Sunday, August 10, 2025

Piano Man

I was not the best version of myself yesterday. I got up from sitting at breakfast and suddenly, my foot hurt as if I had just severely sprained my ankle. But I hadn’t. I was just sitting! And it continued to bother me throughout the day. 

 

Then I went to try to clean my hearing aids, a process I’ve done successfully four or five times. But my little brush had mysteriously disappeared from the case and I have no hope of finding it. Then the thing that takes out the old miniscule part and replaces it with the new one just wouldn’t do what it was supposed to. I’m okay without the hearing aids all day every day, but they feel increasingly important for teaching, especially when people make comments or ask questions. So the fact that I return home late Saturday and leave for China to teach early Monday is a problem as Kaiser’s Hearing Center will be closed on Sunday. Add to this the maddening re-appearance of daily dizziness and it’s no wonder I screamed out loud in frustration, scaring my wife and starting an argument between us. 

 

So here I am advocating for kindness and acceptance and appreciation and about to publish a book about The Humanitarian Musician and finding myself a miserable, frustrated, angry excuse for a human being. But in some ways, I guess that’s what actually makes me a human being. I’d like to imagine that even the Dalai Lama might get pissed off when he can’t find his glasses. 

 

The other day, one of my Level III students sent me the re-worked lyrics to Billy Joel’s Piano Man. There was a beautiful moment in Level III when I entered class and they were at the instruments and sat me down to sing this song to me. Truth be told, I didn’t know the original, but still was overcome to the point of tears by their beautiful gesture and lovely singing and playing. 

 

So to comfort myself today, I looked up the song on Youtube and followed along with these new words. It was a poignant reminder of a better moment and a better self and that helped restore me. Though the dizziness is still there and the foot still hurts and the hearing aide remains unusable, it helps. If you were in that Level III reading this, you might accuse me of Imposter Syndrome or you might realize that try as I might to improve, I’m still as flawed a human being as anyone. And perhaps that brings you some comfort!

 

Here's the song:

 

“Piano Man” by Billy Joel
altered lyrics by 2025 Level 3 Class at Hidden Valley

 

It's 10:20 on a Thursday
The LEVEL 3 crowd shuffles in 

There's an old man sittin' in front of us, 

Playin’ his piano again. 


We say, "Doug, can you teach us functional harmony? 

We’re not really sure how it goes
But it's sad and it's sweet, and in volumes 5 and 3 

And it keeps all of us on our toes 


La la la ti do ti la.....la la la ti do ti....la so...... 


Sing us a song you're the piano man 

Sing us a song day and night
Level 3 loves you Doug Goodkin
And thanks you for sharing your light. 

 

 

Saturday, August 9, 2025

Grand Hotel

"Grand Hotel. Always the same. People come. People go. Nothing ever happens." 

-       Ending line of the classic film Grand Hotel

 

When my wife’s parents built this place back in 1974, they called it “the cottage.” Though larger than our image of that descriptive word, we still call it the cottage. Throughout the summer (and rarely, but sometimes in Fall, Winter, Spring), my wife and her two brothers and our extended families and friends pass through, much like guests at a grand hotel. They come. They go. And nothing ever happens. 

 

The waters of Lake Michigan lap against the beach as they have for millennium, the ladybugs and fruitflies and biting flies come and go, the fishing boats dot the seascape each morning and evening and as noted yesterday, the town’s library and post-office and restaurants and 5 & 10 stores and ice cream parlors and more open the doors each day as they have for the half-a-century I’ve been visiting. 

 

And yet, everything changes.We who gather each August (sometimes July) re-visit the traditions listed in yesterday’s post and on the surface, it’s the same moments lived yet again. But if the land and the town barely change, one thing is certain— we do. 

 

This morning I climbed the Sugar Bowl sand dune as I do each year and yes, I got to the top. But my 74 years showed up in the three times I paused while ascending and feeling out-of-breath when I reached the top. Meanwhile, 10-year old Malik scampered up and then jumped into the lake to swim on the way back. Almost 14-year old Zadie chose not to come down to say goodbye to the beach where at 4-years-old, she used to walk at the water’s edge chattering to herself, so happy. My own kids who used to do the same now in their 40’s and experiencing the same places and activities from their own place in life’s grand cycle. So it goes on.

