There’s No Place Like Home

Teaching is traumatic. When I first heard this statement, I had a physiological reaction. Maybe it was because I was tired, or maybe it struck a real chord as I’ve been working with pre-service and new teachers who I have watched struggle with fatigue and frustration, and I remember this  vividly, particularly because I feel that I finally found my groove this year. Teaching is Traumatic in many ways, as Steve Collis discussed; it’s true.  Our job is pretty high pressure and high stakes. Trauma reminds me of hospitals, and if you think about it school admin is much like the emergency ward. You can make a list of things to get done, but an incident may happen, or something needs you swiftly, and this means everything stops and all focus is on this unexpected event. It means lots of the creative, and the ‘to do’ work is done late into the night, into the weekends. We are dealing with raw human, heightened emotion every day.  It’s exhausting and exciting. But one way or the other, it’s important to recognise and be cognisant of this ideas so that we can be effective as educators, leaders and role models.  While trauma can be debilitating, stressful and straining, another friend put some wonderful perspective on this concept as I continued to unpack it some days later. Trauma is what our body goes through every day in order to grow and become stronger. It’s not all bad. But I know, there are days where no matter how much I love my job, it exhausts me.  No doubt this year,  I will make more mistakes and have many sleepless nights, but by always acting with good intent, reflecting often, and living in the moment more, hopefully I will continue to have no regrets, and get stronger everyday.  I invite your ideas around this discourse.

As a teacher, I look for lessons everywhere, and I find inspiration in so many places. Dave Grohl is, for me, a truly intriguing person. He is the front man of Foo Fighters, and unashamedly it’s ‘HIS’ band; his vision, his life’s passion. While recently watching Back and Forth; the Foo Fighter’s documentary, I became more interested in how his journey has certain similarities with my own; interesting given he’s an epic rockstar of awesomeness and I’m, well a suburban school teacher. Dave has spent his career following his passion and refining his craft as I intend to continue to do. He has also relished in the growth of the band (in popularity and membership) as he has creatively taken a range of directions. I have done similar with the growth of my PLN. If you haven’t seen Dave’s great story, do. He talks candidly about the pain and gratification of building a band…a tribe per-se. He reflects often on the trauma of going through growing pains in public, but ultimately rests on the notion that while all of this may fall apart tomorrow, right now it’s successful because of the collective of the people and the purpose of Foo Fighters. Many people gave Dave a hard time following the end of Nirvana for starting a rock band in the essence of the same music of Nirvana. I have long enjoyed Dave’s response to these cricics. Rather than look for nuances of difference in the music of the Foo Fighters and Nirvana, he unashamedly always refutes that he plays rock and roll, that’s who he is and what he does. ‘What, do you want me to play Reggae? Be something I’m not? I play loud music with drums and guitars. It’s what I do, it’s who I am’. No apologies. I too often hear people apologise for what they do or like.  If you are doing what you’re meant to do, if you are living your truth, good things happen. The world needs you.

I love this recent addition to this post. “Learning to do your craft is the most important thing. It’s not about being perfect, it’s about what goes on in your head and your heart” Have a look at Dave’s Grammy’s speech.

Spend some time with the Foo Fighters, you will get a great sense of how passion-driven living leads to great things, and process over product.  I first got to thinking about some lessons for educators while at the recent Foo Fighter’s Concert.  Usually, I would see a bunch of very cool people taking up god-like status on a stage and doing amazing, seemingly unreachable things, but what I was really seeing was a bunch of guys who love what they do, gut wrenchingly, all-consuming love what they do. I get that.  And they are grateful for the stage they have been given to share this. I saw a group of actually pretty ordinary guys; friends and fathers who were out to give the crowd a really great time; they appreciated our time, support and investment. It was very cool indeed.

My Hero  is one of the greatest songs; “There goes my Hero, he’s ordinary”…a good reminder that we are all just people right? Look how humble Dave is in this clip. Very cool. And Just like Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz, Dave knows there’s no place like home. When the industry was washing over him, and his inner voice was drowned out, Dave always set up shop in his garage. The best Foo Fighters albums have been recorded in the Grohl home; Dorothy’s whole journey was in order to find he way back there. Home is where our heart is, where we feel safe and where we belong. It’s a concept over a geographical space. So if good ideas and good vibes come from being at home, how can school and learning become more like ‘home’?  I keep coming back to the lesson I learnt at the concert. I keep thinking, if Dave Grohl can make each person feel seen, and there were 50,000 people in the arena and every single one felt as if the Fooies were there to play just for them, how can I do better with 20 kids in my classroom, with my year group?  For me, it seems to come back to building the team, tribe and community. And never ever compromise the vision and passion, or the importance of who and what matters.

