While the planet’s size and shape relatively remains the same, developments and discoveries continue to rise, creating constant change within.
I would like to think change is only good if whatever has been modified or improved leads to improvement for all. And yet, I see now, how can this be?
I think hard and deep. While there are those who thrive under a certain condition, there seems to always be those who suffer or are inflicted in not so good ways.
I never saw so many loose rabbits out and about within our neighboring yards and fields until the pandemic. When running into one while walking, I swear it looked at me as if to say, “You guys back out again?” Hysterical. Seriously. Wild animals did not miss our noise and wrecklessness.
While establishments closed down, those that stayed open, the non-essentials having found a way to remain open lowered prices to entice those they could to spend and perhaps contribute to the silent SOS taking place worldwide. The essentials kept their prices strong knowing, to their fortune, they were deemed the needed ones.
Those who could spend for travel and accommodation did. Those who couldn’t, purchased or ordered online and without option, willingly waited to receive goods merely because perhaps non-essentials were quite essential for the soul and spirit when confined indoors.
Those needing medicine or medical assistance had to work harder or hardest. Some made it through. Some didn’t.
In terms of understanding adaptation, natural selection, what I recall learning as “survival of the fittest” theorized by Charles Darwin, rings recollection of sameness to the present of time.
Change, whether small and insignificant or massive and cataclysmic, happens whether we try to stop it or not. I’d like to think of this as theories of Darwin meeting theories of Newton.
There is always a reaction, even in no reaction at all. Yes? One doing nothing or is sought to be unnecessary will cease to exist. Even parts of our body will lose function should they no longer be active. Those or that of significant resilience, strength and determination, continue in and out of their existence for well-adapted generations to follow.
While I also suggest we are in a game of chess, I have said the world is a labyrinth, each of us finding our way through in hopes of one thing- getting out- well and alive. If neither, at least having passed on the baton to the next to do better.
What for those who have thought to find a way to step out or stand high above the walls and openings? Must they go through the labyrinth at all or have they already found a way to just freely exist without confined to walls and restrictions?
I have said, “Where there is an in, there is an out.” Just as long as one was not proposed to ever get out, just so as long as one put themselves in, one can indeed find themselves out. Pushing forward or turning back. Or, stopping. Fight. Flight. Freeze.
The thing with the mind, heart, body, and spirit maybe is, not all enjoy or want to withstand change. Adaptation is not a desire or anticipation for all. There is willingness. There is also capability to be able.
Change is not for all. There are those who struggle. There are those who thrive.
Each time I think of those rabbits I saw skirting about during the pandemic upon our much needed walks while others slowly started to come out to join us outside again, I truly still smile and laugh inside.
Why did I feel like the guest each time I said “hello” to them while they stopped to seemingly stare me down? Too funny. Those rabbits thrived in our absence. While many of us quickly had to assimilate the world’s drastic change to make do, those furries seemingly adapted just fine.
Did we? Did we all?
How does one change the heart, the mind, the body, and the spirit to approach the world differently in able to succeed in it?
When one hits a wall, how many stand there or just simply fall to surrender? How many look around for another way to keep going or get out?
What separates one to survive versus one who does not?
From plants to mammals, did Darwin know which could predominantly adapt to exist irregardless of the environment? Or, as I thought to understand his theory, wasn’t it that the fittest survive in its accordance to their environment? Thus, survival of the fittest? Natural selection genetically predisposed due to phenome dominance?
Hence, if your phenome has already been presumed to thrive amidst a given environment, the likelihood it will cast great favor versus not- yes?
Our school recently has taken temporary accommodation at a building whilst our upcoming new school works toward completion of being built. At our old school, I had been located for some time at a nearly corner room, far from any need for major walking traffic.
While of course there were those who would hide here and there at times in our area to escape having to attend class (Yes. That hasn’t changed.), I had been spoiled with least amount of ongoing activities outside my room. My newest classroom location, however, has got me thinking it’s definitely payback time.
While I am truly grateful for my spacious room and peaceful window view, just enough for the sun to peak in at times to greet us, my entrance is something else. I am directly up one of the main staircases. At first, before the onset of students traversing, I thought, “How wonderful! I also have easy access to head downstairs when needed!”
Change of mind. Now that students have exhibited their energies to me during passing periods, I find myself seeing IT ALL- the us who found ways to socialize and interact with one another at highest degree of energy between classes with some who seemingly forget their way back into their next classrooms.
During the first few days of school, I was still in full energy upon returning home, even finding myself ironing clothes that could have waited to be tended to for the weekend.
Now, to no exaggeration, not even a month in, I am finding myself to wake from what I’ve come to feel as a much needed nap upon returning home.
I stood there, outside my classroom, sometime by the end of this week, knowing it was time to change my perspective on things. I had to. The energy I was burning amidst what I call a daily marathon and sprint from the onset of school to the end of the day dismissal could not be good for the rest of the year.
It is an honor to teach and thus, have the power to reach incredible young minds who reciprocate wisdom right back to you. However, the cost at times to address the unnecessary distractions can be moments where you hear yourself say, “No. Not today.”
My husband spoke the solution I perhaps was already thinking, but definitely needed to hear.
“Think of it as just fun, babe. Change your perspective.”
He was right. I was out there between passing periods like a hawk and not an eagle. I needed to focus on students currently mine.
Change of mind again. Although I found myself to wake from another nap as my husband and our two youngest headed to go to their soccer practice, I knew I had succeeded in already switching my mindset even after just one day readjusting my locus of control.
It felt good to once again remember to focus on what mattered most- finishing strong as I guided students out from my class who just finished to elbow-greeting those coming in while high-fiving or quickly chatting with my former students who stop to say “hello” or, to my humble flattery, jokingly try to walk back in.
There IS a way to find joy in even what seems like a hopeless predicament. I am in no control to change all that I see happening around me. I can, however, change my focus on those meant to be my direct concern.
Energy exerted for the maximum turned to energy preserved for the minimum. I adapt to the change before me to continue to thrive within me.
There is the need to survive. There is also the need to thrive.
Change happens. While rabbits probably prefer that we remain indoors so they can still own the fields without our interruption, I have to remember that our children are needing to be out and about, too. They just aren’t rabbits. They are our children to protect.
Not everybody likes order. Not everybody likes routine. Not everybody cares to understand why we have such structures in place. Some are just meant to be; others to become; while others have already been knowing they were that one- free from the push and pull of walls.
As a teacher, I get it. I am no good help if lifeless, however.
Survival of the fittest? Some just don’t give themselves a choice.
If not me, then, who?
A superhuman, you say? I’d like to think teachers have already been given that superpower.
