Today I taught my first restorative yoga class. I've taught meditation, yin, yoga nidra, slow flow, and gentle flow/challenge, but never restorative. I'm sharing my class teaching with an another amazing teacher, as we are able to organize our every-other-weekends (hers with a daughter in travel sports, me with my 500-hour meditation teaching coursework), and …
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Not being in a classroom on the first day of school since 1975 has been a textbook meditative exploration of riding the flow of emotions. In meditation, we learn to ride our emotions as they arise in our practice and our life as a series of waves.
But if you want total transparency, I am disgusted that this elected group of people led by an out-of-touch superintendent played chicken with our classrooms and the education of the students we serve, many of whom are already notably behind their peers due to COVID and the negative impact of digital learning in an environment where technology is often unavailable and unreliable.
Why are we striking? The superintendent and board will have you believe it's over our pay. The 1000% unvarnished truth is that our 103 school building district in the heart of Columbus, Ohio, has been poorly managed and even more poorly maintained over the years (I have been here since 2001), and we are requiring the superintendent spend some of the $400 million dollars she was allocated from the federal government from COVID funds (ESSA funds) to do some of these tasks:
So much to do, say, tell you about, over these last 48 hours, but to be honest, I am too emotionally drained to form much of a narrative with all the important details. I didn't want to let the day go by, however, without stating that I am absolutely finished teaching.
And when that final dismissal bell rings
two roads diverge at The Wood1
and I
take the one less traveled by...
So wild to think back to my first few years and how I craved having my own classroom, after two years spent subbing, and two years spent teaching in a janitor's closet. Yes, I had a janitor's closet for my first two years teaching high school, with 10-12 high school kids trying to fit in a room the size of a household bathroom because...
I've been immersed in the experience of being a student on Zoom instead of the teacher, and learning that it is possible for beautiful things to happen there despite the digital divide. With the right teacher and the right energy, my assumptions about online learning have dissolved. Makes me wonder what other assumptions need further investigation against the truth of the matter.
What I do know is that as each day passes, I feel lighter and more human. That's enough for me right now. It's been decades since I've felt this human. I kinda like it.
I may have started teaching in 1995, but I have never known what it feels like to not have August be my New Year's Eve and the first week of June having a holiday-like vibe. I've had bits of dreams of what it would be like to enjoy a gorgeous, chilly autumn morning outside of the cinder block school walls, or...
Why is patience one of the hardest human states to cultivate? Why is it so easy to disrupt?
As you can see, I'm not yet back in the flow of a daily post, but I'll keep working on it. There's something to the habitual practice of writing even a short blog post each day that has an alchemical reaction to making me more aware of the moment-to-moment spaces in life, so it's a place I like to be. In the meantime, this week has been interesting...
Hello, friends. It's been some time, hasn't it? Today is a gorgeous, warm, mid-spring day here in Ohio, the kind we spend the rest of the year either wishing for or looking back upon. I've spent the weekend dog sitting for a colleague, which reminded me of...
Feeling good about your life, but not expressing a heartfelt 'thank you' is like wrapping a gift for someone but never giving it to them--Chip Conley
Dear Football Gods, Please may I have a touchdown? Amen.
Words by Beth 