 

This morning, my daughter Kerala and Zadie and Malik drove away, on their way to Chicago to catch their flight back home. All the rooms except one in our little Grand Hotel are empty for two nights until the next guests come. It is again a hot day—up to 80— with higher winds (35mph) than usual and waves in the lake. Two days of relative solitude, divided between taking care of all the business I’ve been putting off and sinking deeper into Summer’s grace, with nowhere to go and nothing to do and happily so. It feels a little harder these days to re-kindle that childlike mind, to be at peace and wholly immersed in the life where “nothing ever happens” amidst the hustle and bustle in the hotel lobby. But I need it and value it. That return to the unconditional state of “Isn’t Life grand?!”

 

Wish me luck.   

Friday, August 8, 2025

Grand Slam

We are all creatures of habit and I’m no exception. But I like to take the next step into Ritual, a conscious habit that refreshes and rejuvenates. In 50 years of coming to the same summer place in upper Michigan, our family has a long list of “must do’s.” In four short days, we already walked up the Sugar Bowl sand dune, hiked to the larger Baldy dune and walked back on the beach looking for Petoskey stones, canoed and walked to the Outlet, played basketball in town, went to Mystery Hill (a place that seems to defy gravity), ate at the Cabbage Shed (where I first played cornhole!), got ice cream at The Cool Spot.

 

Yesterday was unique because we did four of them in one day! Grand slam! Breakfast at Watervale Inn, miniature golf, walk to the Frankfort lighthouse, movie at The Cherry Bowl Drive-In Theater (Freakier Friday). There are still a few more that we’ve often done—bike riding on Rails to Trails to Crystal Lake, walk the beach to Elberta, lunch at Arcadia Bluffs, visit to the Frankfort Library and sometimes, a trip to the Sleeping Bear Dunes. (Of course, this all means nothing to most readers, but if you’re ever up this way, you now have a great list of things to do!)

 

I generally enjoy each and every one of these traditional activities but enjoy yet more sharing them with others. The things I did with my own children that I now do with my grandchildren I also love to share with others coming to Michigan for the first time. In the past few years, that includes Zadie’s friend Zulia and my sister Ginny, this year Talia’s boyfriend Matt and the ex-head of the SF School Terry and his wife Kathy. And of course, all of this includes shopping at the Farmer’s Market, cooking great meals, ball games on the beach, board games/ card games/ jigsaw puzzles at night, watching the sun set over the lake. Oh, did I mention swimming? Reading? Hanging out and talking? 

 

Yesterday Talia and Matt flew home to begin their next year of teaching, my two brother-in-laws Barclay and John also left and tomorrow daughter Kerala and grandkids Zadie and Malik head home to Portland. Then on Monday, Terry and Kathy arrive and I’ll trot out the must-do list again to share with them. 


Gratitude to Frankfort for the best of conservatism, keeping things that bring happiness alive and ongoing. In this fast-shifting world, it's somewhat of a miracle that the Cherry Bowl Drive In Movie Theater and the Garden Theater are still open, as are the Frankfort library, lighthouse, laundromat, bookstore, ice cream places, various restaurants. That the beach areas (thanks to the Nature Conservancy) are wholly preserved and protected. That it's possible to keep traditions of a half-a-century alive and be able to count on them each year. May it continue!

Wednesday, August 6, 2025

Better Late Than Never

Another one of those clichés that actually rings true. Certainly for me today. Consider:

 

I’ve come to this spot on Lake Michigan for 50 years now. 50 years!! Sometime in the last 35, my brother-in-law brought two thin-tired bikes here and that’s what my wife and I have used for decades riding through the lovely back-country of this lake-speckled district. We’re less-than-thrilled with either of the bikes but have put up with them all these years. In this last ten years or so, we’ve rented bikes in town for one day of riding on the rails-to-trails path, the last five with the grandkids. We’ve had guests come stay who would have enjoyed riding with us, but with just two bikes, we usually just let it go. 

 

So after taking one bike ride around Upper Herring Lake as we often do, finally the thought struck— “We should buy another bike.” After all, we can afford it and with an unexpected tax return of almost $300, it seemed like a great use of the money. Plus my daughter Talia’s boyfriend Matt knows a lot about bikes, so he could help me pick one out. 

