​Most days I love writing. I love the process and the “click” that sometimes comes when I start writing, as if the wheels have been greased.
 
And I’ve heard from every writer: “Writing is hard work.” But, it’s not the writing part that’s hard for me. Noooo, it’s the sitting my ass down in the chair without having to warm my coffee, get a better pen, check emails one more time, meditate or do the dishes first — that’s the hard part!
 
Scott Pressman tells us in The War of Art that resistance will bury me, so I know that when it comes to writing, the most important thing is to move past my resistance and just do it.
 
Lately, in addition to writing my blog, I am also working on writing a memoir piece about my days as an 18 and 19-year-old girl touring with John Denver in the early ’70s. I’m calling the piece “Rocky Mountain All Time Low.” Hey, it wasn’t all horrible, but it was the pivotal point in my life and career that left me pretty well traumatized and putting the pieces together at 60.
 
I’ve even decided to sign up for a month-long writing class and hire an individual writing coach to help me turn the piece into something I can be proud of, and taking both of these steps has really made a difference in not only the piece itself but also in letting go of my resistance to writing.
 
When I was younger, I had a hard time asking for help or going to teachers for advice. Not only did my mother discourage me from going to school (she said I didn’t need an education if I was going to be a singer), she also said I didn’t even need a voice teacher. She would say: “You have a natural gift, and you don’t want anyone to ruin that.”
 
Hmm. Well, while it’s true I was born with a gift, I’ve realized over the years that it’s only when I have had teachers, coaches and help from those who knew the terrain I wanted to travel that I really started getting somewhere.
 
So, here’s to all of us students who know they don’t know and to those of us who are willing to show up to learn every day, work every day and practice — ugh — every day. (It’s a goal…) And to all of the teachers who are helping us to grow.

​I love making records. It’s something I’ve gotten a thrill out of my whole career, and the excitement never seems to go away when I get into the studio and start to sing.
 
This past weekend I recorded with some other Positive Music artists, and it was so much fun to get back to doing what I love. I recorded a song called “I Will Surrender,” by David Roth, Karen Drucker and Faith Rivera, as well as an original song called “I’m Not Alone.”
 
Then later this month, I’ll be traveling to Nashville to start recording some songs for a new record (I will always call ’em records) that I’m working on that’s tentatively titled Burnin’ Karma.

I’m planning on recording a few songs written by other songwriters — including “Train Leaving Dallas” by Thom Bishop and Billy Panda and “Empty Hands,” a beautiful song by Daniel Nahmod — as well as some of my own. I can’t wait to get back into the studio and see what magic happens!

To date, I have recorded 19 albums — seven of which are compilation CDs, including five with The Four Bichin’ Babes (we are celebrating out 25th year this year!) and some Christine Lavin projects, including On A Winters Night, Just One Angel and holiday classics.
 
I recorded my first record when I was just 14 years old, after a family friend submitted a reel-to-reel tape of my original folk songs to the “WLS Big Break Radio Contest” and I WON FIRST PRIZE! One of the prizes was a recording contract with Mercury Records. I cut two singles, as many as Mercury said they’d make, and — well — they released me instead of the record. But it was still amazing to be able to record my first record at Universal Studios in Chicago with Mini Ripperton as one of the background singers! I was in heaven.
 
A man named Bobby Monaco produced the two songs for Mercury, and we stayed in touch after my deal was over with Mercury. I would get home from high school, change clothes and either take the train to the city from Crystal Lake, or drive downtown to his office and play him my latest songs. There were always cool rock musicians at the office working on songs too. More heaven.
 
One day Bobby called to tell me he and his partners were moving their production company to LA to start a label, and maybe I could come out too and he would try to get me a record deal! So, I finished my junior year of high school, packed my bell bottoms and headed west. Hippy heaven.
 
I got a record deal in about six months with Wooden Nickel Records/RCA; a manager, Jerry Weintraub; and a tour with John Denver after I recorded my first LP, In The Megan Manner. To this day, it is my favorite recording of mine. Songs I had written to heal from grief and loss and now loneliness for the same small town I couldn’t wait to leave a year earlier.
 
I was in way over my head. I fell in love with a guitar player who, it turns out, had “a thing for young girls.” I was definitely a girl from Crystal Lake, IL. Naïve and groomed by a pro, I recorded three more LPs, and then before I knew it, I became privy to an affair that a certain someone who had a hit song for his wife on the charts was having. I checked it out with Guitar Man, and next thing I knew, it all went away — the tour, the record deal and the love of my life, the married guitar player.
 
Opening acts are dispensable.
 
