Tag Archives: Life Lessons

Make Lemonade – A life lesson about perspective

This was my yearbook ‘message from the principal’ for Inquiry Hub this year:

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Make Lemonade

          When the backdrop of your school year is a Global Pandemic, it’s hard to think of the things you got to do, and easy to think about all the things you didn’t get to do. It’s hard not to think this way when so much has been taken away from us. We are used to students mixing across grades and getting to know everyone in our community through events and potluck lunches. Well, this was not a year for those things. But when you look at the year we had, we were lucky compared to many high schools.

          We provided all-day schooling when other schools were having students only come to school for half a day and doing another course online, then switching these two around. Meanwhile we had our cohorts in school for the entire day. Other schools rushed students through quarters, with 2 courses at a time. We continued with our year-long classes. Courses in other schools were paired down to the essential curriculum. We had students continue to follow their passions and interests with Inquiries and IDS courses, and teachers continued to look at things in depth, and had time to follow student interests along the way.

          I was watching a TikTok recently and it was about things non-native English speakers didn’t understand when they first learned English, (I am definitely on grown up/teacher TikTok and have a different feed than a younger-than-me generation). The phrase that this person didn’t understand was “If life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” To most of us this is a phrase that means, when things are sour and going against you, make the most out of it. However, this woman was from a country and culture where lemons are used to spice things up, and the taste of a lemon is truly enjoyed. To her, “If life gives you lemons, make lemonade,” meant, appreciate the good things in life. She never understood the phrase to mean anything negative. When life gives you a wonderful lemon, well then celebrate and make some lemonade!

          When you look back on the past year, I hope you can see it from the perspective of this lady, and find the delicious lemons you made lemonade out of. Who did you spend more time with? What did you enjoy doing that you don’t usually do? What do you feel lucky that you had, that others didn’t have? If you were living in Toronto this year, you would have spent almost the entire year doing school from home, whether you wanted to or not.

          Also, we are heading into a summer with much less restrictions than last year. What are you looking forward to that you will enjoy even more than you ever have? What opportunities are you going to take advantage of, that you probably wouldn’t have? Where is your family going to travel next?

          It’s time to enjoy your summer… and make  some lemonade.

 

The shade of our minds

My morning meditation included this quote:

“We are sitting under the tree of our thinking minds, wondering why we’re not getting any sunshine.” ~ Ram Dass

It’s interesting to think about some of the negative loops we play in our mind:

Self doubt – I’m not good enough. I can’t do it, it’s too hard for me.

Regret – Both for the things we’ve done, and the things we wish we did.

Sadness – for things we’ve lost, for uncomfortable moments that happened in our lives, and also just in our minds.

We put up our own shade while wondering why the sun doesn’t shine on us… and we do this without ever leaving our own thoughts. But we aren’t always in control. The dark spaces can grow, the shade can seem to be daunting. Grey, stormy clouds do not allow the sun through, even if we get out from under the tree.

“Smile.”

“Snap out of it.”

“Just think happy thoughts.”

It’s so easy for someone who sees sunshine to toss out simple advice to those who are stuck in the gloomy shade. But it’s so hard to have the advice of others penetrate the shade we cast on ourselves. When we are stuck in the shade, we do not feel in control of navigating to brighter spaces in our minds. If we did… we would, if only it were so simple.

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However it is important to remember that we are not our thoughts, our thoughts are not us. If we can recognize this, we can create some cognitive dissonance. We can separate the elements of shade we create in our heads from the shade we are experiencing. We can have doubts and still move forward, we can fake confidence and pretend we are more capable than we feel. We can act our way into a new way of thinking. We can choose to do something that reduces regrets from the things done and not done. We might not feel happy, but we can choose to see our sadness rather than live it, to observe it from a place where it does not grip us so tightly.

So easy to say, when one is not feeling down, when not depressed, when we see potential in ourselves and others… So far away from achievable when we are in the midst of shadow, gloom, and despair. We do not think our way out of bad thinking so easily, we do not break the loop from within the loop. When everything is spinning around us, it can feel like nothing stops moving even if we can stand still. We can’t un-think our own thoughts so easily.

Yet we can act differently, we can choose what to do when we can’t choose what to think. We can take a walk in nature, we can connect with a friend who makes us feel better. We can read a book that takes us to places our minds didn’t know we could go. We can dress in a way that makes us feel empowered. We can do a kind act for others and feel the endorphins that is the reward for selflessness… for not just thinking for and about ourselves.

We can exercise, not to transform our bodies but to transform our minds… not a gruelling workout to make ourselves more fit, but short spurts of activity to change our heart rate and clear some clouds. Activity vignettes that alter our physiology, and get us out of a rut.