 

And so today, we went to the bike rental place in hopes that they had some for sale. Inside the store, there were two, both around $1600. Outside the store were two more— one for $100 and one for $75! Both bikes with hybrid tires, easily adjustable seats (unlike the ones we had been riding), gears on the handlebars rather than on the crosspiece down low, one with high handlebars and a big seat. Matt and I rode them around the block and they seemed great. 


For just a brief minute, I was trying to decide which to buy when the thought struck— at this price, I can buy both! And still come $125 under the $300 I was willing to spend for one. What a deal! And close to what we spent when we rented bikes once a year for everyone!

 

And so I bought them, Matt and Talia rode them the five miles back to the cottage and we now have four bicycles to choose from. Only took me 50 years to figure it out. But as the saying goes, “Better late than never!”

 

Now can we please do the same for finally, finally, putting the Orange Criminal behind bars where he belongs? I’d even donate a bike for the exercise yard. 


 


Tuesday, August 5, 2025

Don't Let Him In

… is the title of an intriguing book by Lisa Jewell that I’m listening to on Audible. Alongside Symphony of Secrets, the book by Brendan Slocumb that I just finished reading, it paints a pretty depressing portrait of toxic men supported by the three evil isms—sexism, capitalism and (in the latter), racism. 

 

But it also is a reminder that Clint Eastwood gave when he was asked how he could be so active at 90 years old: “I just don’t let the old man in.” Freshly 74, I hear that man knocking at my door and need to be careful about how wide I open it. There were times in the recent Orff course when a dance movement went to the floor and back where I deferred and even a few times during vigorous dancing when I just sat on the side. But here in Michigan, I'm renewing my campaign to not let the old man into my body’s house. Consider. In just two days, I’ve done the following: 

 

·      10 mile bike ride

·      6 mile beach walk

·      1 mile canoe

·      1 mile kayak

·      1mile swim

·      15 games of cornhole

·      Frisbee

·      Rock skipping contest

·      Paddleball

·      Kickball game

• Volleyball game

 

That’s the active side of the “keep the old man out” routine. Then there’s the playful, game-playing self— Taboo, Rummy 500, King’s Corner, PIT, Spoons, Salad bowl charades, most of which we play after dinner. That "we" is four over-70’s folks—my wife, me and two brother-in-laws, three people in their 40’s —my two daughters and a boyfriend— and two teens, my grandkids. Miraculously, we all enjoy each other so much and these active games and exercises side-by-side certainly helps keep things fun between us. If someone were to write a novel about it, it would not be a best-seller. It appears that human failings are much more interesting to read about than people getting along and having fun. 

 

Maybe that’s as things should be. Keep the horrors confined to novels and plays and operas and keep our best selves alive in our actual day-to-day lives. In company with the cool unsalted lake waters, bald eagles soaring overhead, evening sunsets savored out on the deck. To quote another edgy novel/film, this little corner of paradise is “No Country for Old Men.”

 

 

Sunday, August 3, 2025

Baptism and Preaching

In a letter lamenting the loss of understanding the value of the arts back in the early 1900's, the poet W.B. Yeats suggested, “We must baptize as well as preach.”

 

This came to mind an interview I had with someone asking what advice I would give a teacher about developing “intercultural teaching competency.” My initial response was simple: “Keep an open heart and mind and a lifelong curiosity.” There simply is no curriculum, stepped-program, sure-fire method to be gathered, packaged, marketed, sold, bought and implemented. If there was, it would be sure to fail, for without direct experience of the supreme pleasure of investigating the other until you finally realize it has been part of you all along, you’re just skimming the surface. And if I presumed to give “advice” or a series of steps, it would feel like a “should-do/ must-do/ pedagogically-politically-socially-correct way” that you will be evaluated on and judged by. 

 

Instead, I suggested that a music teacher reflect on a different style of music or dance that somehow attracts them and follow that thread. Listen to it, go to concerts, read about it and then see if there’s someone in your area who teaches it (you’d be amazed how often there is someone, especially in the urban areas). Or perhaps you’ve noticed an intriguing instrument far different from your area of expertise. It might be a didjeridoo or shakuhachi flute or steel drum or Irish bagpipe or Bolivian panpipe— hundreds of choices out there! Get studying! And then see where all of that leads you in your own teaching. 


