Monthly Archives: October 2020

It’s just this

I was speaking to a colleague at work about sleep. She said that she was getting to bed really early and passing out exhausted, and I was saying how I was staying up late not able to fall asleep, even though I feel tired. She pointed both hands up, palms open, and made small circles, “It’s just this“.

I totally understood.

‘This’ is wearing a mask most of the day, and not seeing full expressions on the faces of students and colleagues.’This’ is pausing outside doorways to give people a wide birth to pass.’This’ is being busy, but that busyness not feeling as rewarding.’This’ is not all sitting around the same tables at lunch.’This’ is sanitizing your hands because you touched a door knob.’This’ is limiting students’ plans when we are used to always getting to yes. ‘This’ is knowing that we will likely start next September much the same as we started this school year, and knowing there are still 8 months of ‘this’ to go this school year. ‘This’ is living through a pandemic.

We might have made these adjustments fairly quickly on the outside, but ‘this’ is still not normal, and so it’s draining, and requires more effort than usual. ‘This’ will take a bit more time to fully adjust to. More time, and more sleep… Sweet dreams. We will get used to ‘this’ eventually, and when we do, we will find ways to thrive.

Resilience Revisited

Right now it seems like I chose the right #OneWord for 2020: Resilience. But as you read my last post of 2019, written before we learned about the impending pandemic, remember something… We are social beings and we are not incredibly resilient on our own. We need a community, we need friendship and love, we need each other.

Relationships, be they with family, friends, co-workers, student/teacher, and even pets, build our resilience, and our ability to not just cope, but to thrive.

Let’s support one another and show our resilience together!

Here is the post:

December 31, 2019

If I were to pick 2 words for 2020, I might pick “Growth Mindset”, but if I’m only choosing a single word, it would be:

Resilience

The world needs this word right now. Here are some specific places I see a need to pay attention to this #OneWord in 2020.

In Schools:

Student anxiety seems to be on the rise, and anxiety lowers resilience and the willingness to try new things. Words seem to ‘injure’ students in ways that victimize them rather than make them stronger. This is not to say that students should tolerate bullying or inappropriate language or slander, rather they should speak up, defend themselves, and report poor behaviour. Instead it seems that they feel wounded and do not act. This is a sensitive topic, but one where I’ve seen a greater awareness of adults who want to support students and at the same time I see students allowing words to hurt them deeply, giving too much power to the transgressor.

In Politics:

I said this in Ideas on a Spectrum, “In a civil society, dialogue is the one problem-solving strategy that should be sacred. To do this, free speech is essential. But right now there is a culture of ‘attack the opposition’ that is very scary.“ – We need to be resilient when hearing opposing views, and understand that, “…we must be tolerant and accepting of opposing views, unaccepting of hateful and hurtful acts, and smart enough to understand the difference.” When we can’t have conversations with people that have different political views, we don’t grow as a culture or as a society.

In Online Spaces:

People will make mistakes online. They will say things that are unintentionally hurtful, or blindly offensive. This is different than someone being intentionally biased and rude. If the slander is intentional, it should be reported. If it is unintentional, even to the point of ignorance, we need to be more resilient about what our responses are. When every transgression is treated with an attack, the most severe/bigoted/rude/biased transgressions are not given the heightened alarm that they deserve. With lesser errors and mistakes, we need to let people have a venue to recognize their errors and invite conversation rather than damnation.

Growing up, I heard the playground retort to taunts, “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never harm me.” We are past the era of letting nasty people say whatever nasty things they want, and just turning the other cheek to pretend we are not hurt. This is a good thing. We want to live in a world where that behaviour is not acceptable. But it does not serve us well to treat the attacker like they can not repent or be sorry. It does not serve us to let the words said hurt us too deeply. By being resilient we can speak up, clarify our perspective, and engage in conversations that help us feel empowered rather than victimized.

Resilience allows us to be strong, flexible, and engaged in a society that is the kind of society we want to live and thrive in.