We can pattern what we do to pattern what we think, rather than the other way around… Routines can be ruts, and routines can be grooves. We can find physical grooves that helps us out of mental ruts. We can act our way into new thinking when we can not think our way into new action… because the shade won’t think itself away, and sunshine does not fill the shadows when we choose to create our own clouds.

It’s not what we think, but what we do that makes a difference, and action is what moves us from underneath the shady trees of our minds.

Choosing or observing?

How much of our lives are passive?

We observe the world, watching through our eyes, hearing through our ears, feeling through our skin, and tasting in our mouths. Each of these senses giving us feedback about the world around us. But how much time do we spend really choosing what those senses share with us, versus passively accepting what those senses are exposed to?

It is our action or lack of action that determines what our senses observe or endure. Is there a hobby you’ve always wanted to try? A food you’ve always wanted to taste? A place you’ve always wanted to visit? (Maybe somewhere you can walk or hike to, while travel is restricted.)

How much time do we spend being observers of this world, mere victims of our circumstances, versus creators of our world, choosing our path and seeking out new experiences, new things that our senses can take in?

This is a choice. Not realizing this is also a choice.

More like real life

I enjoy seeing teachers talk about assessment like this:

The best part of the clip is when Mrs. Lemon says, “I wrote better tests that focus less on recall and more on application.”

Although, I love the ending too… “At the end of the day, this is more like real life. There are very few circumstances where are you don’t know the answer to something and can’t look it up.”

What future are we preparing students for? How is our assessment demonstrating this? Are we showing what we value by what we measure, or are we just measuring what’s easy to measure?

A Simple Reset

It took a whiny rant yesterday to help me reset my frame of mind.

I rethought the rut I was in last night, after I had a massage. Usually my massages are painful ordeals, working out deep muscle knots, but most of my discomfort was from muscle soreness from working out. This is really unusual because I generally deal with a lot of back discomfort, verging in pain. So, my workouts haven’t been as lazy as I thought. Then I looked at some not too old archery scores and I truly am happy about where I am right now in my progress.

Sometimes it doesn’t take much to set my brain on a bit of a tailspin, but overall I see myself as a positive and happy person. I work in a school with some truly amazing students and teachers. I have a wonderful office staff. And I come home to an awesome family.

I’m blessed, and when I get into a rut like I did yesterday, I need to get over myself and appreciate how truly lucky I am.

The weather is wonderful all this week, and it’s going to be a great day today!

Many years later…

Somewhere between the years 2000 and 2002 I taught a grade 8 art class. I was teaching a lesson on drawing faces with pencil and one student was a far better artist than me. She could really capture the details of the face, and not just be anatomically correct, but also bring life to her drawings. However she was hesitant to go dark with her work. It lacked contrast. Her drawings were like beautiful but faded photocopies.

“Don’t be afraid to go darker.” I would say. She would try and the image would get ever so slightly darker, but still look faded.

“Darker!” I would say.

“It is!” She would retort.

“Not enough, go darker.” Or, “You know what I’m going to tell you!”

It was a banter that went on all year, because no matter what we did in art, she had a pencil journal that she also worked on. Again, her work was beautiful, but too light.

Fast forward to yesterday, and this former student, now a friend on Facebook, did a tribute drawing of an older photograph, of a loved one. (It’s 5:30am, and I haven’t asked to share the story, so I’m not sharing names or details.) The drawing is beautiful with rich dark highlights, and still has her soft touch that brings her drawings to life.

I commented on the photo:

“Beautiful. Nice to see that you are no longer afraid to use rich dark shades 😜”

She replied,

“NO joke, I was actually hearing you repeat to go darker/not to be afraid to commit to it and smiling about how this many years later your teachings still come out 😊”

And,

“I even wondered if you’d consider it dark enough 😆 glad to see I’ve made progress with it!”

My response,

“It really is, and you’ve captured [your subject’s] sparkle… not easy to do in a drawing. I love it! ❤️”

I truly enjoy interactions like this. They warms my heart. They remind me of why I wanted to be a teacher, and make me miss being in the classroom.

We are lucky to live in an age where we can connect with former students and celebrate their marriages, the birth of their children, or just check in with them when things aren’t going their way. And it’s so much fun to know that we can make small differences in their lives, long after they’ve left our classroom.

Removing the obstacle

Since buying my new bow, I haven’t had a new personal best score. I’ve made a lot of adjustments and changed arrows, and have learned a lot, but my best score hasn’t moved up. One challenge I’ve had is that the fatter arrows I purchased are harder to keep on my tiny arrow rest while I draw the bow. I start to pull the string back, and the arrow bounces off of the rest and I have to let down the bow, reposition the arrow, and draw again. With a 50 pound bow, those extra draws that are unsuccessful get really tiring.

