It Pays to Bend: The Benefits of Emotional Flexibility

Isn’t this a great image?

Ayden A., 10, drew this. He has type 1 diabetes (T1D), like me. His mom sent this to me in response to one of my requests on InsulinNation for art by those with this condition.

I want to connect with others with T1D. I also want to practice my preaching that we're stronger together. I'm looking to answer: What will happen to me and my writing if I work with other artists?

For my art requests, I’m intentional vague on what I want to see. My parameters are flexible. I’m simply looking for images that people feel tell something about themselves and their stories.

Flexibility is a powerful and scary skill to practice.

We like control. Flexibility requires a release of control. It takes courage. I was reminded of this in a great TED talk by Harvard Medical School psychologist Susan David, called The Gift and Power of Emotional Courage. She's also written a book on this flexibility, called Emotional Agility: Get Unstuck, Embrace Change, and Thrive in Work and Life.

As I was absorbing this talk, my mind went back to Ayden's picture. I’d had a strong reaction to it initially. With Dr. David’s words running through my head, possible reasons appeared.

In Ayden’s art, I see a pumpkin with two faces in it. One, a regular smiling face. The other, what appears to be a devil in red, also smiling. Both faces are framed together within a single segment of the pumpkin’s rind. Perhaps Ayden feels like he has different things inside one whole. I know I feel that way. There are days when I’m feeling great. And there are days when absolutely everything feels awful and I wish for a “get off this crazy ride” button.

Both his faces are smiling broadly, but very differently. That reminded me of Dr. David’s admonitions on false positivity. In the loss of her father, she described herself as the master of being OK. She wasn’t and hiding it only made it worse. We do that quite a bit, whether we have diabetes or not.

That devil’s grin has teeth.

If we try to smile all the time and simply reply, “I’m OK!” without thinking, we’re lying.  We’re hurting ourselves. We have a huge pile of emotions, none of which are bad. We need to accept them all and be open to what they can teach us about ourselves. To me, Ayden’s picture shows that. Having only just entered double-digit age, he’s depicted a whole person (pumpkin) contains many feelings.

We are complex. Our lives are complex. We can’t hold everything in a certain place.

Dr. David indicates in her talk that many people want feelings to go away. Alas, “Discomfort is the price of admission to a meaningful life.” We are not our anger, fear, jealousy or disappointment. Nor are we happy. We feel these emotions and they tell us something about ourselves and situations.

Life’s not all neat and perfect. That’s another thing I like about Ayden’s drawing. He colored within lines but there’s a mix of the real and the imaginary. There’s a corner that maybe should have been green, but is red. The pumpkin is partially blue. He’s added hearts and stars with pencil. Not everything is just simply blocks of color. And why not? Life’s like that. Unpredictable. Pleasure within pain. Growth within change.

Dr. David used the term “tyranny of positivity” to describe our culture today. Let’s loosen its control by embracing flexibility. When we’re feeling sad, it’s good to explore it and its causes. When we’re feeling glad, it helps to look at why. When we’re at our wits’ end, it’s best to admit it and look for steps we can take. We need to face the emotions we’ve come to understand as “bad”, both to ourselves and those around us. As Dr. David concluded,

"Emotional agility is the ability to be with your emotions with curiosity, compassion and especially the courage to take values-connected steps."

We can all benefit if we do this. In fact, if I had one complaint in Dr. David’s theory, it would be a greater emphasis on the need for us to understand how linked we all are and how we all need to participate. I know so many people who have been reduced to living with this one mantra: “Keep your head down and just get through it.” The “it” can be anything. Sometimes diabetes feels like that. There isn’t even the false positivity to hide behind.

We can (and must) all help each other out. We can all get through more if we do it together.

I’ve been able to understand more things by looking at Ayden’s art and listening to Dr. David’s research, just as I was able to flesh out my messages of support for teachers in Dear Teachers using the images of my friend, Marlene Oswald.

I thank Ayden for his work, both artistic and as a Diabetic Warrior, and his mom for the opportunity to show this in one example and I hope to do more in the days ahead! Stay tuned and keep sending that T1D art (from all ages!) to dearwarriors2018@gmail.com!

On The Shore of What Is and What Could Be

Brian Crosby’s photographs inspired me again this week, this time on the ageless beauty of the sea and shore. His image at Whitehaven in Cambria spoke of a balance that I wanted to explore. While not revolutionary, I felt it worthy to be considered again. I do try to apply a unique KPop hook at the end, so I hope you’ll stay with me.

Life’s a dance about what we have and are and what we could have or could become:  What Is and What Could Be.

I see our schools are one place where What Is and What Could Be come together on a regular basis. Not the only place, but a consistent one.

What Is

We’re all a part of What Is. Adults and children: every single human alive today. Our kids are living and breathing What Is. Sometimes it’s privilege, comfortable and sure- one’s life is spread out and the way is fairly clear to see. Many times, it’s not. What Is is messy. It’s good times and things, but it’s also stress, poverty, abuse and job loss or underemployment. It’s differing abilities, preferences and creeds. It’s unexpected calamities. More and more, It’s us against them. It’s fear and anger. It’s blaming someone else. Our teachers experience What Is not only in their own lives- their days are spent soaked in the What Is of hundreds of people. Day in. Day out.

In the midst of What Is, our schools seek to guide young minds to the the concept of something of fluid (and some feel, scary) power: What Could Be.

What Could Be

Today, teachers have technologies and pedagogies (the fancy word for “ways of teaching”) that could lead to amazing advancements in the world. They have ways to guide minds to operate together, debate constructively and to be open to trying and failing and trying again.  They have access to worldwide sources of information on today’s cutting-edge discovers and research and for their students to share their own findings near and far. I doubt I’m too far off when I say that teachers today seek to form people who will lead the world- a world they hope will include their students warmly and allow them to contribute meaningfully.

