I found myself very thankful last night. While working on some projects, I received a call from a dear friend and former student--one of my favorite people. He wanted to run some thoughts by me about a project he is working on. He is in grad school at Kansas State and my heart swells when I think about where he is in life, what he is learning, who he is becoming, and whom he is already influencing with the ideas he is cultivating in academia.
I don't really have any regrets about leaving teaching, simply because I have so many former students who have become amazing adults. And while I take absolutely no credit for who they are and what they are doing, I do find satisfaction in knowing I saw greatness in them when they were teenagers figuring out how to navigate life in the halls of Boling High School.
We talked last night about identity and how we see ourselves. We talked about how identity changes when we learn to stop accepting the identity others project upon us. How we have to figure out what it means to exist when we realize we aren't the person other people told us we were. There is freedom in shedding that false covering. It was a stimulating conversation to say the least.
I continued to think about identity--including my own. I thought about the fact that I used to think a lot about getting there. The elusive there that would be the place in life where I stopped wanting more. And I had one of those lightbulb moments (I have a lot of those) in which I realized that I don't want to get there--that particular place--anymore. Because my there was a place of not wanting any more from life. The place where I could sit back and coast. And knowing myself like I do, I know I'd just get lazy and complacent. I need more from life than that.
My there has changed over the years and I couldn't be happier about that. My there used to have a lot of stuff in it. A lot of material goods. Now it has a lot of experiences and change. And that's how I prefer it. That's a longing for more that I can live with. That I don't think I can live--really live--without. And I'm deciding I'll take the discontent that can go with that kind of longing. Because in my lightbulb moment I realized that the world has never been changed by satisfied people. And if you ever catch me coasting, point me back to this blog, throw my words in my face, I can take it. I'm used to it. I taught high school.
I don't really have any regrets about leaving teaching, simply because I have so many former students who have become amazing adults. And while I take absolutely no credit for who they are and what they are doing, I do find satisfaction in knowing I saw greatness in them when they were teenagers figuring out how to navigate life in the halls of Boling High School.
We talked last night about identity and how we see ourselves. We talked about how identity changes when we learn to stop accepting the identity others project upon us. How we have to figure out what it means to exist when we realize we aren't the person other people told us we were. There is freedom in shedding that false covering. It was a stimulating conversation to say the least.
I continued to think about identity--including my own. I thought about the fact that I used to think a lot about getting there. The elusive there that would be the place in life where I stopped wanting more. And I had one of those lightbulb moments (I have a lot of those) in which I realized that I don't want to get there--that particular place--anymore. Because my there was a place of not wanting any more from life. The place where I could sit back and coast. And knowing myself like I do, I know I'd just get lazy and complacent. I need more from life than that.
My there has changed over the years and I couldn't be happier about that. My there used to have a lot of stuff in it. A lot of material goods. Now it has a lot of experiences and change. And that's how I prefer it. That's a longing for more that I can live with. That I don't think I can live--really live--without. And I'm deciding I'll take the discontent that can go with that kind of longing. Because in my lightbulb moment I realized that the world has never been changed by satisfied people. And if you ever catch me coasting, point me back to this blog, throw my words in my face, I can take it. I'm used to it. I taught high school.
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