A Teaching Life

As we move through life, we develop routines we tend to stick to. They work well at first, but unaware they can become a hindrance. We might “fall in” but not notice that our ways no longer serve us. When it happens again, we may blame others. Later when we “fall in,” we recognize it to be our fault.

If we are fortunate, when we choose to “walk around the deep hole” we become aware of what we are doing. The next time, we choose another path, one that will belong to us.

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When you step back to contemplate your life practice, can you find the patterns that are interfering? You think ‘it will get better,’ but it doesn’t. Blaming eventually makes no sense. Taking responsibility becomes the only way out.

Pay attention to those habits that see you “walking down the same street” again and again, falling into the same routines and not considering other possibilities. Apply Portia Nelson’s wisdom to your life and assess whatever is not working and let it go. Take responsibility to “walk around” what’s holding you back. With courage you take full responsibility for yourself. You “walk down another street.”

“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forward.” (Kierkegaard)

I write to bring ideas and methods from my life as a teacher in the latter half of the 20^th century to help teachers and the public to “live forward” in this century. My latest book, Teacher in the Rye: Doing It My Way is available on Amazon. And I welcome comments here on my Substack or by email at frankthoms3@gmail.com.