They do, at least, when not so beaten by What Is that they lose sight of the promise of What Could Be.

What Could Be is fluid, as I said before. I picture it as the ocean and What Is as a rocky island. What Could Be is all the stuff that we wonder and dream about. It’s bits of what we know and splashes of novel things sloshing around with potential, but no real form yet.  It’s neither good nor bad, and What Could Be washes constantly on the shore of What Is, eroding and depositing, molding it over time.

Natural Progression Unless...

That is, if What Is allows it to. What Is can build barriers against What Could Be. These barriers can be laws that select for the status quo. They can be the withholding of information to or access to resources for certain people. They can be the silencing or defamation of contrary voices. These barriers can even be as simple as plain unknowing ignorance, disinterest and/or stubbornness by enough people to slam the brakes on the hopes and dreams of others seeking What Could Be.

To be open to the potential of What Could Be, we have to have hope that things can get better than What Is. We have to be willing to take risks with What Is and practice with new ideas and ways. We need to be willing to help each other and to risk failure. We have to be willing to stand back up and try again when we do fail, because we always will face calamities.

That last paragraph? That’s what you learn in school. That’s what we should practice regularly in our jobs and personal lives, too. All of us.

The ebb and flow of a seashore is a reminder to us all of the amazing and exciting dance we face if we’re willing: What Is and What Could Be. As Block B asks in their 2017 hit, Shall We Dance:

“I don’t want to be locked up
Gather the crowds, let’s break the taboo
We need to spread out
Or else we might become scarecrows
We can make empty lots into royal spaces
This is the peak, don’t exit out now
To the left, to the right, rock all night

Gather in a circle
Hesitant people won’t get in
Turn on the music and don’t give a care
Ya’ll just vibe with me, baby
I like that person over there
Pop it up, burn it up, more and more
Hey you guys, wanna play?
Don’t just watch, join us

Shall we dance…?”

Yes, we should.

Hopes and Opportunities

Today, I am sharing an essay from my book, Dear Teachers, which is available at Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk. From the beautiful pictures of Marlene Oswald, I wrote messages to educators of my own life struggles and understandings in the hopes that they might help others in their own. I made writing space for the reader to connect because I think we all have things to share- we’re together.

Hope

Sometimes, I open my eyes in the morning feeling more tired than when I closed them the night before. My feet ache, my ankles crack and my knees pop as I stumble down the hall, seeking the healing warmth that is my morning joe.

I hear Time ticking. It all reminds me that nothing lasts forever. I can no more forever hold back the ravages of time as I can see the universe in a single glance. But I can be OK with that. I can still have hope and take opportunities.

Hope is feeling an empty page is an opportunity for a new tale or seeing a barren field as tomorrow’s harvest. Hope is what powers that step off the porch for the last time, turning our backs on one dream to begin a journey toward another. There can be more.

Both the veteran educator and the newbie can fall short. Whatever the cause, reality sometimes strips us bare despite our best efforts and plans. Yet, we can still have hope. We can take another chance.

We must remember a truth of all human life: what we have built will stand in some way, shape or form. What we’ve even tried to build will live on in another’s memory or their future discovery. The rusted fence may no longer hold back the wilds of nature or retain the builder’s fortunes, but it still stands. It is. It can be. Something. The life-giving windmill still sings a song, although today it may be a completely different tune and to an entirely different listener. It just needs an ear to hear it.

There is always pain. There is always discord. Yet, there is also always hope and opportunity.

Reflections on Hope: Who, what and where are my own hopes and my opportunities?

The Bell

The weather has warmed up enough that I sit at my kitchen table writing with the windows open. Humid breezes brimming with the sounds of spring are brushing my bare arms; it’s a rich pattern of bird song, wind chimes, trembling tree leaves and construction traffic. Suddenly, there’s a new sound.

Wafting in from a distance comes the buzz of a school bell.

Personally and professionally, this sound has regularly ran my life, as it has with most people at some point. Today, it reminds me of bigger bells.

The old Metallica song is going through my head: “Time marches on. For whom the bell tolls…” (Sorry, Mr. Hemingway, for once I’m not going to cite only great literature.)

While I think the chiming melodies they use in Japan are far more soothing than the jarring ones we typically use here in The States, school bells can be great reminders for us. Set goals. Follow a schedule. Go for it every single day.

Time goes by regardless.

The zing of springtime reminds us also to ENJOY it. Don’t just work for work’s sake. Don’t just trudge through something with no interest or excitement. Like the kids on the playground before the start of a school day- let’s laugh and move with enthusiasm. Tensions and worries abound. Some live with violence and fear at their very doorsteps. If it’s nothing more than telling your feet you’re glad they are carrying you today, then so be it.

The end of the current school year is within sight here. The bell will be silenced for a while. Time will tick on, however. Let’s embrace its movement and keep moving forward.

I thank my readers for your time. Speaking of time, there is still some to order & receive a copy of my book, Dear Teachers, before this school year ends!

Parents: Dear Teachers would make a thoughtful gift to end the school year, as it’s filled with messages of support. I will also have a Facebook page through the 2017-18 school year to offer weekly followup all year.

Principals & Administration: Please consider Dear Teachers as a gift to a special teacher or to your entire team. Writing and photography from artists working with teachers for teachers.

Teachers: You always take care of others, treat yourself to a year of positive vibes and room to write your own thoughts for well, all for well below $20. You deserve it- you are Dear!