Onward: Cultivating Emotional Resilience in Educators

[00:01] SPEAKER_01:

Welcome to Principal Center Radio, bringing you the best in professional practice.

[00:06] Announcer:

Here's your host, director of the Principal Center and champion of high performance instructional leadership, Justin Bader. Welcome, everyone, to Principal Center Radio.

[00:15] SPEAKER_02:

I'm your host, Justin Bader, and I'm honored to be joined today by Elena Aguilar. Elena is the founder and president of Bright Morning Consulting, an educational consulting group that works around the world supporting educators to meet the needs of children. She is the well-known author of The Art of Coaching and The Art of Coaching Teams, and a longtime contributor to Edutopia and Education Week, where I'm sure you've seen her writing. And she's the author of the new book Onward, Cultivating Emotional Resilience in Educators.

[00:48] Announcer:

And now, our feature presentation.

[00:50] SPEAKER_02:

Elena, welcome to Principal Center Radio.

[00:52] SPEAKER_00:

Thank you so much, Justin.

[00:54] SPEAKER_02:

So great to have you here, and so great to talk about this topic of resilience. You mentioned that about 70% of teachers quit within the first five years. And I wonder if we could talk, just to kick things off, about why you see resilience as so key to addressing that challenge in our profession.

[01:14] SPEAKER_00:

That is the reason I got pulled into this work around resilience was those high turnover numbers. And whether teachers are quitting or changing schools or districts, what I saw as a teacher and then as a coach and as an administrator was a ridiculously high turnover rate that created destabilization in our schools, for our communities, in our ability to implement new initiatives, to work towards goals. And so I was initially drawn to focus on resilience because of that reason. What I found as I started exploring the topic and using strategies to coach educators in cultivating the resilience was that there was so much more that could happen if we worked on boosting our resilience.

[02:06]

I found that for myself personally in my work, as well as with the people that I coached or worked with. And what I found simply was, we had more energy, we had more passion, enthusiasm, ability to deal with the little daily challenges that just continuously pile up no matter how far along we are in our career, there are always going to be challenges. And I saw that cultivating resilience could help us to really transform our schools beyond just having a stable teaching population, which would be incredible and really powerful, but beyond that could help us transform our schools by improving the skill set, contributing to improving the skill set of educators, helping us all become more efficacious, as well as changing the culture and climate at a school and in an organization to one that is simply happier or more joyful.

[03:07]

which is a side effect of cultivating your resilience.

[03:10] SPEAKER_02:

Absolutely. And I'm reminded of a lot of reading that I did early in my career as a teacher in Parker Palmer's work. And I imagine that what you're saying rings a lot of bells for people who are familiar with Parker Palmer's work. And I understand he actually wrote one of the blurbs on the back of the book speaking to your work on resilience.

[03:28] SPEAKER_00:

He did. And his work has been really influential in my life. The first time I read some of his work, it hit me like a lightning bolt. I just felt like nobody had ever talked about what it was like to be a teacher in the way that he did. And it's deeply influenced my work as well as other conversations that are going on in our broader society around mindfulness and emotional well-being, all of that work. Thinking about people and educators more holistically as whole human beings and And thinking for myself, thinking about how do we approach professional development and teacher and administrator training through a lens of looking at the mind, the cognitive skills, the knowledge we need, as well as the heart and the spirit, really.

[04:19] SPEAKER_02:

Well, and really, it strikes me as analogous to the physical training that an Olympic athlete might go through. And we think, well, I'm not sure that teaching is like being an Olympic athlete. But I think in terms of the demands that it places on us as educators, You know, in a lot of ways, it is. And I think our profession has been lacking in kind of training resources as far as how we bring ourselves to the table and keep ourselves in a condition that allows us to do the extremely difficult emotional and mental work that teaching is, particularly in challenging contexts.

[04:57] SPEAKER_00:

Right. And there is sometimes a little bit of a misconception around resilience and Resilience definitely includes the disposition or the capacity to have perseverance and to persevere and to make it through that marathon. And resilience is about how we rebound after a setback. So after we confront adversity, we fall down, we're challenged by something, how much spring is in our step? How do we not only recuperate, but actually thrive in spite of the challenge and perhaps spring forward because of what we've learned and how we've grown through the challenge?

