This weekend was Rosebro2’s 13th birthday. I now
have another teenager in my house. It seems unbelievable that he is 13. He is
such a precious, young man and he has come so far since the days of
appointments in Greenville twice a week dealing with his speech issues and his
development. While he still has some social issues, he otherwise is very normal
comparatively on the scale of whatever a normal teenage can be. We had a great day on Saturday-not thinking
about the one phone call that wasn’t coming. My mother always loved birthdays.
There would be a phone call first thing in the morning singing Happy Birthday
and presents and cake. How she loved a birthday cake. Saturday was hard. So
when things are hard for me-I do what I do best-avoidance.
We went to a baseball game and we went to the westside to do
a little shopping. As we were shopping I explained to my boys that we needed to
look at the clearance rack first. After
a little shopping we went for lunch. As we entered the shopping center where
the restaurant was, I noticed a homeless couple begging for money. They had two
children with them. While I don’t know their circumstances, I could not help
but feel a twinge of sadness that I had just complained about having to shop at
the clearance rack and hoping I had a coupon for lunch while this family was
outside in the cold wind begging for money for food and rent.
I realized that my life-my wonderful, full, blessed, crazy
life, is slammed full of everyday blessings that I am choosing to ignore.
Rather than focusing on “counting my blessings” as my mother would say, I
choose to focus on the things that I want to change-another year with my
mother, my never ending to do list, unending emails, phone calls to be
returned, thank you notes to be written. Yet the only thing that I really need
to be focused on is seeing better. When
I see better, I see moments of incredible wonder surrounding every single day.
As teachers we can be very consumed with what is wrong. I
heard Tony Robbins once say, “What’s wrong is always available, but so is what’s
right!” When we focus on the good things, we tend to find more of it. This
positive focus also allows us to be happy-even through trails. It is also
contagious. When we tend to focus on what is going wrong, we miss what is going
right. So much energy can be lost on focusing on the negative. I challenge you in these last three weeks
before spring break, to focus on what is right-not on what you have left to do.
When we do this, it makes the work ahead seem so small compared to the work we
have already done. This habit of awareness makes your heart happier and who
doesn’t need to be happier.
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