I don’t agree to disagree

In Canadian fashion I will apologies for this, but I don’t agree to disagree. Sorry.

No I won’t say it’s ok for you to have a different opinion about Covid-19, it is not just a flu. It’s also not an infringement on your rights to wear a mask any more than it is to insist you wear a seatbelt, or not enter a store naked from the waist down… and no, this is not a ridiculous comparison.

No, it’s not ok for you to spread QAnon conspiracies any more than it’s not ok to share religious reasons to infringe on the rights of others. These are both wrong in an open, free, and democratic society.

Do you have a right to expunge stupidity in this open, free, and democratic society? Yes. Yes, you do… but I don’t have to accept it as something deserving an equal stance to science and facts. I don’t have to see it as an opposing view worthy of debate. You are wrong.

I don’t agree to disagree, not at all. Your sources are not reliable, your opinions are not facts. I’m not agreeing to disagree. To do so, I would be weighing fact to fiction like they somehow are the same thing. They are not.

The economy can stay open if people wear masks, socially distance themselves and sanitize appropriately. Some people might disagree with me, and on a topic like this we can agree to disagree.

However, with 40,000,000+ cases worldwide 1,118,443 deaths, and over 9,000,000 known active cases worldwide this is not just a bad flu, it’s a pandemic. And if you want to disagree with that well then sorry… you are wrong.

Put a mask on, and thank those around you for being respectful and doing the same.

Digital bubble

Just a quick reminder that while our social circles are very small right now, we can still connect with others online. Make that phone call a video call. Make that video call a 3-way or 4-way conversation.

We need to be thoughtful about how many people we meet face to face with, but that doesn’t limit us from connecting with family and friends online.

Who haven’t you seen in a while that you miss? Well, you can still see them on a screen. You don’t have to tidy the house or add an extra cleaning to the bathroom, just pick up your laptop or phone and make a call. (Ok, maybe comb your hair first 😜.)

We live in an incredibly connected world and we can make distance and time zones disappear with the click of a few buttons. So, who are you missing right now? It’s time to open up your digital bubble!

The battle beyond

Yesterday I wrote, ‘The battle within‘ and said,

“The battle within is greater than the battle beyond.“

And while I firmly believe this I am seeing countless tweets from educators and educational leaders across different districts, provinces, states, and international borders, talking about the overwhelm and exhaustion of their role in a pandemic. The challenge ‘beyond’ is taxing the battles ‘within’ and burnout seems endemic.

I’ve seen comments like:

“I can’t sleep thinking about how much I have to do.”

“I have no time to exercise or take care of myself.”

“I have to take the weekend off.”

“I asked for help but it isn’t coming fast enough.”

“I’m in my second year teaching and I feel I have to quit.”

“I’m tired of just doing an adequate job.”

“This is unsustainable.”

“I won’t make it to June at this pace.”

“My students deserve more, but I have nothing more to give.”

Here are a few suggestions I hope can help:

  • Take care of yourself. Busy times are exactly when self care matters most. Everything you do for yourself during these times will give you the energy to help and provide for others… but more importantly, you will just feel better!
  • Ask for help. It’s ok to let others know you need support.
  • Collaborate. Find others who can share the load, and find energy by working with others.
  • Reduce your own expectations around work load. What can you do to reduce marking, or to provide assessment that is student rather than grade focussed? Example: Instead of giving a test that takes 10 min. each to mark, give a 1-1 assessment that takes 5-10 minutes. You and your students will both get more out of the experience.
  • Take body and brain breaks. Have fun, while recharging yourself and your students.
  • Turn off work for a set time each night… be militant about this. Go for a no technology walk with someone. Put a block of time in your calendar. Play a board game.
  • Do something creative.
  • Meditate daily.
  • Get to bed early.
  • Exercise. Suggestion: Try to do a quick workout early in the morning… get your heart rate up for 20 minutes to start the day.
  • Pack healthy treats that you enjoy, so that food breaks are rewarding in more ways than one.
  • Connect with friends digitally. Your digital bubble need not be small just because your face to face one is.

