The mindful teacher

I can’t control if I wake up with a headache, but I can wiggle my toes and move my feet I can’t control what politicians say or do,  but I can get off my couch, and put my shoes on I can’t  control if my dog leaves a mess on the carpet-  but I can pick up my left leg   I cannot control how I'm feeling - up, down, bored, excited..., but I can place one foot on the pavement   I can’t control whether it’s about to rain, but I can pull out my umbrella - and take another step   I can't control all the thoughts running through my head, but I can focus on the sensations in the bottom of my feet, and take another step   I can’t  control what people think of me, or say about me... but I can keep moving anyway    I can’t control what’s past, or  what’s yet to come- but I can look around me, and take another step   Someday, I won't be able to move my legs, or my feet, or any part of my body...and I cannot control when that day may come.   But for today, for  this moment, I can take an

While the mindfulness in education movement is still young, it has an increasing footprint in schools across the US and the globe. One can argue that most of the practices are body and sensory based practices- breathing, awareness of sound, mindful movement, etc. All in the service of self-awareness and emotional health, all well and good. But some educators are trying to expand that interpretation of mindfulness. Amy Edelstein is an educator in the Philadelphia schools where she has worked as an outside provider (meaning she is not a regular classroom teacher) teaching mindfulness to students for many years. She has developed her own program called  The Inner Strength System , and her most recent book is entitled, The Conscious Classroom (Emergence Education Press, 2017) . In this  wide-ranging book Edelstein shares her experience working in the urban schools of Philadelphia. She does not shy  away from describing the tremendous challenges her school faces, challeng

My local grocery store has lots of "BOGOS" in their aisles- buy one, get one free deals. Instead of  getting just one bag of Tostitos with your purchase, you get two. Awesome, right?  It struck me that emotional states often come as BOGOS too. Buy into one, and you get another right along with it- often the same one. But in our emotional life, the effects are not always so awesome, and sometimes, the price is high.  For example, if I notice anxiety arising, I might feel anxious about my anxiety. If anger is present, I might get angry at myself for being angry.  As the psychologist Albert Ellis put it, "If you look at what you are doing, you can often discover that you are making yourself anxious about your anxiety, depressed about your depression, and guilty about your rage. You  really are talented at upsetting yourself!" (from the book, How to stubbornly refuse to make yourself miserable about anything, yes anything ).  The problem is that the secondary emo

Photo by Yogendra Singh on Unsplash Life has a way of knocking us  flat at times -  but for some, that's not just metaphor.  Recently my friend Michele told me a story about just that: being knocked flat in a violent encounter during a broom ball match. As she was scrambling after the ball, a member of the opposing team crashed into her hockey style, tripping her  and knocking her flat on the ice. She was  left with  with painful bruises on her side. She experienced a wave of intense anger flow through her. She "saw red",  and  noticed an impulse to strike back at her aggressor, whom she was sure made the hit intentionally. Her natural  impulse  to fight or flee was fully online, "completely out of the ordinary", as she says.  But what really made her story memorable was what she did - and didn't do- next. After the hit,  she paused and said out loud, "I am experiencing rage right now!" She watched her rage- and thoughts of hitting back, 

I met Tom Odland my freshman year at St. Olaf college in 1977. He was a typical college kid, full of life and had a great sense of humor. He was a talented trumpet player too, and was always after  me to sit and listen to his latest jazz hero. (He was part of  a small band that played Mexican and traditional rock music which I remember dancing to and having a ball.) Tom eventually left St. Olaf, to continue his studies at the University of Minnesota, eventually becoming a successful research scientist for St. Jude's Medical for ten years. After that, he worked for a German medical company and later, went on his own as a consultant.  He was happily married, with a wife and four  daughters, when tragedy struck.  While fixing a toilet one day,  he realized something was going terribly wrong. When he tried to grasp a plunger with his right arm, he couldn't hold it. With his knowledge of biology, he figured he was having a stroke.  By some miracle, he got himself  to a local c

Enlightenment comes in many shapes and sizes. The classic story of St. Paul on the road to Damascus, or the Buddha sitting under the Bodhi tree, or  Sir Isaac Newton getting hit  on the head with an apple, come to mind as examples of  insights that changed the course of history.  Photo by Drew Coffman on Unsplash      But for most of us, insights come in more modest packaging. And  like the previous examples, they can come after months or years of preparation.  Suddenly, one day, we see something differently that changes our lives.  I recall a moment  many years ago,  when something I knew intellectually, abstractly, I suddenly knew with my whole being.   One of my own breakthroughs came as I was sitting on a noisy bus.  I had been struggling with anxiety, and here I was again, feeling jittery.  And then, it hit me:  I don't have to do anything. I can just let these feelings be there.  Bam.  Years of striving to find the right  way to cope with my emotions  just seemed to