Your Cape - Breathe Owl Breathe
Shine On - Seth Bernard and Daisy May
Rise Up Singing - Daisy May
Looks Like Love - Needtobreathe
Can't Go Back Now - The Weepies
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
I have high hopes for November
My soccer team lost on Monday... 1-0... to the team we always seem to lose to. I always feel like it's my fault, like if I were actually a soccer coach (because I don't really have any experience with the sport) then they would win. It goes along with the persistent underlying feeling that I'm not qualified to do what I do, that one of these days a parent will call me out as being practically a child and not at all experienced enough to have significant sway in the lives of high schoolers.
Sorry about not blogging much in October. October was survival month for me. I didn't have anything to say on here because, in reality, I wasn't thinking much at all beyond the daily lesson plans, grading, soccer practices, and other work-related responsibilities. There were a few breaks, some visits with good friends, but all-in-all, here I am at the beginning of November and I am exhausted. I am behind on grading, I'm disappointed in myself because I feel like my lessons have stunk recently, I've been impatient with my students, and I have been selfish with my friends.
I have high hopes for November. I want to take November to get healthy - to work out regularly, to read and pray and study, to spend good time giving in relationships (not taking... I feel like I always take), to find out how to love God and love others without getting so caught up in what I'm doing. I don't know what that will look like, but hopefully it will involve more regular posts on here. Posting on here is a sign that I'm actually taking the time to think.
Sorry about not blogging much in October. October was survival month for me. I didn't have anything to say on here because, in reality, I wasn't thinking much at all beyond the daily lesson plans, grading, soccer practices, and other work-related responsibilities. There were a few breaks, some visits with good friends, but all-in-all, here I am at the beginning of November and I am exhausted. I am behind on grading, I'm disappointed in myself because I feel like my lessons have stunk recently, I've been impatient with my students, and I have been selfish with my friends.
I have high hopes for November. I want to take November to get healthy - to work out regularly, to read and pray and study, to spend good time giving in relationships (not taking... I feel like I always take), to find out how to love God and love others without getting so caught up in what I'm doing. I don't know what that will look like, but hopefully it will involve more regular posts on here. Posting on here is a sign that I'm actually taking the time to think.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Perspective
I was reading in Psalm 74 this morning, and I kept rereading these verses:
12 Yet God my King is from of old,
working salvation in the midst of the earth.
13 You divided the sea by your might;
you broke the heads of the sea monsters [4] on the waters.
14 You crushed the heads of Leviathan;
you gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness.
15 You split open springs and brooks;
you dried up ever-flowing streams.
16 Yours is the day, yours also the night;
you have established the heavenly lights and the sun.
17 You have fixed all the boundaries of the earth;
you have made summer and winter.
It's important for me to remember this as I teach, interact with students, and hang out with friends. These verses say so much more than God is in control of my life. They reassert that my King is from of old, from the beginning, and has been working in the world from the beginning. His plan for his people has been in place from the beginning and will be in place in the end.
12 Yet God my King is from of old,
working salvation in the midst of the earth.
13 You divided the sea by your might;
you broke the heads of the sea monsters [4] on the waters.
14 You crushed the heads of Leviathan;
you gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness.
15 You split open springs and brooks;
you dried up ever-flowing streams.
16 Yours is the day, yours also the night;
you have established the heavenly lights and the sun.
17 You have fixed all the boundaries of the earth;
you have made summer and winter.
It's important for me to remember this as I teach, interact with students, and hang out with friends. These verses say so much more than God is in control of my life. They reassert that my King is from of old, from the beginning, and has been working in the world from the beginning. His plan for his people has been in place from the beginning and will be in place in the end.
Friday, October 9, 2009
Oh, man... where do they come up with this stuff?
(In response to my asking a girl on my soccer team why she looked so sad)
student: Miss, WE'RE not sad, it's just that YOU'RE happy all the time.
me: Really?
student: Yes. It's unnatural. You're always smiling. Nobody smiles that much. It's unhealthy. You're definitely not from New England. You definitely don't fit in here.
me: Well, ok then. Thanks for that!
student: Miss, WE'RE not sad, it's just that YOU'RE happy all the time.
me: Really?
student: Yes. It's unnatural. You're always smiling. Nobody smiles that much. It's unhealthy. You're definitely not from New England. You definitely don't fit in here.
me: Well, ok then. Thanks for that!
