Remember the cartoons where Wile E. Coyote
runs off the cliff in pursuit of Road Runner? Defying gravity, he momentarily walks
on air until suddenly realizing what he is doing, looks down and crashes to the valley
floor.
I had a similar fall during my high school senior year, on stage in front of a large
audience. It proved to be a defining point in my life.
I began playing piano when I was six. Mom was a music teacher and choreographer, and
she held great hope for me as a pianist, my one shining talent that overshadowed my
lackluster academic achievements. I was a social animal much more interested in reading
people than books, so it never occurred to me to apply myself in my studies.
But piano was different; it was my creative outlet for passions arising from social
interactions. I entered all the recitals and competitions available to a lad living in a
small Kansas town, and always did well.
Then came my senior year.
It was the best of times. For once, my grades were good, some of the awkwardness of
adolescence was gone and studying piano had become a serious pursuit. I took lessons from
a Wichita State University professor who encouraged me to enter a competition for high
school students. First prize was the opportunity to play with the
Wichita Symphony Orchestra.
My part in the competition was a Mendelssohn
concerto in G minor. Seated at my Steinway
Grand, I easily connected with the piece and played it well with little practice.
Still, I was surprised when I was selected as one of five finalists.
A sizeable crowd assembled on the afternoon of our competition. Accompanied by my
professor at another piano, I waded into Mendelssohn completely immersed in the flow of
the music and the moment, playing much faster and more articulately than ever before...
as if walking on air.
Then, like Coyote, I looked down.
About three-quarters of the way through we reached a dramatic crescendo in the music.
Suddenly my mind went absolutely and completely blank!
Paralyzed, I stopped. My accompaniment continued without me for nearly a whole page
before I clumsily found my way back and stumbled to the end of the song. I heard the
crowd react in disappointment. I was traumatized. At that moment, I gave up piano and a
potential career in music.
Ten years passed before I got the urge to play again. I was in
Cairo, Egypt, working for an
offshore drilling company and living the carefree life of an expatriate in a comfortable
home attended by a maid, gardener and driver.
Pianos were rare in Cairo, but one day while passing a storefront I saw a Steinway
Grand. My passions aroused, I went in and negotiated a rental agreement. They delivered
the piano to my house and I climbed completely back into playing, even scored a regular
Thursday night gig at the
Nile Hilton.
Today, the piano plays a key role in my life. It is where I go to relieve stress and
think through the challenges of culture change. I often play recitals for residents and
recently we started a choir called Meadowlark Seniors. Music has helped make my own life
whole, and it is a great unifier in our quest to create wholeness and home for our elders.
So what happened to me on stage that fateful day? Here is what I think:
If we are lucky, there are times we find ourselves in shared pursuit of something much
bigger than ourselves, with a potential outcome far greater and more harmonious than the
sum of individual efforts that create it. Whether our goal is to perform a beautiful
concerto or change the culture of aging, the quest takes on a life and flow of its own.
By surrendering ourselves to the flow, we can perform well beyond our normal limits,
almost defying gravity.
I had so surrendered myself to the Mendelssohn piece that day I became, as the sages
might say, "at one" with the music, playing from deep within my soul rather than from the
memorization of individual notes and stanzas. In so doing, I tapped into a power that
momentarily carried me beyond my usual talents. But rather than staying in the flow of
that power, I froze with fear at the realization of it, like Wile E. Coyote who suddenly
remembers the laws of gravity and plunges to the desert floor.
These days I am learning better how to stay with the flow in our pursuit of culture
change in long-term care. Coyote's lesson for our movement, I believe, is not to be
afraid of our own innate power and the responsibilities of leadership, but to embrace
them... not to limit our vision by merely playing to bureaucratic rules and regulations,
but to delve deep within our souls to find the true meaning of "home" for our residents...
not to look down, but to soar.
Steve Shields is CEO of Meadowlark Hills Retirement Community, one of the premier
Culture Change homes in the country. Click
here to read more about Meadowlark Hills and their work in our Featured Stories
section.
