Compassion Resilience Newsletter

Compassion Resilience for those in the education field is...

1. The ability to maintain our physical, emotional, and mental well-being (using energy productively) while compassionately identifying and addressing the stressors that are barriers to learning for students

2. Identifying and addressing the barriers to caregivers/ parents and colleagues being able to effectively partner on behalf of children, and

3. Identifying, preventing, and minimizing compassion fatigue within ourselves.

Many of us give the very best of who we are every day, yet all too often struggle to feel like our best is good enough. Understanding, and at times challenging our own expectations and perception of others’ expectations is key to identifying and transforming unrealistic expectations that compromise our ability to approach others with compassion and extend that compassion to ourselves. In this section, we identify the expectations we have for ourselves and for others and question whether these expectations are helpful for us or holding us back.

We all carry a load of expectations with us. Expectations are firmly tied to our needs, desires, values, and beliefs. They paint a mental picture of how we think things “should” be. As educators, we are taught to have high expectations for our students and to hope that those expectations will drive them to do better than they otherwise would have done. Our expectations of ourselves or the expectations placed upon us can also drive us to excel. Self-expectations and the expectations placed upon us can be realistic or unrealistic, helpful or hurtful. When our expectations are made explicit and realistic, they can be the foundation for dreams, ideas, and possibilities. They can feed us, inspire us and help us to show up in our lives. If we are holding ourselves or someone else to an unrealistic standard, then we can learn to adjust these expectations. Expectations become problematic when they take us out of the present to solely focus on the future, or fill our heads with how things “should” be and feel and of how the people around us “should” act and feel. Our “shoulds” of ourselves reflect expectations that we feel we are not meeting. When we tell ourselves that we “should” be doing something, we are reinforcing the idea that we are not doing it. If our internal dialogue says “I should spend more time on these lesson plans” the implicit end to that sentence is “… but, I am not.” We are reinforcing the negative and this can result in guilt, frustration, or anxiety. Well meaning, but unchecked, expectations can form the bedrock of compassion fatigue. Expectations may operate in the short-term: “If I get this lesson just right, all the kids will love it.” In this example, we create expectations for ourselves (“If I get this lesson just right…”), as well as for others (“all the kids will love it”).

Elementary Schools

Brianna Capesius, ABE & West

Jamie Carney, GLW & North Freedom

John Davies, East

Middle School

Laurie Kowalke, JYMS

Christina Olson, JYMS

High School

Joe Bavlnka, BHS

Ann Renn, BHS

Brittany Schmidt, BHS