I came home to Crystal Lake to help my mom out, and slept for a summer. I didn’t get back into the studio for four years. Shame will silence a person so completely that I feel blessed it was only four years.

And luckily, my love of making records hasn’t stopped since.
 
Thank you for the love, and support, and for being on this journey with me. So far, heaven.

​​Oh everybody’s got a Blue Star Highway
To take them somewhere else
No matter where you go — you only need to know
The road back to yourself
Yes, everybody’s got a Blue Star Highway
In their heart or in their mind
‘N’ what keeps us here is mainly fear
Of what we will or will not find
                        Megon McDonough ~ Blue Star Highway
 
Wow, I am probably not the only one thinking: “Where does the time go?” I wrote this song in 1992, after I’d had my son, Denvir, and I will play it at The Woodstock Opera House on July 16 in my show A Girl And Her Guitar.
 
I grew up in Crystal Lake, a couple miles from The Opera House on West Hillside Road, with — literally — a white picket fence in front of our house and a beautiful oak tree, which is the main reason my father bought the place in the ’50s. It was heaven. I would drive those back roads way too fast. In fact, I learned how to drive on those roads when I was about 13 in Danny Powell’s little VW Bug — on a shift stick, no less! To this day, one of my favorite questions to ask people is “Who taught you how to drive?”
 
Danny not only taught me how to drive, but he constantly encouraged me to sing, too, and play my guitar. He’d always be saying, “Bring your guitar to my parents party!”
 
I’m really looking forward to this show for many reasons. I’ll get to see some family and friends. We will all, most likely, be a little surprised and accepting of the changes we see in each other.
 
Danny won’t be there though.
 
See, Danny was the first gay person I ever knew. He and his family moved into the neighborhood when I was about 10, and he loved my sister, Kevin, because she was the most irreverent, passionate, creative, talented person I ever knew. She was an actress and painter, and had been in several plays at Crystal Lake Community High School. She was planning to go to The Royal Academy after graduation to study acting and art, but was killed in a car accident her senior year on her way to the local theater to meet her boyfriend, who was in rehearsal for a play. We were shocked, and broken in places that healed over time, but the bones never really got set right.
We were heartbroken. Especially Danny. He lost one person who loved him and supported him and “got” him unconditionally.
 
He moved to the city after school, and changed his name to Chris. He was closing up a bar where he worked late one night and was the victim of a stabbing. I had been living in Los Angeles at the time, and didn’t hear until weeks after it happened.
 
So, I will sing Blue Star Highway for Danny. And for all the beautiful souls I knew and loved when I was just a girl and her guitar.

I have enough
I do enough
I am enough

This weekend I attended the most gorgeous wedding of the daughter of one of my best and dearest friends. It was held in Charlottesville, VA, in a handsome old church with the reception at Thomas Jefferson’s home, Monalto. It was breathtakingly beautiful.

I’ve been to lots of weddings before, but this one was rare for me because I didn’t bring my guitar. I rarely go anywhere with out my guitar. This time, it was deliberate. I wanted to be a guest.

I wanted to simply “be” and not perform, and performing is what I do best. At least that’s what the little voice in my head says. It also says performing is the only thing I do best.  This voice is not my friend. It’s the same voice that says I’m not doing enough, I don’t have enough and that I am not enough without performing/doing/being on. And that, unless I am DOING, I’m not going to have enough, or be enough, so hey, do you see where I’m going with this? It’s unending torture. And I know I will never do enough to silence the voice. Oy.

I had a wonderful time. I did sing an a cappella song at the rehearsal dinner that I have sung at the weddings of my sisters and friends. I am the family Bard after all!

But I wanted to see what it would be like to not enter the weekend as the performer, but as the guest. Here’s what I learned about myself: It was a little easier than I’d anticipated. I was in my body more, and more present.

I listened more. I was still nervous when people asked me if I was going to sing and had to tell them no. I had a great conversation unrelated to what I “do” with the women sitting next to me at dinner. I still talked a little too much about myself with my friends’ cute brother. And, I gladly sang in the bus/shuttle after the reception at the request of a few people I’d not seen in a very long time and had heard me at other weddings. It was so fun to sing Patsy Cline songs on a bus with a couple iPhone flashlights on me and then singing I Want To Hold Your Hand with the other passengers.

And, here’s what I know: I am at a crossroads. I love to sing, and most likely always will. I love entertaining people — I love to make them laugh, feel and think, and many times even cry.  Singing still feels like what I’m here to do, but I am realizing that it is ok to be me, too, without the label of “singer.” Trying another label on feels a little scary and exciting at the same time, but not only am I curious as hell — I’m trying to stay willing and welcoming.

