I am sitting at my kitchen table, sobbing for the third time in 24 hours because, with two degrees and over a decade of experience, I am not and never will be a successful teacher.
But I became a teacher to continue learning, and learning requires discomfort; it’s part of my job. I get up every morning to teach my students to lean into the discomfort, replace it with confidence, and learn to move up to another learning cycle.
My professional hopes are constantly buffeted by the storms that plague education, and I doubt that I am a unique teacher to be challenged by a never-ending internal catalog of my failures and shortcomings.