Where to begin. This post comes after quite the journey.
Okay, for most of my life I have been an idealist, a perfectionist and a brainstormer to an internally toxic degree. Every day, all day long, I would be confronted with all the potential of any given situation:
-the intrinsic ideal (facilitated by a great education in the classics)
-how to make it perfect (facilitated by FB, Pinterest and personal observation)
-coupled with an ability to brainstorm a million different ideas of both at the speed of light thanks to Mrs. Berg's 4th grade "gifted and talented" training
The explosion of possibility and personal responsibility to make it "the best" was frequently overwhelming and I would blast out either outward (external frustruation) or inward (internal blasting for inadequacy).
Day after day. Year after year. The more I was exposed to, the more I filtered into the whole analysis of every given moment.
Exhausting.
So back to the obvious toxicity of this scenario. I had to stop. Or be stopped. It wasn't pretty.
In a very prayerful, earnest and even desperate path, I found help: my husband with his "chill" attitude, the obvious negative effect of this level of living, my Bishop (ironically enough, my husband's brother) and the Tao of Pooh.
Without dragging out this healing journey, I will just tell you where I landed.
Source and lesson:
Husband: he is living pretty much the same life I am living...it is possible to live my life in peace
Obvious negative effect: it just kept feeling toxic, even deadly at times--not healthy
Bishop: manage expectations
Tao of Pooh: life is beautiful and you have everything in front of you that you need right now
End new personal motto? It is what it is.
I can feel those old, building up emotions and expectations around any given corner:
-walking into my house after being gone for the day with the ensuing messes, emotional and physical;
-entering previously anxiety-ridden social situations laden with expectations of others;
-packing to go camping for our family of 12+;
...and then stop, look at my choices of action, pick the one I feel I can do or might do the most good, and move forward, perfectly content that that is all I can do and it is enough.
"It is what it is."
It makes snuggling with my little ones at night a lot more enjoyable.
Is that it? Really? Well, there are two other factors that have affected this change:
#1-My now absolute certainty that in God's love for all His children: not one of us is expendable. God--in His might, power, wisdom and love--knows that each perfectly tailored scenario for each individual will create the Victor Frankl in each one of us. He knows perfectly the glory and incomprehensible compensation that belongs to each and every victim in this life. Take home message? I cannot permanently damage anyone...anyone...around me. God has their backs. My mistakes will not and can not terminate another's chance for happiness. No matter how much I mess up.
...and hand in hand with that...
#2- My knowledge of the absolute goodness and beauty of those around me.
You see, I have started looking into people's eyes. Everyone's. And if you do that enough--with a prayer in your heart to see them as God sees them--it doesn't matter how much they have hurt you, it doesn't matter how beat up they seem,...they are beautiful. They have pain, loss, growth, education, emotions, knowledge, experience. And I have realized that they have ALL done the best they could with what they have. And their lives have beauty, purpose and meaning.
And I can't destroy that no matter how faulty, broken and toxic I am.
And you know something else? I have finally realized that I am doing the best I can with what I have.
Because I finally really looked into my own eyes and caught a glimpse of the beauty of what God sees.
***************
Now, you may be asking yourself, what in the world does this have to do with education?
Well, as several writers from my core book have said so well, "sometimes we can speak a lot better than we can write" and I think I have too much emotion about this next subject to try and capture it in words.
I am going to try in video format, so let's roll with it...
Once you change how you see education, your whole opinion about yourself and others should change! Instead of a lot of people who are not "measuring up" to some external, vague standard, we see ourselves as a beautiful combination of knowledge and experience...that is continuing to grow!
Here is someone who puts it in a different way.
"How to escape education's death valley" by Sir Ken Robinson, who had a fabulous British accent.
