Why This One Inspiration Quote for Teachers is Essential and Not Toxic Positivity

  Okay, Teacher Friends, here we go. This week's episode is going to be a little bit shorter. Do not confuse brevity with lack of content because I feel the subject matter of this episode is is really something that has the ability to make a lasting impact on you as it has on me. So here's what we're going to talk about.

We're going to talk about my signature outro which is how I really end the episodes, how I end a lot of my emails. It's kind of my signature saying and it's causing a little controversy. Couple of people accuse me of being toxically Positive. Wowee. Well, I'm not about any of that. So, we will dive in inside the episode and I can't wait to bring it to you.

You are just gonna love this quote that I have and learning where I got it from. See you on the inside.  Welcome to the Balance Your Teacher Life podcast, where we talk all things avoiding educated burnout, setting healthy boundaries, and achieving better work life balance.  If you're passionate about education, but tired of it consuming your whole life, you have found your home in the podcast universe.

I'm your host, Grace Stevens, and let's get going with today's show. 

Okay, before we get started, I'm going to mention something in is by way of not only giving you information, but I'll be honest, it's by way of keeping myself accountable. This is something I've been working on for a long time. And you know, some of you know that there has been, you know, some changes happening in my home that have taken a lot of my time.

And hopefully we're starting to come out the other side of that. But even beyond that, this is something I've been working on for a long time. And by mentioning it here, I feel like I have a better chance of keeping myself accountable. You know, when you just work for yourself,  you got to keep yourself accountable.

So for quite some time, there have been at the beginning of my episodes and what we call an intro and it's an invitation for you to take the boundary blind spot quiz. Now I hear from a lot of you that you've taken the quiz. The quiz is amazing. You love it. And you're not doing so well in that department.

Now, I don't know how everybody does because the quiz is confidential.  You do it in your own home, old school style, right? Like those of you old enough to remember Cosmo magazine where you would pull out the quiz and, and tally and see what your score is. Well, anyway, good news for all of you who feel that you really have some work to do in this area.

Of course you can listen to this podcast, but there are so many ways to do a deeper dive into this topic. And it really is at the foundation of why a lot of teachers lives are aren't balanced, right? And so I want to let you know that I have a new book coming out very very soon which is  Beat Teacher Burnout with Better Boundaries.

A lot of my subscribers voted on that type of title. It's really about how to thrive in teaching and still have a personal life, right? Teaching shouldn't be our whole life. I've had episodes on that. But anyway, accompanying that Of course, it's going to be a book. It's going to be super affordable. You know, I keep my books so affordable, especially as some of them are used in teacher training school, and it's one of my pet peeves is how much textbooks are.

So the book is super affordable. Everybody can afford that. I also have almost finished up an accompanying course, which is going to be fantastic. Self study, do it yourself at your own pace, come back and revisit it whenever you need it. So that is also going to be beat teacher burnout with better textbooks.

boundaries. So they are coming out soon. Now, look, I've said it and keep myself accountable.  So it's made me a little nervous saying it, but I want to, like I said, be accountable. I've been working really hard on it and I'm really excited about it. Okay. So on to today's episode. What?  is my signature sign off that is causing people to go a little crazy.

Okay, so  if you're listening, maybe this is the first episode you've ever listened to of mine. So then you don't know, or maybe you've just forgotten, or maybe you don't make it till the end of the episode. So how I usually sign off is  Create your own path and bring your own sunshine.  Now,  what is toxic positivity?

So that was actually one of the first episodes I ever did because what I'm known for is my book Positive Mindset Habits for Teachers, which has been around for coming up for six years now. And I'm not about the toxic positivity at all, but I see a lot of it. on campus, especially  the last few years. So if you're really curious into doing a deep dive as to what is it, and oh my gosh, do you participate in it unwillingly I invite you to check out episode three, which was, is toxic positivity killing teacher morale on your campus?

Okay, so let me basically tell you what it is. Toxic positivity is, you know, those memes, those stickers the, the sayings, that are like, you know, positive vibes only, right? Or here's the one, oh my gosh, here's the worst one in education. Teachers aren't in it for the income. They're in it for the outcome, right?

So can you see what the problem is with this messaging? It is not acknowledging the challenges in teaching. Now, am I all for being positive? Absolutely. I'm going to go over my ECHO framework again in a minute before I tell you the inspiration for my signature sign off, right? There are so many challenges.

We need to acknowledge them. You can't just, I liken it to this, if the gas tank is running on empty, right?  You can't just stick a smiley face sticker on it so that you can't see the empty gas tank and hope that things are going to be okay. You know how that's going to turn out for you, right? So there are a lot of challenges in education.

Likely there are a lot of challenges, frustrations, burnout,  things that need to be changed. on your campus. So, not acknowledging them, just merely saying like, oh, we're all, oh, here's this one, we're all superheroes. We are so not superheroes. We are living, breathing, functioning, hopefully functioning humans.

