When you love what you teach, who you teach and where you teach in the good times, you feel like you are in your “flow state” but hold on…Let’s be real for a minute. How many times have you had to teach through hard circumstances? Maybe students are difficult this year, you are on a team that has conflicting values, or you feel like an island in your school or district. How often throughout your career have you lacked joy and passion while you teach during the school year? Probably more than once. Probably more than a few times. Teaching is hard, but it is even harder when we are burned out. We are missing the “bullseye of our sweet spot.” When we are burned out, we’re tired, irritable, and in extreme cases numb from situations at home or situations at school. We are SO passionate about what we do, but friends, I’ve come to this conclusion: When we only work from passion, we’re gonna sink. Passion on its own won’t float your boat. It cannot and will not sustain us. Passion alone is irritating to those who don’t share your passion.
We need to ask ourselves three questions to find our sweet spot in our professions.
- Ask yourself to identify what you are passionate about. What could you talk about for hours but also be felt the moment someone comes into your classroom?
- Ask your what does it look like when we are successful? What is success to you and your students? What does learning look like when students are successful in what you are teaching them?
- Ask yourself what you are best at.
When you can answer those three questions, it’s time to find the bullseye of those three places and hang out right in the middle in your “sweet spot.” Let the three question bullseye guide you! When you start to slide towards passion and what you are best at but forget what success looks like, you are going to burn out. When you slide towards what you are best at and what success looks like, but forget about your passion you will burn out. And when you slide towards passion and success but forget what you are best at you will burn out. Teaching is an absolute roller coaster but learning how to identify when we are burning out can help sustain us through the hard parts. Reach out to your teacher friends and ask them those three questions. Use them with your department and use them with yourself. See if the conversation goes deep. Remember that passion alone is irritating but passion, success and knowing what you are best at will sustain and guide you throughout your career. Check out more tips for avoiding teacher burn out here from @Jenheebink (on X) with the Heartbeats of Adapted PE Podcast:
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Pair this blog post with the following:
From Dream to Launch by Jen Heebink
I Didn’t Need to “Remember My Why” I Needed Therapy by Casey Langendorfer
Rethinking Productivity for School Practitioners by Ryan Fahey
More, More, More! or More Better by Jim Davis
Lessons from Ted Lasso: 5 Lasso-isms We Can Practice in Relationship Building by Jen Heebink
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