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I have recently become reacquainted with the drama of booking a flight.
It is a fraught decision-making experience. Not only must you navigate existential issues like, “Am I even going to be the same person seven weeks from now? What if I’m not alive? What if I don’t want to go on this trip?”, you also have to deal with logistical ones, plus shifting and unpredictable prices that create a sense of urgency and FOMO. As much as I love travel, I do not love this process.
Read MoreA friend has two daughters in elementary school. One of them loves to revisit her earlier childhood — pictures she drew, early attempts at spelling, and photos of herself. She has said that she wishes to go back and be a baby again “so I can see how cute I was and how much everyone loved me.”
The other sister, however, feels uncomfortable with her former self. Her past work makes her cringe. “I was so stupid,” she says, laughing and rolling her eyes.
Read MoreA fellow math teacher presented an intriguing brain-teaser involving coins. I think of myself as someone who enjoys problem-solving, so I gave it a whirl.
Solving the problem took several hours of work over the course of a couple of weeks, including some time spent talking it through with my husband. There was some eccentric behavior on my part, like staring off into space with a frown and sitting on a park bench manipulating a lap full of coins. I found myself in some tricky blind alleys that required challenging mental three-point turns to get out of them. I thought I had the solution, but then discovered that I didn’t; I thought my husband had figured it out, but he hadn’t; then I went for a walk and finally got there.
Read MoreA teacher expressed dismay that the majority of her students failed their final exams in both of her classes. She talked about all of strategies she had used to ensure her students’ success, helping them to learn the material and build a growth mindset. She couldn’t figure out what she was doing wrong.
But there it was, in the middle of the wall of text she shared in the teachers’ forum online:
“They are the laziest, least capable group I’ve ever worked with.”
Read MoreWe are all multidimensional, complex human beings.
I know that I am — so I can reasonably conclude that you are. It’s only logical. But sometimes, we simplify people for our own convenience.
The lady on the train is inconsiderate. The guy behind the desk is brusque. The kids are unruly. The girl is sweet.
We label a behavior or trait and then label the person, defining them accordingly.
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