And we have human needs. We need sleep. Right? We need to not be overworked, overstressed. Right? Right. The issues in education are damaging our health. They're damaging our relationships. And honestly, they're damaging students. Okay. So that's the overarching theme that we all know. Now, beyond that,  can you have a good attitude?

When it comes to really wanting the best for yourself and your students, does being toxically negative, which would be, you know, finding a problem for every solution, poo pooing anything people try and do to make things better, constantly complaining, constantly having your radar set for shortcomings, things that annoy you, people who aren't doing what they're supposed to do, Even if that has nothing to do with you, right?

Does that make education any better? Heck no. Okay. So my signature sign off, create your own path and bring your own sunshine is about empowerment. It is about how having a good attitude helps. So  there's two parts to that. Create your own path.  And the other part is bring your own sunshine. So let me first remind you of my ECHO framework, if you're not aware of it. 

My Echo Framework for Educator Empowerment, right, E C H O. We all love our acronyms.  So the E part, I'm going to say one more time for the people in the back. I feel like I say this a lot, but if you're new here, the E stands for your energy teaches more than your lesson plans. Stay with me. I'm gonna go over it.

E, right? The C part stands for control what you can control. When we have that when I just did my introduction telling you about toxic positivity is that Being toxically negative doesn't help either. Focusing on what we can control, right, even though there are these different issues that are bigger issues that need to be fixed in my classroom, in my world, you know, on my campus, these are the things I can control, right, is empowering. 

Last week when I talked about  Reducing testing anxiety for students. One of the activities that I suggested was working on you know, a very popular exercise, especially in life coaching called Circle of Concern versus Circle of Control. And the more you focus on what you can control, that circle expands and the circle of things you're worried about reduces, right?

I said I have lesson plans, for all different grade levels for that, but you know, it's something I work with adults with a lot. So if you're more interested in that and that how that can help your students go back and listen to last week episode, which was about reducing testing anxiety.  But back to the framework.

E. Your energy teaches more than your lesson plans. C. Control what you can control.  H, happiness can be synthesized. Done a lot of episodes on that, was the foundational piece of my positive mindset habits for teachers, right? All the intentional habits where you could help boost your baseline happiness level, right?

And then the last part of the ECHO framework for educator empowerment, the O is other teachers experience doesn't need to be your experience. Right, just because another teacher  said they had the class from you know where, it was terrible, it was the worst. They're going to make you want to retire. It doesn't mean that's going to be your experience of those students or of a certain parent or of a team player, right?

You get to have your own experience.  Okay, so the ECHO framework. So let's see how that plays in. So when I sign off, create your own path. Thanks. That's a shout out to make your own experience. And when I say bring your own sunshine,  it's this notion that our energy teaches more than our lesson plans, that we can synthesize happiness, but more directly What inspired me to this idea of bring your own sunshine  was a quote.

It was a quote I found when I was in teacher training school.  And I remember it impacted me so much. I printed it up on beautiful,  which used to be a lot more difficult to do before, you know, word processes and everything. But I made a beautiful copy of it for my master teacher. I was student teaching at the time.

And I'm telling you, she had it up in her room till the day she retired. Which was about 16 years later. So it was beautiful. It is by a man called Hain Ginnott. Now you may or may not know of him. Let me tell you a little bit about him. Right? So he was a school teacher, a child psychologist, a psychotherapist and a parent educator, right?

He wrote a very famous book called Between Parent and Child back in 1965.  At the time it stayed on the best list. Sell a list for over a year, but it's still pretty popular, right? It's really about, I mean, when you think back to 1965, that's a long time. He was really one of the first to pioneer the techniques for conversing with children, right?

Now it, this is also obvious to us, but at the time it was very different for him. He really focused on students feelings. Right. And, you know, if you want to go Google him, you'll find the official definition, you know, founded on the principles of humanistic psychology that focus on acceptance and validation as essential for healthy self esteem for students.

So we know that now. Right.  Everything that we learn about classroom management is focused on, you know, having relationships with students. Okay. So he was one of the founders of that, you know, back in the day, like I remember being in school in 19 well, 1970. I started school in 19 70, 71. Yeah. Nobody was worried about my healthy self-esteem.

I'll tell you that.  So anyway, here, I remember, you know,  the nuns taking out rulers and wrapping your knuckles if you didn't know your times tables. I remember being afraid of my teachers. Corporal punishment was a very acceptive practice. I was a very compliant child, but I got very stressed if other children got in trouble.

Anyway.  All that to say, here we go. So here was the quote. Okay, come on Grace, tell us the quote. You may have heard it, some of it, or all of it. But here's where my bring your own sunshine comes from. So this quote is from Haym Ginnott. He says, I have come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element. 

