RePost from my Blog: "On the #firstdayofschool: I want to glow, too...."

I intermittently follow and integrate into my writing class (due to its terrifically brief length) Seth Godin’s blog, which is the most succinct yet provocative blog online I have ever read.  Today, Seth blogged about “glowing in the dark.”  Here is a repost or quote of that blog – or you can click the link to read it on his page. It’s so short, I feel I should quote it so I can accurately and directly respond to it and how it impacted me this evening.

Some people are able to reflect the light that lands on them, to take directions or assets or energy and focus it where it needs to be focused. This is a really valuable skill.

Even more valuable, though, is the person who glows in the dark. Not reflecting energy, but creating it. Not redirecting urgencies but generating them. The glow in the dark colleague is able to restart momentum, even when everyone else is ready to give up.

At the other end of the spectrum (ahem) is the black hole. All the energy and all the urgency merely disappears.

Your glow in the dark colleague knows that recharging is eventually necessary, but for now, it’s okay that there’s not a lot of light. The glow is enough.

[Posted by Seth Godin on August 19, 2015 on ThisIsSethsBlog.com.]

Godin really knows how to land a punch, doesn’t he?  And as a teacher, four days before school starts, I need that punch to rejuvenate my passion, reignite my idea center, and reorganize my thinking about learning, as well as my role as a facilitator of that learning. For so many of us, reflecting the light around us is valuable, but is also easier than the glowing Godin describes.  I think I’d rather glow in the dark, too.

Now don’t get me wrong — I’m not in a dark environment as an educator. But somehow, every year, we encounter other teachers or educators, and even students, who are close to the edge of that black hole and the tragic disappearance of a passion for learning. The light has faded or is fading slowly. It is comfortable there. We feel timeless and infinite there, much like the surface of a black hole, where time slows down and mass becomes infinite. (Thank you, Mr. Taylor – I still remember that from 11th grade physics.) We are tempted to pull out what we did last year, with what we hope to accomplish better, and quickly place ourselves in or near that black hole with what Einstein so effectively described about insanity: “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” To be honest, I think to emerge from the darkness and despair of this belief, which sometimes we don’t even realize we have adopted as a way of life in education, we must embrace this idea of glowing that Godin delineates in his blog. 

Let’s be part of “restarting that momentum,” part of creating a larger glow in our little corners of the universe as students step across the thresholds of our worlds in the next couple of weeks. Let’s agree to glow and not just reflect the light of our environs – let’s create our own light, our own sparks, our own energy source, our own bonfire of learning and a passion for it in our students and in our colleagues.

Cormac McCarthy, one of my favorite authors, uses this phrase often in his 2006 novel The Road to identify the “good guys” in a bleak landscape of darkness and gloom, which attempts at every turn to steal what is left of a young boy’s and his father’s hope for a world that could someday restart: “you carry the fire.” The boy asks everyone this: “do you carry the fire?” Are you one of the good guys? This could not be more appropriate to describe the search I am on as an educator.  Do you carry the fire? Because I do.  And I need it to be bigger. The students… they need it to be bigger, too. And they need us to share it.

Let’s agree to no longer repeat the same things expecting different results.  This year, let’s not just carry the fire – let’s share it.  With each other and with our students.

In fact, let’s just glow.

NOTE: Godin’s blog reposted as a quote – not with his permission. Please attribute all credit for Godin’s “glow in the dark” blog post to his blog and his original work.