similar to Seppälä’s 2016 definition of happiness,16 right?).
As the 2014–2015 school year was about to start, I had an opportunity to work with a great California school district as part of the start-of-the-school-year activities. Mary was on my mind, as I was very aware she would not be back in my school district for her thirty-sixth season.
As I walked out of the three-hour session, a veteran teacher and someone I suspect has worked hard for a long time to be more like Mary, stopped me to say thanks. His words did give me pause though, as he said, “It was so great for you to be honest with us and not give a *!#@! about our reaction, good or bad. Thank you for saying what we needed to hear. It was tough, but it was done with a spirit of love.”
You know the heartprint you are leaving on others. You know the real residue of your work life and effort. What do you hope that residue will be? How do you hope your students and colleagues will describe you?
You know, I thought a lot about what he said when I got into my car. I suppose on that day, I was a bit more direct than I normally am, perhaps too direct with these wonderful teachers about to start a new school season. I tried to understand why I was so direct. As I sat in my car, I realized why. For several minutes, there were quiet tears. The tears were for my love of Mary. She didn’t get to start a new season like all the teachers I had just had the privilege to interact with. The tears were for my own inability to deeply impact those who get the privilege of another season, and somehow wishing I could have given her more. I think too the tears were for the students who deserve for their teachers to demonstrate love for each of them and to have great seasons just like Mary, every year.
Teachers and leaders just like you.
Find your inner Mary Layco and go for it in this school season of your professional life. Bring an increased understanding of love to your work, your colleagues, and your students. Don’t let any form of cynicism win the day.
Work together, learn from one another, and give it everything you’ve got. There really is nothing to lose—other than the privilege of that next school season.
At the start of this chapter, I asked you to name the best teacher you have ever known and three characteristics that describe what this person contributed or contributes to your life.
As you end this chapter, I would like you to turn the heartprint task around and think about one colleague at work who needs you to be someone who loves him or her (in the sense that you are going to pay attention to that person more) enough that you become a person he or she looks to as a positive contributor to his or her life.
Remember, this is not something you will declare to your colleague, “I have chosen to notice you more this year!” Think of it as just a more quiet and subtle way to improve the culture of love for the colleagues in your workplace each day.
Are you still in love with your work? And your colleagues and students? How do you know?
Name a colleague or student and write out a few actions you might take to be more fully present for him or her. Start your commitment with I will …
To some extent, as you complete the My Heartprint, you will notice it requires a certain amount of compassion for your colleague. Happiness in our profession and in the school workplace requires a personal compassion check—time and time again, over and over and over.
What does it mean to experience a compassionate workplace? And what exactly is the compassion connection to happiness? That is next.
Got Compassion? Check!
If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.
—Dalai Lama
A fully formed heart—a heart that pursues happiness in its work for students, for colleagues, and for you—finds completeness in its compassion.
Don’t read too fast. Read that sentence again.
A fully formed heart—a heart that pursues happiness in its work for students, for colleagues, and for you—finds completeness in its compassion.
Run a Google images search for the word compassion, and you’ll see several images with a heart in them. To become a teacher whom a child or colleague would follow and to become an administrator whom a teacher or colleague would follow, we demonstrate and develop a culture of compassion. It becomes part of our heartprint over time.
She was a colleague of mine. We taught many of the same classes together. She taught in Room 212. I taught in Room 210. This was before the professional learning community (PLC) era. She was older than I, and I did not know too much about her. We mostly lived in different worlds: my life filled with teaching, coaching, and my own young children; her life filled with friends and activities outside of school. We did not work on school activities or lesson planning together.
How would you define compassion? What does the word compassion mean to you?
How does a fully formed heart exhibit compassion?
Then one day I entered her room before school, because I could hear her crying. She sat at her desk sobbing. Her dog had died the night before. Yet, here she was at work. I knelt down by her side and hugged her for what seemed like a really long time, maybe three minutes. And it seemed a bit awkward, hugging an older female colleague.
But at that moment, she needed me to mourn with her. She needed me to provide her with my compassion. She needed me to allow her loss to enter into my being. And I do not know why I felt that way. I wasn’t sophisticated enough to think, “Oh, she needs compassion right now, so give her some.” It just seemed to be the right thing to do.
A few years later, I needed a small amount of money for a family emergency. She heard about my dilemma from another colleague. Without reproach or request, she wrote me a check. She said she knew I would repay her. She said she had never forgotten my act of compassion on the day her dog died. Again, I was too young to understand, but her act of compassion on that day was her way of identifying and owning with me my family emergency. Her kindness overwhelmed me.
Compassion means being there for the students and colleagues that intersect your path. It means you identify with them. You are cheering for them. You celebrate victories with them, no matter how small, and more important, you mourn their setbacks. It means you always and sincerely wish them well in your heart. You lean into them, even when it is difficult to do so.
You and I have a lot of power. Think about the words used thus far: We demonstrate compassion. We mourn setbacks. We cheer on victories. We identify.
We can also choose not to do these things.
We
