Most of my songwriting inspiration comes from specific moments. I’ll find myself repeating a single phrase to my kids over and over and after awhile, once it’s completely lost all meaning, I’ll turn it into a song so that I can convey the same concept in a new way.
"There Is No Such Thing as Being Lazy" is a message my younger self really needed to hear
“There Is No Such Thing As Being Lazy” just might be the most personal song for kids I’ve written so far. It came from a deep, core memory of being invalidated and unseen by some of the adults in my life. They thought it was a joke to call me lazy bones, but as I looked back at my childhood self, I noticed with so much softness that I was never being lazy: I was resistant because I was deeply troubled by the chaos around me. I was legitimately too tired and my body boundaries weren’t being honored. What they saw as laziness was actually a cry for help around unexpressed, unmet needs.
“There is no such thing as being lazy” became a mantra that I told myself over and over whenever that sneaky interior voice would tell me that I wasn’t doing enough, that I wasn’t enough. And then one day a whole song came out around it and it was a message I needed to hear. It was a message that my baby self really needed to hear. I thought about my little self sitting on the bed, saying that I couldn’t or wouldn’t do something and being called lazy because of it and then being forced to do it anyway. I thought about telling her that it’s ok, she’s ok. And it healed something in me.
I hope that adults aren’t going around calling kids lazy anymore. I hope that this song isn’t really needed by kids. I hope that my kids’ peers are being raised with empathy, compassion, and respect for their body boundaries.
But I know I’m not the only adult who has spent a lifetime trying to unlearn the capitalist lie that we can never work hard enough, that our value is measured by our productivity. If I can help kids develop an understanding that their interior world is important, that their worth is inherent and never comes from external validation then this song will do what I want it to do.
I don’t know if it’s a song you need to sing to your kids, but I hope you’ll sing it to yourself if there’s still a voice in your head that calls you lazy for no good reason.
So just in case you need to hear it again: there is no such thing as being lazy!
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Check out the Mama Nous YouTube channel for more
You can watch the full video for There Is No Such Thing as Being Lazy on my YouTube channel: I also have a quick and simple version without the intro if you want to put it on repeat!