Can't Stay in My Feelings

I don't wanna do this anymore ...

I'm getting antsy ...

Everything's a state of emergency here, and all I see are red flashing lights accompanied by the overwhelmingly blaring sound of alarms everywhere.

"Prove this, fix data, manage your classroom of challenging children, fill this form out for under performers, call these homes for the truant kids, attend this meeting for the climate issues and that meeting for Instructional Leadership, show the district what they want to see, catch all the kids who are on their phones during instruction, keep every kid engaged in your lesson, explain why that kid was sleeping in your class, go home, grade, and lesson plan" IN ADDITION to all of the above.

Do I want to bow out? Yes ...

After almost 15 years, I feel like I'm done with this urban teaching scene ... the school teaching scene period. I'm convinced that I can actually live the rest of my life without doing another lesson plan, and ... be ... FINE.

I have a good teacher friend who, as this summer came to an end, wrote about her itch to get back to her students ... I didn't share that same itch. In fact, my itch had to do with dread that I had to snatch and put away from me.

BUT I'M GRATEFUL

Though I've had these thoughts and feelings in intense waves since about the middle of last school year, I do realize that I'm to be grateful for my teaching job. It's been my current source of income and God's channel of provision to my family for just shy of 15 years. So, I won't spit on it with disdain; it's been a major contributor in giving my family the lifestyle of comfort and opportunity we've come to know. It's been consistent and dependable, and I thank God.

Also, God's put AND KEPT me on a spiritual post in my career where He's groomed and conditioned me as an educator who knows Him, planting and watering seeds that He's already caused and will cause to bloom and grow for His glory and pleasure. Just like He's wanted and loved me over the years I've known Him, I know He wants and loves the students, families, and faculty I see on a daily basis. Again ... thank You, Lord.

I SENSE A SHIFT

It's been hard, grueling work -- this is for sure -- and I'm honored that God knew I'd operate out of the goods He gave me in my mother's womb to do what I've done in this one school for my entire career. I just really sense a shift in my world, and I believe that these feelings of I'M RET TUH GO have something to do with this shift.

So, though the start of this post probably had you thinking, "What is going on with her?" I think the true message is becoming clear ... the GOD in me won't let me go too far into myself when I go through the temptation of emotionally throwing up my hands because I know how UNtrustworthy this part -- this emotional part -- of me, is.

Here's where you find me ...

I'm stronger ...

During the daily seven hour whirlwind of deadlines, quotas, and kids who need a whole lot of love, I look at myself and see that I've gained some muscle mass. I watch myself chill in the midst of the crazy. Though you may pass my classroom and see me looking busy, maybe even frantic sometimes, I'm a different kind of chick on the inside. It's a very strange place to be because it's far from comfortable but right for the GIANT in me.

I now know the strange pleasure that maturing Christians can have in trial because we know it's perfecting, strengthening, and establishing us according to God's pattern of child rearing. This sweet spot gets really trippy when we can smile in the fire and wink at our enemies when we're hurting.

THE GOOD KIND OF CRAZY

It's a Castor Troy (the movie Face Off) type of experience! When the pain's piled on and our eyes get wild with the knowledge that we're thriving off of it instead of buckling under it, I offer that our enemies -- THE enemy -- freaks out even more because he finds that the crazy in trial brings out the crazy in us, God's peeps. This is the type of crazy that hinges on the uncovered posture of our audacious hunger to follow God NO MATTER WHAT. The devil's schemes fall apart and backfire, leaving him in the dusty cloud of our continual turn to God.

So, yes, I'm excited about this shift (that I've been in prayer about and have solicited prayers from others regarding), but I'm grown enough to know that though the grass certainly looks greener on the other side of school teacher, this DOES NOT change the fact that it'll still have to be mowed. My next chapter will have its own learning curves, growing pains, and muscle builders that'll show up in circumstances where my faith will continue to be tested. And I'll have to keep going then like I have over these years in the school system.

It's been a conduit through which my Schoolmaster's pushed me toward spiritual beast-hood. And always a student, I really just want to be found paying attention and obedient.

#stay #feelings