~Elaboration on My Mini-Epiphany
2006-02-04 - 6:17 p.m.

Did I tell you about my resolution not to be negative anymore? Obviously, one has to have a certain amount of realistic cynicism in one's life in order to be adequately prepared for things going pearshaped, but, by the end of last year, I'd taken beating myself up to a whole new, ridiculous, level. I was very focussed on improving myself, but it was more based on...hm, material achievement. I wanted to feel prouder about my teaching, in particular, and so I stressed about all the things I wasn't doing well (and how I appeared to others). Even with my health, I'd be so aware of all the things I should be eating and how often I should be exercising and so forth...it just seemed that, while I could still be a cheerful and outwardly positive person, I had a lot to work on and I really didn't feel good about myself, nor very confident.

I don't think I went so far as to sobotage myself with my performance in my job interview last year, but I do think my slap-dash preparation for the whole thing was an indication of how little my heart was really in another year of feeling trapped in that same mental space. Teaching is such a relentless job that it doesn't really give the chance to change whole lifestyles and life outlooks very easily. Of course, it also doesn't help that I don't always feel my space is my own at home, either, so, all things combined, I'd pretty much say that I was in a bit of an emotional rut.

And it's funny how a month can change everything. With the prospect of a Big Overseas Trip and without the prospect of being stuck with another class that'd be my responsibility for the whole year, I actually had a chance to step back and look at myself a bit more clearly. I'd been focussing on things like my discipline strategies, my organisation, my self-discipline, my planning and implementation of lessons and the way my health would sometimes make it feel harder to do things well.

And it's all rubbish. That is, I don't mean I can't improve as a teacher, but I'm not a bad teacher. I don't feel like a good one yet, but I had thought I would when I'd mastered enough skills. I realise, now, that I'll feel like a good teacher when I get emotionally healthier. I simply said to myelf "STOP! This is all crap!" and it's funny how that realisation really did shift my perspective quite suddenly. I'm not allowed to look at the negative things anymore. I won't let myself. I'm always going to see the things that I do wrong, so I'm not going to let myself think on them or dwell on them. I may think "Next time I'll..." but, mostly, I'm making myself think "That went well," "I was good with this," and "I enjoyed that..."

And I don't mean I'm stopping being healthy and exercising, but, again, I'm giving myself kudos for the good things I do and making myself feel good about it, rather than saying to myself that I only walked three nights this week and that means there were 4 (or, at least 2, weather and other committments taken into account) when I didn't force myself out and should have. Goodness, three years ago I was lucky if I forced myself out for a walk once a term and two years ago I felt good if I got out once a month or once fortnight! Hardly a week goes by, now, when I don't go for at least one half-hour walk and, quite often, I go for three or more. "Isn't that great?" I now tell myself, "I'm going to keep on like that!". I could think that I should do stretches many times a day, but instead I think "There is maybe one night a term when I go to bed without doing some stretches first. Pretty much every night, even if it makes me half an hour later to bed, I do a set routine of stretches. That's fantastic, that means I have the self-discipline to never miss a day's stretching!"

I've still got a way to go with this thinking, because I still feel guilty, as if I'm letting myself down over certain things, when I shouldn't, and don't have my confidence back, but it's starting to work. It amazing how much easier it makes it not to procrastinate, too. Of course, I still do procrastinate, but I've now got a little voice in my head that remembers more often to say "Well, just do it now and get it over and done with! Is there any real reason to wait another few minutes? Do it while you still remember and then it will be done and you'll feel so good!"

So, I don't do that with everythin So, I have got so much better and remembering to do all of my little chores and things. Of course, I'm silly in that a lot of the time I only like getting stuff done when I'm on my own, and there's pretty much always someone else in the house when I'm home, but that's something else I'm getting better at, too: Not letting outside considerations affect me so much. Pretty much all of my problems and difficulties really originate from me, from my own thoughts, feelings and behaviour, therefore the solution also lies within me. It's how I'd begun to feel, anyway, but the Buddhism, Plain and Simple book that I'm reading was talking about that, too. While I wouldn't say that I believe it in the sense of being a convert to Buddhism and on my way to enlightenment, it was something that I think I was coming to realise and it came along and expressed it explicitly at just the right moment. Most of the solution is to do with how I look at the problem, too, not in trying to do something better or differently to erradicate the problem.

Take my teaching ability, for instance, the solution to me not feeling like a good teacher is not to work at getting everything perfect, the solution is for me to switch my way of thinking about my teaching so I don't feel bad about it anymore. It doesn't mean I stop trying to improve, but there's a difference between being inspired to do something better and feeling as if nothing I do is even adequate and that I should be ashamed of my abilities and only a miraculous amount of effort would make me worthy. It wasn't that I didn't tell myself anything like this last year, it was that I didn't believe it, I didn't know it in my core. I still don't, all the time, but I do far more often than I used to.