Yesterday I went to the archery store just before they closed and they installed my drop-away rest that I had on my old bow. This rest isn’t a tiny ‘V’ blade that the arrow sits on, it’s a big ‘U’ that cups the arrow and drops down and out of the way before the fletching at the back of the arrow hit it.

I then went and shot a round. First I had to recalibrate my sighting and get my bow adjusted to the slightly different location of the new rest, then I shot 30 arrows and scored a 278.

My personal best is a 280. Looking at my score card, the first round, when I was still adjusting my sight was the only round that I didn’t score at least one 10 or X in the round (you always score high to low score as opposed to by the order the shots went in). Also, I only shot 3 arrows outside the yellow 9-ring.

I shot two 8’s and a 6. The 6 was a really bad shot that I know my mistake. Part of the issue was I hadn’t lined everything up properly and was trying to readjust myself at full draw of the bow. I should have let down the bow and restarted, but having had the old rest where I kept having to redraw with the arrow falling off, I was accustomed to fighting through to avoid this. An old habit I’ll gladly break soon.

Still, if that 6 was even an 8, my other worse score on the card, I would have tied my personal best on my first attempt with this arrow rest on my bow. I know that not having to draw the bow so many times, frustrating me and tiring me out, will go a long way in getting me to my new personal best score.

After a couple weeks of dedicated shooting over the break, I saw no progress in my score. Then I remove one obstacle, and I shoot the best I have in a while and get close to my personal best. This reminds me of the quote, ‘the obstacle is the way’. That thing getting in your way is the thing to figure out, or it becomes the path forward. I thought I could persevere and learn to use the tiny ‘V’ blade but couldn’t. The archery shop has ordered a wider blade for me and I might try again… it is a better rest than the drop-away one. But for now, I’ll use this one, I’ll draw my bow back 30 times to shoot 30 arrows, rather than 100 times, and I’ll smash my personal best score very soon.

The paradox of tolerance

This is a brilliant 1-minute TikTok on The Paradox of Tolerance by user @TheHistoryWizard.

Here is the key part, “We must be intolerant of intolerance… racists, sexists, etc. are intolerant of people.” As opposed to being “intolerant of ideas that are intolerant of people“.

This is an important distinction. These two things are not on an equal footing. Being intolerant of intolerance holds a moral high ground that intolerant, ignorant people do not hold.

Lessons from a 97yr old

This 2.5 minute video is an absolute gem! Meet Charles Eugster:

I’ve been on a fitness kick since the start of 2019, and I feel younger than I did in 2018. I know I won’t win the battle against old age, and that my abilities will decrease. But, I also know that I can live more vibrantly in my old age if I keep this up… and quite frankly the alternatives suck.

There are so many take-aways in this short video. Watch it again. Think about how Charles’ attitude could benefit you, no matter how old you are.

Broke my bow

On Thursday after work I was shooting my compound bow and stopped for the day. I decided to wax my bow strings, then on a whim thought I’d shoot one more round. With a quick mental lapse, I stood up and put my trigger onto the bow loop, drew back my string and dry shot my bow… I shot the bow without an arrow in it.

When you do that, all the energy intended to push the arrow forward gets returned to the bow. I heard a whip sound that was the volume of a firecracker at close range. Then I felt the sting on my hand. My broken bow string whipped my thumb.

I got ice on it right away, and it’s really just a surface wound, so honestly my ego hurts more. And as it turns out, my bow got hurt even more than that. I took it to the pro shop yesterday and it turns out that I damaged both cams. And unfortunately, it’s an older bow and the bottom cams are no longer available. So I need a new bow.

I’m all for learning from my mistakes, but damn this was an expensive mistake! The only saving grace is that they have a used model upgrade of my bow on sale and, while still expensive, it’s far cheaper than a new replacement of this quality. I’m told it’s a bow that’s been to the world championships, and since I know of only one left-handed shooter of that caliber around here, I think I know the previous owner, who would have treated the bow very well. Today I’m going in to try this new-to-me bow out.

I’m trying to see the silver lining and appreciate that I’m getting a bow upgrade that I probably would not have gotten for a couple more years. Something good has come from this… even if it’s a bit of a financial expense. My goal this year was to shoot at least 100 days this year and I’m way ahead of schedule, so I know I’ll be getting great use out of my new toy… and I’ll be a lot more careful about putting an arrow in it before shooting!