Life teaching at Carroll High School has been stressful. With a new subject, jaded kids, and challenging classroom management, it hasn't been an easy stroll in the park from the beginning. There have been times where I've felt like I hit a wall and dreaded seeing certain classes come into my room. I didn't really know this type of stress, one that almost paralyzed me...and that was such a strange, foreign feeling since I felt so confident teaching fifth and third grade.
As time has gone on, and now that we've moved into the period of Lent, it has been a real time of self-reflection. I've been going to the chapel for Our Lady of Guadalupe every day before school in the National Shrine just for a few minutes to pray...and that moment of calm, those precious few drops of absolute silence in reflection has been nothing but monumental to start my day. And what have I really focused on in those few moments in the morning?
It's been the ability to be thankful. Yes, my job is hard. Yes, the commute is sometimes an hour and is extricating. But there is SO MUCH to be thankful for in my life. From seeing the sun in the morning on the way to school...knowing that I am making at least some sort of difference, even when it is hard to see it...having a job to begin with...living in a home and being comfortable and knowing I have three square meals a day...being in a wonderful relationship...there is so much to be thankful for in life and more. I found a video on youtube that sort of models this in a song form. A dj called DJ Pogo took sounds from a trip to Bhutan and transformed it into a song called Kadinchey, which in Bhutanese means "Thank You." There is so much in life to be thankful for...the songs, the sights, the sounds, the smells, the tastes, everything around us. During this Lenten season, take some time and just be thankful for what you have and what is around you...especially the small, seemingly insignificant things we don't typically notice. God blesses us in so many ways...all we have to do is open our eyes and see the good that He gives us!
I felt these same things towards my last period class when I was teaching at St. X high school last year and the one blessing was that the happy moments and little things that a student might say or do to make me smile were a billion times more meaningful. You can't have rainbows without the rain. You can't have success without sacrifice and you can have Easter without Lent....
ReplyDelete