***The following is the transcript from the original episode, airing August 21, 2023. Some excerpts were changed for the August 3, 2026 encore replay.
Hello studio music teacher friends! Welcome back to the Beyond Measure Podcast, hosted by me: Christina Whitlock, otherwise known as your Anytime Piano Teacher Friend. I’m so happy you’re joining me today because we are talking about something SO important in TeacherLife. We’re talking about Emotional Labor… which sounds like such a downer, right? Well, I’ll do my best to keep things on the upswing, pinky promise. 😊 Let’s get down to business! THIS is episode 140 of the Beyond Measure Podcast.
I want to thank a couple of teachers who helped inspire today’s episode. At the recent NCKP Conference in July, I was having a conversation with my friends Valerie Merrell and Nicola Cantan. I’m sure you know Nicola Cantan; she runs the Vibrant Music Teaching community and also hosted episode 128 of this podcast.
So, I’m naming Valerie and Nicola as my thought-partners for this episode. As so often happens at teacher conferences, we had a million conversations in passing, and this one little nugget just really stuck with me.
Basically, Valerie was sharing about a studio parent who asked for a pretty bold exception to her policy. We were all laughing about it, and she mentioned the parent said, “Hey, it’s free to ask, right?” To which Nicola replied, “No! It’s NOT free. It’s costing ME emotional labor!”
And… just like that, a one-minute conversation set off a total lightbulb moment.
Of course, the concept of emotional labor isn’t new to me. It’s something all of us teachers deal with – FREQUENTLY, in fact – and we obviously know it’s a thing. BUT… I also know we teachers don’t account for it nearly enough. We don’t acknowledge the TIME it takes us to deal with our emotional labor. We don’t acknowledge the impact our emotional labor has on our mental health and our sense of self. It CAN work for the better, if we find confidence in expressing our boundaries. However, more often than not, I see it slowly erode teachers’ self-confidence.
I used to tell my college students – when they would try and flatter me with all their compliments and tell me they wished more professors were as genuinely invested in their education as I was – I would tell them that’s because I was still relatively new and, otherwise, they WEAR THEIR TEACHERS OUT.
All the excuses, the constant workarounds, hunting for loopholes, the complaints, the requests for exceptions… it’s all so. exhausting. after awhile, right? I can practically FEEL you nodding in agreement through cyberspace. 😊
Emotional labor is hiding around every corner of TeacherLife: Oh, Johnny doesn’t seem like he’s enjoying his lessons. What can I do differently? Oh, Susie’s mom seems like she’s frustrated with me about something. I wonder what’s going on? Ugh, Amy’s dad doesn’t want to pay for that missed lesson, but I’m counting on the money. What should I do? Wait… my neighbor is taking lessons from someone else? Do they not think I’m good enough? Oh no…
I’m telling you: Emotional Labor is everywhere.
But here’s what I have to say about emotional labor today: it’s just part of the job. It’s part of the job. And I say that NOT to dismiss the exhaustive nature of our emotional labor, but to point out that IT SHOULD BE EXPECTED. We should PLAN for it.
It’s kind of like going to the grocery store. There are definitely seasons of my life where I fail to build in a set time to actually go to the grocery store, and then I get overwhelmed and stressed out because there comes a point when a person HAS to go to the grocery store. Then it feels like it’s taking important time away from something else I *DID* plan on doing, and it’s a whole can of sour worms from there. (Before you tell me, I know there’s home delivery now, but it doesn’t fit my analogy, so just go with me here, okay? 😊 )
Well, emotional labor is like the grocery store. You’re going to have to deal with it at some point or another… but if you don’t PLAN for it, it’s just going to overwhelm you.
Now – my analogy is flawed here, I realize. I wish I could tell you to schedule an hour on Thursdays at 2:00 to deal with your emotional labor, just like you can plan a trip to the grocery store. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. 😊
BUT – we CAN acknowledge that there WILL be aspects of emotional labor in our work.