So, just for today, I have MORE than enough, I am doing enough, and truly I am enough. And you are too.

Friends had an extra ticket to a Cubs game yesterday, and invited me along! I've been a lifelong Cubs fan but I haven't been to a game in a long time, and I have to say, it was wonderful. Being at a Cubs game while they are on fire, and being with friends talking, cheering, and dancing in my seat, and letting go of THINKING for a while was just what I needed.

I didn’t take any selfie’s though. I did get one shot as we were leaving the park.

Here’s some of what I learned at the game:

Watching the players work really hard, both mentally and physically is so inspiring. And although it’s a game, you have to play it with strategy and skill. You have to be prepared. You have to rely on others and you have to listen to your coach. You have to be completely in the moment or you’ll miss something.

Yes, all the baseball game metaphors I’ve heard my whole life are TRUE.

Go outside. Play well with others and as a team. When you strike out – let it go and get back in the game. And, even though sometimes I need a good cry – there is no crying – in baseball.

​Batter up. Go Cubs go!

“End of the road, nothin’ t’do, and no hope of things gettin’ better.” — Eeyore
 
My inner Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh, seems to be louder these days than Tigger, who shows up if I’ve had too much coffee, or Pooh, who I like being because he’s content with a simple life. But it’s Eeyore today, and while I don’t want him hanging around too long, I do want to acknowledge him because he is part of the family.

Recently, however, I think I’ve found a way to get my inner Eeyore to be a little quieter: Take action. I’ve been following the adage, “Move a muscle, change a thought,” and when I do I start to make changes.
 
However, I say I’d like to change, but then change shows up, I often say “Hey, not THAT change!”

Spring always seems to ask a lot of me. It’s as if I am breaking through the cold hard soil against my will. It’s been really gloomy here in Chicago. (Eeyore again). Taxes? Ugh. But still, something seems to be pulling me forward. It’s a little like the feeling of wanting to buy new pens, pencils and notebooks in September. Spring makes me feel mixed feelings of excitement (which can often feel like fear), hope, and anticipation of better things to come. And learning — I love learning.
 
Both Spring and Fall ask a few things of me though: to be open to change and GROWTH. Most times I don’t want to grow. I love my winter cave. I made it really nice! Besides, it’s still cold and kinda’ dark out there. But, can I learn without growing and vice versa?
 
So, I made my last stew a few days ago, I’m locating some bank statements, and I’m getting to work rehearsing for the four shows I have this month. I’m moving forward while still staying grateful for the cave, and for having a cave to come out of, and for the fact that I saw two robins the other day. They’re out of the nest and catching worms through the snow! I can do this — c’mon Spring!

Happy St Patrick’s Day! The parade has been paraded, the river has been dyed green here in Chicago, and I have a confession — I’ve never been in or watched the St. Patrick’s Day parade.

Many times I’ve been down at WGN on the day of the parade with my friend Susan O’Halloran talking about our show, “Pot of Gold,” that we have done for the past five years and will be performing at SPACE in Evanston again this Sunday, but I’ve never actually watched the parade.

The parade I have seen is the steady stream of people before and after the parade.
Mostly loud clans, looking for the next bar, and that’s when it hits me, I feel sad and angry that alcohol is one of the main things people think of when the Irish come to mind. I loved the movie Brooklyn for many reasons, but I especially appreciated a more refined, genteel view of Ireland. I’m guessing it’s a lot like how the Italian Americans feel about being associated with organized crime. Not all Italians are in the mafia.
 
And I got to thinking about how the Irish love affair with drinking started — centuries ago — and wonder if it will ever end. I don’t think so. Not as long as the Irish continue to constantly look back and resent or hate others, namely the British. Being half Irish (another confession), my experience of my people is that a lot of us seem to be the great stuffed potatoes of the world, rarely expressing ourselves for fear of being vulnerable and – heaven help us - defenseless. It’s as if the Irish have two settings, angry/fighting and angry/depressed. Drinking goes with both dishes.
 
Now, I can’t begin to explain why the Irish are the way they are, it is a deep and complex culture – (I like that). Growing up I heard terrible things about the British, and I just took on the resentment like it was in the Baltimore Catechism.  But I do know this; if I hold onto an ancient resentment that I didn’t even experience first hand, but one passed down to me, I will say, think and do things that will keep me chained to the past. And I cannot walk backward to a bright future — I’ll fall every time.
 
I remember the first and only time I flew to London, I was sitting next to a very proper-looking English woman. We started exchanging small talk, and when I asked her about “the conflict” between the English and the Irish, she said, “Well, the thing about the Irish is that they have such dreadfully long memories.”
 