For me, every such study— all of them far short of mastery and virtuosity— influenced the pieces I adapted for the Orff Ensemble. My various studies in Philippine Kulintang, Indian maddalam drum, Balinese gamelan, Trinidad steel drum, Irish tinwhistle, Bulgarian bagpipe, Brazilian percussion, Ghanaian xylophone, American banjo and yet more not only brought fabulous music (and sometimes dance) to the kids that expanded their ears far beyond the Western norm but brought me such great pleasure keeping my own musicality challenged and enlarged. Not to mention getting to know many marvelous teachers from diverse traditions who also connected me to the wonderful cultures that birthed the music. 

 

All of this also found its way directly into my Level III Orff program and I believe that all the students felt the rewards of such a diverse immersion in familiar Orff scales and textures and instruments and ways of learning. Thinking of the Yeats quote, it indeed felt like a baptism in the refreshing waters of “the other” that was wholly necessary before any “preaching” made sense. And little preaching is needed—at least not the kind meant to convert, cajole, connive to accept the missionary dogma—when one has experienced first-hand the blessing of immersion in the sacred waters. 

 

Here on Lake Michigan, a different kind of baptism is at work. As I have every summer for some 50 years, I jumped into the lake’s cool and refreshing waters and felt the Spirit re-awakened. I listened to the preaching of the sea gulls and the breeze through the grasses and that is the only sermon I need. No testimony of the faithful proclaiming salvation, just the patient presence of Petoskey stones speaking silently of the holy Spirit that lives and breathes inside of all things. It’s enough. It’s more than enough. 




4 am Bicyclist

And so the story continues. The 3-hour drive from sunny Carmel Valley to foggy San Francisco, arrive at 7:30 pm and a few hours to unpack from one life and re-pack for the next. Then up at 4:00 am and off to the airport. On the way, thinking about all the cars— not many, but still enough— driving around so early in the morning. Why? Where are they going? What is their story?

 

Then I noticed a lone bicyclist and really wondered about his story. Was he sneaking out after a rendezvous in a torrid love affair? Was he a baker coming home from work? Was he on his way to early-morning meditation at the Zen Center? That would be a great assignment for a school English class— imagine what’s going on and tell the story. 

 

Meanwhile, my story was much more boring. Got dropped off at the airport, got to my gate, got on to the plane to Chicago and then another to Traverse City. Got picked up by my daughter Talia and my granddaughter Zadie, both of whom I love to the ends of the earth. Zadie is almost 14 and after a few explosive years when she hit puberty way too early (4th grade!), she is the most delightful young person. I just feel happy in her presence without a word being spoken. And when the words are spoken, they often are intriguing or hilarious. For example, I asked her about a visit to my nephew on my wife’s side where she dog-sat for him and his wife up near Seattle and then took a train home all by herself to Portland. I asked whether the train trip all by herself felt exciting and she said, “Well, I sat on the train and it moved.”

 

The power of understatement. Maybe I should have her write the bicyclist’s story. 

 

“It was 4am in San Francisco. I got on my bike and rode home.” —The end.

 

Saturday, August 2, 2025

We've Changed

The closing of the two-weeks in Paradise was as magnificent as I imagined it would be. Someday I may share the closing ritual I do with Level III, complete with three boxes of tissues ready to pass around as needed. But for now I’ll  just say that the whole course closing ceremony, including the Level III graduation, delivered its promise. The final canon sung in a spiral was the soul-stirring closure it always us, the ringing of the gongs that signaled the beginning of the course returned again at the end, but we all heard them with our new selves. I returned to the cocoon metaphor and acknowledged how we indeed reorganized our insides to emerge as butterflies flying back into the known world. As described in James Harding’s brilliant little canon in his From Wibbleton to Wobbleton book (substituting “we” for “you” as the pronoun): 

 

We’ve changed, we’ve changed. We’re somehow not the same.

We’re somewhat wiser, somewhat bolder, 

Somewhat kinder, somewhat older,

Somehow re-arranged, we’ve changed!

 

After the hugs and tears and heart-felt goodbyes with the 90 plus students, the staff gathered for the ritual final lunch at the Corkscrew Café and I read my cards of appreciations for each one while passing out the checks. What a fine crew of people we have assembled, each unique and authentic in our particular genius while sharing the same overall practice and values and appreciation for each other. More goodbyes and off we went to our separate homes— Barcelona, Munich, New York, Seattle (via Brazil), Chicago, San Francisco (with a detour to a folk-dance camp in France), Michigan for a family gathering. The goodbyes continued on through WhatsApp (“I’m at the airport!” “Just arrived home!” etc.) before they’ll fade out like a tide going out and we’ll return to our other lives. 

