Unexpected Teachers

To love life seasons this way as well, yeah? 

We all have those wonderful teachers in our lives, those teachers who made the subject matter come alive, who made you actually want to study the things you were learning. Those kinds of teachers make learning a little easier, they can give you keys to access new ways of thinking or enlighten you to a new concept. 

And then there are teachers who do not do this. Who seem to dull your ability to think and imagine. These teachers are challenging and the process of sitting through a class with them can be painful. Yet, you feel guilty for tuning out the droning voice, you know you need to learn the information but the process feels so much more difficult. 

Different teachers evoke different reactions. I learned a valuable lesson from someone the other day, they had recently read a book that talked about seeing difficult people or experiences as unexpected teachers. The reframing of a situation or season in this way caused me to think about my own life, about my current "teachers" and what I was learning. Some of the "teachers" in my life are like the teachers in my first description; interesting and disseminating information very clearly. But the difficult people or situations can often feel like the second description, confusing and frustrating with the information often feeling unnecessary... (Calculus 1 for me in college...#butwhy #idontgetit) 

Even if you have been out of school for years, I think you have still been experiencing some lesson plans. The lessons that are thrown at us, with some of the necessary ones feeling a little unwanted, are so important to our education. 

The way that we react to our teachers can change everything. If you are in a painful lesson plan right now, that has you watching the clock and the calendar for the end of the semester (season), consider what it would be like to sit and take in the information. To accept that this semester is not going to go any faster by you hating it. 

Get out your notebook and handwrite your notes, talk to the teacher after class and see what they think of the lesson from that day, look at an essay or another book on the subject. Let's consider taking a break from agonizing over the frustration of the subject and figure out what it is stirring up in you. 

I understand that some subjects are more difficult than others, illness or death of a loved one certainly seems like classes I am wary to take. But if we can take a deep breath and let the lesson happen, we may actually learn something. 

Love from the trenches (and the classroom), 

Amy