[05:42] SPEAKER_02:

I wonder, is there a part of resilience that also includes stepping away or stepping back and saying, okay, I need to get myself into a good place here before I can come back and do this work because... I look at those statistics about teachers who quit in the first five years, and I often wonder if I should count myself in that because I didn't quit after five years, but I did leave the classroom and move to a different school and into kind of a dean of students role. So I wonder how much of that was my own wanting to go into the administrative side, but also my own kind of, you know, honestly burning out in kind of a tough role in terms of what I was doing. I don't know.

[06:21]

What do you think about that? Knowing that stability for our students is so important. What do you think about that within the realm of resilience?

[06:28] SPEAKER_00:

Well, I really appreciate you raising that and that resonates for me too. I was in the classroom for three years and then I left for a couple of years and then I came back and then I changed schools and then I changed roles. And when I look back at all of that, there were many reasons. that were valid about why I wanted to change what I was doing. And the other side of that was teaching is so hard. And even in my seventh year of teaching, almost every year that I taught, and I taught for 13 years, almost every year, I thought, I don't know if I can keep doing this for another year.

[07:02]

And then when I had a child, it was like, how am I going to keep doing this? And then a few years later, it was, it's just so hard. And I often think back to that time, many of those times. And if I had known what I know now about resilience, I actually think I could have stayed in the classroom longer. And I loved being a teacher. I loved it.

[07:24]

I miss it still. And I do believe that we need to have teachers in the classroom for at least five to seven years, because that's what we know is the amount of time it takes to really become a master at something. And ideally, we'd have teachers who would stay much longer once they are a master and But whether they're continuing or they're moving into other roles, I think we need to have educators who have that kind of expertise as classroom teachers. And I do think that for so many teachers, it's the burnout that is challenging, the questions of, how can I keep doing this? Why am I doing this? It's taking a toll on my health, on my family.

[08:05]

So I'm really hoping that I can contribute to that conversation, to helping educators who want to stay in the classroom stay a little bit longer.

[08:14] SPEAKER_02:

I really appreciate your thoughts on that because certainly that rings true for me and especially on the skill side. I mean, definitely teaching is always hard. Teaching in challenging contexts is always hard, but there's also a skill side to it. And I know that I was just starting to get into that kind of downward slope where, okay, I'm getting my feet under me. I'm developing my own skills, which makes this job easier and not so you know, cognitively demanding and draining, you know, just to figure out what I'm going to do every day so that I am showing up fully prepared to meet my kids' needs. I mean, I agree.

[08:47]

It takes years and years to get to that point skill-wise. And I think that's such a, you know, a critical need to retain teachers, you know, through that learning curve so that, you know, we can make a contribution year after year for our students. But let's get into the book itself and talking about how we cultivate resilience. I understand you've organized the book into kind of monthly chapters and themes so that educators can go through it over the course of a school year.

[09:13] SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. So my hope is that people will actually take an entire year to go through this book and the workbook because resilience isn't something that can be cultivated in a month or two or a couple of weeks. not that I don't think the book is a great read and people might want to read sections over again, but the book is organized around the 12 habits of resilient educators. And so each of those habits is mapped onto a month that correlates to what many educators are going through at that time of month. Like in September, when we've just returned to school, The chapter, the habit is on building community and building community with students and parents, colleagues, others in the district. And that is a key trait of resilient people in all the research.

[10:08]

I read a ton of research about resilience in general and resilient people have deep social connections with others and they've learned skill sets to build those relationships, whether that is listening or cultural competence or And so the chapter that's lined up with September focuses on those skills and habits and dispositions of resilient educators.

[10:32] SPEAKER_02:

Well, Elena, I really appreciate that flow that you've designed, starting with the month of June, you know, so starting kind of when school is getting out and we're thinking about summer and working through topics over the summer to building community in September. But I want to land on November briefly, because in November, you talk about taking care of yourself and dealing with disillusionment. And you address this concept of martyrdom, which is something that I come across with administrators as well, that we think that in order to do right by students, we have to do our best to kill ourselves in the process of serving students. And I wonder what you see in your work with teachers and what you've found to be true for your own practice as an educator when it comes to those kind of self-care versus martyrdom issues.

