My own learning curve is more like being on a roller coaster these days. This ride is a new one.No way to prepare myself for the ups, downs, and turns. The speed is intermittent where we vacillate between breakneck speeds and crawling up hills that feel unsurmountable. The safety bar is loose and the person running the ride is WAY underpaid and overworked. At top speeds our ride is careening down the rails while a deluge of information, mostly helpful and overwhelming, is dumped into our speeding car. We are splattered at every turn with how to be better at this new world- how dangerous this new world is-how unpredictable this new world is. We are soaked with insecurity and disillusionment. While riding through the loop-d-loops our hearts remind us that we have to protect the children in our cars. They are on this ride as well. Their end of year expectations are falling out as we go. We scramble to secure our precious cargo with our arm stretched across them as if protecting a passenger in a wreck. We can not even truly share the experience because we aren’t sharing this ride directly with our peers. We are all riding our own speeding, nauseatingly upside down course where screaming would be more natural if we weren’t staring at electronic screens. This isn’t the roller coaster we signed up for, but it is the one we are on. And it’s hard. And WE are going to hang on...
As we first went into quarantine, I focussed all of my manic energy in getting things done. All the things. All of them. We truly painted the outside of the house. The sheds. Replaced the kitchen floor. Organized the sheds. Organized the closets. Rearranged the kitchen. Painted and cleaned the back patio. Closets were reconfigured. The pantry was reorganized and now I can’t find all of the macaroni. All the things were getting done because I couldn’t admit that I was devastated to not get to finish the year with my beloved students. That was the hard thing.
Yes, we can do hard things that help us realize our strength and potential. And yes, we can do hard things that suck and hurt and leave us feeling empty.
BUT we don’t have to do all the hard things in the middle of the huge hard thing because of the unbelievable hard things that are still happening. And we don’t know how long this will continue. There is no foreseeable end to this ride.
We can do hard things if they need to be done.
We can do hard things if they will make our lives better.
We can do hard things if they will not drain us completely.
We can do hard things if they will strengthen us.
Hell yes! We can do hard things, but that doesn’t mean that we have to do every hard thing immediately. (Yes, Rachael I know. I could listen to you more.)
With this quarantine some feel the hard thing is getting up and out of bed. Getting dressed. Eating responsibly. Moving intentionally. For some of us, we struggle, truly struggle, to even look at the work we need to do online, much less attend the digital meetings required of us. The hard thing is different for each of us- just like a good lesson plan. That differentiation cannot be underestimated. Each of us is going through this pandemic with their own hard things. WE need to discern what is accessible and fortifying for us. My hope is that we all conquer a few hard things by doing beautiful things.
We can do hard things by doing one simple thing. For me, that means that I follow a work schedule which has kept me oriented during such unpredictable times. One thing can be an email, a text, move clothes from washer to dryer. For some, that might be to go to bed before 3:00 a.m. Do one thing that makes you feel better- more human- more you. Do one thing then try another. Like consider getting those clothes out of the dryer and hanging them up. One thing.
Tomorrow, what is your one beautifully hard thing going to be?
Love you, Jasmin!
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