What’s been on my mind lately… Your social media page is not the town square I saw a meme on Facebook a few days ago that said (ironically), "The best way to become enlightened is Mr. Rogers I wish I had been able to play Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood for my daughter when she was a pre-schooler, but Losing everything "If you feel like you're losing everything, remember that trees lose their leaves every year and they still stand tall And like that, she’s gone "And like that, [s]he's gone." I have been going 90-to-nothing for over six months, now; doing and being things for Praising God through the the pain I regularly FAIL at this. I frequently interpret difficult, soul-trying circumstances as punishment. When you were raised by a sociopath In the event of an emergency, place the oxygen mask on yourself first I have seen this meme pop up in dozens of places around the web lately. It has been attributed to Make sure the stories you listen to are true "We become the stories we listen to." --Matthew Kelly Right now there's a huge opportunity for gossip in my community Teachers who fail upwards from the classroom into administration or education policy In public school teaching, the ones who already think they've arrived are the ones we should worry about. I am Do not grow weary in well-doing It stinks to be hacked. I've just spent five hours on a Sunday changing all of my passwords everywhere I've Coincidence is God winking at us There are NO coincidences. As a friend at Holy Rosary once said to me, "Coincidence is God winking at us." « Previous 1 … 10 11 12 13 Next »
Your social media page is not the town square Ceilon Aspensen, November 4, 2019January 22, 2024 I saw a meme on Facebook a few days ago that said (ironically), “The best way to become enlightened is to argue with people on Facebook.” It resonated with me because comments from people trying to argue in my post threads get DELETED. I don’t want that energy on my wall. I don’t care if you’re right or wrong. Attempts to argue are immediately deleted. Here’s the path to enlightenment through the vehicle of Facebook (because all vehicles are paths to enlightenment, if you use them the right way): when someone posts something you don’t like or agree with, notice your response/reaction. If you come racing out of the gate, shouting them down, telling them how stupid or misinformed their position is, you are as far from enlightenment as it is possible to get. But if you pause, take a breath, think about what they said, try to understand why they said it, consider whether it is true/factual/informed or not, then carefully consider whether to respond at all, and then if choosing to respond you also measure your response through the THINK gate (is it True, Helpful, Informed/Important/Inspiring, Necessary, AND Kind), then you are approaching enlightenment. In the USA, we have taken our right to freedom of speech too far when we do not recognize that we also have the freedom and responsibility to measure our words and be kind. This is a lesson that I have made a top priority in my teaching at school, because it’s something sorely lacking in American society in recent years. And for those of you who have not yet figured this out: you CAN delete people’s comments from your post threads; you are under no obligation whatsoever to be the town hall for whoever wants to rant on your wall. It’s YOUR wall, and it’s not only your right to moderate it, it’s your responsibility.
Mr. Rogers Ceilon Aspensen, November 3, 2019January 22, 2024 I wish I had been able to play Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood for my daughter when she was a pre-schooler, but since I had to work and she was always at daycare during the show I was unable to do it. I wasn’t able to watch it myself, even though it aired in 1968, because my Mom wasn’t into educational programming or wasn’t aware of PBS, so I didn’t know about Mr. Rogers until I was in college. As a teacher, I review a lot of educational programming. Mr. Rogers is hands-down the BEST that there is; better than Sesame Street, and Sesame Street’s pretty darned good. But if I had been able to watch, and let my daughter watch, Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood, both of us might have had better emotional skills and equipment for dealing with 1) all the trauma from my own childhood that interfered with me being the best possible parent, and 2) all the trauma in her childhood resulting from that, as well as us living with an alcoholic before I was able to recognize that’s what was happening, and the resulting devastating wake left by that broken marriage. But you don’t have to be traumatized to get the most out of Mr. Rogers! He was simply brilliant at communicating with children, and helping them find their voice and ways to express themselves in a healthy way. Do yourself and your children (and grandchildren) a favor and watch Mr. Rogers. It’s simply the best children’s programming ever created. You can learn more about Mr. Rogers and his unique way of speaking to children by reading this article: Mr. Rogers Had a Simple Set of Rules for Talking to Children
Losing everything Ceilon Aspensen, November 2, 2019January 22, 2024 “If you feel like you’re losing everything, remember that trees lose their leaves every year and they still stand tall and wait for better days to come.”–tinybuddha.com I do NOT feel that I am losing everything. I’ve had several new and wonderful things enter my life, for which I am grateful. But they were only able to enter as I LET GO of other things that no longer served me. Letting go–shedding things that no longer serve us–can create room for things that do serve us to come rushing in. Additionally, when we let go of things they can be gifts to those who actually do need the things we no longer need to hold onto. There’s an old African proverb that tells us that when children are born, they come out with their fists clenched because that’s where they keep all their gifts. As they grow their hands learn to unfold because they’re learning to release their gifts to the world. Unclench your fists. Release your gifts. Leave your hands open and see what comes to you. Life is good and I am grateful.
