I'm Getting New Eyes!

Anacortes, WA

Today it happened to me again.  During noon recess duty I was trying to figure out how I would stay warm for the 40 minutes outdoors.  So I picked up an orange hula hoop from where a kindergartner left it on the ground and headed with it in my hands towards the large swings.  Some fifth graders were flying high back and forth.  As I approached them, I held out the hoop in front of me and challenged one of the boys to jump out of the swing and through the hoop before landing.  Naturally they were up for the challenge, but when the actual moment came to jump out of the swing in high arc, it took a number of attempts before reluctantly letting go of the swing chains and sailing through the hoop.  Lots of cheering encouragement was given and the exhilaration of success was eventually experienced.  Soon a line-up of students, both boys and girls, were desiring the challenge.  Repeat the same cycle for each contestant.  Lots of cheers erupted, along with community building, as successful hoop jumpers stood by to encourage their fellow students.  I had a blast and all thoughts of enduring the cold vanished!  But in that activity I got new eyes.

It can happen easily enough....the matter of not really seeing.  I think we all find ourselves in that condition from time to time.  I am guilty of forming assumptions about people before I really get to know them.  I find myself subconsciously placing people in categories and dismissing further investigation from my mind.  Conclusions are drawn erroneously.  But on that basis I choose at times to relate to others on those assumptions.  I don't really see them.  

Ouch!  Not good especially when one is a teacher.  This morning I told my middle school students that they had taught me way more this year than I had taught them.  They looked at me a little suspiciously and then quizzically at first.  But it's true!  I have once again had to learn to look past the difficult parts and push further in to understand and get a feel for where others, my students included, are coming from.  Today at recess was no exception.  Some of those students flying high in the swings were ones about whom I had formed incorrect assumptions.  And there I stood, in a new way of encountering them, outside the classroom context, cheering for them and helping them learn to be brave and courageous in a new way.  They went back to afternoon class having accomplished something that before they had never done and dealt with fear in their success.  And I....I went on my way humbled by the relationship discoveries, a new way of seeing, that I encountered during noon recess.  I'm getting new eyes!

Live bravely and beautifully!