High, Low, Buffalo

Any of you out there scroll through videos on your phone until you lose track of what time it is? I do. If something doesn't really catch my attention, I usually move on to the next pretty quickly. But sometimes I'll learn something I didn't know before - and I like that. I imagine my life kind of like a video game. Every day is a new level, a new course, a slightly harder race. I like to grind for experience by learning new stuff and trying it out, basically every chance I get. The newest powerup I found is in a video by Vinh Giang - a motivational speaker who teaches his audiences how to speak... well, motivationally. He's good, too. I've genuinely applied a bunch of his concepts to my speech, because I find them very compelling and quite effective. For instance, he's a big advocate of the "pause" when speaking. If you run out of words, pause. If you start fumbling words, pause. If it's taking you longer to complete the thought you have, pause. Pause long enough to actively envision what you're trying to do or say, and then begin when you're ready. I dig this, a lot. Especially when teaching, I pause to let students process - but also because sometimes I just need a second. I am very insistent about that pause though - if I stop, everybody stops. The younger the student, the more trouble they have with that, and it's actually quite a lot more innocent than I think a lot of people realize...

...it's just awkward.

Silence is awkward. Why do so many students play in the rests? Rests are awkward. Let's be honest, by the time they're playing instruments in a course of study like band class, violin lessons, or choir, the thoughts students are having are mature enough to really mess with them. They'll tell you straight up "Mr. Hall, please say something. My thoughts are too loud." "Nope!" I insist, "quiet your mind, be still, and just be silent. BET YOU CAN'T GO THIRTY SECONDS!" "Ooooh, it's on now. A challenge? Let's go. Watch, I'll be so silent. Mr. Hall doesn't even know!" ...and then it's awkward for a bit.

Afterward, I genuinely praise literally any amount of effort toward an exercise like that because honestly that is a very hard skill in such a loud world. It is my view that you don't grow into or out of humanity - you just require differing levels of support at each stage. Kids are tiny adults - they require the space to try, fail, dust themselves off, look back at a fellow human giving them the thumbs up, and the ability to try again. That's it. That's everything. Learning to speak with clarity, learning to treat others with kindness, treat themselves with kindness, the ability to perform under pressure, the ability to process complex feelings and act appropriately, entering the room without sprinting and shouting... all just levels in a video game. Ok so my favorite Vinh Giang game is called High, Low, Buffalo. When starting a conversation, begin with a high point that you're really excited about. Then, share a low point that you've been struggling with. Finally, mention an interesting fact about yourself: a buffalo. I'll get us started: Hi, I'm JaRod! I'm really excited to be teaching lessons at the schools I visit. The students are great, the adults like having me around, and the parents are great! Lately though, I've been struggling with finding a tribe in my city. I've only been here for 5 years, and I have not been very successful in connecting with folks my age over here. It gets better a few towns away, but this one seems like a very tough nut to crack. Something interesting though - I'm thinking about starting a Twitch channel and streaming composition content! Stuff like this helps me tremendously because social skills are extremely difficult for me. I'll even throw in an additional buffalo related to this: my first full conversation I ever had with somebody took place at 13 years old. Incidentally, I had just found out the year prior (at 12 years old) that I was lovingly placed somewhere along the Autism Spectrum at birth. It's something that I contend with to this day, and a big reason why I am always in "learning" mode: I kind of have to be. A bunch of things that come naturally to others - emotional regulation, physical balance, reading faces, eye contact, task-switching, and executive function, among others - are things that I have to practice on the daily to be a functional, independent adult. I also realized that I process information extremely slowly, which only became apparent to me when I completed educator training to help students with that issue. So, What's your High, Low, Buffalo?