A very little boy just asked me to fold his paper into a circle.
Perplexed, I asked what he meant.
“Like a treasure map!” He replied.
I rolled his paper into a scroll for him, and was rewarded with the most beautiful smile.
He ran out of the library, still smiling. Then he ran back in, came to the desk and said “ThankyousorryInearlyforgot!” And ran away again.
I was reading a newsletter in my school staff email this morning when one paragraph really caught my attention.
“Can you remove yourself from people who are negative or holding you back?
The quality of our lives will depend on the quality of people with whom we surround ourselves… It is a sign of our maturity to identify any negative effects of others and then have the courage to remove ourselves from that influence.” (Vital Staff, 2015, 14)
This is a truth that many people don’t realise.
I’m not just talking about people who don’t like your haircut or the way you dress. I’m not even talking about people who don’t share your views on politics or religion. I’m talking about those people who bitch, backstab, undermine, conspire and manipulate so that people they perceive as “powerful” will see and treat others in a negative and often quite destructive way.
I know the effects certain negative people have had on my life in the past, both personally and professionally. I’ve seen friendships and relationships eroded gradually until they no longer exist. I’ve seen different people nearly bring down a church, a school, a family. It’s ugly. It’s an incredibly awful thing to experience.
I’ve also experienced the benefits of removing those people from my life. It hasn’t been easy, nor has it been painless, but it has been totally worth it.
Negativity is a cancer that attacks and weakens from within. We often can’t detect it working away under the surface, threatening to overtake and kill the very thing it’s feeding on.
When we do realise it’s there, the best way to treat it is to cut it out and leave it behind. We can’t afford to allow it to continue to grow, because it will gradually choke the joy, and then the life, out of us.
I can hear some of you thinking, “But wait. You’re a Christian. Aren’t you supposed to love and forgive and all that?”
Sure. Love and forgiveness are at the top of the list of ways in which we’re meant to treat other people.
However, that doesn’t mean we have to allow people to continue behaving in ways that are hateful and harmful to themselves and others. How is it showing love to someone if others just let them destroy every relationship they have? How is it forgiving or restoring them if there’s no stand against the behaviours that will eventually destroy both them and other people?
So, when it comes to my friendships, relationships, and interactions with other people, I will continue to choose to surround myself with the positive and constructive, and excise the negative. I can, and will, continue to remove the negative people from my life.
There’s no compulsion for you to follow suit. There’s no obligation for you to keep me in your friends list if you think I have a negative effect on you.
I know not everyone will like me. I realise that even the people who like me don’t like everything I do or say. It would be naive of me to think otherwise.
You know what? I’m entirely okay with that. I don’t need to be liked by everyone. I don’t need a fan club. And I am more than happy to accept that there are some who will be much happier without me. That’s life.
I do not desire to be everything to everyone. At some point earlier in my life I did, but I have long stopped trying to achieve that, because I found out the hard way that it simply isn’t possible. That’s a sure-fire recipe for heartbreak.
What I do desire is for the people close to me to continue to be positive and constructive in my life.
I relish the freedom to choose who and what will speak into my life and influence my thoughts and actions, and the freedom to be who I am without always looking over my shoulder, afraid of the judgement and negativity of others.
Tonight as I was driving home from work, Raf Epstein on ABC 774 was asking the audience what “crazy theories” they’d fallen for or actually believed.
Callers confessed to believing in ghosts and poltergeists and premonitions.
One female caller suggested that Mick Malthouse was a Collingwood plant at the Carlton Football Club, because it was the only way to make sense of the poor job he’s doing as coach.
“IKNOWRIGHT!” I said excitedly to nobody in particular. “That’s exactly what I’ve been saying for months!”
In fact, when Collingwood clobbered Carlton on Friday night, in Malthouse’s record-breaking 715th game as coach, my uncharacteristically few tweets were thus:
Personally, I’m not convinced that it’s such a crazy theory.
Besides, for a die-hard Carlton tragic, it beats believing that my team is so bad that they don’t need anyone to conspire against them in order to lose every week.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mEBlPfBbpI
Hundreds of people attended the ANZAC Day memorial service at the cenotaph in Cobden for the 100th anniversary of the Gallipoli landing. There were thousands at the dawn service in Warrnambool and hundreds of thousands at the dawn service in Melbourne. The grey clouds and steady rain did not deter them: instead, it seemed appropriate for a time of sombre reflection.
In Cobden, the path to the cenotaph was lined by a guard of honour consisting of our Scouts and Girl Guides.
A lone piper played in tribute to the fallen and in honour of the returned servicemen who were present.
Hearing the New Zealand ode spoken in Maori was very powerful, even though most people there couldn’t understand a word of it. The speaker’s love for his country and thankfulness for the ANZACs and all those who served after them was evident through the emotion in his voice.
The Australian ode was spoken equally powerfully.It was impossible to remain unmoved by all the feelings of love for my country, gratitude for those who have served and the freedoms we still have because of them, and sadness for the loss of life on both sides. I made no effort to hide several tears that spilled down my cheek when they played The Last Post and during the period of silent observance before they played the Reveille.
When they played the instrumental version of the Australian national anthem there was no invitation to sing, but half the crowd sang anyway. I would have loved it if everyone joined in, but I guess the “I’m not singing in public” sentiment is still strong among many people.