This is a time when the battle beyond can overwhelm the battle within… so make intentional efforts to care for yourself and not only you, but those around you will benefit!

The battle within

The battle within is greater than the battle beyond.

It is challenging to realize that our ultimate enemy is ourselves. Our vices vary. Our demons come in different sizes. But they come from within, not from outside.

In today’s Daily Calm meditation, I heard this quote worth contemplating, “You can close your eyes to the things you do not want to see but you cannot close your heart to the things you do not want to feel.”

Anger, frustration, jealousy, hurt, upset, sadness, embarrassment, pride, guilt, shame, fear, regret, anxiety… These are all things that we can not simply close our eyes to when we feel them. We rarely have complete control over how deeply we feel them. But we can decide how much we fuel them. How much we let them burn us up.

I chose my words carefully when I said, “We rarely have complete control over how deeply we feel them.” If I feel sad, I can not easily make the sadness disappear. Just like when you shut your eyes in direct sunlight, light shines through your eyelids, so too does an emotion like sadness seep in as you try to block it out.

Sometimes it’s better to feel than it is to block emotions, even if they are negative. Embrace the emotion and let it come over you. But how long do you allow this? At what point does the emotion take over? At what point does a feeling like sadness or anxiety or grief become an enemy within? At what point does it take control of you?

‘Don’t be sad.’

‘Don’t be anxious.’

There are few words that can be said with good intentions that could be worse than saying one of these phrases to a person feeling those emotions.These worlds only magnify the emotion’s hold on a person, who desperately wants to escape the overpowering feelings that are burning inside.

So if it is a battle within, how does one fight it? I’m not sure I have an answer that works for others. What works for me is to play with the ideas that bring those feelings to me. I imagine the emotion being first worse and then better. Not just worse but horrific. How much more could it hurt, how much worse could it feel. I take it to places further than it could possible go. Then I weigh how bad I really feel. Then I think about how I could feel better.

That’s how I battle. I shine the light brighter than I can look at it, then look away and the brightness seems so much less intense. I don’t try first to look away, I look more intensely, and then I choose to look away. Then it feels less like a battle to fight and more like something I have fought and moved on from. But I also don’t pretend it’s gone, I simply care less that it is there.

I don’t pretend this always works, I don’t imagine it would work for everyone, but I seldom spend time on battles I see others struggle with… and I’m sure some of my battles within are battles others could handle with ease.

I think it’s true for most everyone that the battle within is greater than the battle beyond. But I also believe that these battles need not be as big as we make them.

The wrong hill to die on

I came across this Tweet and felt compelled to discuss it,

“Can someone please explain why a student wearing a hat or a hood in class is so bad?

Why is that a hill so many teachers are willing to die on?” @ryanr_lester

I’ve worked in schools where ‘No hats’ was the rule, I’ve worked, and still work, in schools where it doesn’t. Students appreciate the freedom to wear hoodies and hats, and while I’ve dealt with policing this in schools where it is policed, I can’t think of an instance where this was a major issue in the schools where it isn’t.

Could a kid pull the rim of a hat down low to hide their face? Yes, but that might be something that helps them cope in a stressful situation, and that might also be something a teacher addresses… it depends on the moment. And if you think that moment that needs addressing would have vanished if the hat wasn’t on, well then you probably haven’t worked with that many kids who would do this… they would find another way.

Rules like this are about control and compliance, masked as issues of respect. Respect is neither earned nor demonstrated through control and compliance.

This is an uphill battle. You are better off choosing a different hill, and taking the high ground.

What is your response?

When someone asks, “How are you doing?” What’s your response?

Alright. Ok. Great. Good. Fine. Not bad. Could be better. Busy. Surviving. Keeping my head above water. Meh. Hanging on. Surviving.

I bet that if you think back to your childhood, your answer was probably almost always ‘Good’ for anyone beyond your parents, who might have gotten a more explicit answer.

