Rewriting the Narratives That Shape Our Lives
“We are the stories we are told and we are the stories we tell ourselves.” — Harold R. Johnson
While living in Germany, I was once asked to fill in as a prep teacher after the regular teacher fell sick. In Germany, you can’t teach full-time without a Master’s degree, and back then, I only had a Bachelor’s in Education. This meant I taught primary part-time, but mostly supervised homework and special activities.
I digress…
“Prep?” I repeated, staring at my colleague. “Like, little kids?”
“We have no one else, please, Jake.”
My mind started spinning. I was reading my own script: I am a primary school teacher and an academic, not a damn prep teacher. I don’t do screaming kids, crying kids… little kids.
This was not who I was.
I should have said no. I should have explained that this wasn’t my skill set. Instead, I heard myself say, “Yeah, I can do that.”
And I immediately regretted it.
Thirty minutes later, I stood in a classroom filled with blinking, wide-eyed toddlers. No lesson plan. No prep…