 

For staff and students alike, the echoes will continue to ripple out and cross each other. We are all forever in each other’s hearts. And what a rare and precious gift that is.  

Friday, August 1, 2025

Footbridge to Paradise

 


                        All things go too fast, swiftly pass the years

                        Only love it is, that with us stays, abides with us. 

                        To be selfless we must trust. 

                                                            – Avon Gillespie

 

This little canon written by my teacher was running through my mind as I crossed the footbridge to Paradise for the last time this summer. That little wooden bridge marks the transition from the hotel to Hidden Valley Music Seminars, where some 100 people gathered each morning for breakfast. Walking into that room with the buzz of conversation and the lilt of laughter was my daily return to my particular paradise in this Orff training. 

 

A life that began 52 years ago at Antioch College when I took my first Orff Course with Avon Gillespie. After meeting each Saturday for six hours, the poem above was the closing song Avon had us sing. I was 21 years old, he was 34 and what did either of us now about how swiftly the years indeed to pass? He couldn’t have known that he would only have 17 more of them on this planet and I could only hope that I would have 52 more and hopefully, more years to come. 

 

But both of us intuited the truth that Love was the redeeming angel, the eternal presence in our fleeting temporal existence. And that’s why we both understood that the music education we cared about was very little about reading quarter and eighth notes and playing the piece perfectly correctly and wholly about awakening Love in all its many faces— love for music, love for playing and singing and dancing with others that led to love for those others, love for everything that is beautiful and real and life-affirming in this world. 


That’s the sub-text to the buzz of the breakfast gathering and the tangible presence in last night’s sharing, where each Level present outward to the others what they had created inwardly amongst themselves. 

 

The calendar month has turned to August, this morning we will have our always-stirring and sob-inducing closing singing a later canon Avon used to close his courses. The world—our families, our homes, our jobs—await our return and hopefully, with astonishment at the colorful butterflies we have become gracing the year to come with new-found confidence, understanding, skills and awakened hearts and minds. 

 

Hopefully this old caterpillar has also sprouted some new wings. Looking forward to the family vacation that awaits me and more teaching in China. But first I have to pack!

Thursday, July 31, 2025

The Cracked Mirror

Today was the next-to-last day of our 10-day course. The way I organize Level III is like a perfectly sequenced universe where everything has its place, clearly coming from what just happened before and leading to what happens next. Musically speaking, it begins as a review of Level I with two-note songs accompanied by two-note drones, on to the full pentatonic scale in company with drones, ostinato and color parts. From there we ascend the ladder to the pentatonic modes of 2nd grade, then the transposed keys and related modes in 3rd grade and finally, the diatonic modes (Level II) of 4th and 5th grades, with their shifting triads and elemental harmonic movement. Finally, we arrive at major scale melodies accompanied by I, V and IV chords, pentatonic melodies again over the Blues chord changes and then the final part of the study with minor melodies with harmonic accompaniment. (Of course, all of this refers to the rhythmic/ melodic/ harmonic sequence as it applies to the Orff instrument ensemble— alongside all of this, students are playing games, learning folk dances, exploring creative movement, playing recorders and more.) If you’re not a music teacher, I assume none of the above makes much sense, but the two most important points are:

 

1)   Orff teaching artfully done is an exquisite sequence of skills and understandings, a universe unto itself in which everything is connected and makes sense while still continuing to be just plain old fun.


2)   The minor scales and melodies often evoke emotions of longing and sweet sorrow. (The scientific explanation is that the minor 3rd note is very high up on the harmonic series and thus, quite far away from the original tone that we feel as home. )


     And so today was the day to share three poignant 3-part songs from the Ukraine, Bulgaria and Sweden. The melodies themselves and the way they were arranged had everyone close to tears and when I revealed the meaning of the texts, those tears spilled out. (One song about a mother bird pushing her baby bird out of the nest and watching it fly away the way I will do with Level III tomorrow, another song about how you can sail without the wind and row without an oar, but you can’t say goodbye to a friend without crying.)

 

So we cried. And all it takes is one person who starts to tear up and then without effort, all in the room begin to also. Science attributes this to “mirror neurons,” the neural basis of the human capacity for emotions such as empathy and compassion.  This will happen again tomorrow at our closing circle and in anticipation, we always have at least three boxes of Kleenex tissues at hand. This is how things are meant to be. 

