One morning I woke up early and sent my mom a text that said, "A positive attitude gives you power over your circumstances instead of your circumstances having power over you." She was starting a new job and was quite nervous. Later that day she told me this quote got her through the day. This quote gets my through every day. Lately I've been focusing a lot on having a positive attitude, continuous improvement, and conquering obstacles.
Attitude
I'm writing this after the first six weeks of school has passed. I taught last year full-time from October to June, but this is the first time I've started a school year on my own. It's gone really well, and I'm lucky and thankful to have the position I do in the school I'm at. Though it's been a good start to the year, it is of course not been without challenges. The sheer number of tasks a teacher must plan for, think through, get help with, and do before the year starts and during the first few weeks can be overwhelming. For example, because our school was low on student enrollment, we had to let two teachers go. My department was one of two that had to reinterview for our jobs. Thankfully I made it and was able to keep my job. Just in the first six weeks I've seen many teachers struggle, especially the younger ones. The older ones I've noticed are either completely fine or they complain about everything. This leads to my first point: what does complaining accomplish?
As this quote from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies states, it's not life's problems themselves that distress us (with some exceptions, of course, like natural disasters or deaths), but our attitude about these inevitable problems. It's how we think and over-think and worry and complain and find excuses that distresses us. I've always found it ironic when someone complains about never having enough time to get everything done, yet he/she spends much of his/her time complaining instead of getting things done. These people have the wrong attitude. Will complaining fix the problem? Or will taking action fix it?
Teaching is a unique mix of feeling accomplished and validated and feeling inadequate, stressed, pressured, scrutinized, and under-appreciated. Indeed such a description may describe many if not most professions. I believe there is but one thing that can get us through these challenges that we all face at one time or another, and that is attitude. It takes years of being focused on this goal and pushing yourself to think in a way that actually benefits you, but it pays off in a major way. I've found no better way to put it: A positive attitude gives you power over your circumstances instead of your circumstances having power over you.
Continuous Improvement
I always think back to my time as a serious and dedicated music student and assess how my experiences can help me. It turns out that my time studying music helps me every day. Music teaches you -- if you're serious about it -- that there are no limits, that you can never be good enough. Depending on how you look at this, it can completely drain you or light a fire inside. Knowing that you can never be good enough can serve as a constant reminder that you need to keep growing and keep moving forward. Have a positive attitude about this reality, and it can drive you to be your best. Music also taught me that perfection doesn't exist, but being really, really great does. As a teacher, all I want to do is get better and learn and go beyond plateaus that I reach. I had the same attitude when I studied music, but now I've found something that I feel even more passionate about. Even if it means going into higher levels of education one day, this drive, this desire to be greater, will push me. Something I've seen too much of and something I am committed to never becoming is a person who stops growing and learning. I will not become complacent.
Conquering Obstacles
"A man of ambition is capable of anything." - Quintus Lentulus Batiatus
Something else that I've been faced with lately is several new tasks at my job that all teachers have been asked to complete in addition to our normal workload. There are also some things that are directly related to how I'm teaching that I'm currently learning. One of these tasks, when I first learned about it, stressed me out a great deal because I thought it would be way too time-consuming and would lead to me having even less free time and thus being less satisfied with my job. But all of those thoughts and worries were just a negative attitude creeping up on me. I had to take time to process it all, decide how I felt about it, make a plan, work together with people who could help me, and then find a way to get it done. Through this process, I just decided that I will conquer these kinds of things. I will own them and make them small, because my attitude will give me power over them.
We have the power to control how we feel about things in life, and how we go about living our life. We can take control, and have power over our circumstances, all the while becoming better versions of ourselves.
"Step from the road to the sea to the sky." - Anthony Kiedis
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