Well, I write this Random Thought in the midst of a vortex of emotions. On one hand, I’m still enveloped by the aura of Lily. On the other hand, Susie and I are packing up for an early Monday morning flight to Boston to assist with emergency family medical issues. Needless to say, I’ll be more than distracted. So, while I can focus my thoughts and feelings swirling around Lily, here goes.
“People-ness” has a very small academic lobby in academia compared to powerful voice of “thingification.” Yet, we academics don’t check our hearts at the door. We are heirs to a mass of emotions, perceptions, experiences, memories, pains, influences, to which we react, which shape our perspectives, and which makes sense to us of what’s going on. That inner nexus creates a dynamic that impacts on attitude and performance and achievement. We experience the push and pull of thoughts and emotions of satisfaction or irritation, suredness and confusion, answer and question, fear and courage, direction and drift, love or hate, accomplishment or frustration, joy or sadness, focus or distraction, energy and fatigue, and a host of other influences. All these intertwine to affect our motivation, our perceptions, expectations, and what we will or won’t do from moment to moment.
Consequently, there’s a certain barrenness and destitution when so many of us submit to the influence of “thingification” as we talk of improving teaching. So many of us see teaching solely in terms of tweaking method and technique, transmission of content, use of technology. We see change in terms of changing what we do being divorced from changing who we are. We see the “who” does as irrelevant to the “how” and “what” to do. We don’t see it in terms of the need to master and use the inner values of “self.” We talk of thinking about content, understanding subject matter, using technique and method, implementing technology. We seldom talk of feeling, attitude; we rarely address teaching and learning in terms of virtues and values. We tend to separate the intellectual from the emotional.
I’d be the first to admit that a learning about the methods and techniques, having knowledge of the content, and utilizing the available technology are important. We need, however, as Steve Jobs, might say, to intersect humanity with those three. Just take a look at Carol Dweck’s “fixed mindset” vis-à-vis “growth mindset,” or Clayton Christensen’s “sustaining innovator” vis-à-vis the “disruptive innovator,” or Sonya Lyubomirsky’s negativity vis-à-vis positivity, or Barbara Fredrickson’s sadness vis-a-vis happiness or Martin Seligman’s pessimism vis-à-vis optimism, or Richard Boyatzis’ dissonance vis-à-vis resonance, or Robert Brooks’ succumbing vis-à-vis overcoming, or Teresa Amabile’s uncreative vis-à-vis creative, or Jon Kabat-Zin’s mindfulness vis-a-vis mindlessness, or Frederick Herzberg’s enrichment or impoverishment, or Mihaly Csikszentmihaly’s enthusiastic flow vis-a-vis unexcited low, or Ed Deci’s purpose vis-a-vis meaninglessness, fear vis-à-vis fearlessness. Read their MINDSET, SELF THEORIES, WHEREVER YOU GO, THERE YOU ARE, INNOVATOR’S DILEMMA, FLOURISH, LOVE 2.0, POSITIVITY, LEARNED OPTIMISM, WHY WE DO WHAT WE DO, HOW OF HAPPINESS, RESONANT LEADERSHIP, POWER OF RESILIENCE, FINDING FLOW, MOTIVATION TO WORK, THE PROGRESS PRINCIPLE. They’re not talking about pedagogy or content or technology. They all are talking about the fact that it’s always personal. It’s people’s attitudes, perceptions, and emotions. It’s people’s values, character, morality, ethics, vision, purpose, meaning.
Sure, pedagogy, content, and technology are important cards in the game, but it is the “me” who turns them into either a winning or losing hand. It takes wits and hustle; it takes a keeping on; it takes awareness, attentiveness, alertness; it takes seeing with your heart. Pedagogy, content, and technology are trumped by the power of intent, happiness, fear, anxiety, worry, enthusiasm, “ho-humness,” sadness, well-being, anger, boredom, content, discontent, frustration, elation, fun, vision, purpose, resilience, passion, energy, perseverance, commitment, courage to fail, strength of character, authenticity, openness, vulnerability, fear or fearlessness, caring, belief or disbelief, kindness, rudeness, hope, hopelessness, love, disdain, and all the slings and arrows to which we are heir.
The inner “me” is imperative. It makes the difference. It turns adversity into advantage, or advantage into adversity. It determines if you think, feel, and believe you can or can’t. We don’t see pedagogy, content, and technology as they are; we see them as we are and how we use them reveals who we are. Pedagogy, content, and technology are always structured according to somebody’s perceptions, knowledge, attitudes, emotions, and emphases. They may look objective and disinterested, but they are the result of subjective choices all the way from perception, to intent, to selection, to organization, to interpretation, to application. If we are to get smart about pedagogy, content and technology, we have to get even wiser about and more aware of ourselves and others. We have to learn about and accept the role the our emotions play. We, have to understand that our humanity captains our lives. Pedagogy, content, or even technology do not.
No, as Teresa Amabile says, our most potentially potent teaching tool is my inner “Me,” who I am and who I can become. It’s my inner character; my principles and values, my heart and soul, my spirit, my attitude; my emotions; it’s my inner culture that determines my priorities and allocation choices; it’s my level of self-esteem and self-confidence and self-respect; it’s how I define myself; it’s my authenticity and integrity; it’s my avowed purpose in life. And, as Clayton Christensen says, it’s how I measure my life.
Louis