Celibate and Sane: Music in the Workplace ©

March 17, 2010

Music in the Workplace ©

At many workplaces, the radio provides the only relief from either silence or the general hubbub. At my workplace I usually listen to the same station where I am a volunteer announcer. A community Christian radio station, Rhema FM is not going to be everyone's cup of tea, but I love the fact that it focusses so strongly on bringing positive music and programs to its listeners.

Most of its listeners are Christian, but there is a good sized component of non-Christians who tune in because they're sick of the rubbish on other stations and the gross or crude stuff that is aired nowadays.

It was while I was volunteering somewhere else recently that I realised that workplaces can produce music of their own. Many places including offices, have machines that can produce a good or interesting beat. Photocopiers or printers can have a steady rythym, while other types of machinery can produce a series of beats that you can put words to. Being a creative person who likes to work with words, my brain can't help but put words to a particular rhythm. I sometimes wonder if I had to work around a particular machine for a long period of time whether my brain could develop a sort of OCD with a single phrase in my mind repeating over and over and over to the machine's beat, even when I wasn't at work.

The new workplace where I'm helping out has a couple of different machines that create their own sound. Some have a really good rhythm, but the eyelet machine actually produced a musical sound. Though not strictly a melody, as the unpunched eyelets rolled around inside the metal holder before they moved into the shute, they produced a melodic rumble while emitting one or two clear musical notes. It was quite a harmonious sound, which is rather startling considering it wasn't deliberate. It was only a very simple two note melody, but with the background harmony I found it quite soothing.

I'm not quite sure what that says about my mind... ©

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Personal Quotes from Vicki-S

"Occasionally I find my breakfast a little bitter, and sometimes it's difficult to chew and swallow; though at other times it's sweet, but it’s very satisfying and always sustains me. My most important meal of the day, is feasting on God’s Word and drinking up His presence."

I love me, because God loves me. It's not that God doesn't see my flaws, they are like blazing torches in His eyes, but rather that He sees past my imperfections and still loves me. And who am I to argue with the perfect God that I am worthwhile, that I am worthy of love, and that He accepts me and wants me to be His child, His beloved daughter? When I understood this, I began to accept and embrace His version and His vision of me, and not the world's.

"The silent treatment and sulking are simply two other weapons in the arsenal of the manipulator."

"Often people use the metaphor of a butterfly emerging from its cocoon to describe how we can grow from difficult experiences, but what they don't mention is the fact that at first we start off as an ugly caterpillar."

"We so often just get caught up in trying to just get through each day, that we forget to pause and be thankful for the fresh one that is presented anew and untouched each morning."

"Contrary to what we might think, forgiveness isn't so much about healing our relationship with that other person, but about healing our own broken heart."

"The purpose of school reunions is to show off how much you've achieved in life, to laugh at the once popular kids who've aged more quickly than you; and to wince at the guy who was a bully in school and who aptly became a policeman."

"I've found in many organisations where volunteers are needed, including the modern-day church, that 80% of its people sit back and let everyone else do most of the work, then there's the 10% who actually make the place run, and the remaining 10% just like to whinge about the 10% doing the work, especially about how they could do it better."

"When traced back to its source, every sin, every despicable act, and every war was motivated by someone's selfishness."

"I do not want to think of man, for that would distract me from God. But if I focus on God, I cannot help but think of my fellow man, and each day God keeps the scales balanced so that I have enough within me to do both."

"Overcoming depression isn’t about changing ones attitude, or just ‘getting on’ with things, it’s like removing one’s personal black shroud one thread at a time, with ones teeth.”