 

And yet. Collectively, our mirror neurons are broken, like a cracked mirror that distorts our true reflection. We are training ICE agents to harden their hearts and shut down their natural neural functioning, while equally broken people in the news media report on it all without a hint of a tear. And every day, we feed our twisted fascination with AI and it creeps into every corner of our lives, guaranteeing that the machine’s inability to feel or cry will be running the show. This is most assuredly not how things are meant to be. 

 

But here we are. All I can report is that in our little tiny corner of paradise here in the Carmel Valley, some 100 humans with beating hearts are laughing, crying, hugging, exulting together with soul-stirring music and dance by our sides. Tomorrow we will emerge from our cocoon where we have thoroughly reorganized ourselves inside and out to transform our sluggish caterpillar bodies and fly free as beautiful butterflies. 

 

Teacher

The happy birthday greetings keep trickling in on Facebook or e-mail and the message is clear— in over 500 greetings, the vast majority are remembering me as their teacher. Both the kids I taught in school and the fellow teachers I taught in workshops and courses. Their heart-warming appreciations are not for me as a friend, author, performing musician, social justice advocate, all roles I’ve worked to cultivate. They are expressing gratitude for my teaching and how it opened doors for them, affirmed their deep character, made their own teaching more fun and effective. 

 

And that’s as it should be. Every morning these past two weeks, I wake up with the next idea about how to bring my familiar Level III material alive more vibrantly in this moment and with these people. As we are about to do a sharing, I’m dreaming of which parts best fit certain people or how I can stretch them to try a part they didn’t know they were ready for, but I have faith that they are. While I value all those other roles mentioned above, I pursued most of them to make my teaching both more successful and enjoyable. And if I do my math, I’ve spent many more hours teaching than I have writing, playing piano, hanging out with friends, etc. 

 

So teacher it is, an identity I proudly claim. Thanks to all who have let me know that it has made a difference in their lives. It certainly has been a great joy and pleasure in mine. So off I go to continue in today’s classes. 

Tuesday, July 29, 2025

The Beauty of Character

 

Life is a long series of inhales and exhales, tensions and releases, of preparation and accomplishment and the relief of the exhaled release and the satisfaction of accomplishment is directly proportional to the quality, depth and duration of the work of preparation. So today we arrived at this watershed moment in each Level III Orff class where they teach a Practicum Lesson to demonstrate their grasp of an inspired lesson that uplifts students and brings them into the fun and pleasure of making great music and dance. 

 

As I knew they would, they all without exception did a beautiful job. They demonstrated the power of beginning in the body and voice, of bringing in imaginative hooks, of scaffolding the sequence so each new learning grows from the steps before, of leaving room for improvisation and creative response, of preparing everything meticulously and then responding spontaneously to the energy in the room and the response of the students.

 

Most importantly, they were relaxed and at ease and taught from the depths of their authentic character— no “Now boys and girls…” fake teacher self, but presenting themselves wholly as they are. I said something about that that I hadn’t ever said before in quite this way. Something like:

 

“It was so wonderful to see you emerge into your full character. As a student, some of you are boisterous and some of you are quiet, but when you step up in front of the class and take charge, that’s when a big part of you shines forth. And without exception, it was beautiful. Anyone who shows their deep self and genuine character is beautiful in my eyes because they are real. Anyone who presents a pseudo-character that they crafted to hide their vulnerability, to belong to this group or that, to lash out to hurt others because they were hurt,  to be what others told them to be, to armor themselves because they fear others might not like them, is never beautiful. 

 

Without you knowing it, you’ve all just giving me the most meaningful evaluation as a teacher you could gift me with. The fact that you all were relaxed enough to present your confident true self means that you felt my permission to present that self without fear of judgement, of success or failure. Of course, I care greatly about how well you teach and want you to do well, but I also know that the best path to help you get there is to remove all unnecessary fear, stress, anxiety so you can get out of your brain stem into your higher feeling and thinking skills where your truer selves resides. A little bit of stress or anxiety is good fuel for the meticulous preparation needed, but once you step in front of the class, you have to let that fall away and boldly proclaim your whole self. And that’s exactly what you did. I couldn’t be more pleased.

 

Three short days left to grow yet closer to these marvelous people and I will savor every minute of it. Congratulations to Level III 2025!!!