Last month, our introductory training project at Open House came to an end after seven exciting weeks. You might have seen Tako’s blog on her first five weeks of delivering the project and today, she is sharing with us how her remaining two weeks of the project went below, as she continued to advise and share her music skills.

We are looking forward to sharing the immediate impact of the training at Open House in Georgia, so keep an eye out for when we do!

How I am lucky

I think there is no successful case where the therapist is the only one who gets the credit; there is a successful case where the therapists and parents/guardians have contributed. In this case, this training has exactly this combination – many people contribute to this successful training, starting from the planning and bringing it to completion.

It is emphasized once again that when the training is interesting and good, it cannot be one-sided, in this case it will be mutually productive for both the participants and the training leader. This is exactly what happened here, because besides doing the training and leading the sessions for several days, I was also watching, remembering and learning some interesting things from each participant.

In the beginning, before arriving to Kutaisi for the first time, I had many questions on the way, especially to myself; how it will go, what will be the situation, etc. However, the best option is when you don’t think too much in advance and just wait and accept whatever happens. You have to be prepared internally that any situation can be adapted and benefits can come out of it.

And so it happened, I arrived and everything was arranged in its place, calm and well.

About Collaboration

My collaboration with Jenny started even before Kutaisi, Jenny has been my supervisor for more than a year. She also wrote a review about one of my books, and we also collaborated on another project in Tbilisi. We got over that shyness and first-time work experience, which quickly allowed me to confidently and calmly work remotely with her and get a lot of interesting advice.

I am very grateful for this opportunity, as I said before, Kutaisi is my one of my favourite places in Georgia.

This project is my first long-term collaboration with Music as Therapy International and I hope there will be more with this brilliant team; Alexia – who is the inspiration of everything and the fact that the Kutaisi skill-sharing project came out is thanks to her. Makeda – who was always there for me and gave me many professional advice before we started the project; and Jenny. These are people who significantly enhanced my therapeutic/professional path this year. I’ve got lucky. I often say that I am surrounded by professional people who are ready to share their experience with me, rejoice in my success and make me feel that they stand behind me. Let it stay that way!

The last two weeks

I had a chance to express my feelings and experience about my first weeks in Kutaisi in my previous blog. I remember there was two weeks left when I wrote that blog and I was hoping that last two weeks would be as important and nice as the previous ones. And it was! The last two weeks I had a chance to observe other specialists leading music sessions, to give them some advice and also participate in their group sessions as one of the beneficiaries. After the sessions we had time to discuss and think about every session and beneficiaries, also to plan how to continue sessions and what to offer for the next session.

The last week was divided in two. First part of the day was for music sessions and planning how the specialists were to continue all by themselves. Second part was to meet all the staff to do some music making, answer their questions about music therapy and let all the “Open House” staff to participate in a music-making group session. It was fun, really exciting and the loveliest part was the instant feedback that I got during the meeting. We also awarded the participating staff with certificates for ‘Participation’ and ‘Achievement’. There were different certificates: one for therapists who participated and used music in their different therapies; and the second type of certificate was for music teachers and therapists who led music sessions and participated in this project from the very beginning to receive training on: How to use music as therapeutic tool, to have a good attitude and approach on working with people with special needs, etc.

The last week was also the same day “Open House” moved to a new building, with beautiful garden in front. So it was a bit symbolic for our last meeting to be on their first day in the new building for Open House.

I hope we will meet soon and have a music-making session again with all staff. Also, I hope the therapists who were involved in this skill-sharing project will continue using music in their therapy sessions. Also, I hope Irma and Nini, who received the ‘Achievement’ certificate, will be able to continue their music sessions with the same passion and love they did while I was there for their support.