And like that, she’s gone Ceilon Aspensen, November 1, 2019January 2, 2022 “And like that, [s]he’s gone.” I have been going 90-to-nothing for over six months, now; doing and being things for other people that they needed without any regard for what I needed. I made some decisions this past weekend. I would say they were hard decisions but they weren’t. It’s amazing how easy it was to make this shift, really. I just did what I needed to do for me. I didn’t do it soon enough, but once I made the decision it was quick and easy. From now on, people in town will likely only see me as I beat a path between my home and the school and back, or on my weekly trip to mass. I’m in the process of hunkering down, getting down to MY business, and taking better care of my own needs for a while. As I was reflecting on how quickly I decided to do this and acted on it, this scene from The Usual Suspects came to mind. If you’re not one of my students or colleagues you might think I’ve moved out of town. I haven’t. I’m just hunkered down in my art studio, doing my own thing. Life is good and I am grateful.
Praising God through the the pain Ceilon Aspensen, October 23, 2019January 2, 2022 I regularly FAIL at this. I frequently interpret difficult, soul-trying circumstances as punishment. When you were raised by a sociopath you are trained to believe that when bad things happen to you it is always your fault, and you deserve it. This is a hard thought pattern to break. I must constantly remind myself–in the wake of such a long, quick succession, of repeatedly unfortunate events, recently–that I behaved and responded with integrity, did “as much as depends upon me,” and did the very best I could, though imperfectly. When such is the case I have nearly passed the test. But only “nearly” because the other part of the test is to hold fast, weather the storm, and remember that I am and will be OK because I am not alone–Jesus is IN THE BOAT in the midst of the storm, so to speak. Jeremiah didn’t do any better than I am doing. God had to remind him that He is in the stillness, the suggestion being that when you’re caught in a whirlwind you don’t run or panic, you go to that still space inside yourself. That. Is. Difficult. The best I can hope for and expect of myself is that when I am continuously and regularly on the receiving end of so much bad stuff, despite doing “as much as depends on me,” and always getting up and trying again after an attempted knockout punch, is to be like the man who said: “Lord, I believe! Help my unbelief.” Life is good and I am grateful.
In the event of an emergency, place the oxygen mask on yourself first Ceilon Aspensen, October 3, 2019January 2, 2022 I have seen this meme pop up in dozens of places around the web lately. It has been attributed to Word Porn, Hart Ramsey, Truth Theory, Positive Energy, and Tiny Buddha. I am giving attribution to Lori Deschane at Tiny Buddha because I subscribe to Tiny Buddha’s Facebook page and derive benefit from it regularly, and honestly have no idea who originally said it (the Internet is terrible for that). This meme resonated with me because I am an introvert with mad social skills. Contrary to popular belief, introverts are not necessarily shy. By strict definition an introvert is a person who loses energy being around other people too much, and restores her energy by spending time alone. People often assume I am an extrovert because I am gregarious, conversant, and can hold my own in social situations. But when I’m done I’m done. There comes a point at which I can’t cope with the overstimulation of too much social interaction. This is so important for extroverts to understand. If you’re an introvert, it’s bad enough (we restore our energy reserves by spending time alone). But if you’re an introvert also going through any one of these things, or several, it’s only made harder when you have extrovert “friends” pressuring you to come out into the world for their benefit. You need to put the oxygen mask on yourself first before you try to take care of the needs of other people. Life is good and I am grateful.
