first year
identity
life update
reflection
Teaching
When You're Trying Your Best and You Don't Succeed
I’ve been thinking about this, and partially because no one uses Facebook anymore and partially because I’m beyond caring, I’m not protecting the links to this blog anymore.
When I started this blog about a year and a half ago, I didn’t really know if I would stick with it or keep up with it. I didn’t know what it would turn into and where it would go. I didn’t know if people actually wanted to read my thoughts, so I did the gradual release method: wrote for myself for about a month, opened the link to close friends and family, and slowly added people to the list as they mention hearing about my blog.
And the safety of a protected list is nice. I often don’t edit these pieces as I edit my the post calvin essays—the last one probably taking me about 4 to 5 hours from start to finish. I was able to be fully myself and say whatever I wanted. I guess now I’m confident enough to do it without a safety net.
Will I actually promote this blog more? Probably not. Will I write more on it? Also probably not. But this year I am trying to write more as I find it helps me work through my feelings. We’ll see what 2020 brings.
(If you’re new here, here are some posts that capture what this blog is about: The Start, Who Tells Your Story, Living in the Hyphen, Hallmarked Homecomings)
*****
I asked Abby, the post calvin content curator, for feedback on my posts. As I’ve mentioned before, I feel a little unworthy to be on such a high-caliber blog such as the post calvin and I don’t do my best writing under imposter syndrome. She mentioned that I’ve written a lot about teaching and that I should make a rule to not write about teaching until, say, April.
A part of me immediately balked at this idea. Me, a first-year teacher at a difficult school, not write about teaching for four months? What else am I supposed to write about? It’s what consumes most of my waking hours; if I’m not at school, I’m either lesson planning, thinking about my day and how to do better, at church, hanging out with friends, eating, reading, or sleeping. That list pretty much sums up my life.
“My life is teaching, my house, my church, and reading,” I glibly remarked to most of my parent’s friends at our annual New Year’s Day open house. I got kind of sick of explaining my job and having to be like, “No, it sucks and it’s really hard and I am kind of dreading it but it’s fine!” so I defaulted back to my joke-y line that reminds me of something Mom said in September 2018: “First-year teaching isn’t a job; it’s a lifestyle.”
That statement or advice has become unhealthy to me, I think.
(and even a piece of me right now is saying, “No it isn’t. Teaching takes a lot of time, and you are investing a lot and that’s good. Don’t try to weasel your way out of doing a good job just because you are tired. That’s really what this is.”)
I spend so much of my time thinking about teaching that it is becoming who I am. It’s taken me four months of conversations that have danced around this topic for me to finally let my guard down enough to even engage with that idea: that perhaps I am more than my job.
I’ve been so focused on being a good teacher that it has come at the cost of me being a whole person. Sure, being a part of a church and a PN house has mostly counterbalanced it, but I’m afraid if I keep hurdling down this route I will become the person who only talks about her job because she does nothing outside of that.
Here’s what I’m going to try: when I feel anxious and want to avoid my work, rather than browsing the Internet and find random memes or essays about pop culture, I’m going to turn back to things that I know fulfill me—reading, writing, prayer, and meditation. I will give myself evenings off. I will be a full person so I have the energy to love my students, even when they so clearly do not love me back.
But first, I have some lesson planning to do. Thanks for letting me process with you all.
Recommendations:
When I started this blog about a year and a half ago, I didn’t really know if I would stick with it or keep up with it. I didn’t know what it would turn into and where it would go. I didn’t know if people actually wanted to read my thoughts, so I did the gradual release method: wrote for myself for about a month, opened the link to close friends and family, and slowly added people to the list as they mention hearing about my blog.
And the safety of a protected list is nice. I often don’t edit these pieces as I edit my the post calvin essays—the last one probably taking me about 4 to 5 hours from start to finish. I was able to be fully myself and say whatever I wanted. I guess now I’m confident enough to do it without a safety net.
Will I actually promote this blog more? Probably not. Will I write more on it? Also probably not. But this year I am trying to write more as I find it helps me work through my feelings. We’ll see what 2020 brings.
(If you’re new here, here are some posts that capture what this blog is about: The Start, Who Tells Your Story, Living in the Hyphen, Hallmarked Homecomings)
*****
I asked Abby, the post calvin content curator, for feedback on my posts. As I’ve mentioned before, I feel a little unworthy to be on such a high-caliber blog such as the post calvin and I don’t do my best writing under imposter syndrome. She mentioned that I’ve written a lot about teaching and that I should make a rule to not write about teaching until, say, April.
A part of me immediately balked at this idea. Me, a first-year teacher at a difficult school, not write about teaching for four months? What else am I supposed to write about? It’s what consumes most of my waking hours; if I’m not at school, I’m either lesson planning, thinking about my day and how to do better, at church, hanging out with friends, eating, reading, or sleeping. That list pretty much sums up my life.
“My life is teaching, my house, my church, and reading,” I glibly remarked to most of my parent’s friends at our annual New Year’s Day open house. I got kind of sick of explaining my job and having to be like, “No, it sucks and it’s really hard and I am kind of dreading it but it’s fine!” so I defaulted back to my joke-y line that reminds me of something Mom said in September 2018: “First-year teaching isn’t a job; it’s a lifestyle.”
That statement or advice has become unhealthy to me, I think.
(and even a piece of me right now is saying, “No it isn’t. Teaching takes a lot of time, and you are investing a lot and that’s good. Don’t try to weasel your way out of doing a good job just because you are tired. That’s really what this is.”)
I spend so much of my time thinking about teaching that it is becoming who I am. It’s taken me four months of conversations that have danced around this topic for me to finally let my guard down enough to even engage with that idea: that perhaps I am more than my job.
I’ve been so focused on being a good teacher that it has come at the cost of me being a whole person. Sure, being a part of a church and a PN house has mostly counterbalanced it, but I’m afraid if I keep hurdling down this route I will become the person who only talks about her job because she does nothing outside of that.
Here’s what I’m going to try: when I feel anxious and want to avoid my work, rather than browsing the Internet and find random memes or essays about pop culture, I’m going to turn back to things that I know fulfill me—reading, writing, prayer, and meditation. I will give myself evenings off. I will be a full person so I have the energy to love my students, even when they so clearly do not love me back.
But first, I have some lesson planning to do. Thanks for letting me process with you all.
Recommendations:
- The Good Place Season 1. Don’t say that I didn’t warn you that it is addictive. It’s on Netflix.
- The Way You Make Me Feel — a sweet YA contemporary summer novel that was light and yet had substance. I enjoyed it a lot more than most of the books I’ve been reading.
- Mad Max: Fury Road and Into the Spider-Verse are movies that I revisited due to the decade ending. Surprise! They are as amazing as they were when I first watched them.
- Little Women. I’m totally sold on everything Greta Gerwig produces now.
P.S. This NPR article about how to use your weekend effectively is the kind of energy I was going for in this post, and it gives some pretty solid tips. Check it out.