It is my personal approach that creates the climate.  It's my daily mood that makes the weather.  I possess tremendous power. To make life miserable. or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration. I can humiliate or humor.  I can hurt or heal.  In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis is escalated or not.

or de escalated and a person is humanized or dehumanized. If we treat people as they are, we make them worse. If we treat people as they ought to be, we help them become what they are capable of becoming. All right, so that is directly from his book, Teacher and Child, a book for parents and teachers. Now, that was a lot. 

Here's the takeaway. My daily mood makes the web. Now,  you don't even need to be a teacher to know that is true about teaching. Think back to your own teaching experience.  It's an exercise I take a lot of my own students through, adult students, teacher students, it's like close your eyes, remember the best teaching experience,  not teaching experience, excuse me, learning experience you've ever had.

Think about that teacher. What was it about them?  I'm telling you, I mean, unless it was a literature class and you loved that class, cause it was, you know, some of your favorite books. Okay. But I'm talking about the teacher themselves. It wasn't about the curriculum. Who cared if they had journeys over, you know, whatever the reading curriculum.

Right. So it wasn't necessarily about the curriculum. You know, I remember going to school. Math was math was math was math. And I had a great math teacher who I loved. Okay. who gave me confidence in my skills, who seemed excited to be there, who was patient.  And then there was another math teacher. Let me just say the opposite of that.

Let's go back to the part about escalating and humiliating and hurting, right? Not a good teacher. Same curriculum.  So that isn't what makes a good teacher. What about the room decor? I can't even, you know what? I do remember being jealous. My bestie was in another class and her teacher,  Mr. Gately, I'm sure he's long gone, but let me tell you, Mr.

Gately, how much love I had in my heart for how long a time. He let them paint the radiators pink.  This was in a Catholic school  in the early seventies.  Yay for him he was a lay teacher one of the few teachers at the school that wasn't a member of the clergy so yay for him anyway so given Mr. Gaitley's pink you know radiators aside wasn't about the room decor right what made your favorite teacher your favorite teacher it was their energy and I'm not talking energy about bouncing up and down you know like the energizer bunny but the energy that emanates from you that says I want to be here, right?

Not the teacher who's resentful, exhausted, worn out, burnt out, overextended, overstressed, not patient, like lecturing the class, berating the class, right? It's the teacher who is relaxed and calm,  right? And holds everybody accountable, but in a pleasant way.  Right? And really seems to care about students, seems to want to instill confidence in students, regardless of whatever skill deficits they have.

They're focused on growth. You know, now we know a lot about that, all the jargon, growth mindset, all that. Back when I went to school, there was none of that. But my favorite teacher, I remember her telling us, everybody has gifts. Right? And it wasn't about like, you know, everybody gets the participation trophy.

That wasn't a thing back then, but everybody had gifts. So if you weren't excellent and you, if you were struggling in one area, then what are you good at? Let's work on that. How can you help other students with that? It was just a whole vibe, right? The energy teaches more than your lesson plan.  Right?  I believe it.

This is the hill I'm gonna die on. It's the foundation of everything I do. If kids, you know that kids learn from people they like. Right. That's simply saying it. They like you, they need to be friends with you, they need to respect you, but if they like being in your room, if you make it somehow comfortable, safe,  but fun. 

Not everyday fun, but, you know, not so rigid. You make the weather. When things go not so great, are you calm, or are you really  not helping? The situation, are you escalating? Are you really, you know,  in parent, in students minds, you know, are you, you just waiting, you waiting for a gotcha, you're not doing what you're supposed to do, turn your head around, take your earbuds out, like all of that stuff.

I'm not saying you don't hold standards, but you know what I'm saying, that energy of like a gotcha, a teacher who's just looking to compensate stuff, stuff, and the teacher who's there to really, you know, inspire And if you have gifts and other interests letting you explore those as a way of, you know, learning other things.

So that's what it's about. It's my daily mood that makes the weather. I possess tremendous power to make life miserable or joyous, right? So that's where it comes from. I'm the decisive element. And so that's when I say, create your own path, right? Don't, don't have to do what other teachers did. Have your own teaching experience.

If everybody in your campus is miserable,  you don't need to be,  right? You could be the only one who's happy. And when they come and ask you why, you tell them, I make my own sunshine.  And then, two, yeah, bring your own weather. Even when you're under the weather, even when you're not feeling your best, if you have that kind of vibe in the classroom, students will give you grace.

They won't play up on the days that you're not feeling good and you're honest with them about it. Hey, I just don't have, you know, my usual. energy today. I'm not feeling great. You know, they'll go out of their way to make sure  everything is successful. You, that has proven, you know, my experience time and time again.

Okay, I promised you a shorter episode. That was it.  Not as short as I thought, but let me leave you with this. I believe in you. Don't let one bad day, one bad day that you've had in the classroom, one day when you weren't your best self. Don't beat yourself up about that as a general rule. Just create your own path, bring your own sunshine.

I believe in you. I'm proud of you for listening to this podcast to try and make your experience better. Everybody benefits from that. Everybody. And I can't wait to talk to you next week.