MEGAN GODFREY, MT-BC
Hospice & Palliative Care Music Therapist
MOTIVATIONAL SPEECHES
Included below are the beginning or concluding paragraph of the three-music therapy-based speeches. Please note that the Chastity and Seasons Talk are written with a Christian audience in mind. However, the Mental Illness Talk is inclusive of any person suffering with a diagnosis, regardless of a faith background or its absence.
CHASTITY AND EMPOWERMENT FOR YOUNG WOMEN
(CLOSING PARAGRAPH)
Topics: the consequences of sexual relationships for young people, God's love and unconditional acceptance
Audience: Young Women
So, Ladies, what I want to leave you with is this, and it’s very important, so listen up! You are loved! You are loved so intensely by God. God gave us these desires, these longings, these cravings, but He intended us to be filled with Him first. He made us to crave! And can I tell you that food, sex, drugs, alcohol, tv, none of these things will fill that void. Only God can. God made the hole in our heart, and it can only be filled with Him! We were not made for this world, but for His perfect dwelling in Heaven, so of course we remain unfulfilled within this lifetime. Don’t trade His love for the lies of the world. In addition, recognize that you don’t have to do this on your own. You have God; you have your sister’s in Christ. So let’s be kind to one another; we need each other! These are your sisters! Your sisters! Let’s not bring each other down. We all have our own unique stories, our own baggage. It’s not a question of if we have it, but how much! I challenge you all to see your inner beauty, your inner goodness. To see you how God sees you. To know that God doesn’t see a failed exam, a weight on the scale, or a broken down depressed girl, but that beautiful child my son Liam will tell you He in fact created! So Ladies my prayer for you is this: May you crave the Lord, and the Lord only, may He fill your soul and spirit. May He shine into your deepest, darkest, most sinful places and fill you with goodness and love and the constant reminder of your inner beauty and His unending love for you. He has a plan for you. He has a plan for me. And it’s not too late, it’s NEVER too late, to start again and be made new in God’s redeeming love and truth. Go be made new for Christ today ladies. You are forgiven, you are free, you are God’s perfect creation and He makes no mistakes, and it is certainly no mistake that you are sitting here today. Go forth. Multiply what is good in the Gospel. Share love. Share hope. Share joy. Remember that you were created in and for love; and absolutely nothing you will ever do will seperate you from the love of your Maker, who: "created [your] inmost being; [who] knit [you] together in [your] mother’s womb" and ladies He says, "[you] are wonderfully made" (Psalm 139: 13-14). The Lord says you are wonderful girls, who are we to question Him. I challenge you to own that idea today. To own the idea of being His daughter, living for His Kindgom, and this idea of profound love. A love so great the Lord sent His only son to die for your redemption, and you know what, even if you were the only person on this earth, He would still die, just for you alone. That is how much you are loved. Go and be love for the world today girls, Lord knows we need more of it. God Bless.
Music Therapy Intervention: Lyric analysis of Rise-Up by Andra Day
Discuss stressors we need to rise above
Discuss the people in our lives that help us rise above them
Discuss times when we’ve felt broken down
Complete Positive Affirmation Card to take home
© Copyright Megan Godfrey 2022
SEASONS AND GOD'S PRESENCE
(CLOSING PARAGRAPH)
Topics: leaning into God, major life changes
Audience: Women of faith
The seasons of life will keep coming. They are relentless and reliable. You can count as much on the hope of a spring blossom, as you can on the falling of autumns cast-off leaves. We too must honor the seasons of our lives and know we are not meant to stay in one indefinitely. When you feel pressed by the intensity of a given season, lean in, don’t fall away. God strips away what is comfortable so that we lean into Him, and Him alone. He asks us always to lean into Him first. I don’t understand a great many things that happen in my life, but I find if I take a step and lean in, I will find God’s hand upon me. “To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven: a time to be born, a time to die; […] a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep and a time to laugh; a time to mourn and a time to dance; […] a time to gain, and a time to lose, a time to keep and a time to throw away; […] a time to keep silence, and a time to speak” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-7). I feel it is my time now to speak. My time to share and spread God’s light. What time are you in? What season is God calling you to lean into, or perhaps move away from? Listen for God’s gentle whisper, He’s there dear one; He’s listening. Own your season -no matter how dirty or painful; and when the sun shines again know who sent it, for He lives in you.
Music Therapy Intervention: Lyric Analysis of “Landslide,” by Fleetwood Mac
Discuss group members current seasons of life
Identify coping skills and stressors
Activity outlining coping skills to try out and take home
© Copyright Megan Godfrey 2022
MENTAL ILLNESS TALK
(INTRODUCTORY PARAGRAPH)
Topics: mental health, coping skills, toolkit for survival
Audience: those struggling with mental illness and those who love them.
I’ve been thinking a lot about boxes. Societal boxes. Gender boxes. Symptom boxes. Cereal boxes; I mean I do love a good box of Lucky Charms. As I think I’m reminded of a song written in the 70s by a Malvina Reynolds, who sings about: “little boxes on the hillside, little boxes made of ticky tacky, little boxes on the hillside, little boxes all the same. And the people in the houses, all went to the university, where they were put in boxes, and they came out all the same.” Our current culture loves to categorize and organize the ins and outs of life in ways that maybe make us feel comfortable with ourselves, but may be contrary to how we are designed to think and act. We are not meant to be confined; and there are not always easy answers or boxes with which to rationalize the answers that do come. I think we often forget about the simplicity of our humanity. Malvina also sings that among the boxes “there’s a pink one and a green one, and a blue one and a yellow one, and they’re all made out of ticky tacky, and they’re all made just the same.” And although I think she may be reducing our humanity to our basest designs and desires, I think it is also necessary to be reminded that we were all made one and the same. That all humans bleed, shed tears, break bones, and are made up of the very same matter. We may appear slightly different on the outside, but our insides are one and the same. We all have brains that think, and hearts that feel, and feet that can carry us through our own unique experiences and paths of life. And life is messy. Life is chaos.
Music Therapy Intervention: Lyric Analysis of "Million Reasons" by Lady Gaga
Discuss red flags and stressors
Identify our “reason” to survive/live
Create Relapse Emergency Plan to take home
© Copyright Megan Godfrey 2022