choose to sing
My negative spiral always starts with something small.
Not enough ice in the ice maker. A pile of shoes that suddenly makes me extremely irritated. The “mom” call that means I need you.
I go from small irritation to a spiral, leaving me discontent, and I’ll admit there’s more than a hint of entitlement in it. Nothing is working, nothing is what it should be. I deserve better!
What a pattern in myself. A small discomfort becomes a story of disillusionment. And the world affirms it as I listen to the narrative around me — how wronged we’ve all been by inadequate education, disappointing leaders, high prices and low pay. I deserve more. I am a victim. Poor me.
I even bring this negative self to the couch for the finale of American Idol, which is thankfully a place where I can just enjoy and escape.
Hannah (one of the contestants) begins to sing. And as I always do, I start to cry. I cry every single time, and until I started writing this, I couldn’t quite understand why. Why does her voice undo me like this?
Let me give you a bit of her story. She grew up in a bluegrass band, traveling around the country, singing for strangers. They romanticize it on TV, but I can see past the glamour. She sings about longing for roots. Hints of financial uncertainty come through. You see her as the center of the band — always adored, always visible — and the pressure to be perfect resounds. She then shares about her marriage, about stepping away from the travel to enter motherhood. She opens up about what could be labeled postpartum depression.
The show focuses on the men in her life. Three small boys who love her instinctively. Her father who tears up as she sings. Her husband who vows in front of millions of viewers to love her forever. I imagine him climbing mountains for her, fighting bears, protecting her from everything.
And yet… I know.
Not that her kids, her father, or her husband are being insincere but, because they are human, they will let her down. We all will. Those of us who have voted for her every week and proclaimed her our “American Idol” will let her down, too. And she could spiral, just as I do so quickly, into negativity and victimhood. Poor me.
But she does something different with every hardship; she names it, she feels it, and she sings through it.
She performs two of her own songs on the show. One is about motherhood — String Cheese — and one is about community and marriage– Married into this Town. In both, she does something so profound it almost seems invisible, and yet it changes me.
She names what is good.
Her children. Her ordinary days. Her town. The people. The daily patterns. The strange mix of blessing and burden that make up her life.
She is thankful for all of it.
And I realize, sitting there, that she is doing something I so often fail to do. She is choosing to see the beauty in everything.
“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable — if anything is excellent or praiseworthy — think about such things.” Blessing is mentioned over 300 times in the Bible,
Before they announced the winner, I noticed a protective, doubting reaction building in me. “America won’t vote for her; we prefer a flashy kind of confidence she doesn’t have.” Vulnerable, quiet confidence doesn’t usually win. And honestly, even if she did, I felt worried for her. Life would transform her, and what was good would be corrupted.
But when they named her the winner, something shifted. The fear disappeared and I felt sheer joy.
Once again, she sang, this time the gospel. One of my favorite songs by Chris Tomlin, capturing all of her vulnerability, her exposure, what she has carried and what she will carry:
There’s a place
Where mercy reigns
And never dies
There’s a place
Where streams of grace
Flow deep and wide
Where all the love
I’ve ever found
Comes like a flood
Comes flowing down
At the cross, at the cross
I surrender my life
I’m in awe of You
I’m in awe of You
Where Your love ran red
And my sin washed white
I owe all to You
I owe all to You Jesus
There’s a place
Where sin and shame
Are powerless
Where my heart
Has peace with God
And forgiveness
Where all the love
I’ve ever found
Comes like a flood
Comes flowing down
Chorus
Here my hope is found
Here on holy ground
Here I bow down
Here I bow down
Here arms open wide
Here You save my life
Here I bow down
Here I bow down
Chorus
And unexpectedly, watching her sing drew me back to a completely different memory. Years ago, I directed a children’s choir. Voices unfiltered, unguarded. Sacred. They sang the words from the New City Catechism:
What is our only hope in life and death? That we are not our own, but belong to God.
In that moment, I felt it in my bones, the gratitude, the blessing. Even when I forget. Even when I spiral. It is still true. The blessing is still there. How can it be poor me in the presence of such blessedness?
On my couch, watching someone else’s life unfold, it always comes back to the same questions: Is God good? Can He be trusted? Is what He has given… enough?
It is. The love story is true. You are blessed. Choose to sing.
Jennifer Boyd is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT) with 18 years of experience helping individuals, couples, and families pursue healing, connection, and relational growth. As part of a blended family with five children ranging from kindergarten to college, Jennifer understands the challenges and joys of merging families and parenting across seasons. Outside the therapy room, she loves dancing, singing, and playing, bringing that same sense of creativity and joy into her work.