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
It's good being a teacher when...
... Your day begins with your advisees telling you how cute you look (conversely, not so good when they tell you how awful you look).
... Your soccer team wins a game 6-0 because they finally started young what you've been telling them to do.
... Your student dedicates a Brittany Spears song to you when it comes on the radio ("Miss! It's our song!")
... You have a meeting with the Development department (fundraising) in which you get to talk about great kids with great stories.
... You get to take students out for coffee during free periods.
... You help kids with their homework, they get it, and they're excited to keep working on it.
I really love high schoolers. I really love my kids. They're so worth every minute they require of me... It's sad when I get so behind at life that I don't have the energy to really love them.
... Your soccer team wins a game 6-0 because they finally started young what you've been telling them to do.
... Your student dedicates a Brittany Spears song to you when it comes on the radio ("Miss! It's our song!")
... You have a meeting with the Development department (fundraising) in which you get to talk about great kids with great stories.
... You get to take students out for coffee during free periods.
... You help kids with their homework, they get it, and they're excited to keep working on it.
I really love high schoolers. I really love my kids. They're so worth every minute they require of me... It's sad when I get so behind at life that I don't have the energy to really love them.
Sunday, October 4, 2009
The Abolition of Man and an understanding of identity
I've been reading/thinking a lot recently about identity (as you have undoubtedly noticed in previous posts). I'm surrounded daily by students who seem to be feverishly consuming, rearranging, adding to their lives in an attempt to feel good about who they are. I had multiple conversations this week with students who are "too stressed out" and who want to drop some responsibility, requirement, activity because overall they're too tired and miserable to enjoy anything. The argument, across the board, is that there is one activity (a sport, a class, a club) that puts them over the edge, that they used to enjoy but that no longer brings them happiness, and that dropping that sport/activity will allow them to be happy again.
This is so sad! If they continue to approach their lives in this way - evaluating the worth of their activities based on what those activities do for them - they will never find happiness. It's so subjective, so transient, so unstable. In my frustration with a particular senior, I asked her what part of the activity of grading papers, lesson planning, and prepping soccer practices she thought gave me happiness... what does spending hours correcting paragraphs on ancient Egyptians do to enrich my life? Although I was perhaps a little harsh in my presentation, my point was that meaning in life cannot come from what we do... we must realize that meaning comes from something much bigger, something outside of ourselves - that what we do is a product of that ultimate meaning, or a vehicle for bringing that meaning to others, not an end in itself.
In The Abolition of Man, C.S. Lewis addresses this tendency in modern society to base value judgments on either what is rational (the head, cerebral, what can be arrived at by deconstructing to the point of eliminating all things emotional) or what is instinct (the stomach, based only on what makes us feel good, rather than on a standard outside of ourselves). He says,
"The head rules the belly through the chest - the seat, as Alanus tells us, of Magnanimity, of emotions organized by trained habit into stable sentiments. The Chest-Magnanimity-Sentiment - these are the indispensable liaison officers between cerebral man and visceral man. It may even be said that it is by this middle element that man is man: for by his intellect he is mere spirit and by his appetite mere animal."
And his point is that the chest, Magnanimity, must be based on a standard of what is good that is completely independent of either our rational, deconstructive analysis or our irrational, self-seeking instinctual desires. There must be a greater standard of good that informs both our quest for knowledge and the way in which we seek to apply that knowledge to the greater world around us. He ends his essay with the following:
"The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it. It is good that the window should be transparent, because the street or garden beyond it is opaque. How if you saw through the garden too? It is no use trying to 'see through' first principles. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To 'see through' all things is not the same as to see."
If, in our approach to our world, we are not seeking knowledge as a means of understanding the opaque behind the transparent, we are completely missing the point. The philosopher Charles Taylor, in his book, Sources of the Self (which I've just begun to try and tackle - it's huge), looks extensively at the modern idea of identity (well, at how the modern view of identity has come about). He also sees man as formulating identity based on what he does rather than on some objective standard outside of himself that informs his view of identity:
"Much contemporary moral philosophy, particularly but not only in the English-speaking world, has given such a narrow focus to morality that some of the crucial connections I want to draw here are incomprehensible in its terms. This moral philosophy has tended to focus on what it is right to do rather than on what it is good to be, on defining the content of obligation rather than the nature of the good life; and it has no conceptual place left for the notion of the good as the object of our love or allegiance..."