I have such great affection for my Jewish friends and how they seem to honor their devastating history and commit to never forgetting, but they have used the past as fuel instead letting their pain rob them of a beautiful life now. They do not seem chained to the past in a futile effort to change it. Not even God can change the past.
 
So this St. Patrick’s Day, I am committed to acknowledging the pain and sadness that the Irish have endured while also celebrating all that is good and wonderful about being part of this beautiful culture — the music, the mysticism and especially the humor!  
 
I hope you will all join me, Mary Megan Margaret McDonough and world class story teller Susan Eileen Marie O’Halloran Sunday as we do what the Irish do best — tell great stories and SING!!
 
Oh… and have a RAFFLE!!

Did you watch the Grammy’s? I did. They were terrific.

Bruno Mars fills my longing for James Brown. Halleluiah! Adele is not only a great singer, but oh so beautifully real. And I am sure there’s a sound person in Hollywood out of a job and on his way to doing sound for The Ice Capades in North Dakota for the dreadful sound we were hearing during her song.

Turns out it was a mic in the piano that had fallen onto the strings. Both Adele and her pianist were PROS! She said afterward she was going to treat herself to an In and Out burger. Yeah, baby!

Gaga is a force of nature and never fails to entertain and demonstrate what true cutting edge creativity looks like. My experience of her is that she is truly fearless, and, my guess is that what fear she does feel, she pushes right through.

Then Bonnie Raitt saunters on, guitar hung low, and plays “The Thrill Is Gone,” and I’m doing a Wayne’s World bow to her in front of my TV. Goddess.

As if I’m not slayed enough – Alabama Shakes finishes me off.

These are just a few of my favorite moments that reminded me of the courage and discipline it takes to follow a vision for your life. It takes courage to shine as brightly as Maurice White, to be as alive and raw as Kendrick Lamar, as innovative as Gaga, and as long lasting as Bonnie Raitt.

You might ask yourself the same thing I do: How do they keep going? How do they block out the negative thoughts and naysayers?

Well, how do you do that?

For me, I learned long ago it all starts in my mind. And my mind is not my friend most of the time. I have learned that focusing on what is right in front of me and letting go of the past is one of the best ways to make progress.

Connecting with a Power greater than myself is also a really good idea. (Although that is constantly morphing). I have to trust that if I’m not moving in the right direction, this Power will guide me. I also connect to my Higher Power through getting help and support from others – which I need to ask for!
And I connect to my Higher Power by taking action. I love the saying, “Move a muscle, change a thought,” and I know when I do something differently, my Higher Power brings me different results.

So, hey, while the feud between Kanye and Taylor has been playground fun, I think it’s time for them to move on and to send Kanye some good thoughts. He is clearly in some trouble, and I ask myself, “What would it be like to send him some healing energy instead of criticism?” Taylor Swift too. She has been really graceful through this, and might have a hard time putting her sword back in the sheath, but I hope she can take Bette Davis’s mother Ruby’s quote to heart: “It’s the best fruit the birds pick at.”

Even though I wasn’t on stage at the Grammy’s, as I write this from my hotel in Newark, OH, where I have a gig with The Four Bitchin' Babes in a beautiful theater tonight, I feel grateful and proud to be a member of this musical tribe. As a voice teacher, I love encouraging others to follow their vision by passing along the wisdom of those who have gone before me. This is what they taught me:

1. Believe in yourself and whatever you conceive to be a Higher Power.
2. Keep your eyes on your own work. (Thank you Sister Mary Martha – 5th grade)
3. S.I.T. Stay in today
4. If you never want to have stage fright again, never criticize another performer
5. We are all sparks of The Divine. We just forget.

“SAY IT! SAAAYYYY IT!!” My Meisner Technique acting teacher was yelling now. “SAY WHAT YOU SEE!!!”
 
In this exercise, my scene partner, Julie, was giving me SO much to work with, and I just could not say what I was seeing/feeling. I pushed my instincts down and doubt was the only thing in my mind. I knew that I thought she was being a total bitch, but the words just couldn’t come out of my mouth. Mercifully, Ed, my teacher, stopped me.
 
“Megon,” he said, “You seem like someone who’s been ‘therapized’ – like you’ve had a lot of therapy.”
 
Ugh – guilty. Though actually what I think he was seeing was not the result of too much therapy, but of living a life avoiding feelings and of people pleasing; a life of doubting what I saw or felt and being told, “You don’t/shouldn’t feel that,” and, “No, that’s not happening.”
 
Sanford Meisner, who created this acting approach, said that his approach to training “is based on bringing the actor back to his emotional impulses and to acting that is firmly rooted in the instinctive. It is based on the fact that all good acting comes from the heart, as it were, and that there’s no mentality to it.” 
 