And considering our inevitable emotional labor, are we being fairly compensated? Are we being as clear in our communications of expectations as we can be? (that was last week’s episode, by the way… don’t sleep on that one) 😊 Are we teaching too many students? (because each student and each family does bring with it an inherent amount of emotional labor)
You know, I have several episodes of this podcast devoted to types of students. I have the Quiet Ones (way back in episode 5), the Challenging Ones (episode 61), I’ve got episode 74 on the Chatty Ones, and episode 123 on the Surprising Ones. EACH of these student types: the Quiet Ones, the Challenging Ones, the Chatty Ones, and the Surprising Ones…EACH OF THEM come with their own unique forms of emotional labor.
One of my BIGGEST PROBLEMS with this idea of the-more-students-the-better is the fact that we ultimately miss the amount of emotional labor that comes with each student.
(sigh) I don’t want to get too far off topic here…
Suffice to say, I want you to factor in the EMOTIONAL LABOR of teaching into your own vision of what you do. The act of having to put a dollar amount on the value you bring and the skills you possess. That’s emotional labor. The act of piecing together your own income from multiple sources of revenue. That’s emotional labor.
But before we wrap this party up, I need to remind you of one more thing: We cause emotional labor for our students as well. We also cause emotional labor for their parents.
So don’t get caught up in this, like, “woe is me; teaching is so exhausting” mindset, okay? Yes, it is a demanding job. But families are entrusting us with their time, their money, and their children… and THAT results in a LOT of emotional labor for them, as well. Believe me. There is nothing more costly in emotional labor than parenting. And budgeting for parenting. And scheduling for parenting. It’s. So. Much.
So – when that parent in the original scenario today says, “Well, it’s free to ask!” What they might as well be saying is, “I’m going to see if I can push off some of my own emotional labor onto the teacher.” 😊
A transfer, of sorts. It’s not meant to be malicious or even annoying. It’s just part of the job. And how we handle it is going to frame everything else. I just loved how quickly Nicola was able to put the label on it: “Oh, this is emotional labor”… and, once you can label it as such, I think it’s much easier to deal with.
So the big takeaway today is to acknowledge the inevitability of emotional labor. Factor it in to your tuition costs. Recognize that EACH family you deal with is going to require a certain amount of it. In my episode on the Challenging Students, I mentioned that I actually enjoy having a few Challengers in the mix… but only a few. I understand the emotional labor they cost me, so my limits stay pretty clear in my mind. Acknowledging is the first – and most important – step.
OKAY: BEFORE WE GO: I’m going to host a LIVE Zoom Webinar on Monday, August 28th, at 1:00pm. I’m calling it Getting Our Acts Together, and we’re focusing on a handful of pro-active things we can do to make sure our upcoming studio year is the best one yet. Any teacher of any instrument is welcome. Simply head to christinawhitlock.com/together to register and get the link. That’s Monday, August 28th, at 1:00pm (eastern time). I will offer a replay, but you won’t have access to the chat that way, where a lot of the magic will be happening. So, I encourage you to try to attend live, if at all possible. We’ll also be chatting about the next 6-week session of the Studio Foundations Course, so if that’s been on your radar at all, you won’t want to miss this.
On that note, let me offer us a toast!
Studio Music Teacher Friends from all around the world, today we acknowledge the importance of naming the previously-unnamed. I hope today’s episode provided one big collective exhale for you and your previously un-named emotional labors. May we move forward looking for opportunities to proactively eliminate these conflicts from our lives, while also recognizing their inevitable role in the work we do. Let’s take good care of ourselves so we can continue to take good care of others. Cheers to you, my wonder-working teacher friends. Here, here.
As always, THANKS for listening to episode 140 of the Beyond Measure Podcast! You are, absolutely, no doubts about it, THE BEST audience on the internet. I love the quality of the humans who rally around this show. If you know anyone who would benefit from today’s episode – or any other – please consider sharing it with them. I’m proud of the work we do here together, and I know there are other teacher friends out there who need us in their lives. 😊
Links to the webinar registration, the Patreon community, the One Thought Thursday e-letter, and SO MUCH MORE are in today’s shownotes at christinawhitlock.com/episode140.
Onward and upward to naming the unnamed, friends! Be well.