[11:15] SPEAKER_00:

Oh, this was a section that I have been thinking about for over 20 years since I got into teaching because I saw colleagues who really, I felt like were just nailing themselves up. And then there were times when I was sort of picking up the hammer and considering it myself that there's so much that's actually sort of attractive. And as you said, that is messaged around good educators will do everything for their students, right? Like, They need to have what they deserve tomorrow and we need to do whatever it takes. And then there's a line that we cross where things become unhealthy and where the martyrdom complex can sound like, you know, nobody appreciates how hard I work and, you You know, I can't take a day off. My classroom crumbles without me.

[12:07]

And that starts getting into an unhealthy realm where there are just a whole lot of emotions underneath those statements that the person who's expressing them really needs to explore and dig into and move through. The bottom line is we're not going to give our students what they deserve if we are sick And stretch so thin that we're snapping at them for every little thing. That's not being a good role model for them either. And so this section in here sort of exploring the really challenging side of the self-care conversation, the propensity that some of us have. towards self-sacrifice and martyrdom and the possible real danger that that can do to our bigger picture goals and intentions around transforming schools.

[12:58] SPEAKER_02:

Absolutely. And I know one of the early indicators of a need for self-care that we see at the school level is absenteeism. We see people taking sick days and not necessarily not needing them, but we see that showing up in terms of when people are absent and just needing to take some time off. So if we step back a step or two and look at the kind of preventative side, and I know as administrators, often we're kind of pushing people to the point where they do need to take a personal day or take a sick day. What are some things that you advise educators to do to take care of themselves up through including taking a sick day, but even before that point on the preventative side?

[13:42] SPEAKER_00:

You know, a lot of the things that I know that we all know, but we need to be reminded of where we need to explore why we're not doing them. Those things like take a 15 minute walk, go to sleep half an hour earlier. I am really passionate about getting sleep. And a lot of times when I'm talking to an educator who's really having a hard time and falling apart, one of my first questions is how much did you sleep last night? And that might be a really important place to start. Eating nutritiously, throwing a bag of almonds into your bag or your desk, those really important basic things.

[14:16]

The question I think is interesting, however, is why don't we do those things when we know that that's how to keep our body strong and healthy? And there's such a big connection between our emotions and our physical health. then why don't we do these things? And that's where I think the conversation needs to be happening. And it goes into that self-sacrificing or the inability to say no or to overcommit or fear of telling an administrator, I have to decline this invitation to be on the leadership team this year because I've got to make sure that I can get to the gym twice a week and I just can't. I have to take care of myself.

[14:57]

That's really scary and hard for many teachers to say. So that's where I think that we really need to do some exploration. I mean, this is a lifelong learning for me how to say no and say yes to the things that will most keep me going and stay focused and prioritized. So that ability to take care of ourselves is so interconnected with our emotions and other experiences we've had in our lives.

[15:24] SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, and we haven't even touched on issues like family, you know, raising kids or dealing with aging parents. And I know for a lot of educators, one or the other of those is going on most of the time, you know, throughout most of your teaching career, if not simultaneously with each other, where other people are depending on us in addition to our students. And we've got to figure out what gets the attention and what gets the time and effort. And often it's not our own health. You know, we don't put that first because we are thinking of others. So I want to encourage school administrators to keep an eye on that issue for people, because I think we have...

[16:01]

a certain type of person who becomes an educator, who is a very hard worker, who is very dedicated to other people and may really need permission to take care of themselves. You know, I think a lot of people really have been taught to see that as selfish, to spend time exercising or to spend time eating right or to spend time sleeping. You know, there's a certain amount of guilt that goes with that. And I think we've got to keep an eye out for that and just let people know, Hey, I think you are pushing yourself too hard. I really appreciate you wanting to be on the leadership team and this committee and that committee and that committee, but it's okay not to, you know, I think we've got to, got to tell people that explicitly.