For many years of my adult life, I used to respond, ‘Busy, but good’. Then I went to an Ignite presentation by Dean Shareski that he titled, ‘Busy is not a badge of honour’.

That short presentation made me rethink my response. Everyone is busy. It’s not a thing in my life that should define how I’m doing or feeling. When I think back, I can’t remember a time when work wasn’t busy. When I think back to the people who ask me how I’m doing, seldom are they not busy too.

Right now, if you were to ask 10 people, ‘How are you doing?’ And then after their trivial response you replied, ‘No, how are you really doing.’ What kind of responses would you get?

What response would you give to that follow-up question? Really?

A couple days ago I wrote about self care, and making time for yourself. It’s a thought that I keep coming back to. I’m not sure how well people are doing right now?

I’m up every morning by about 5am to write, meditate, and listen to an audio book while exercising. This is my self care. I’m getting on my exercise bike right after I schedule this post. This routine makes me feel good. I have accomplished a few things for myself before I get to work. If I have to work late, I’m not missing my self care.

This makes it easier to say that things are good. That I’m doing well. What about you?

How are you really doing?

Here comes the rain

I woke up before my alarm this morning to the sound of heavy rain. It’s actually a nice sound to wake up to, but it also is a reminder that we are heading into the dark and cold of winter. For those of you that don’t know, I spent almost 10 years growing up in Barbados.

When you live on a tropical island, not too far from the equator, every day gets close to 12 hours sunlight. The rainy season means an hour of heavy rain daily before its sunny again, and sometimes the sun is still shining during those rains. Also, it doesn’t get cold. Ever.

Now I’m living on the edge of a Canadian rain forest on the wet/west coast. I like it better than the chill of Toronto, where we first moved when we came to this country, but sometimes the rain gets to me. Sometimes the damp feels really cold. Sometimes I really miss the sun.

In Barbados the rain was a welcome reprieve from the heat, although sometimes it brought uncomfortable humidity. Here, it can bring a chill. It can come with dull skies that hide the location of the sun in the sky… for days on end. When the rain comes, it can sometimes feel like it’s not going to leave.

For this reason, I load up on vitamin D, I have a natural light lamp on my desk, and I start dressing in layers that includes pairs of long underwear (that I’ll start using soon). People think it’s funny that I wear long underwear from late October through April, but I get chilled easily and am more comfortable hot than cold.

The rains are here. The cold is coming. I have to psych myself up. I have to prepare myself for the short, wet, dark days. I know what lies ahead, and I have to keep my chin up, and keep the clouds outside from creeping in.

Self care

Apparently yesterday was Mental Health (awareness) Day. I didn’t realize until I saw a number of tweets come through my feed. What’s interesting is that two days ago, after coming home from a long week at school, I saw many tweets from educators talking about being exhausted, feeling overwhelmed, and essentially saying, ‘the struggle is real’!

I felt it too, as I shared in this stress-releasing tweet I shared on Thursday:


These are interesting and exhausting times, and overwhelm seems to be palpable to many. So now is a good time to remember the importance of self care. When we care for ourselves, we have more to offer others.

  • Exercise
  • Meditation
  • Walking (for pleasure, not to get somewhere)
  • Hobbies
  • A glass of wine
  • Binging on Netflix
  • Conversations with friends or distant family
  • A technology free dinner with family
  • A good book
  • Creating an upbeat playlist
  • Cuddling with a loved one
  • Ordering in a favourite meal
  • A long shower or bath
  • A funny podcast
  • An extra hour or two of sleep
  • Playing a mindless game
  • Puzzles, crosswords, Sudoko

What you probably don’t need is to spend more time on social media, unless you have a stream that’s intentionally funny or entertaining. You don’t need to think about the work you have to do all weekend, schedule a bit of time and that’s the time to think about it.

When there are many things beyond your control, when spare time seems nonexistent, that’s a hint to make time for yourself. You’ll feel better because of it. You’ll have more energy because of it. And most importantly, you deserve it.