When the Soul is Tired, it Needs More Than a Nap.

When i greet some of my colleagues on a Monday morning, and they ask, "How are you?" I hate my answer, "I am tired....but fine."

"Me too," they often say.

We still have eleven weeks to go before the school year is up, and I want them to be meaningful for the students and me. I want them to fly, as enjoyable experiences do, and not drag, as treacherous, have-to experiences do. How can I make these next weeks positive when I am feeling so tired. I am tired of hearing speeches about, "You aren't engaging enough.... You don't empathize enough.... You don't differentiate enough... Kids are failing, so what about your teaching needs to change? (Do these accusers really think we haven't beaten ourselves over and over with these thoughts already?!)

In short, although I know that our state of mind and heart colors what we hear and how we interpret what we hear, basically, what I have been hearing is, "You are not doing it right. Students that are not learning are your fault." (What about those who are learning? Can we ever take time out to talk about them?) Something in all of this just doesn't seem right and it is making my soul tired...the tiredness that i communicate to my colleagues on a Monday morning.

Whenever I feel this overwhelmed, tired, S.O.S feeling, I reach for Parker Palmer's The Courage To Teach, like others reach for the Bible, and as always, this weekend, he said just the right words to help me heal and begin to recharge and move gracefully on. I share these words with you:

"Teaching tugs at the heart, opens the heart, even breaks the heart. The more one loves teaching, the more heartbreaking it can be. The courage to teach is the courage to keep one's heart open in those very moments when the heart is asked to hold more than it is able so that teacher and students and subject can be woven into the fabric of community that learning and living require." (p.11)

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