Knowing you have congenital amusia makes a difference

Finding out that I had amusia made a big difference to my life and I talk about some aspects of this in an article here. The point of the article is that I am thankful to know that my inability to carry a tune or learn a musical instrument is not due to laziness, sloth, or weakness of character. Those are qualities that are routinely ascribed to people with amusia. Here's some more of what I said:

I’m sure I could write a whole chapter about how much it hurt to suffer those accusations, the self-recrimination and doubt that it induced. I know I could have done without the castigation of teachers who were sure I could learn to play the recorder – a rite of passage in English schools of the 1950s and 60s – if only I would apply myself.

Then there’s the chapter on how frustrating it was to grow up in the sixties with a strong poetic streak but no ability to voice the songs I composed, not to mention fruitless hours failing to learn guitar. Sure, I could pose for the album cover, but I was never going to be on the album. But today I’d much rather give thanks for the unexpected gift of this diagnosis: the empathy it has given me for this thing called neurodiversity, the growing realization that human beings are not all wired the same way.