Anyone who’s ever shared their home with a rabbit will understand the old fable of the tortoise and the hare better than most. All of my bunnies are perfect examples of the hare (unsurprisingly) from Aesop’s fable. Bunnies are, after all, natural born sprinters. They love to zoom around our home at lightening speed…but just for a few minutes, and then it’s time for a rest break.

The tortoise and the hare metaphor obviously has its place in distance running. Anyone who has gone out too fast in a race knows how painful it is (physically and mentally) to burn out and have to slow down drastically. Flying fast and close to the sun is fun…until it’s not all of a sudden.

It struck me yesterday during a run (of all places) that despite my fanciful notion I am like my rabbits (antsy, disliking loud noises, disliking when I have to leave the house sometimes!) I am at my core a tortoise. I don’t want to go fast and burn out. I want the slow, sustainable pace–not just in running but in life.

I think for a lot of our early lives we’re taught to be more like hares than tortoises. In school, the message is really to work as hard as you can, cramming in homework between social obligations and all of the other activities that give meaning to our lives. (The often used term “semester sprint” comes to mind here.) Sprint fast, then take a mid-semester break. Cram for auditions, juries, recitals. Rinse and repeat.

I tried to live this way for a time in my 20s and became severely burned out, trying to balance grad school with a full-time job, practicing, and commuting. My sleep, nutrition, and health overall suffered. I came out of my master’s program jaded…and honestly unhappy. I’m not sure I would make the same decisions again.

I’m not trying to fault higher education here necessarily. You can live like the hare for a time. My point here is that it’s not the way to live a sustainable and happy life. The as a whole needs to stop glamorizing the grind, evangelizing the side hustle, commercializing hobbies.

The thing the pandemic has given me is a sense of space and perspective, as it has for many others. I see gigs posted a lot that I could take…but I don’t know if I want to. I’m in a fortunate enough position to not need an extra few hundred dollars. I find myself questioning whether I really want to be a ringer for a high school show when we’re still in a pandemic just to say I’m a working musician.

I’m honestly not sure where I’m going with this…but it’s struck me that in spite of being a type A personality and a hard worker, I don’t want to be working and grinding all the time any more. Slow and steady is a much happier, more fulfilling choice especially as I age. Here’s to prioritizing what we really want to do as long as we have the privilege.

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One of the most influential people in early adult life was (and still is) my undergraduate violin professor. She was an amazingly talented and hard-working woman who left this world far too soon. She inspired me to work very hard in college in positive ways, and helped me to find my voice and self-confidence. I was astounded by all she had accomplished and by a fairly young age and for a time wanted to be just like her when I grew up. I still feel this way in many respects.

You probably see where this is going. Sadly, my professor died after a long illness in early 2020, shortly before the pandemic. It was around the same time my grandmother also passed. I found myself questioning the meaning of life and work quite a bit during this time. At 30 years old, having recently switched careers, and being newly engaged, I felt I was at a crossroads for how I wanted to live the rest of my life.

I was fortunate enough to see my professor a few times while she was in remission. We had lunch once when she was in New York (as she and her husband maintained an apartment here). I remember her tone with regards to work had changed a bit during this time. I distinctly recall her telling me to ensure I took care of myself. She mentioned frankly that stress had played a role in her illness. Now I am not suggesting that living like a hare give her cancer, but if she believed working too hard contributed to getting sick I do too. I don’t want her legacy to become a cautionary tale, because she was a beautiful, complex person that I’m sure I only saw a glimpse of as her student. But she did inspire me to be careful about how I use my energy, and to above all appreciate the beauty in art and life.

I want to be the life-loving, slow burning tortoise who lives well into her 100s.