As the school year is about to break for summer and holidays are around the corner, I’ve been thinking about all the changes that have been going on in my life. Today, I share a recent experience I had with a long-time friend and how our conversation sparked this week’s episode.
As leaders and educators, our aim is to be the highest versions of ourselves, allowing us to serve our colleagues and students, as well as ourselves. I’m all for transformation and striving to be the best we can possibly be, but sometimes our life choices and aspirations can make the people around us feel uncomfortable.
You might be doing some serious mindset work to climb the ladder, or maybe you’re on the other end of the stick, feeling fearful about the change you’re witnessing and struggling to understand where it’s coming from. Whatever the case may be, I’m here to shine a light on what’s happening and how it affects the people around you.
As an educator, you spend your time running around after students and teachers alike, sometimes it can be difficult to take a step back and really acknowledge the amazing work you do and how it makes you feel. Well, it’s the end of the year – you made it! You’ve been a school leader for the whole year and now is the time to sit back and reflect on a job well done.
When you’re having a bad time at work, do you find yourself pointing the finger of responsibility at the actions of the people you work with? We’ve all been through the scene – we’re talking to our friends and making our work environment sound like everyone is out to make life miserable for us – that we’re somehow the victim and there is something fundamentally wrong with everyone who makes us angry.
Welcome to The Empowered Principal Podcast. Every tenth episode, I am paying tribute to my greatest teachers and influencers. And with this being the 20th episode, I have some words of gratitude for one of the people who has been a huge influence in shaping my journey as a coach and my life as a whole – the awe-inspiring Dr. Martha Beck.
We generally have an idea of the kind of principal we want to be when we finally receive the news that we have achieved the position. It’s usually exactly what we ourselves appreciated in a leader before we made it to the top. But it can be challenging when your vision and expectations don’t match up with the results you’re getting in your school.
I don’t think there is a human being on this planet who looks forward to receiving criticism. As school leaders, everything we do is scrutinized; by parents, students, and staff. It really is part of being a principal that we know all too well.
On the show last week, we dived deep into our brain’s predisposition to blaming other people for how we’re feeling based on their words and actions when really it’s our thoughts about a person’s actions that dictate our feelings. Toward the end of that episode, I mentioned boundaries and how it is possible for people to overstep into our emotional or physical space, which blurs the lines of blame.
On last week’s show, we talked about the importance of taking responsibility for our thoughts, feelings, actions, and results. Taking this responsibility in our lives makes us feel empowered and helps us take ownership of our actions and results.
Do you always take responsibility for the things in your control? Most likely, you’re avoiding it at least a little bit. It makes sense why we want to resist or avoid responsibility when we hear that we have to be answerable and accountable for something within our control… nobody likes having too much accountability in their lives.