprint for vocational success while embracing the critical importance of fueling one’s mental, emotional and physical health. Spot on! Bull’s eye!

What is uniquely wonderful about Lesley’s writing is based on her own teaching journey. Her wisdom reflects reality rather than hypothesis. She has “been to the well,” she “walks her talk,” and she does it with a sense of understanding unknown in common hours. Rather than simply focusing on the obvious, she delves into the why, what, and how of the given situations:

Here’s why you need to take stock of this concern or breakdown.
This is what you can do to reset your compass to achieve resolution.
… and this is how you can do it to reach your destination.

A bit of history: By all standards, Lesley Moffat was at the top of her teaching (band directing) career. She developed a program-of-excellence recognized (and envied) by her colleagues. The numbers grew, the quality soared, and the awards continued to spotlight this one-of-a-kind culture-of-artistic-excellence being driven by her ongoing desire to serve the students, the school, and the community. However, all of this manifested at the expense of Lesley’s health and well-being. To attain these high, self-appointed educational standards, she was short-changing the most important part of her program: Lesley Moffat. Let us be reminded of this cornerstone truth: “You can’t lead others until you lead yourself.” Fortunately, she recognized her plight and executed a massive course-correction. Now, we are the benefactors of her self-explored research via her trademark writing talents.

This manuscript is an endless treasure chest of immeasurable value. From the self-reflection templates to proven time-management skills, each page reveals yet another golden nugget you can integrate into your own daily agenda. This is not a book you read and then put on the shelf; rather it is a file cabinet of priceless data certain to bolster the health, happiness and good fortune of every (music) educator.

We’ve all heard the familiar teacher outcry, “I’m tired. I’m frustrated. My health is suffering. I live in stress. I don’t have a life. I don’t know what to do. I want to give-up. I’m just plain burnt out!” It truly is “a sad state of affairs” when one experiences this kind of desperation. Might I suggest that reading Love the Job, Lose the Stress offers-up a powerful prescription availing us to a personal/professional avenue arriving at one’s desired contentment and fulfillment.

Lesley, thank you! We know the master teachers are also keystone role models. That being said, you are an exemplar for all of us!

Music Educator Mondays – Let’s Prepare for the Future of Music Education Together!

I am STOKED to have Dr. Matthew Arau of #upbeatglobal joining me on a webinar for Music Educator Monday this week at 9:00 AM pacific / noon eastern time, where we will talk about the realities of what our roles as music educators are during school closures and what we should be prepared for when we return to our classrooms, whenever that may be.

Matthew and I will be sharing our thoughts about the critical role music teachers play in helping our students and communities cope during this crisis.

We’ll also be sharing tools you can use to keep your own stress levels managed so you have the stamina to do this for the long haul.

If you can’t make it to the webinar, register anyway and I’ll send you the replay.

Together we rise!

Webinar Registration

https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_sX3udf6DSqW3EvW7kIlz_A