At first I was intimidated to put out my voice with someone like this but then I realized that my voice is needed for the people that I am conversing with even as his is needed in his circles...and yours is needed in your circles...so that together we may end this epidemic of anxiety and false notions of what education should be:
Okay, for most of my life I have been an idealist, a perfectionist and a brainstormer to an internally toxic degree. Every day, all day long, I would be confronted with all the potential of any given situation:
-the intrinsic ideal (facilitated by a great education in the classics)
-how to make it perfect (facilitated by FB, Pinterest and personal observation)
-coupled with an ability to brainstorm a million different ideas of both at the speed of light thanks to Mrs. Berg's 4th grade "gifted and talented" training
The explosion of possibility and personal responsibility to make it "the best" was frequently overwhelming and I would blast out either outward (external frustruation) or inward (internal blasting for inadequacy).
Day after day. Year after year. The more I was exposed to, the more I filtered into the whole analysis of every given moment.
Exhausting.
So back to the obvious toxicity of this scenario. I had to stop. Or be stopped. It wasn't pretty.
In a very prayerful, earnest and even desperate path, I found help: my husband with his "chill" attitude, the obvious negative effect of this level of living, my Bishop (ironically enough, my husband's brother) and the Tao of Pooh.
Without dragging out this healing journey, I will just tell you where I landed.
Source and lesson:
Husband: he is living pretty much the same life I am living...it is possible to live my life in peace
Obvious negative effect: it just kept feeling toxic, even deadly at times--not healthy
Bishop: manage expectations
Tao of Pooh: life is beautiful and you have everything in front of you that you need right now
End new personal motto? It is what it is.
I can feel those old, building up emotions and expectations around any given corner:
-walking into my house after being gone for the day with the ensuing messes, emotional and physical;
-entering previously anxiety-ridden social situations laden with expectations of others;
-packing to go camping for our family of 12+;
...and then stop, look at my choices of action, pick the one I feel I can do or might do the most good, and move forward, perfectly content that that is all I can do and it is enough.
"It is what it is."
It makes snuggling with my little ones at night a lot more enjoyable.
Is that it? Really? Well, there are two other factors that have affected this change:
#1-My now absolute certainty that in God's love for all His children: not one of us is expendable. God--in His might, power, wisdom and love--knows that each perfectly tailored scenario for each individual will create the Victor Frankl in each one of us. He knows perfectly the glory and incomprehensible compensation that belongs to each and every victim in this life. Take home message? I cannot permanently damage anyone...anyone...around me. God has their backs. My mistakes will not and can not terminate another's chance for happiness. No matter how much I mess up.
...and hand in hand with that...
#2- My knowledge of the absolute goodness and beauty of those around me.
You see, I have started looking into people's eyes. Everyone's. And if you do that enough--with a prayer in your heart to see them as God sees them--it doesn't matter how much they have hurt you, it doesn't matter how beat up they seem,...they are beautiful. They have pain, loss, growth, education, emotions, knowledge, experience. And I have realized that they have ALL done the best they could with what they have. And their lives have beauty, purpose and meaning.
And I can't destroy that no matter how faulty, broken and toxic I am.
And you know something else? I have finally realized that I am doing the best I can with what I have.
Because I finally really looked into my own eyes and caught a glimpse of the beauty of what God sees.
***************
Now, you may be asking yourself, what in the world does this have to do with education?
Well, as several writers from my core book have said so well, "sometimes we can speak a lot better than we can write" and I think I have too much emotion about this next subject to try and capture it in words.
I am going to try in video format, so let's roll with it...
Here is someone who puts it in a different way.
"How to escape education's death valley" by Sir Ken Robinson, who had a fabulous British accent.
At first I was intimidated to put out my voice with someone like this but then I realized that my voice is needed for the people that I am conversing with even as his is needed in his circles...and yours is needed in your circles...so that together we may end this epidemic of anxiety and false notions of what education should be:
the discovering and acknowledging of the beautiful, purposeful and meaningful within usLet us manage our expectations. Accept the beautiful of the ordinary within and around us.