It's not about me! I cannot make my decisions based on how I feel or what makes me happy or on what is rationally and scientifically the decision with the least percentage of error. Instead, there is something greater, a universal standard of what is good (which Lewis calls the Tao) that each of my decisions must be motivated by. It's not that making magnanimous decisions rejects the rational or the instinctual, it's not calling us all to be ascetics and to continually deny ourselves happiness... instead, it's this idea that, in my complete self-centeredness, my view of what will make me happy is so microscopic and distorted in comparison to God's view of my happiness, in his complete understanding of the ultimate "big picture" of humanity.
This is so sad! If they continue to approach their lives in this way - evaluating the worth of their activities based on what those activities do for them - they will never find happiness. It's so subjective, so transient, so unstable. In my frustration with a particular senior, I asked her what part of the activity of grading papers, lesson planning, and prepping soccer practices she thought gave me happiness... what does spending hours correcting paragraphs on ancient Egyptians do to enrich my life? Although I was perhaps a little harsh in my presentation, my point was that meaning in life cannot come from what we do... we must realize that meaning comes from something much bigger, something outside of ourselves - that what we do is a product of that ultimate meaning, or a vehicle for bringing that meaning to others, not an end in itself.
In The Abolition of Man, C.S. Lewis addresses this tendency in modern society to base value judgments on either what is rational (the head, cerebral, what can be arrived at by deconstructing to the point of eliminating all things emotional) or what is instinct (the stomach, based only on what makes us feel good, rather than on a standard outside of ourselves). He says,
"The head rules the belly through the chest - the seat, as Alanus tells us, of Magnanimity, of emotions organized by trained habit into stable sentiments. The Chest-Magnanimity-Sentiment - these are the indispensable liaison officers between cerebral man and visceral man. It may even be said that it is by this middle element that man is man: for by his intellect he is mere spirit and by his appetite mere animal."
And his point is that the chest, Magnanimity, must be based on a standard of what is good that is completely independent of either our rational, deconstructive analysis or our irrational, self-seeking instinctual desires. There must be a greater standard of good that informs both our quest for knowledge and the way in which we seek to apply that knowledge to the greater world around us. He ends his essay with the following:
"The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it. It is good that the window should be transparent, because the street or garden beyond it is opaque. How if you saw through the garden too? It is no use trying to 'see through' first principles. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To 'see through' all things is not the same as to see."
If, in our approach to our world, we are not seeking knowledge as a means of understanding the opaque behind the transparent, we are completely missing the point. The philosopher Charles Taylor, in his book, Sources of the Self (which I've just begun to try and tackle - it's huge), looks extensively at the modern idea of identity (well, at how the modern view of identity has come about). He also sees man as formulating identity based on what he does rather than on some objective standard outside of himself that informs his view of identity:
"Much contemporary moral philosophy, particularly but not only in the English-speaking world, has given such a narrow focus to morality that some of the crucial connections I want to draw here are incomprehensible in its terms. This moral philosophy has tended to focus on what it is right to do rather than on what it is good to be, on defining the content of obligation rather than the nature of the good life; and it has no conceptual place left for the notion of the good as the object of our love or allegiance..."
It's not about me! I cannot make my decisions based on how I feel or what makes me happy or on what is rationally and scientifically the decision with the least percentage of error. Instead, there is something greater, a universal standard of what is good (which Lewis calls the Tao) that each of my decisions must be motivated by. It's not that making magnanimous decisions rejects the rational or the instinctual, it's not calling us all to be ascetics and to continually deny ourselves happiness... instead, it's this idea that, in my complete self-centeredness, my view of what will make me happy is so microscopic and distorted in comparison to God's view of my happiness, in his complete understanding of the ultimate "big picture" of humanity.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Trust and grace
I'm not sure how to word this post in a way that won't sound self-seeking, like false modesty. Here goes, hopefully...
I live a very blessed life. God has given me various abilities and has allowed me to see success in using them. I tend to succeed in what I do. This weekend, I was complimented on several different occasions for several different things. I don't like being told how good I am at things - I don't like it when I'm introduced to new people and all that is said about me is how good I am at something. It scares me to be known for those things because it makes me afraid to mess up. If I am known and valued for what I am good at, if I mess up, I'll lose my value, I'll disappoint the people around me and they won't want me around any more.
