Here's the situation. I've never turned down a calling, I always work my tail off in my callings, and I have loved my current calling, Primary Chorister, very much. I work hard and I love the kids. I smile at them and compliment them and encourage them while teaching them the songs. I am used to people letting me do my callings without a lot of interference from leadership-- I do my job, they trust me, it's all good. It's never been perfect, and there are always little conflicts and problems, whatever the job, but I always do the job.
Plus, I am good at this calling and have had a lot of people tell me how much their kids love it and how glad they are I'm doing it. (I dont' mean to sound prideful, that's just the backstory since none of you know me... I don't think :) ) I have also never had any problems taking direction from those in authority over me-- Bishop, Stake Pres, Auxiliary Presidents, etc. I'm very independent, but I respect the chain of stewardship.
However, for the first time in my entire life I am beginning to understand why people leave the church. I am not easily offended, and have let many, many things roll off my back. My faith in my Lord keeps me "in" the church, not the actions/inactions of others.
I had a meeting the other night with my Primary presidency. Upon walking in and sitting down, the president turned to me and said, "We want to know what we can do to help you." I wasn't sure what they were talking about. I thought things were going along fine, so I said "help me with what?" They talked about reverence issues with our large primary, especially in Jr. Primary, and about teachers not encouraging the kids to be quiet, to sing, etc. I hadn't complained about any of this, it's normal stuff in Primary.
Then the president told me a few other things. First, she said I shouldn't let on to the kids when I'm getting frustrated, because then they get frustrated. I haven't ever actually felt frustrated with them and I try very hard to always be positive with the kids. Plus, from the feedback I've gotten the kids love singing time-- the littlest ones especially. I realized later that I may have shown HER frustration on Sunday when she told me I needed to have the kids practice our January song because they've forgotten it already (not entirely true, and I had a HUGE activity planned to finish learning Praise to the Man, so I was annoyed at being micro-managed.)
Then she told me that there is a small group of kids who don't like singing time and don't want to come to primary anymore because of it. She wouldn't tell me who, she didn't indicate WHY or what I had done to offend/bore/bother these kids. She wouldn't even tell me the age group-- is this just the normal 10-11 year old "sick of primary" thing or did I actually DO something wrong? I don't know. I was kind of flabbergasted, because I felt like she was telling me I was responsible for making these kids hate primary. It was very, very strange. I asked her who it was, and she said, "I'm not going to tell you that." I said, "Then you shouldn't have said anything, because now I'll really worry about it." I was ticked.
They also went into how I should be doing more "fun" stuff, more "wiggle" songs, etc. Okay, I can do that, but they also want me to teach all the kids all the verses to all the songs for the year PLUS about 5 extra songs. It felt like they were just venting criticism of how I do the job, not like, "we have prayed about this and feel like the kids need..." information.
I did get the "oh, you're doing a good job, we appreciate you" thing at the end of the meeting from her new 2nd counselor, but it was forced. All in all I went home feeling confused, criticized and very frustrated. I barely got out the door before I started crying!
The bottom line here is that today I sat down to plan for this Sunday and I started crying again about all of this ridiculous drama. I couldn't begin planning because I don't know what to do anymore. I went from feeling confident and capable to feeling frustrated, alone, and unable to do the job "right". I don't have the energy for this. I'm tempted to ask to be released, but I don't know if that's the best solution.
I live in a pretty gossipy, judgmental ward, and now I'm worried that there are parents discussing how I hurt their child's feelings or did something "wrong" or whatever. I'm concerned that if I try to talk about it to the President, it will make it worse instead of better...
Any advice? Am I being unreasonable? I'm probably overreacting, but this was such a surprise I couldn't think straight.
