February 27, 2021 Linda Markley

SPIRIT Journey: Trust

Can do's, Essential questions, i am enough, Intention, Introspection, Intuition, Maslow before Blooms, Passion, Purpose, Sincerity, Spirit of teaching, Spirit practices, Strategies

Oh boy, this is a BIG one! 

It all starts the minute we’re born. And it ebbs and flows as we move through Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs in life.

Base level of Maslow’s Hierarchy = are our basic physiological needs being met? Food, water, shelter, clothing, rest…

As children, if we are left to cry when we are hungry or there simply isn’t enough food available to eat, what does that teach us about trusting the adult who is supposed to help meet our needs?

Next level of Maslow’s = are our basic safety and security needs being met? 

Do we feel safe physically, emotionally and psychologically? As we are learning our way in the world, how do others support us? Do they guide, encourage and celebrate our efforts or do they use guilt, shame and physical punishment as a method to control us?

We learn and develop trust through our experiences in the world
...good and bad.

That means all our experiences with people, places and things…ALL the nouns.

PLUS the actions that go with the nouns.

Then comes all the feelings and emotions, the adjectives and adverbs, that describe our experiences and create the memories and the stories that we associate with those experiences.

 

Good experiences = good feelings, memories and stories (and therefore, I should trust them?)

Bad experiences = bad feelings, memories and stories (and therefore, I shouldn’t trust them?)

(note that when it is a REALLY bad experience = trauma, which is a whole other topic to explore. I just want to mention here that there is a lot of attention on the trauma sensitive classroom these days, and with reason. Again, to be explored more at another time).

 

So, maybe instead of looking at trust as something that is developed through good and bad experiences, such as a good experience means I can trust the person or what has happened and a bad experience means I can’t trust the person or what has happened, maybe we can explore trust in another way.

Perhaps we can look at trust as a contract that is established

 between the two parties involved: 

the first party who has the needs and 

the second party who is meeting the needs of the first party.

 

Sounds so legal and not my usual heart-centered, emotional, Vagus-nerve flowing approach, no?

Stay with me here as we explore this a little more. Or should I say, trust me? 

I want to take a moment here to suggest that if you haven’t read the other blog posts about the SPIRIT Journey leading up to this one, I recommend you go back and do so. You will make a lot more connections for meaning and get a lot more out of all this.

The SPIRIT Journey, just like all learning journeys, is scaffolded and spiraled because learning something is never a one shot deal (unlike what the current educational system believes/practices which is that any content can be delivered up on a computerized silver platter or prescribed textbook activity, and the students magically download the content and own it…have learned something??? NOT!!!

To learn anything, we need to constantly re-visit and practice the different aspects or steps of the learning journey or process. I don’t know how we can know this and accept it in sports (where kids are expected and willing to go to practice after school), but not in academics?! 

Anyway, I digress…

We started with sincerity = are we “all in” and committed and true to the outcome of the journey? 

Then, we have moved our way through many steps of the process, such as finding our purpose and building resilience and so on, so that we could become clear about who we are and how we want to show up in the world (our intentions). 

As we have more and more experiences in life,

 we are constantly evaluating them to see 

if our needs were met and the desired outcome fulfilled.

Do I trust what I’ve been through? Do I take the next step forward to be fully transformed, to have my life shift and to show up like I have always imagined and dreamed it would be? To reach the pinnacle of Maslow’s Hierarchy…self-actualization? To have all my needs met?

Well, what I learned on the Camino was that with each step I had to develop my faith…in myself, in those around me and in the process. I had to create an intention of good faith and be bound to that intention, no matter what, I was on the right path, and that I was going to get there by putting one foot in front of the other, repeat, repeat, repeat…practice-figure things out to get better-practice-adjust-practice-learn something new-practice-get better—— you get the idea.

At all levels, it takes faith…like contracts made in good faith. 

And when a contract is broken, we lose faith. 

And when we lose faith, we can get off track, stuck or even lost. When this happens, we are not clear in our choices and may betray ourselves or may even be open to betrayal from others.

 

What happens then? The contract is broken, and therefore, the bond and trust.

“Trust”, according to Merriam-Webster, is defined with such key words as “depends”, “assurance”, “confidence”, “belief”, “character” and “hope”.

“Bond” is associated with words like “connection”, “relationship”, “agreement” and “promise”.

It becomes a vicious cycle. Life starts to feel like we are a hamster stuck on the hamster wheel going nowhere and we lose hope, faith, trust and our bond with everything that has always been true and that works.

