Growing up as a musician, I learned the importance of listening to others. As an adult, I’ve realized that listening is not just a skill but a cornerstone of effective advocacy. It’s through listening that we understand others’ needs, empathize with their struggles, and work toward meaningful change.
My mother was a musician and an educator, having transitioned from being a special education teacher before I was born. She played organ in church every Sunday and taught piano students during the week. I accompanied her to Incarnate Word College in San Antonio, Texas, to sit quietly at her feet while she obtained a second degree in music. As a young child, I watched the professors scratch music theory onto the chalkboard, listened to college students perform their solfège exams, watched instrumentalists give recitals, and went with my mother to the music library. I could identify composers by name when they came on the classical radio station before I was five.
Mom was in her forties, returning to school as a liberated woman living a new life after a traumatic and abusive first marriage. My father, a veterinarian and a military man, bought her a piano and listened to her dreams. I sat at the feet of their love as they collaborated on their life and navigated change together.
For thirty-four years, they did this with dedication, love, persistence, and through so many mistakes. He was restrained and tied down in a hospital bed for three weeks while he died from dementia. We were unable to bring him home or even release him to hospice due to C-diff.
They listened to each other. She abided by all of his wishes and advocated tirelessly for him.
My mother held my father’s hand while he took his last breath, finally released from the straps on his bed.
Our system is not meant to handle situations like theirs.
When I first stumbled across the Alliance Against Seclusion and Restraint on social media in 2020, I was dealing with my daughter’s unpleasant situation at a preschool in Washington State. I followed them and kept tabs on their posts, interacting occasionally, never imagining I would need to become seriously involved. My daughter was okay; I thought I could handle it.
Fast forward to September 2023, my daughter’s second day of public school in Connecticut. She came home with bruises from her paraprofessional over the use of her AAC (Augmentative and Alternative Communication) device, which they misinterpreted as a general-use iPad. Horrified and panicked, I reached out to everyone I could think of, and Guy Stephens of AASR wrote back to me immediately. He listened.
That was the moment I became a loyal volunteer at AASR. In my moment of pain and helpless confusion as a parent, the executive director was right there to help guide me. I will never forget that and will always be here to pay it back and forward it to others.
As a volunteer, I’ve worked on projects with professionals from various fields and learned more about legislation, grants, education, administration, research, psychology, and neuroscience. I’ve written articles and delivered presentations. I’ve learned to be a better advocate, ally, and friend. One of my closest friends is someone I met through AASR; she has encouraged me to attend more presentations and events, increasing my knowledge and ability to network with others.
We listen to each other.
When I think about my early days as a musician with my mom, I think of the importance of co-regulation. A recent study conducted during a performance by pianist Yuja Wang found that her heartbeat was in sync not just with the conductor but with members of the orchestra and audience as well. This study is a powerful testament to how we can all co-regulate with each other if we are listening and on the same page. It is about so much more than music; it is being in the same space together, sharing the same goals, collaborating, and each of us playing our part. We are all part of this community, and our collective efforts can bring about significant change.
It also proves that “listening” is not what they were teaching in my children’s former public school — “whole body listening” isn’t sitting still, training your brain to do something that doesn’t feel natural. It’s your entire body being freely engaged in what you’re doing until your heartbeat syncs up and regulates with those around you.
Perhaps if we bring back funding for orchestras and choirs, many of the “behavior issues” seen in classrooms will recede.
My older sister, Jana, who experienced a great deal of education trauma in the 1970s and 1980s, told me recently that her choir room at high school was the only space where she felt she could be herself, where she felt safe, and where she could regulate.
My sister’s choir director also directed the choir at the church where my mother was the organist. My mother taught at the same high school before she married my father and taught herself how to play the organ.
We are all connected.
As a child, going to concerts with my mother and watching all the string instruments with their bows synchronized, I could not help but fall into the rhythm. As an adult, in May of 2022, I was taking a meditation class after my mother passed away. During a meditation exercise, while everyone was silent, I fell into a deep breathing rhythm that I realized upon the end of the exercise had me swaying ever-so-slightly from side to side. When I opened my eyes, the trees outside my window were swaying in the exact rhythm of my body. I had picked up the heartbeat of the earth simply by closing my eyes and listening to something I couldn’t hear.
This is something music taught me.
The teacher of the meditation class I was taking in Connecticut was the son of the choir director in Texas.
We are all connected by more than we know.
During one of my piano lessons as a teenager with Raymond Hanson, a concert pianist and professor at Hartt College of Music, I struggled to get the sound of pianississimo just right. The soft pedal felt wrong, and my hands were playing from the fingertips. Surely, to get the softest sound, I needed to use the least amount of pressure.
Mr. Hanson gently took my arm and showed me how to relax so I could play from my shoulder. Supporting the suspended weight of the arm allowed for a deeper tone instead of a superficial tapping of the key on top. By changing how I approached the sound with my body, holding myself away from the keyboard to hear it better instead of scrunching myself up close, I allowed myself the space to absorb the sound the same way I had learned words as a child.
“Dahlin’,” he said, “Now try it again, but don’t play for the person sitting in the front row. You know they can hear you. Whenever you play pianississimo, play for the person sitting in the very last row at the back of the auditorium. They’re the ones who need to hear it.”
I’ve never forgotten Mr. Hanson’s wise words, and while I haven’t touched a piano since 2011, I apply the same philosophy to my advocacy daily.
During a Zoom meeting with Guy Stephens a few weeks ago, my daughter appeared behind me.
Guy smiled and waved at her. “I just wanted to say hello to your friend,” he told me.
Alice, pleased at being noticed, waved back. “Oh! Hello!”
He listens.
This is true advocacy.
