This week, we will focus on reaching a goal, on accomplishing a quest.

Sometimes, we feel stuck in our everyday life. We loose the motivation or the little spark that makes us willing to go further, to project ourselves into something. We just take one day as it comes, and live through it, without any enthusiasm or joy. This year was like that, to me. I went to work, did my job the best way I could with all the boundaries and blocks placed by the pandemy, with a fear anchored in my guts each and everyday. To be sick, to have a kid pass it to one of his high risk family members… We couldn’t use common material, we all had to wear a mask (not the 2 first months though, only teacher had to). Have you every tried to teach language and phonology with a mask on? Yeah, not that easy. Have you ever tried to get 25 kids attention while the only facial expression they can read are your eyes? Nearly impossible… Anyway, I decided to just do what I had to do and to get them where I was supposed to get them. No sparks, no enthusiasm… I almost thought about quitting at one point (because the situation was difficult, but if you add administration blindness and meaningless orders, well, it’s getting close to mistreatment… ). Then I decided to have a goal, something that would ignite my spark back, something that would give a sense back to my job. I decided to change my whole way of teaching, next year. This year is almost done, I can’t do anything about it, but next year, I want to be the teacher I usually am, and I also want to balance my private and professional life in a way that won’t let the second one take over the first. I did my researches, and the simple fact that I will take a new start made me feel relieved. As soon as I set my goals and acted upon them, everything changed. I have something to work towards, I have a challenge to face, I have a lot of work to do, this summer, but it will be something I build, not something I just follow while I wait for the end of the year to come. This is something that I can do no matter the circumstances, that I will be able to improve and to take joy doing. My spark is back. And I already am in a better place. Right now.

When I think about it, it’s not even the actual goal that made me find my motivation back. It’s the action I took, once I took my decision, once, I set my intention. I was stuck in a swamp, up to my waist, wondering how to get out or even to go on… And now I feel like I was lifted out of there, and projected in a whole different direction, just like that. And then I realized that this is the way I work, actually. I go on the way I am supposed to go, because this is the way I am told to go. I lose myself in the process… especially when the orders are contradictory, that you also have to deal with unexpected additional difficulties to overcome… when I have to adapt to meaningless things… It increases my frustration, and I spend a lot of energy to deal with it… And I am still not good at that, even if I work on it… It took over my professional life. And I felt helpless, instead of finding a way to own it and to go my own way, to find a way to creatively make everything more meaningful.

As soon as i decided to react, to act, and to gain back some control, in a way, I wasn’t crushed anymore by all this. I wasn’t enduring it. I was overcoming. What was my comfort zone became a very uncomfortable place, I needed more space, I needed a new breath of fresh air. And that’s what I managed to do: allowing me to take some fresh air and to expand my vision on my job. By looking at it from another perspective, I wasn’t stuck anymore. It wasn’t boring anymore, it wasn’t frustrating anymore. It became exciting again, it made sense again, I was enjoying it again.

This is true for other realms of my life too. I can feel overwhelmed sometimes, stuck, but as soon as I decide to act on it, I discover that it was only an illusion. I can do whatever I put my mind to do. I just have to stop running, stand up and declare that from now on, I am working on it. Weirdly, everything goes in the right direction far faster than I first thought it would. And all the energy I spent feeding my frustration is now aimed to something more positive, actually meaningful, something that lift me up instead of crushing me down.

So this week, set goals for a realm of your life. A small easily reachable goal. And act towards it. Baby steps or giant jump, it doesn’t matter, just act. Do researches, get the material you need, make a plan, and go forward. Because you deserve it.

The card

When I thought about a goal, I envisioned this stone on top of a hill. Something you can reach, something you can keep your eyes on while you walk towards it. It had to be special, so I went for a pinkish color, to contrast with the environment. I feel more confident to try new stuff, to experiment, and I had a lot of fun playing with the tree and bushes, and to try and draw the rocks and moss. I first went with a far darker color for the rocks, but changed it to this more neutral hue. Because our eyes have to be on the stone on top of the hill, not on those protective but blocking rocks. I think I managed to express it. I hope you’ll like it too.

My journey

Our journal

I wish you a sweet exciting week!