Make sure the stories you listen to are true Ceilon Aspensen, October 2, 2019January 2, 2022 “We become the stories we listen to.” —Matthew Kelly Right now there’s a huge opportunity for gossip in my community of which many are availing themselves. This only muddies the waters, stokes the fears, and doesn’t solve any problems. Make sure the stories you listen to are true. If you’re not sure, you can be certain that anything beginning with, “I heard…” is likely NOT true. Stick to the facts. Redirect the conversation to something useful, helpful, uplifting, and kind. Don’t stoke the fears of our children for an opportunity to gossip. If we become the stories we listen to, BE the truth by only allowing truthful stories to be told in your presence. This is a battle I fight every day, especially working with kids. But it’s not just the kids. Be the truth. Life is good and I am grateful.
Teachers who fail upwards from the classroom into administration or education policy Ceilon Aspensen, May 24, 2019May 24, 2024 In public school teaching, the ones who already think they’ve arrived are the ones we should worry about. I am never satisfied with my performance. I am constantly re-evaluating my methods, changing this or that thing to make my instruction better, always striving to be more effective. Maybe by the time I retire I’ll feel that I’ve gotten it down, but I doubt it. Meanwhile, the Peanut Gallery of non-certified critics of our profession are certain they know more about what we do than we do (they don’t–not even close), and think they could do it better. And yet there is a teacher shortage…because what we do is HARD. At the end of my first year of teaching I told my husband that teaching is the most powerful and intensive self-improvement program a person could ever go through, because although you are there to teach children, the one you learn the most about is yourself. It puts you right up against your STUFF, and reflects back all of your flaws, where you need to change, what you need to improve in YOURSELF. The best teachers are the ones who don’t look in that mirror and run as fast as they can out of the teaching profession. They stay and keep working on themselves and become the best teachers and human beings they can be. Maybe they change careers later, after they have put in enough time (perhaps five years, minimum) to discover whether this is the right career for them. I have found that those who quit early (within the first year) and then go on to get a masters in education policy or some adjacent field are in complete denial about what the real problems are. They haven’t stayed in it long enough to give themselves a chance to be good at it, and they also haven’t stayed in it long enough to discover that the entire system is broken, and no matter how good they become at teaching and mastering their craft, that there are many things that need to be fixed. Usually they quit believing that it’s the teachers around them who are broken. Again–deep, deep denial. The teachers who stay are not the problem. This career is not for everyone. Teaching is not for sissies. But the solution is not to quit before you’ve had a chance to extensively explore whether it’s not right for you, or whether you are not right for it. And leaving the profession before your first year is up to become an “expert” in education is an enormous part of the reason that public education is broken right now. We need a requirement that teachers put in a minimum number of years of service in the classroom before being admitted to a master’s degree program in public education policy, or an administration licensure program. Those jobs should only be for teachers with a minimum of five years of experience. At that point they know the system inside and out, and have had time to draw conclusions about what is working, what isn’t, and what needs to change. When they don’t gain that experience before moving on to create policy or run schools, they become the biggest part of the problem in public education.
