Proposal: mBODYed at UNCG

Session Overview and Dates

Learning Outcomes Across the Arc

By the end of the three sessions, students will be able to:

  • Recognize dominant identity patterns in their musicianship

  • Understand archetypes as adaptive strategies rather than flaws

  • Notice how identity lives in the body

  • Differentiate habit from choice

  • Apply somatic awareness to practice and performance

  • Engage musical challenges with greater agency and clarity

Value to UNCG Students

This work supports:

  • Artistic development without added pressure

  • Injury prevention through awareness

  • Mental and emotional sustainability

  • Retention by naming unspoken strain

  • A more humane, reflective music culture

The sessions complement applied study and ensemble work by addressing the human system inside the musician.

Scope of Events

  • Session 1

    (ZOOM)

    Scheduled: One week prior or earlier (date TBD)
    Length: 90 minutes

    Theme:
    Identity and Archetypes: Who Am I Becoming as a Musician?

    Focus:
    This session introduces identity as something learned and adaptive, rather than fixed or personal failure. Students explore common musician archetypes and how these roles support success while carrying hidden costs.

    Key Content:
    • Identity shaped by training, culture, and expectation
    • Archetypes as adaptive strategies, not labels
    • Overeffort, perfectionism, people-pleasing, and disappearance
    • The difference between excellence and self-erasure

    Experiential Elements:
    • Guided reflection and journaling
    • Small breakout conversations
    • Somatic noticing practices done seated
    • Invitations to observe patterns during the week that follows

    Outcome:
    Students leave with language, curiosity, and self-recognition rather than diagnosis.

  • Session 2

    (Zoom)

    Date: February 15, 1:00 PM ET
    Length: 90 minutes

    Theme:
    From Identity to the Body: How Patterns Show Up in Practice and Performance

    Focus:
    Building on Session 1, this session connects identity and archetypes to lived bodily experience. Students explore how anticipation, effort, and expectation organize attention and physical response.

    Key Content:
    • How identity patterns affect breathing, effort, and coordination
    • Habit vs. protection vs. choice
    • Attention as an organizing force
    • Why awareness precedes change

    Experiential Elements:
    • Simple somatic experiments
    • Practice- and performance-based scenarios
    • Reflection on what students noticed since Session 1
    • Optional sharing without analysis or correction

    Outcome:
    Students begin to experience choice where habit once dominated.

  • Session 3

    (In Person)

    Date: Wednesday, February 18
    Length: Determined by class schedule (typically 2 hours)

    Theme:
    Integration: Choice, Presence, and Sustainable Musicianship

    Focus:
    This in-person session integrates insights into identity and somatic awareness into embodied musical activity. The emphasis is on application without pressure to “fix” anything.

    Key Content:
    • Translating awareness into real-time choice
    • How attention shifts performance quality
    • Working with effort, support, and presence
    • Performance as a relational experience

    Experiential Elements:
    • Standing and movement-based exploration
    • Clarinet-specific applications (as appropriate)
    • Short performance excerpts or demonstrations
    • Group reflection focused on noticing, not evaluation

    Outcome:
    Students leave with an embodied understanding that they can carry into lessons, practice, rehearsals, and performance.

Optional Enhancements

  • 1:1 Time with Students while on campus Tuesday and Thursday (not to exceed 5 hours each day)

  • Faculty observation or debrief

  • Written reflection prompts for courses

  • Dominant Archetype-specific breakout groups

  • Alignment with wellness or professional development initiatives