[16:37] SPEAKER_00:

And I know that's hard for administrators sometimes when they really need people on this team or that or to chaperone the dance on Saturday night or it's really hard for them to not take up, you know, that invitation or not extend that invitation or take up the offer. But it is so important that there's that kind of leadership and messaging around self-care. And I think it's also really useful for site leaders to recognize signs of burnout and depression. And both in the book as well as on the Onward website, Onward has its own website. It's called onwardthebook.com.

[17:14]

Both In both places, people can find links to those resources to be able to recognize what the difference between burnout and depression and when an administrator might need to actually really express concern over a staff member's mental health. Because I think the rates of depression and anxiety amongst educators are really high. I know they are. The research says they're actually higher than in many other professions. And I've worked with so many both site administrators and teachers who have never had a history of anxiety or depression and are faced with those challenges as educators at some point because the work is so challenging.

[18:00] SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, knowing that that we do have, you know, that full set of kind of human issues to deal with, I think, you know, building resilience is such an essential priority for educators. And Elena, if you had a particular place that you would advise people to start thinking about building their own resilience, where would you encourage people to start?

[18:19] SPEAKER_00:

So in doing the research for this book, I had to learn what an emotion is, because I realized that I didn't know what I couldn't define it. Like, An emotion is sort of thoughts, but then there's a physical component and there's a, like, how do you say what a feeling is? And what I discovered led me to what I think is the highest leverage, most strategic point where we can cultivate our resilience. So an emotion, because now I've got everybody suspensively awaiting the definition, an emotion is actually a cycle of events that begin when something happens. So an eighth grader rolls her eyes at you. That's the thing that happens.

[19:03]

Next, we interpret that event. And this is where the key to building resilience lies, because we can interpret that event in a way that sends us into a whole emotional cycle of frustration and anger and feeling unappreciated. We can see that eighth grade girl roll her eyes and think she's so disrespectful. Day after day, I come in here offering my hardest work and this is what she does. Or we can interpret that event in a way that leads us to have a completely different experience and to build our resilience. We could interpret her eye rolling as a oh, that's normal eighth grade behavior.

[19:55]

She's exploring her frustration. She's exploring power dynamics. She's actually self-regulating because she did not curse at me. And that interpretation could lead you actually to have perhaps a little surge of appreciation for the child and to think class is going great today. And then you're on a completely different emotional cycle than the first option. And so that point then in between a thing that happens and how we interpret it is precisely where either our tanks of resilience will be depleted or could actually be boosted.

[20:36]

And that idea is explored in Chapter 3, which is called Tell Empowering Stories. And it's all about this idea that things happen and we make meaning of them. We draw conclusions. We come to interpretations. And we have tremendous power over that. There's so much that we can't influence, but we can influence how we interpret an event.

[21:00] SPEAKER_02:

That's hard to recognize in the moment. We feel like we make maybe an emotional judgment about why something happened. Why did this kid roll her eyes at me? And we kind of start down a path of interpreting that and then responding to it. And I know in some of our classroom management moments that we're the least proud of, often we go down that path very quickly without pausing and Expressing some curiosity. That was the word that came to mind for me is curiosity about, okay, why did this happen?

[21:31]

What's a different spin on that that's not quite so negative as the one I went directly to? And I think that's such an important skill for getting beyond those kind of fight or flight reactions that we tend to default to if we're not very intentional about it. Well, there's another aspect to this that gets at the long-term nature of kind of building these skills, of building resilience. And that is the workbook that you've put together to accompany your book Onward. And I know a lot of times when people put together a workbook, it's like, you know, 20 pages of additional kind of reflective questions. The workbook that you've developed to accompany Onward is quite a bit more than that.

[22:11]

And I wonder if you could tell us about that.

[22:13] SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, the workbook contains one activity for every day of the year. That's 365 activities or more. And as I was writing Onward, I realized that I wanted people to not only be exposed to the ideas and the theory and the stories, but also the skills and the behaviors that can help us cultivate this resilience. My experience...