It was beautiful to meet a little boy, Euan, who was incredibly proud to be wearing his great-grandfather’s war medals. I watched him stand attentively and proudly through the whole ceremony. He had obviously been made aware by his parents of the importance of the medals and the reason for the commemoration, because he took it all very seriously.
I am so thankful that remembering those who served their country and their fellow Australians, New Zealanders and allies, often at the expense of their own lives, is so important to so many.
“They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.”
Lest We Forget.
When I was a teenager, the dating show ‘Perfect Match’ was at the height of its popularity. Since then, we have seen a long list of shows that have varied only in the degree of tackiness, such as ‘Please Marry My Boy’ where the mothers of single men selected a bride for their sons to the considerably more sordid ‘The Bachelor’. I honestly didn’t think it could get much worse than that… until tonight.
I’ve just seen a promo on TV for a show called ‘Married at First Sight’. The premise of the show is that a number of couples are ‘matched’ by a psychologist and a neurologist, and meet each other for the first time at the altar where they enter into legally binding arranged marriages. They have never met; they don’t know anything about each other; they don’t even know one another’s name. The show is openly advertised as a social experiment.
Seriously? How is this allowed? Can this really be legal in Australia, where arranged marriages that are quite acceptable in other cultures are frowned upon? I am incredulous at the hypocrisy of this is acceptable in our society when the right to marry is denied to loving, committed couples who happen to be gay: hasn’t the loudest, most popular argument against legalising gay marriage is that “it debases the sanctity of marriage”? Surely, this ‘experiment’ is guilty of doing exactly that. Let’s face it, heterosexual couples haven’t done such a great job of maintaining the sanctity of marriage up to this point, and this program is most likely to hit a new low in that department. This really only serves to reinforce my belief that we are guilty of huge double standards in this department.
It must not be forgotten that these are real people with real feelings and the rest of their lives ahead of them. I can’t imagine how my gay friends and family must feel about the sanctity of marriage being turned into a game show but still denied to them.
It seems that “reality television” is about to reach a new low. Are we really that desperate for entertainment?
I’m about to embark on an international classroom collaboration with my Year 10 History class and some students who attend the school where my cousin teaches in Detroit, USA. Our students will discuss world events, their interests, and their perspectives on issues and challenges that they face as young people in an increasingly globalised world.
This has not been done at my school before, so I am very aware of breaking new ground for my students and of my responsibility to mentor them and protect them while flinging them out of the proverbial comfort zone of our classroom “nest”. The online classroom environment where this collaboration will take place will be monitored and moderated by myself and the American students’ teacher, who I’m sure shares my anxieties and my excitement as we embark on this experimental educational journey together.
I’m excited because while these kids’ lives are worlds apart, they live in the same world and witness the same events from their own unique perspectives. I’m excited about collaborating with another teacher and having our personal professional horizons broadened, too.
My hope is that they will broaden their horizons and see things from different points of view while becoming more aware of what is happening in the world around them.
Hopefully we will all be inspired as well as informed.
My drama class was rehearsing a play which includes excerpts from a number of Shakespeare’s plays.
While creating a donkey mask, the actor who briefly plays Richard III said, “A pencil! A pencil! My kingdom for a pencil!”
Not missing a beat, another student replied, “2B or not 2B? That is the question!”
I am so very, very proud.
This evening I’ve been watching the committal of Richard III’s grave to Leicester Cathedral from the University and the “funeral” ceremony in the cathedral.
Richard III: The Reburial (Channel 4)
It’s mind-boggling to think that I’m watching the funeral of a medieval king whose life, actions and legacy I have studied at length in both history and literature, more than 500 years after his death.
Despite the heated and lively historical debate over whether or not he was responsible for the disappearance of his two nephews, the sons of Edward IV known as ‘the princes in the tower’, and the hideous portrayal of Richard by Tudor historians and, in turn, Shakespeare’s famous play, his reign was characterised by many things that recommend him.
It’s most likely that the significant question of the fate of those young boys will never be answered. Richard was by no means the only person with both a motive and the means to do away with them, and there are some very good arguments as to why he would not have taken such an opportunity, not the least being the risk of losing his integrity and the loyalty and love of the English people.
I find it bizarre that the British royals, who are descended from his sister, have only sent a token representative in the Queen’s daughter-in-law, Sophie, Countess of Wessex. Richard was, after all, a King of England. He was the last King of England to die in battle, defending his throne and his country.
The Queen’s cousin, Richard, Duke of Gloucester was also present, He bears the same name and title that Richard III held before his accession to the throne, and is the royal patron of the Richard III Society.
I am pleased to see Richard III’s physical remains being treated with dignity and respect. I’m delighted to be able to be a witness to his reburial via the wonders of historical and scientific research and the internet.
It’s also great to see that the result of the discovery of Richard’s remains buried under a car park in Leicester, in what used to be the choir of the Greyfriar’s church, is an increased interest in the history of his reign and of England at the time.
My students have obviously learned something from studying Shakespeare’s ‘Othello’.
A student wrote the following assessments in this week’s essay:
“Desdemona is Othello’s wife; the least he could do is talk to her, but apparently that’s too much to ask of our protagonist.”
“Othello is a dirtbag husband that took advantage of Desdemona’s love for him.”
Spot on, I say.
WordyNerdBird 