I think, because of this, I have a fear that my problems, the real Amy, is too much for the people around me. I don't ask for help because I'm afraid that if I rely on other people, I'll be too heavy, they won't want to support me. So, I tell you that everything will be ok, and I do whatever needs to get done, and I internalize it, or journal it, and rarely do I share it. I'll do what needs to be done and I'll joke about it because that's what I think you value.
This, I'm beginning to understand, is evidence that I do not fully understand the work of God's grace in my life. My talents will never be enough to sustain me. This way of living cannot succeed. When I derive my worth from what others think of me, and I convince myself that the opinions of others are based solely on what I can do for them (what I'm good at), I am operating under the mindset that I on my own can amount to something. It's impossible, it's exhausting, and it's totally erroneous.
Instead, I need to continually be brought back to Christ's death and resurrection, the only reason that there is any hope for any true success or genuine restoration on this earth. I need to regain perspective - it's not about me at all, not about what I can do or can't do. Instead, it is Christ that has initiated, begun, and will continue to transform my heart to match his and therefore to use me to bring him glory in what I do.
My friend Jonathan preached today on the passage from Isaiah 6 when Isaiah saw the Lord (well, his robes, throne, and seraphim). He talked about how when Isaiah saw the glory of the Lord he was filled with disgust at his unclean mouth and the unclean mouths of his people. Then, a seraphim took tongs and picked up a burning coal and touched it to Isaiah's lips. Finally, Isaiah heard the Lord ask who would go speak for Him and Isaiah said, "here I am, send me." Isaiah became sickeningly aware of his sin in the presence of the Lord, bit he could do nothing to restore himself, the renewal was all God's. Ultimately, I am vile and worthless, unable to stop my sin, but God sees, God restores, and God sends. It's not about me... It's not about what I'm good at. It's all about God and his plan for renewing his world.
I live a very blessed life. God has given me various abilities and has allowed me to see success in using them. I tend to succeed in what I do. This weekend, I was complimented on several different occasions for several different things. I don't like being told how good I am at things - I don't like it when I'm introduced to new people and all that is said about me is how good I am at something. It scares me to be known for those things because it makes me afraid to mess up. If I am known and valued for what I am good at, if I mess up, I'll lose my value, I'll disappoint the people around me and they won't want me around any more.
I think, because of this, I have a fear that my problems, the real Amy, is too much for the people around me. I don't ask for help because I'm afraid that if I rely on other people, I'll be too heavy, they won't want to support me. So, I tell you that everything will be ok, and I do whatever needs to get done, and I internalize it, or journal it, and rarely do I share it. I'll do what needs to be done and I'll joke about it because that's what I think you value.
This, I'm beginning to understand, is evidence that I do not fully understand the work of God's grace in my life. My talents will never be enough to sustain me. This way of living cannot succeed. When I derive my worth from what others think of me, and I convince myself that the opinions of others are based solely on what I can do for them (what I'm good at), I am operating under the mindset that I on my own can amount to something. It's impossible, it's exhausting, and it's totally erroneous.
Instead, I need to continually be brought back to Christ's death and resurrection, the only reason that there is any hope for any true success or genuine restoration on this earth. I need to regain perspective - it's not about me at all, not about what I can do or can't do. Instead, it is Christ that has initiated, begun, and will continue to transform my heart to match his and therefore to use me to bring him glory in what I do.
My friend Jonathan preached today on the passage from Isaiah 6 when Isaiah saw the Lord (well, his robes, throne, and seraphim). He talked about how when Isaiah saw the glory of the Lord he was filled with disgust at his unclean mouth and the unclean mouths of his people. Then, a seraphim took tongs and picked up a burning coal and touched it to Isaiah's lips. Finally, Isaiah heard the Lord ask who would go speak for Him and Isaiah said, "here I am, send me." Isaiah became sickeningly aware of his sin in the presence of the Lord, bit he could do nothing to restore himself, the renewal was all God's. Ultimately, I am vile and worthless, unable to stop my sin, but God sees, God restores, and God sends. It's not about me... It's not about what I'm good at. It's all about God and his plan for renewing his world.
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