[22:42]

in the last 10 years as a coach for both teachers and administrators has led me to have a lot of experience in helping people change their behavior and adopt these habits that are more resilient. And as you just said, the ability to reframe a situation, it actually takes practice and it takes effort to retrain our brain and think about things differently. And that's what I hope that the workbook will do, will guide people through. It's sort of me as a coach in a book. If I could sit with you for a year and coach you, this is what I'd be doing with you. These are the questions I would ask.

[23:21]

These are the activities I would engage you in. And I really want people to actually be able to have a change in their behavior and not just some new ideas.

[23:30] SPEAKER_02:

Well, Elena, I really appreciate all of the thought and the research and the experience that you've put in to Onward and the workbook that goes along with that. And I definitely want to encourage everyone to check that out and maybe consider doing that as a personal book study throughout the course of the coming year. But I also wanted to ask your thoughts on what we should do as a profession of educational leaders. You know, speaking to an audience of administrators If you could wave a magic wand and have us all do something to make a difference in this area and to help build our resilience and build teachers' resilience, what would you wave a magic wand and have us do?

[24:06] SPEAKER_00:

I love that question. I would say the first thing I wish school leaders would do is take up this learning about resilience as it applies to themselves. So read the book, do the workbook. think about themselves and give themselves that gift of reflection and time to think about and cultivate their own resilience. Because I've worked with so many incredible principals and the work is so hard and they deserve that kind of professional development experience and opportunity. So start with yourself, give yourself the time, go through the practices and ideally find colleagues, whether that's in person or even virtually, who might be interested in engaging in the learning with you so that you have someone else to talk with about these ideas and how it's particularly relevant in your context as site administrators.

[25:01] SPEAKER_02:

Fabulous. So the book is Onward, Cultivating Emotional Resilience in Educators. Elena, thanks so much for joining me on Principal Center Radio.

[25:09] SPEAKER_00:

You're so welcome, Justin. Thanks so much.

[25:12] SPEAKER_01:

And now, Justin Bader on high performance instructional leadership.

[25:17] SPEAKER_02:

So high performance instructional leaders, what did you take away from my conversation with Elena about emotional resilience? Boy, I think this is such a critical topic and one that for me is very personal. You know, I think as we go to work every day as educators and think about the work that we're doing, think about the trajectory of our careers, that is emotional experience that we're having which is often way in the background you know it's often not something that we're thinking about front and center you know we're thinking about the people that we're working with we're thinking about what we need to do that day but who we are and what we bring to the table and how we show up as educators and as human beings I think makes an enormous difference in how effective we are for our students and how long we're able to keep doing this work.

[26:07]

And as Elena said, I think it makes a huge difference when we're able to stay for the better part of a decade. And I personally did not stay in any role for more than four years. And I wish that I had. I wish that I had stuck around longer to see more of the benefits. We're investing a lot of learning, of relationship building, of skill building in those early years in any new role. And I think we really start to see the benefits of that five, six, seven years in.

[26:36]

But at the same time, we know that we should not overstay our ability to thrive in that work and if it is time to move on it's time to move on and that you know that just is what it is so i really want to encourage you to think about this topic of resilience and particularly you know not just self-care like drinking water getting enough sleep but really building your emotional resilience as elena outlines in the book onward and i want to encourage you to check out the accompanying workbook it really is remarkable that she's put together 365 days of exercises. And it might seem daunting to say, wow, something I would do every day, crack open the same book every day for a year and do some thinking and reflecting and writing. It's an investment. It absolutely is an investment of time and energy. But I think if we are going to show up fully present and fully emotionally prepared for doing the work that being an educator is, it's worth that investment, just as an athlete finds it worth the investment to go to the gym every day.

[27:37]

So again, the book is Onward, Cultivating Emotional Resilience in Educators. And I want to encourage you to check out both the book and the accompanying workbook. And you can find those both on Amazon or wherever you buy books or at onwardthebook.com.

[27:53] Announcer:

Thanks for listening to Principal Center Radio. For more great episodes, subscribe on our website at principalcenter.com slash radio.