Do not grow weary in well-doing Ceilon Aspensen, November 19, 2018January 2, 2022 It stinks to be hacked. I’ve just spent five hours on a Sunday changing all of my passwords everywhere I’ve ever gone on the web, making use of some Norton Security features I’ve never used, etc. I’m not done yet. It will likely take me DAYS to get this done, and I’m sure I’ll miss some. The event that precipitated all of this tightening of my web security was just the latest in a series of events (most of which did NOT happen to me online, but in the real world) that have removed any doubt in my mind that there is real evil in the world. According to Steven Pressfield, author of The War of Art, when one experiences as many setbacks and pitfalls as I have (something he calls “resistance”) it means one is on the verge of a major creative breakthrough. He points out that such resistance only happens when one is actually doing her creative work as she should; that if one is in the throes of procrastination, avoidance, slacking, or in some other way NOT doing her creative work, she will get a free pass and experience no resistance at all. I have been on a creative roll, lately, making major inroads on my own personal artwork. BOOM! BAM! KABLAM! Resistance! A permanent falling out with my father and sister, a beloved dog killed by my veterinarian through neglect and incompetence, a broken leg that hijacked five months of my life and stalled my dissertation for another year, another beloved dog dead suddenly and unexpectedly, and a failed but sophisticated phishing attempt that stole an entire day of my life that I had planned to spend painting, and will likely continue to steal my time for the rest of this short week. And those are just the few events I’m willing to talk about. There’s been so much more going on that I’m not willing to talk about. I am a rational, highly educated, intelligent woman. I am also a Christian (raised United Methodist, now Roman Catholic, practicing Zen through both). While I am devout in my Christian faith I gave up believing in angels and demons a long time ago. However, the events of the last four years (four of which I’ve mentioned here) have forced me to face the fact that there are forces at work in my life–good and evil–beyond my control which I have nothing to do with. There have been many days this year I’ve felt like Job: the object of a cosmic bet, powerless to do anything but just keep on trucking, doing the best I can, believing that the greater the hardship the closer I am to successfully achieving my personal goals. In the movie The Usual Suspects, the character played by Kevin Spacey said, “The greatest trick the devil ever played was convincing everyone he didn’t exist.” I read or heard this somewhere: 1st person: “I don’t believe in the devil.” 2nd: “Well, you should, because he believes in you.” I read a story about Martin Luther once, where he was awakened from a dead sleep (it might have been a dream) by the creaking of a rocking chair in his room. When he looked over at the chair he saw the devil sitting in it and said, “Oh, it’s just you,” and rolled back over and went back to sleep.” I think I’ll re-read The Screwtape Letters again. Meanwhile, it seems to me that with all of this trouble coming at me precisely at moments where I’m on the threshold of significant breakthroughs, I can’t really afford to ignore the obvious anymore. If I want a trouble-free life I should find some kind of shallow, meaningless, self-serving work that makes me mountains of easy money. But as long as I’m in a profession that provides me with opportunities to positively impact great kids, and as long as I’m striving to use the talents God gave me to great purpose, I should just expect to see the devil and his minions trying to sabotage all of my efforts. The trick is to remain vigilant, diligent, and to not grow weary in well-doing. On that note, I’m going to bed and will start over again tomorrow. Life is good and I am grateful.
Coincidence is God winking at us Ceilon Aspensen, November 19, 2018January 2, 2022 There are no coincidences. Photo copyright © Ceilon Aspensen. All rights reserved. This image may not be reproduced, redistributed, or printed without the express written permission of Ceilon Aspensen. There are NO coincidences. As a friend at Holy Rosary once said to me, “Coincidence is God winking at us.” So I don’t think it is a coincidence that this came the very next day after the blog entry I posted yesterday. Some of you know that I’ve been reading the Bible every day for the past 21 years as part of my morning routine. This photo shows where I landed on my regular path through the book this morning. If you can’t make it out, the top part is Paul’s description of the spiritual armor we are to gird ourselves with as we make our way through this world. These are notes I made YEARS ago, probably when this 20-some-odd-year-old book was new. The bottom part says this: “Kill–Steal–Destroy: The Devil’s job description.” In light of my post from yesterday, I can’t see this as a coincidence. At the very least it’s God winking at me, and reminding me, “You’ve got this, because I’ve got you.” Thanks be to God. Life is good and I am grateful.