Boat Across the River
Just another WordPress.com weblogArchive for Lists
Authenticity and Loyalty
Lately I have really been struggling to make sense of my situation at work. This always happens to me…last year I struggled with the same issues; there were three of us in one small office and four sharing one medium sized classroom, and the other three teachers did not get along at ALL. I was always in the middle and ended up feeling like I was trying to be loyal to everyone, but actually being loyal to no one. This year, things have been better, because while we all work together as team teachers, we have three separate classrooms that are adjoined. Having some space to myself has resulted in me feeling better about myself a lot of the time because I have not had to take sides a whole lot. Instead, I have completely withdrawn, focusing primarily on my classroom. I have deliberately done this so that I do not have to interact with the other teachers. Is this me being a grown up? Probably not. Do they all occasionally do things that bother me? Definitely. Is this a reason to completely boycott all interpersonal relations? Probably not.
I am really struggling to find the right balance here. All of our egos are getting in each other’s way. I wish we could all encourage and support each other…and listen to each other without interrupting…and not complain about each other behind the other person’s back. I try really hard to be friendly and encouraging, but then when that person does not reciprocate I get so annoyed that I give up on the relationship completely. Additionally, it’s hard to always be nice to someone when they do things you really disagree with. Then I end up feeling like a fake by trying to be nice when really I don’t feel any loyalty, but you have to be able to fake it to work in such a small space with the same people every day. It’s such a weird petri dish experiment: throw a bunch of completely different people in a classroom together every day and see what happens. It’s the true test of your spiritual progress and that is what is really discouraging to me. I always tell myself to “act like I meditate”…because I do! So why is it always so hard to remember to stay kind, patient, and loving when you’re right in the middle of a difficult situation with someone? It’s really hard to realize that you are not where you thought you were spiritually and it stinks to have to say, “Okay, I’ll start over again tomorrow.” It’s like eating a pound of chocolate when you’re on a diet. I guess we’ve all heard that the only diet that really works is an actual lifestyle change. The process of changing your personality and bad habits takes so many years! I am going to make myself a little list of goals for when I go to work:
1) Be friendly and polite, but not OVERLY friendly! Just try to walk the middle line and honor your true feelings without being a jerk.
2) Don’t avoid people, but when you feel yourself getting emotional, find a way to politely step away and take some deep breaths.
3) When someone is talking about someone else, do NOT join the conversation, even if you have strong feelings about the topic. You are not the principal, and it is not your problem. If you need to vent, wait until you get home!
Aggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!! I’ve told myself these things so many times! What makes me think that this time I will listen to myself?
Top 10 American Towns & Cities
1. Jemez Springs, NM
2. Durango, CO
3. Sedona, AZ
4. Savannah, GA
5. Santa Fe, NM
6. NYC
7. Big Sur, CA
8. Bluff, UT
9. Chicago, IL
10. Indianapolis, IN
These are in no particular order.
Second String
These are movies that I love, but that I don’ t watch over and OVER like my top five.
1. Children of Men
2. Shawshank Redemption
To Do: 2010
1. No more gossip (at work)
2. More active meditation/yoga practice
3. Watch what I eat more carefully
4. Once credit cards are paid off, start giving to charity more regularly again
5. To be continued…
Things That Make Life on Earth Worthwhile
1. Children
2. Music
3. Food
4. Animals
5. Trees
6. Ocean
7. Mountains
8. Snow
Favorite “Green” Items
1. Seventh Generation dishwasher powder — for some reason, it is really hard to find green dishwasher soap around here…but Walgreens has it. This soap does leave a bit of a residue on our dishes, so I am still looking for the perfect green dish soap. But I can put up with the residue…for all I know, I am using it wrong.
(I’ve fouund a biodegradable liquid soap that works much better than the powder).
2. Meijer has a cool plastic kitchen bag called PERF Go Green Biodegradable bags. They claim that their bags completely biodegrade within 2 years, and with no toxins. Hopefully that’s true. Meijer brand has good stuff too — lots of green and organic things.
(My new favorite plastic bag is made by Full Circle and is 100% biodegradable in 9 months to five years or something like that).
3. Fuzzi Bunz cloth diapers. We wash them ourselves — don’t use a service who might use bleach, etc.
4. Organic milk. We buy a lot of organics and will continue to, but this is the one organic product which, to me, tastes remarkably better.
5. Green Power. We buy 100% of our electricity from landfill gas (methane) and wind power. The way this works, as it was explained to me, is that we pay for the amount of electricty we use to be green, and this just collects in the whole city’s pool of electricity. That is, the green power doesn’t necessarily come to us directly…it’s as if the city’s power was a swimming pool, and the amount that people pay for green would be died green in that pool. It’s a nominal additional fee that I am happy to pay.
6. Electric lawn mower — when we plug it in, we know we are getting that energy from green power, too, since we are buying 100% of our electricity from green options through our electric company.
More when I think of them…
Before I Kick the Bucket
I work at an alternative school where our students do much of their work as independent study, asking for assistance from teachers as needed. Each teacher gives two seminars a week. One of my co-teachers gave a seminar on goal setting which I thought was excellent. She told the kids that, “You will never get what you want if you don’t know what you want.” I thought I should take her advice and write down my goals:
1. See Glacier National Park before the glaciers are gone
2. Camp with my daughter and her uncle at Yosemite
3. Kayak with whales
4. Skydive…and go parasailing again
5. See Italy — Rome and Amalfi
6. See France — Paris and Provence
7. Spend a few weeks at a cabin on a lake out west
8. Drive along the coast in California
9. Go sailing — hire someone else to do the sailing
10. Spend a few weeks on an island
11. Foster a child and if that goes well, foster more children
It’s sort of a surprise to me how few goals I actually have when I go to write them down.
