Today is full of things I don’t want to do. My anxiety is sky high at the thought of some of these tasks and my mood soured knowing there is no good or guilt free way of getting out of them.
I’m still working with the new class of employees and though I’m comfortable with a lot of the material, there are some skills I’m very new to teaching and knowing that I will still fumble over my words, forget to mention things, and generally look like I don’t know what I’d doing or talking about. My worst professional nightmare.
I try to tell myself that worst case scenario is never as bad in reality as it is in my mind or and never feels as bad afterward as my body assures me it will when I’m caught up in my worry. I know what I am doing and I only have to follow my instincts and share my knowledge, experience, and perspective. I’ve earned the right confidence in my ability to do a good job.
Besides, the truth is I’m not really on my own today and nothing that needs to get done today is solely my responsibility or rests only on my shoulders. We’ve got this.
Had a strange interaction today during my class. I was teaching Crisis Prevention and Intervention a class in which we give employees the tools to verbally descalate crisis situations involving our students.
We teach that all behavior is communication. We teach that behavior influences behavior. We teach reestablishing rapport with our students after any conflict or crisis. We teach that physically intervening with students always involves risk of harm and should only be considered as last resort. We teach that during a physical intervention the safety of the student, the care and compassion for the student, and the consideration for what the student is trying to communicate through the physical outburst be considered throughout the crisis.
In the class was an ex-cop. This ex-cop did not seem to think anything I taught was of value. He rolled his eyes while I spoke. He closed his eyes as if to fall asleep. He did not participate in discussion except to contradict me and near the end he openly admitted that he took nothing away from the class.
This both infuriated me and hurt me. At first I wanted to fight back, to defend myself and my passion for this material and perspective. Then I considered the entire class, and I considered the chances that I might change this ex-cop’s mind and decided that being confident and secure in my viewpoint and intention was the best strategy I had to defend myself and the material.
I decided to preserve my peace of mind and ignore his outbursts and fits.
I decided that I am stronger than one man’s doubt. I always have been.
It’s debate night here in America. The first Presidential Debate is airing right now and I have to say, I have never been so visceral embarrassed to be an American. This is honestly the first time I have watched or listen to Trump for this amount of time and it’s quite…upsetting. The man can’t even follow simple debate protocol and rules. Biden hasn’t been perfect but he is not the one currently tasks with leading and representing this country and he is showing the world the very ugliest side of America.
No matter where you fall on the political spectrum there’s no way you can watch this debate and not know deep down that something deep in the core of this country is badly broken. You can’t watch this and not see that something fundamental in the way we all think and engage with one another and with our politics needs to change.
Lisa Marie Blair 