A new teacher with a rowdy or resistant class tends to run around the room, dealing with each issue individually. As she successfully guides one student or group back on task, the rest of class dissolves around her. When she moves on to the next issue, the original group melts down again. This is the way our lives can often feel - so many problems to solve and solutions that don’t stick.
A more experienced teacher learns to stand in front of the room and use body language, tone, volume, and silence to command respect, to come from a place of confidence and self-respect, to let go of fear, and to communicate care, high expectations, and respect for the subject and the students’ capacities. This teacher has also knows her students’ needs and plan lessons accordingly: to build skills necessary for the task, provide the right level of challenge, and make tasks engaging. Of course, some students will still need individual guidance, but far fewer.
We can make this shift in our lives, too. The solution is usually not to run around solving lots of individual problems after they have started. We can begin with care for ourselves, respect for our own dignity, trust in our knowledge and motive, and the expectations that we be treated with respect by others. We can keep our eye on our core values and priorities - which helps us not fret over issues that aren’t related to them. We can do a little pre-thinking, to set ourselves up for success. What are we trying to accomplish or how are we trying to live? What structures might we put in place to support our answers? And pay attention, with kindness, to life as it is: meet others, and yourself, where you are, sometimes lowering your expectations, working more slowly, and sometimes increasing the challenge to push through fear or false beliefs about our limitations.
Today, have good classroom management for your life.