In Meisner classes, you learn how to live in the moment as an actor, and how to respond truthfully to a given moment based on what you get from your partner. Through improvisation, emotional truth and personal response, you learn to resonate authentically within a given circumstance.
 
Essentially, the Meisner Technique is designed to help make actors more authentic and real, and less like robots reading a script.
 
Ed went on to say he loved people like me out in the real world (meaning people who let others go ahead of them on the bus etc)., but that,  “in here – that won’t work.
No. In here, you have to destroy and be destroyed.”
 
My heart leapt for joy and sank at the same time. “Yes! Finally, permission to say what I really think,” I thought, which was quickly followed by, “Oh, I don’t think I can do that.”
 
Fear stopped me. Fear does that… a LOT.
 
I don’t know if I’ll ever continue taking Meisner acting classes or not, but I do know that class helped me see that acting is about having access to your feelings, ALL your feelings. It’s about telling the truth and speaking to what you are seeing without judging yourself.
 
My whole life, I’ve worked really hard to hide my feelings because I thought that kept me safe. Yeah, it kept me safe alright; safe and dead inside.
 
Unexpressed feelings make for pretty mediocre songwriting, as well. I think great songs come out of risk-taking. I know for sure great art has to come from the truth.
 
Stuffed feelings can also turn into disease in the body. A friend of mine (whom I met in group therapy) told me she’s heard cancer called the “nice lady” disease. Think about it.
 
I also know that anger is fuel. That’s what it’s for, to fuel change. And change my friend, can be scary stuff. But anger, sadness and other feelings also fuel creativity.

By letting myself start to feel all of my feelings, I’ve been writing a lot more songs lately.

Here’s the chorus to a song I’m working on. 
I’m not going away
I’m not gonna lay down
I won’t disappear
And let you put me in the ground
I’m not going away
I’m not fading to black
No, that nice girl you knew
Is never coming back
 
Unfortunately, learning how to feel feelings you have been trained very carefully to disavow – like anger, sadness, and even joy -- is like turning the Queen Mary around. It takes time.
 
One last quote I love that I think really clarifies this whole thing for me. It is from the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas: “If you bring forth what is within you, it will save you.
If you do not bring forth what is within you, it will destroy you.”
 
Changing course takes time, but it is totally worth it. 

No need to worry if I’m in the flow
Here in this moment I let go
Each blade of grass has an angel leaning over
Whispering, “grow…grow…grow"
(From my song Breathe)

They’re here! The Holly Daze (and my birthday! I’m partial to emeralds). Well, now that we have all finished the left over candy from Halloween, griped about the Christmas decorations that were up before Halloween,(that really frosts my pumpkin!) we can accept the fact – we’re going into the season of FEELINGS. LOTS of FEELINGS.

So I wanted to share a little vocal exercise that also helps calm the nerves, is fun, and can be done just about anywhere. (If you don’t mind looking/sounding a little goofy in line at Target).

Take in a deep breath as if you are filling a glass with water. The bottom of the glass fills first, of course, and as you take the breath in, expand your relaxed tummy, and BACK. The chest doesn’t move much and shoulders are relaxed. 

Now you’re ready for… Lip bubble. You know the one -- you keep a steady stream of air going through your lips and make that “burr” sound. Some folks have an easier time with tongue trills, and they will work too, rolling the r’s in a steady stream. That’s the trick – to expel the air so slowly and quietly that you could keep it going for a while. The more you can relax the face and lips, the easier it will be. Sometimes if you have a hard time getting started, you can place your index finger and middle finger from both hands right under the corners of the lower lip and gently push up, supporting the lips.

The point is to get in touch with your breathing. This simple exercise will regulate your breath, and help strengthen your voice. It will also come in handy for upping your energy level and help you sustain those notes. The body and brain are wild about more oxygen!

I like telling my students; “If you have the breath, you’ll have the note.” So, this holiday season – don’t forget to BREATHE! And SING! Sing in the car, sing in the shower, sing anywhere you can, because singing is one of the best things you can do for your health! You are “toning” for yourself, and actually aligning your mind, body and spirit. If you'd like to learn more about toning, please come to my workshop entitled "The Power of 12 and Toning" on Dec. 21 in Brookfield, IL. 

So – as we move into this season – TOGETHER – let’s all take it easy, stay hydrated (also good for the voice) not leave the house on an empty stomach, have some nuts/fruit, with us, and see how long we can keep the lip bubble/tongue trill going! It’s FUN! And we could all use a little bit more of that. Remember the 11th commandment: “Thou Shalt Lighten Up”!