As I'm looking at the new school year looming, I must admit I feel more apprehension than excitement. I do not feel ready for another year like last year, even though in some ways, last year was really remarkable (for a first year).
I really do believe that next year will be better. It has to be. I think maybe, though, it's like eating the first piece of carrot cake after the last one you ate (years ago) made you sick. You know, logically, that whatever made the earlier cake bad is probably not in this cake--- but how can you separate that knowledge from the vividness of the experience?
Anyway, as I've been trying to mentally psych myself up for this next year, I've been trying frantically to get all my ducks in a row, have all these great new ideas ready to go... and it's been frustrating. In my graspings, I stumbled across this great site: http://mspowell.blogspot.com/
It's a collection of devotionals for teachers, and the ones for returning to school have been really helpful. I'm remembering that I don't have to have it all together. I am falling into the trap again of praying that God will give me everything I think I need for me to do my job the way I think I need to do it. Instead, I need to be praying for His hand on my classroom-- His leadership and guidance and provision. I know I can ask for the tools that I think I'd like to have, but I also need to remember he's not a gumball machine. He isn't there just to give me a little help here and there when I need it. He is my foundation, my life-giver, the Lord of all I encounter.
This is a lesson I started to learn last year, and I am hoping to really immerse myself in it and refuse to buy into the idea that to be a good teacher I must worry and work myself into a frenzy. I think my satisfaction and my desire to be an effective teacher are much simpler to achieve than the ways I've been chasing them:
Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers.
Psalm 1:1-3
I do not have to know everything there is to know about being a good teacher. I simply must avoid what I know to be detrimental and surround and submerge myself with what I know to be good: the ways of our Father.
