December 17, 2020 RCSD Educator Blog

Message from Jamey Schrey

10% Happier

I have spent much of my life being plagued by chronic illness. And while none of my ailments have led to disabling conditions or, even worse, death, at times, illness has caused me to be emotionally paralyzed. The illness challenges felt too daunting to tackle and honestly, just neverending.

Due to the stress of thinking I would not feel good outside my home, become publicly sick, or have people notice my condition, I would be overwhelmed with the urgency to shelter at home. My anxiety led to obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and time wasted doing nonsensical tasks. As an avid reader, I have come across so many people in articles, blogs, and podcasts that share that COVID has very similarly caused them to isolate, hide, and even stop moving emotionally. COVID has reminded us of the fragility of both our lives and of life as we know it. Understandably, so many people are feeling deeply down.

Years ago, I stumbled upon a book, Ten Percent Happier, that changed my life and thinking. When I felt physically ill, I tended to stop growing as a person. I look back and realize that I missed opportunities to build beautiful memories because I was just stuck. I was unable to reject the sense of pervasiveness caused by my illness. Because I did not feel good...then everything was terrible. Reading the book helped me realize that when I was suffering, I tended to project it out indefinitely. Yet, I had health insurance, a good job, and great friends. I needed a new way of building space in my head for hope, and ultimately moving again.

I felt like Ten Percent Happier spoke to me. The book is the true story of an ABC Anchor, Dan Harris, that had a panic attack on national television and, to others, appeared to be having a stroke. His work and what he shares is about not trying to make monumental changes in your life to move forward or become 100% happier. But instead, he talks about what it is like to make shifts and changes in your life that make you 10% happier. Time and space to better enjoy the moments we are in vs. regretting the past and casting doubt on the future.

Upon reading his book, one of the changes I began to make time to pause and assess my dialogue in my head, and at times what I was saying aloud. Rather than defining myself by how I felt, in my moments of pause, I made goals (I actually even wrote them down) that moved the dial to happiness a little at a time. For example, I began playing indoor soccer. And while there were times I did not feel up to exercising, rather than not going and not playing, rather than being paralyzed with my OCD and number counting (3 and 7 are my digits), I always put on my uniform and showed up to the game. 

Funny. The more I planned around the games rather than the illness, the better I ate, the more I laughed, the more organized my days became. I slowly realized I was happier. The more I forgot about the illness. It became just a part of my life, not my whole life.

As we look to the new year, many people set lofty goals that overwhelm them by week two, are unattainable, and often lead to more let downs than making us happier. 

There’s a lot of uncertainty around how long this pandemic will last, which makes the sense of unyielding doom and gloom incredibly daunting. It helps to remember that all pain is temporary. Although we don't know when this crisis will end, we know that it will end.

What if we set our #2021 goals to be 10% happier. Now, this can’t be after the pandemic, when the vaccines arrive, when orange tier is back, etc.  Let’s assume the pandemic is around for a little while longer...what are some actions that we CAN do to move the happiness knob just 10% higher. How are we going to pause and take notice of the moments of joy, of smells, of laughter, and even of sadness?

I hope each of you knows that students, both online and in-person, take ongoing snapshots each day of the moments of success, joy, and fun that they experience. Each one of you has contributed to their daily photo albums that are foundational to their future success as happy and healthy human beings. 

I hope each of you spend your vacation, filling your daily photo album of moments that lift you up, make you smile, and increase your #2021 happiness by at least 10%!

Best Wishes,

Jamey

The Long Journey to Becoming “10% Happier”

Option B: Resiliency

Deepak Chopra-5 things

 

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Progress Report Reminder

Middle School Teachers:  An email from the school site will go home on Friday, January 15th to remind parents they can check grades in Otus. Here is a sample of the message that will be sent home by the school site.

Elementary Teachers:
A reminder, Elementary Progress Reports need to go home by Friday, January 15th.
 
There are two minimum expectations from the District when it comes to Progress Reports.

1. Any student that might receive a Limited on any domain on the Trimester 2 Report Card receives communication regarding progress from their teacher during progress report time.  This includes both academic domains, and the academic behavior and college readiness standards. 

2. PLCs are on the same page in regards to what information they send home and when they send that home.

Teachers are allowed to send additional information or send information to all students if they choose, but that is a PLC decision.

Teachers can communicate using the District form, or you may use your own form of communication. If you are going to communicate using something different than the District provided form, you must let your administrator know.

 

Below is a document that has different progress report options.  There are two types of files, PDF or Google doc. The Google docs have been changed to say Tri 2 on them.

RCSD Elementary Progress Report Tri 2 Master Document