I think this is what has been happening to all of us in the pandemic. As our physiological and safety needs are not being met fully, trust in life has been broken. We all feel like hamsters.

It is really playing out in IMAX 3D for teachers with all the senses being activated as they just keep trying to run harder, faster and more perfectly on that hamster wheel trying to meet the ludicrous expectations being placed upon them.

Teachers and students are face-planted just trying to survive the basic level of Maslow’s Hierarchy. I have heard teachers say, “When I get home, I barely have enough energy to take care of my basic needs of food, bathing and taking care of my house (shelter)” …Maslow’s lowest level of survival. 

So, what is my advice for everyone, especially teachers?

Take a SPIRIT Journey to build up your trust and faith 
and bond once again with what fills your cup 
and recharges your battery for life. 

Find your way back home to you and out of bondage to what is not you!

 

Start with sincerity. Forget the unreasonable demands you are placing on yourself or that are being placed on you by others, and get in touch with who you are and what you can realistically do. Acceptance of your vulnerability and imperfection. No waxing over any “gaps” or perceived shortcomings. 

As long as you are sincere in your efforts and being authentic and real about what you can and should do for the greater good of all involved, that is enough. You are enough.

Then, move into “serenity” because once you get real with what you can do, you will need to find the calm within you to weather the stormy seas that will inevitably swell up when things get rough and are not going according to our expectations.

When we are calm and focused, we are able to stay in our passion and purpose, and use them as our compass to find our guiding North Star.

Like all true navigators on the seas of life, we use our intuition and integrate all the signs and  input from the Universe to guide us and keep us on our true course.

As we continue into uncharted territories, reality may set in and we need to be resilient to the temptations, distractions and false readings.

As we follow our North Star, things may come up that require us to take a deep dive beneath what we see right in front of us. What is underneath the surface and how is that affecting my perceptions and choices? Introspection…a deeper dive than the reflection we see on the surface of the water.

With our inner compass of truth, we can set our intentions in degrees of longitude (north-south vertical direction – how we will bring balance to our inner world to keep us rotating on our axis and ever-evolving) and in latitude (how far we are willing to sway in the wind or drift off course in our attitude and approach to life).

Here is where real transformation takes place. We may form new bonds of trust, but the journey will continue and the cycle will repeat itself in order to help us grow and continue to navigate our way through life until we reach our finally destination. 

Do we want to unconsciously just turn the pages in the story of our our lives until we finally reach the end of the book? Or do we want to awaken to every sense-ational step along the way.

It’s not about the destination. It’s about the journey.

 

TEACHERS:  it’s not about how far we get in the book or how many activities we cover in the chapter or how many grades we give out… it’s not about the destination. Figure out what the needs are…yours and those of your students … in order to find your true path to self-actualization as human beings…to live each experience of the journey fully and in joy…one step at a time, one foot in front of the other. Keep the faith…bond with your experiences…trust the journey. 

EVERYONE:  The pandemic is not forever. Yes, it seems like it has been forever, but we are learning so many valuable lessons about ourselves and meeting the basic needs of life. Frankly, it reminds me a lot of my walk on the Camino and every other big life challenge that took time to go through and figure things out. I have learned to allow things to unfold, to stay bound to my intentions, to keep the faith and to trust the process. 

I know it is a process that takes a lifetime of practice! It’s never over until it’s over., and I don’t want it to be over. I still want to show up for the game and play, coach! I’ll keep practicing and learning, no matter how bad I seem at it or how grueling and impossible it might seem! Now there’s a perspective! Trust me!

Transformation is next.  

 

Essential Question of the Day for TRUST:

Am I staying true to my intentions in this moment or am I breaking the bond with them?

CAN DO Statements:

I am confident, deliberate and bound to my intentions and choices in order to maintain trust in myself and my actions.

I trust the path I am on and welcome the lessons that I am learning along the way.

I grow my faith and secure a greater bond with myself through my awareness, introspection and conscious choices.

Best Practices for Today:

I will do the best I can to meet my basic needs and those of my students, and that has to be enough.

If I feel like I am letting myself or others down, I will check in with Maslow’s Hierarchy and make sure that I have covered the basics first (physiological, safety, security) before moving on to love and belonging.

I will maintain the contract of the relationship between me and myself first, and then, I will work to fulfill the contract between me and others after my basic needs are met.

 

Inspirational song:

A Matter of Trust  by  Billy Joel

*note the people, activities and context of this music video made in the 80’s. We survived then, and we will survive what we are going through now. It’s all just a “matter of trust”!

Photo credit:

“Trust” by schmollmolch is licensed under CC BY 2.0