If you don’t ask you won’t know anything. This seems obvious and a very basic thing yet many of us simply don’t ask because it’s impolite, improper, or we feel we don’t want to impose. And so nothing ever changes in our life. We get stuck in the predictable rotation of our lives but how different life could be if we simply prodded a little.
Why not ask for help when you need it? Why not allow people to come forth or to stay back as they wish? Again, it is far easier to assume nobody wants to help or that everyone is busy and continue grinding it out without help.
I think we try to project a perfect version of ourselves and then spend copious amounts of time living up to false realities that never serve us well.
For my first assignment this year, with all my classes, I decided to ask the students what they want me to know about them. Boy did they surprise me.
I don’t want to betray their confidence but wow! It is unbelievable what happens when you ask a real question and let kids be kids. Now, before you jump to the wrong conclusion, there was no makes me want to cry types of paragraphs that I had to treat carefully through. I was blessed to receive stories about meaningful gifts from grandparents, struggles with self image and self esteem, and apprehensive dreams of a bright future.
If you don’t ask, you are not going to get, but if you ask you will, but it doesn’t end there. Now it’s my turn. I have to think of lessons I can bring into the classroom that will help these students persevere, see themselves in a different light and dream of things they didn’t even think of dreaming about.
That is a tall order, but then again at six four, a tall order is my sort of thing anyway.
Photo credit: https://unsplash.com/@jontyson