If there’s one thing I’m working on and have placed real value in is the ability to build my ‘tribe’; the group of people from all around the world, from all walks of life that interest, inspire and support me.  I have spent the past 12 months identifying people that inspire me, and of whom I look up to. And then working out ways to connect with them. TeachMeet has been the greatest gift of my career, alongside Twitter. Both platforms also making me realise I also have a voice here, and it was @whartonag who opened my eyes to how ‘tribal mentorship’ really is
a two-way street. From connecting with Alex as a new teacher, to taking mentorship from great international educators, to tweeting alongside @charlesworth_J for QandA, Edudates with @benpaddlejones, Ice Cream with @malynmawby, Twitter Birthday Celebrations with @7mrsjames and #teacheats with seemingly every teacher in Sydney and chatting about Social Media with my Best Friend (@abbey_mewith3) as she embarks on her University adventures, along with raising two beautiful girls and pursuing her flair for writing.   I’m lucky in every way. So I am taking a lesson from Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. She had a great vision for what she needed to do in her life,(and wore fabulous shoes) and although she set out alone, she gathered a rag-tag group along the way and brought them on-board with her dream and journey.  As I have forged my own ‘Dorothy-esque’ tribe, I have become a member of other tribes as well. Everyday, I am pushed and compelled to give and share, and search for people and ideas to better my own understanding of what truly matters to me.  It takes a lot of courage to reach out to those who have achieved success or notoriety in their field; particularly if it also happens to be your field. In reflecting upon this year. I think some blind optimism and sheer ignorance towards that human instinct of fear of rejection got me through…a bit like Dorothy.  I’ve certainly been encouraged and changed by my connections and contacts with such people. There’s too much at stake if we don’t, and if we don’t encourage (in guided ways) our students to talk to strangers. Kelly Cutrone wrote:

‘You never know who will end up being your family, or where you’ll find them’.

People are gifted to us; for a reason, season or lifetime. Each person you bring into your tribe or circle makes the journey technicolour.

This year showed me that passion = power. But certainly a mantra for the coming school year is this; I can do anything, but not everything.  I talk about this with my senior students. Sometimes it’s the scenic route that enriches the journey. Life it’s is not a destination. I again think of Dorothy, it was the trip along the yellow brick road as she met trial and triumph that was the source of the story, not the destination.  I will learn as much as I can, soak up as many experiences as I can, but say no when the situation demands it. While last year, I began listening to myself much more, I asked hard questions about what I believe in, what am I driven by.  I even toughened up to the responses. This year, I’m going to be strategic about refining and communicating to others who I am and what I believe of myself. Also, about what I need from other people to make good things (things for the greater good) happen.

And so, here are a few bits and pieces that continue to have me thinking about learning and living.

• You might overestimate your capabilities, fail, or succeed (almost accidentally). But it is in the breaking away from the familiar that you may only have yourself to lean on, and it is in these times that you really get to know yourself.
• You can never be too good for the things that first made you successful.
• You can’t fake hard work, and when your whole heart and soul is yelling out to you that something is right or worthwhile, you need to tenaciously go after it with all you have, and amazing things will happen.
• Instinct is critical; follow your voice and back yourself
• Don’t compromise your ‘brand’
• The Three Core C‘s; Creativity, Connection and Commitment.

It’s the people that have made the journey to now spectacular. Connections and relationships with people is the core of our business in teaching, and fundamental to the business of life.

“There are those relationships that open you up to something new and exotic, those that are old and familiar, those that bring up lots of questions, those that bring you somewhere unexpected, those that bring you far from where you started, and those that bring you back. But the most exciting, challenging and significant relationship of all is the one you have with yourself. And if you can find someone to love the you you love, well, that’s just fabulous.”- Carrie Bradshaw

 

oh….and for the record, Dave Grohl is a legend