Assume Positive Intent

I'm Brian Martin, a second grade teacher who find so much joy and fulfillment in what I do. Being in the classroom for almost 20 years, I know all about the time, effort and energy that you are continuously pouring into those you serve. That's why each week, I'm going to bring you an inspiring message to give you a little joy, and help fill your cup back up. Thank you for being here. And welcome to the teaching champions podcast. What's going on everybody? I hope this finds you striving and thriving in doing absolutely amazing. Let me ask you this. Have you ever sent out an email to someone and heard crickets, and you find yourself checking your email every five minutes to see if you have a response, but you don't get one. So your mind starts racing and you start creating stories in your head of why this person isn't getting back to you. And it sends all sorts of emotions through you. And on the flip side of that, have you ever received an email or a text, and you read it one way, and it hurts, and it makes you angry, and come to find out later on? You misinterpreted how it was meant to be. You see how we interpret other's actions. It affects us emotionally, mentally, and physically. And we can assume that people have hidden agendas, they have bad intentions that they mean hurt us. Or we can approach situations with a positive intent. What if we approach the different situations that we find ourselves in. And we think that individuals have the best of intentions, often, something can happen. And we only know a small sliver of everything that is going on. And we end up filling in the blanks with our own thoughts. And often these thoughts are completely wrong. Or the real situation isn't half as bad as we were making it out to be. Whatever, instead of creating our own stories, we go to others and we ask questions, we gain clarity. What if when we feel we have been wronged, we lead with a little more empathy. You see, we're all human. We're gonna make mistakes. And we don't know what's going on in other people's lives. We only see what people allow us to see. And everybody has something that's going on. So we lead with positive intent. And we choose to think that people have the best of intentions and not the worst. Think about what that can do to our school culture, the relationships with our colleagues, our parents, our students, if we choose to think the best rather than the worst, one of the best ways to leave a positive intent is to ask questions. And a few years ago, a problem arose one of my students, decisions were made without anyone letting me know. And I'd heard about the situation from another teacher. And I was never consulted about this. So my mind went into overdrive. And I knew very little of the whole situation. So what I ended up doing is I started filling in the blanks, with my own narrative. And the more I filled in the blanks, the angrier I got. And the angrier I got, the worse the narrative that I was creating in my head got in by the time I was done, I was so fired up, I was ready to step in the ring with Mike Tyson. And honestly, I'm pretty laid back. And I usually try to give people the benefit of the doubt. I tried to look from others perspectives. But in that moment, I threw it all out the window. And what should you not do when you're emotionally charged? Send attacks, send an email, you leave a message for someone. What did I do? I fired up that computer. I opened up the email, I let those fingers crossed the keyboard and I hit the send button because I wanted my administrator to know that I did not appreciate everything that went down. Now I'm gonna say I kept respectful no matter how you feel, there should be a level of respect that we give to our colleagues to our administration. But the email I signed was a lot stronger tone than 99% of the emails that I will ever send. So I hit send. And I waited, it was late in the evening, so I knew it would probably wouldn't be addressed to the following day. And because of the story that I wrote, in my head, I held on to those negative emotions. For the rest of the evening, I woke up and was still holding on to those negative feelings. And have you ever done that, where you create a story in your head, and you work yourself up so much, but you have no factual basis for the story that you created? It doesn't feel good. So the next day, I get to school, and my administrator sends an email says they'll stop down at lunch, lunch calms, my administrator comes in, we sit down and talk in my administrator explained everything that went down. And you know what? That story that I made up my head, it was completely wrong. None of what I had made up my mind was true, I had caused myself so much unneeded aches, because I had filled in the blanks with my own narrative. And thankfully, my administrator was awesome about it. But it could have been so much easier if instead of creating a harmful narrative in my head, that I lead with a question. And I asked for clarity. And I assume positive intent. See, if I would have assumed that others were doing what they thought was the best from the get go. And instead of making a big assumption of others intent, I would have protected my piece. And I would have felt better at the end of the day. Assuming positive intent also can hold others accountable. Conversations thinks can be said and interpreted one way, in the offender, they might not even know about what they're saying, or what they're doing is offending anybody. And this has happened to me before. A friend came to me once. And they said the conversation that we had the day before had heard them. And this blew me away, because in no way shape or form, would I ever want to do anything to hurt this individual. So I listened. And they gave me their perspective, and what they heard. Because you see in every conversation, there is what is sad, and what is hurt. And they can be two completely different things. So this person came in, they talked and they let me know how they felt. And then they gave me the opportunity to explain myself. And I was eternally grateful for this. And they did it in an open in a non confrontational way. It gave me a chance to hear their perspective. And they could hear my perspective. And they could hear what I actually was trying to say and where I was coming from. And I was so appreciative. Because like I said, I would never want to hurt this person. And because they did that, they allowed our relationship to grow and become stronger, and allow me as a person to grow. Assuming positive intent is also about protecting our emotional or mental and physical well being. Think about, what does it do to the relationships in our lives if we're always assuming that those around us have a secret agenda. But the truth is, people are busy, they have their own lies, and they're often so consumed in what they're trying to do in their own universe, that they're not wasting time trying to bring us down. When we trust people, and we lead with positivity, it's gonna welcome amazing people in our lives. And if we do get hurt by others, we can relieve some of that pain by understanding that hurt people hurt people. Others may be in a difficult place and they might be struggling. And we might not know that. We don't know everything that's going on in other's lives. So if we lead with empathy, it can help relieve some of this pain. And it doesn't give them a free pass. But it can give us a level of understanding where it can help explain their actions. And it helps us not take it personally and it protects our peace. So many positive intentions help strengthen our relationships with our champions, the parents that we serve, in our co workers, every school out there, every school that's filled with amazing individuals who are all working towards creating a place where champions can come, they can shine, and they can thrive. And I've seen countless times where people I've worked closely with, they've stepped up not only for their students, but for each other. So assume positive intent. Assume that people have our best interests in mind. Be careful not to create our own stories, ask questions, find out from others perspectives, and come from a place of empathy. It's not about giving others a pass, about protecting our peace, sullied with positive intent. Thank you for listening. I appreciate your time. It's about serving each other. And if you could share this podcast with anyone that you think would benefit, I'd greatly appreciate it. And it doesn't matter if you're from rural America, to urban America, to Canada, to Spain to Bahrain. We're all on that same team. We're all on that same mission. And we're always better together. And my challenge for you this week, is pay attention to how you react to the different situations that you face. Do you automatically assume the worst? Is your mind filling in all the blanks? If it is, catch yourself, seek clarity. Look to see from other people's perspectives and assume positive intent. Keep me an amazing my friends. And as you go out into this week, may you step into your strength, may you step into your shine, and let's build these champions up. Have a great week, everybody.