Grace

Sometimes we need to be pushed. I talk in my class about struggle. There is a notion pervasive in high schools that once things get hard' the thing to do is whine, to stomp, and to give up. Not always in that order. 

We all have times  in life where we want to do this. Yet, there are times when we must remember the notion of graceful struggle. 

This is how I describe it to my students: you try hard. You are putting forth your best honest effort and so me times even that's not enough. Well, friends, this is the he point where we need top ya close attention becauset his means that we are about to learn something. But we will only learn this thing if we listen closely to what the world has to tell us. This means the at we must stop in our tracks...become silent...and simply listen. This means the at the whining about assignments, or the prompt being too hard will not allow you to hear it. You must stop.

Sometimes in our stoppage we discover the best thing to do is ask for help. Other times, the best action is to revisit where we were and move forward. There are other times when it makes sense to go to the in telnet to try to find someone else who has experience in our area of struggle. And yes, there are other times still when the best thing to do is to go for a run, a bike ride, go to. A yoga class, cook a meal, whatever helps you breathe in your space and let go.

The thing with  graceful  struggle is that we work, to quote my good friend, to become the solution to whatever we are struggling with rather than to become a bigger part of the problem. My students are figuring this out. They ask questions, they come in for help...this is a really beautiful time of year for that reason. 

Struggle can be graceful.