3-16-2018

Mary’s Minute

“Luck is a matter of preparation meeting opportunity.”

                                                            ~ Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“Shallow men believe in luck. Strong men believe in cause and effect.”

                                                              ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

I admit that sometimes I am the fool described by Emerson, believing in luck.  My analytical son loves an argument about the scientific reasons why “luck” doesn’t exist.  I do not need an explanation for everything, and can happily believe that unexplained good fortune can happen!  I also believe in preparation and hard work.

There is a children’s book called “Penny Wishes” in which the main character, Penny sits by the sea tossing pennies in the ocean making wishes.  In the end of the book, Penny realizes that she cannot just make wishes without doing anything to make them come true.  Luck and wishes are not enough, we must also act.  We cannot sit around and hope that some good luck will come our way. 

I firmly believe that the harder we work the luckier we get, but tomorrow is St. Patrick’s Day, which for me is a day that symbolizing good luck.  Don’t stop working for your dreams.  Don’t stop understanding that effects are driven by causes, but I think it is also okay to believe in the beauty of good luck.  On St. Patrick’s Day and always, may the luck of the Irish be with you!

                                                                 Happy St. Patrick’s Day!                   

                                                                               Mary

3-9-2018

Mary’s Minute

“Good is the enemy of great.”

                                                                                     ~ Jim Collins

Sometimes we all crave getting to a point of being settled where we do not have great highs and lows, but can just settle in.  The problem is that when we settle in, we often settle for mediocrity.  Let’s face it, mediocrity can be pretty easy.  It is a place where we are not great.  We are not happy, but we also are not bad or sad.  Mediocrity or even “good” can be classified as good enough.  We avoid discomfort in this state of being.

Discomfort allows us to push for more.  Out of our failures come our greatest accomplishments.  Out of our sorrow can come our greatest joys.  In Greek mythology the phoenix was a bird that rose out of the ashes, and I believe that we need to have lows in order to push us to greatness. We need to have disappoints and failures in order to rise out of the ashes like the phoenix into greatness.

Let yourself make mistakes.  Allow yourself to feel pain. 

Teaching and life may be easy if we settle for “good” but the author Jim Collins reminds us that good can hold us back from being great.  You deserve to be great in everything you do.  Getting to great - getting to true happiness is worth enduring the lows and making mistakes. 

Allow your discomfort to push you beyond what you thought was possible. 

                    

                                                           Have a great week!

                                                                          Mary

3-2-2018

Mary’s Minute

“Where there is great love, there are always wishes.” 
                                                               ~ Willa Cather

“If you don't learn from your mistakes, then they become regrets.”     

                                                               ~ John Cena

I pride myself in living my life without regrets, and I would like to think it is because I do my best to learn from my mistakes. This week I have been thinking about wishes versus regrets. I lost a very dear first cousin this week, and I have to admit that I have a lot of wishes.  Bill was a cousin and a great friend. He was so much fun to be around, and he loved adventure and serving others. “Where there is great love...”  I cannot live with regret that I did not get down to Georgia to see my cousin more often, but I can’t help but I have wishes. 

In our personal and professional lives, we must learn from our mistakes so that they do not become regrets. Living with wishes because we have great love in our hearts is a beautiful gift. Wishes turn the ordinary into extraordinary. Wishes keep us going when we feel discouraged. Regrets feel us with despair and hopelessness. When we look at our students, we cannot regret that we did not give them our very best, but we will always wish for more. 

When we have great love in our hearts (love for our families, love for our friends, love for our students, love for our community, love of nature) we will always have wishes.  I will always choose wishes over regrets. 

                                                  Have a great week!

                                                         Mary