These two quotes can ease pain and give you purpose.

Sometimes I screw up. Often I do ok. Occasionally I do something very right. Yesterday (post-election day), by God's grace, I think I did good. I resisted mansplaining the election results to my progressive facebook friends in pain. 

(Please understand, this would not have been to downplay their pain. I wanted to help people understand how the other side could choose as it did. I live in a very blue-collar town.) 

Rest easy: I’m not going to attempt any such explaining here either.

But I do want to share a couple words from my religion that help me. If you’re of a different faith, I hope you have similar helps. I’m not trying to convert anybody here, believe me.

This Annie Dillard quote is really helping to motivate me today.

Novelist and essayist Annie Dillard writes very insightfully. This one sentence of hers really cuts through a lot of noise for me today as I think about the present and the future.

“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.”

Hmmm. That's got me thinking about my days. And my life in general.

Here's the good news . . . At least you and I, colleague, get to spend our days -- mundane or stressful though they may be -- in the service of a greater good. We are building up fellow human beings (often remediating what was not done for them by parents). In so doing, we're helping to make a better society in the long run. This is significant and consequential!

You are an agent of light in a very dark world. Be well, and try to enjoy your days!

This quote from Lolly Daskal is a good reminder of your significance. . . .

"Shift your focus
from being successful
to being significant."

~ Lolly Daskal

Lolly is an inspirational speaker, motivational coach, and author whose emphasis is on leading from within. She writes about how personal values are more important than management strategies or fads. I'll bet if you're in the education profession, you're not obsessed with success or getting ahead; sometimes mere survival is the order of the day! But Lolly reminds us to remember our focus: as educators we are significant in the development of future men and women. As the school year goes by, with all its drudgery and stress, remember that you really matter in students' lives as you help them grow.

This video is a good reminder that our students are human beings dealing with many real issues.

A couple of days ago we had an assembly about a tip/help line in Michigan called ok2say. It covered a number of topics. One was bullying. The presenter showed a video where a boy shown bullying others is handed a pair of empathy glasses by a custodian. Now as he looks at other students he sees words above them that tell what they're going through.

It was a very sobering reminder to me: I have 170 students this term, thus 170 human souls, all in different situations, some good, some far from good. Looking for that video, I happened on this one for teachers. It's geared toward the secondary level, but is really applicable for all walks of life. Many of the people we interact with are "dealing with something"; sometimes they are wearing their game face, sometimes it's really affecting them. Regardless . . .

I usually try to keep my offerings encouraging or cheerful here on UpTeach, but I pass this along to you today with the hopes it might be of service.

What Bill Gates had to say - about you!

public domain image

Hey, Bill gets us! It's nice to hear a person so identified with technology and business understand that educators are what actually make the difference:

"Technology is just a tool. In terms of getting the kids working together and motivating them, the teacher is the most important."

I don't know about you, but sometimes it seems we're In a field where technology is adopted first and then somehow worked into the curriculum later:

"IPads for everyone! Oh . . . wait. . . ."

(Plus that's the other computer company. Sorry, Bill.)

But as Mr. Gates notes above, the important work going on in the classroom is getting the kids collaborating and being interested in what they're being asked to do. All with the ultimate goal of living a life of collaboration and passion. That's what you are doing, colleague!

Thanks for the reminder, Bill!

These words from Haim Ginott might be a little scary, but they're a lot inspiring.

Here we are, colleague, with about a month under our belts.

I'm a bit late, but I'd like to offer the annual re-posting of one of my favorite thoughts. A few years ago Mr. Matt Reeves, then my assistant principal, read this to the staff on the day before school. I like to pass it on as a first post of the school year, a message that is both cautionary and inspiring:

"I have come to a frightening conclusion.

I am the decisive element in the classroom.
It is my personal approach that creates the climate.
It is my daily mood that makes the weather.
As a teacher I possess tremendous power to make a child's life 
miserable or joyous.

I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration.
I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal.
In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis
will be escalated or de-escalated, and a child humanized or de-humanized."

~ Haim Ginott 

from Teacher and Child: A Book for Parents and Teachers, 1972

You are part of a cause larger than yourself!

Happy National Teacher Appreciation Week! I thought I'd pass along some encouragement I encountered while attending a great college commencement ceremony yesterday.

First was something one of the (many) speakers mentioned as an aside, regarding her professors: "They never belittled me for what I didn't know; instead they shared what they knew." What a nice encapsulation of what teaching can be. Even though I know not who or where you are, let me say Thank you, for sharing with your students what you know about your content and about living life positively.

2. The student speaker was from Traverse City, Michigan. She had children at a young age, but still transferred to the four-year university. For some reason she felt she couldn't move. So she commuted. Four hours each way. 30,000 miles in two years. As they say where my wife's from, Holy whuh! There are students out there who care about learning and growing. Not necessarily 30,000 miles' worth, but still. And some of them are in your class and have been blessed in their endeavors by . . .  you.

3. Last but not least, I saw a number of young men and women graduating not in robes and mortarboards, but in dress blues and whites. After being pronounced duly graduated, they took their oaths of office to protect and defend a country. Earlier, at the start of the day I had seen a squad of them in two parallel lines hoist and salute the colors of the nation they believe in and are dedicating their lives to. I realize that, like all human beings, they are doing what they do for various reasons, but it cannot be denied they will also be living for something larger than themselves. They did not merely go to college to get credentialed to get a certain job, in order to have a relatively enjoyable life at a certain economic level. They also will live for a larger purpose.

This can be true for most people, though it might take some mental recalibration. We can just exist or do a job to pay the bills and take the occasional trip (or -- Argh! -- pay the regularly-arriving tuition bills). Or . . . we can know and feel ourselves involved in an important cause, and wake up each day in order to serve in that effort. I would put to you, colleague, that you are involved in the mission to fight ignorance and incivility, and to promote reason and compassion. 

Trust me, I know that the tyranny of the urgent, the mud of the mundane, the drudgery of data-driven-ness all serve to distract us from what we are doing daily: dispelling darkness and engendering growth. But allow me to urge you to remember that we have the good fortune and joy (and yes, stress) of not merely having a day job, but being part of that great cause. We are part of a profession that has at its essence living for something larger than yourself. 

Take heart in that, and have a great Teacher Appreciation Week.