A Quote
“Life is something we need to stop correcting. My boy was a pocket universe I could never hope to fathom. Every one of us is is an experiment, and we don’t even know what the experiment is testing.
My wife would have known how to talk to the doctors. Nobody’s perfect, she liked to say. But, man, we all fall short so beautifully.”
Source: Richard Powers, Bewilderment, p. 5
A Thought
What do you think you are: a tree or the weather?
Weather sets the conditions for existence. It dominates, holds everything else in its sway. It is forceful, regardless of whether it is pleasant or foul. Everything must adapt to it.
We think a strong person is the one who sets the tone, so we spend so much of our lives trying to be the weather. We try to set people straight, bend them to our will, make them do our bidding.
With so many people huffing and puffing, it’s no wonder the house feels like it’s falling down. It’s no wonder so many people are exhausted.
I’d rather be a tree. Beneath the surface, there’s a hidden universe of connections where trees are interlinked: there they communicate, and provide sustenance for the young seedlings. If the subterranean world is rich and nourishing they are able to flourish and firmly anchor themselves. If they’re not isolated, their growth is supported by the older trees and they can take their time, which makes their trunks become strong, their branches become healthy and supple; they become able to flex and bend, yet stay anchored, whatever the weather. While there’s no one correct way to be a tree they all become beautiful in their own way.
The Stoics had a word for this: assent.
Trees assent to the world as it is; they take the weather as it comes and flex accordingly without being blown off course.
The weather is powerful but it’s fickle and unreliable: storms pass; beautiful days are fleeting.
It’s the trees that remain.
An Action
Apply the metaphor to your classroom.
You can’t control the weather, and when you try to be it you’re in need of a holiday after 4 weeks (max) so think of everyone, yourself included, as trees: what is needed to help all of you become strong and supple, imperfect yet beautiful?