INTRODUCTION
This blog has come out of my journey to become the teacher and person I have always wanted to be. I do not claim to be an expert but I have shared my ides, goals, dreams, and failures with many people over the years and a lot of them told me to put them in a book. Well, it is not a book but I think it will do. This blog is a partial compilation of my 18 year journey, which happily is still going strong. I do not claim to be an expert or a writer. I am just a person with some ideas and the need to write something down. I decided to write this blog as a way to work through my own thoughts and hopefully it might be of benefit to someone else. It will contain stories of my life that have affected me, have caused me to questions things to become the teacher I am today. It will also contains quotes and poems that have caused me to think, reflect, and to look for answers answers. I am happy, content, and I can’t imagine doing anything else for a career. When people ask me why I teach my response is, “Teaching is what I am. It is not something I do. I create relationships, build better people, and attempt to change the world.”
What do I want to do with my life? Why do I teach? What are my goals as a teacher? What really makes me happy? These are some of the many questions I have asked myself over the years. I have found a lot of answers but I have uncovered even more questions. It is in the love of the journey and the acceptance of the questions and confusion that I have found my greatest joy and peace in teaching.
Success is a journey… not a destination
~Unknown
The purpose of this blog is to help you ask yourself a lot of questions and have YOU find some of the answers. I could not possibly give you any answers because my life and my experiences are unique to me and the only answers that really matter lie in each one of us. It is our job to figure them out. Each one of us must take our own journey. A lot of people will come and go in our lives, each one of them on their own journey. They can join us on our path for a while (it may be for a moment or it may be for years) but in the end they must leave to continue on their own and ultimately you must do the same. One of my favorite scenes from the movies occurs in the movie, City Slickers, when a lost and confused Mitch is talking to an old withered cowboy Curly about the meaning of life.
This blog has come out of my journey to become the teacher and person I have always wanted to be. I do not claim to be an expert but I have shared my ides, goals, dreams, and failures with many people over the years and a lot of them told me to put them in a book. Well, it is not a book but I think it will do. This blog is a partial compilation of my 18 year journey, which happily is still going strong. I do not claim to be an expert or a writer. I am just a person with some ideas and the need to write something down. I decided to write this blog as a way to work through my own thoughts and hopefully it might be of benefit to someone else. It will contain stories of my life that have affected me, have caused me to questions things to become the teacher I am today. It will also contains quotes and poems that have caused me to think, reflect, and to look for answers answers. I am happy, content, and I can’t imagine doing anything else for a career. When people ask me why I teach my response is, “Teaching is what I am. It is not something I do. I create relationships, build better people, and attempt to change the world.”
What do I want to do with my life? Why do I teach? What are my goals as a teacher? What really makes me happy? These are some of the many questions I have asked myself over the years. I have found a lot of answers but I have uncovered even more questions. It is in the love of the journey and the acceptance of the questions and confusion that I have found my greatest joy and peace in teaching.
Success is a journey… not a destination
~Unknown
The purpose of this blog is to help you ask yourself a lot of questions and have YOU find some of the answers. I could not possibly give you any answers because my life and my experiences are unique to me and the only answers that really matter lie in each one of us. It is our job to figure them out. Each one of us must take our own journey. A lot of people will come and go in our lives, each one of them on their own journey. They can join us on our path for a while (it may be for a moment or it may be for years) but in the end they must leave to continue on their own and ultimately you must do the same. One of my favorite scenes from the movies occurs in the movie, City Slickers, when a lost and confused Mitch is talking to an old withered cowboy Curly about the meaning of life.
Curly [to Mitch]: Do you know what the secret of life is?
[holds up one finger]
Curly: This.
Mitch: Your finger?
Curly: One thing. Just one thing. You stick to that and the rest don't mean shit.
Mitch: But, what is the "one thing?"
Curly: [smiles] That's what *you* have to find out.
My intent is not to make you fell happy and warm inside all the time when reading this blog. My goal is to have you think about yourself, to question others, and to question yourself so that you my become the teacher, but more importantly, the person you have always dreamed of. My wish is that you accept the challenge to determine what it means for you to be a safe, wanted, and successful teacher and person. The journey will not be easy, it will be difficult and like every journey, begins with the first step.
All you can give is your best. What you are doing today is exactly and precisely what you should be doing TODAY. Is it what you should be doing tomorrow or the next day? Only you know the answer to that question. I know that you are amazing, gifted, and worthy of success. You became a teacher to make a difference, to make things better, and to effect our children. Do not let the whiners, the naysayer, or the worn out bitter teachers get you down. If you fight for it, want it bad enough, and are willing to pay the price you can have everything you dreamed of, you can become an Independent Teacher and make teaching the career you have always wanted.
[holds up one finger]
Curly: This.
Mitch: Your finger?
Curly: One thing. Just one thing. You stick to that and the rest don't mean shit.
Mitch: But, what is the "one thing?"
Curly: [smiles] That's what *you* have to find out.
My intent is not to make you fell happy and warm inside all the time when reading this blog. My goal is to have you think about yourself, to question others, and to question yourself so that you my become the teacher, but more importantly, the person you have always dreamed of. My wish is that you accept the challenge to determine what it means for you to be a safe, wanted, and successful teacher and person. The journey will not be easy, it will be difficult and like every journey, begins with the first step.
All you can give is your best. What you are doing today is exactly and precisely what you should be doing TODAY. Is it what you should be doing tomorrow or the next day? Only you know the answer to that question. I know that you are amazing, gifted, and worthy of success. You became a teacher to make a difference, to make things better, and to effect our children. Do not let the whiners, the naysayer, or the worn out bitter teachers get you down. If you fight for it, want it bad enough, and are willing to pay the price you can have everything you dreamed of, you can become an Independent Teacher and make teaching the career you have always wanted.
Power
strength and self-assertion
lie within the us all
yet we are afraid
we do not use the resources
given to us to live our lives
from the stagnation of comfortable routine
locked into jobs, relationships... ourselves
fearing what others may think of us
we lack the courage to step up
from our custom role
strength and self-assertion
lie within the us all
yet we are afraid
we do not use the resources
given to us to live our lives
from the stagnation of comfortable routine
locked into jobs, relationships... ourselves
fearing what others may think of us
we lack the courage to step up
from our custom role
strength and self-assertion
can be demonstrated
with gracious kindness,
softly spoken truths will take us farther
then belligerent defensiveness,
be true to yourself... dare to be different
by courageously stepping forward
and say “I am”… “I will be”
then “be”
remembering always to move softly
with gentleness and love
free yourself from what others want you to be
that with which you have aligned yourself
find and use the magnificent
loving power within you
~diane westlake
I hope some of the things in here will be of some use to you and help you on your journey to become the teacher and person you have always wanted to be.
Best wishes
Shawn
can be demonstrated
with gracious kindness,
softly spoken truths will take us farther
then belligerent defensiveness,
be true to yourself... dare to be different
by courageously stepping forward
and say “I am”… “I will be”
then “be”
remembering always to move softly
with gentleness and love
free yourself from what others want you to be
that with which you have aligned yourself
find and use the magnificent
loving power within you
~diane westlake
I hope some of the things in here will be of some use to you and help you on your journey to become the teacher and person you have always wanted to be.
Best wishes
Shawn
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