Blog # 5: Teacher Well-Being and Teaching About Microaggressions
Section #1 “One of the most powerful things about compassion,” she says, “is it makes you feel safe and calmer. Instead of just feeling empathy for your students—which is essentially feeling their pain—self-compassion allows you to embrace that pain with loving-kindness, which makes it bearable,” (Zakrzewski, 2012). Through engaging in self-talk and taking the time to reflect on self-compassion exercise, I discovered how important it is to set aside some time to check in with myself and be my own cheerleader. I am very much a people pleaser and have been told by people that I need to get a backbone. Through these exercises and self-talk, I was able to come to terms with the notion that I will not be able to say yes to everything and please everyone and that there is no need to go down the anxiety spiral as a result. When I take on too many things for others on top of what I need to do I often find myself not in a happy or peaceful place. When I took the time to go on walks or just si