In this episode of The Learning Network's Community & Family Studies Podcast, I am joined by a very special guest, Megan Durham, who shares with us what we can do to protect our time, our energy and our wellbeing.
If you've followed me for a while you would know that time, energy and wellbeing is the core of The Learning Network, so when Megan I connected, I knew instantly that I wanted her on the podcast.
This episode is really awesome if you're feeling the pinch of this time of the year or you're nervous about the year to come, which I know is the case for many of my Community and Family Studies teachers. If you listen along, you are going to come away from today's episode with so many strategies, tips, hints and wellbeing related things that you can action straight away and I know you're going to really enjoy Meg's analogies!
Show Notes
Ready to take the leap from Educator to Entrepreneur?!
Let me help you as you turn the skills and dreams in your back pocket into an impactful business of your own!
EDUCATOR TO ENTREPRENEUR
Resources
Looking for Revision Resources?!
Check out my full collection of resources & masterclasses to ensure your students are spending their valuable revision time on meaningful & strategic activities!
CAFS ResourcesEnjoying the Podcast?
Tag me @kellybell.coach on Instagram
and let me know what you're listening to!
Join the Community!
The Learning Network Collaborative Facebook Group
Connect with Kelly on Instagram
Subscribe & Review in Apple Podcasts!
Are you subscribed to The Learning Network Podcast?
If not, jump to it! I share strategic and purposeful applications that I have adopted to increase student motivation, enjoyment, engagement and results; right from the start. Click here to subscribe in Podcast!
Now if you’re feeling extra nice, I would be so honoured if could please leave me a review over on Podcasts. Those reviews help other CAFS teachers like you to find my podcast and make me feel extra grateful for your support.
Just click here to review, select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” and
let me know what your favourite part of the podcast is. You're a gem! Thank-you!
Show Transcription
(Auto generated)
Kelly - Intro
Hello, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of The Learning Network podcast. This is episode number 45. And today I am joined by a very special guest, Megan Durham is sharing with us what we can do to protect our time, our energy, and our well-being. And if you followed me along, you would know that that is the core of the learning network. So when Megan and I connected, I knew instantly that I wanted her on the podcast. So you are going to come away with today's episode, we have so many strategies, tips and hints and things that you can take action on straightaway. So this episode is really, really awesome if you're feeling the pinch at this time of the year or you're nervous about next year. So make an eye chat about what you can do to get yourself off the education dance floor. And look, you're going to really enjoy Meg's analogies. Enjoy this fun crew. Hey, I'm Kelly Bell. Welcome to the Learning Network Podcast. I'm dedicated to helping Community and Family Studies teachers like you, both newbies and experienced through best practice to improve knowledge, increase empowerment and alleviate stress. To help you and your students make meaningful connections across the course. I will share strategic and purposeful applications for my 16 years of experience in the classroom that I adopted to increase student motivation, enjoyment, engagement and results. Early on, it was just me the syllabus and a textbook. I had no idea what I was doing trust me. Fast forward to now I support 1000s of CAS teachers and students inside the Learning Network. Through my membership coaching and mentoring online courses and masterclasses, my dream to help CAFS teachers full-time has become a reality. Together will grow and transform your cast crew to the next level without impacting your sleep and more being in the process. If you are ready to take your Community and Family Studies crew to the next level, you're in the right place to join my free how to improve writing and fast track results webinar head to the low net.com forward slash writing ready to get started The Learning Network Podcast is your shortcut to simple strategies to set your Community and Family Studies students up for success. So Julian, get inspired and let's connect, learn and grow together everyone and a huge welcome back to the Learning Network Podcast. Today I'm joined by a very special guest Meg Durham, she's going to share so much about teacher wellbeing, how we can advocate for ourselves how we can learn to actually switch off from lots of things and really come into our light and support our wellbeing. So, Meg is an educator, a speaker, teacher of well-being and you're going to get so much out of today's episode. A huge welcome to you, Meg.
Meg: Thanks for having me. Kelly
Kelly: Would you like to give our listeners a little bit of an intro? How you became a teacher and what you're doing now in education.
Meg: So, Kelly, I was one of those little girls that just played schools. I played schools, for hours and hours I played schools to a time was probably inappropriate to be playing schools when my teenage friends is like Meg, we don't want to be in your classes anymore. All I ever wanted to be was a teacher. And the only thing that changed for me was what type of teacher and that was dependent on what year level I was in and who was teaching me at the time. And so in the end, I decided I want to be a PE teacher. Because I loved PE I love the carnivals I loved the connection, I loved the teamwork. And then I adored my biology teacher. And so I thought I'm going to be your PE and biology teacher. I did my four years of teaching. And I still remember the night before my first class. I thought 'I've made it. I've got my own class list.' Other people want gold medals. I just wanted a class list. I was ready. And I thought I knew it all. Like I thought I've arrived. No more work needs to be done. I've done my study, I'm ready to go. As listeners know, that first week, that first year, it is an avalanche of so much happening. And I quickly realised that I was really confident in my content. But I was really unskilled and unsure in the human element of teaching
Kelly: Yeah. And they don't teach at uni very much do they.
Meg: I know when I was at uni, there was no talk about relationship wellbeing. It was very much a welfare approach. Back then there was no conversation about how do you deal with parents that are separating? How do you try and get a group of kids on a bus? How do you prepare students for camp? How do you run an information night, all of these things that happen that you don't know how to actually do until you're in it. So I like to think of it as we can learn the skills or sport away from the sport but you don't actually learn the art until you're in it, how to actually play the game. And so after a few years of teaching, I became more and more curious about the wellbeing side. And how can we support our young people to navigate the ups and downs of school life because a lot of my time was to Aiken up by everyday issues, everyday pressures. And then there was this moment, I was teaching your aid. It was a urate biology class. And a student said, Could I please have a conversation with you is like, Yep, let's have a chat, I was on the way to yard duty. So I thought, let's quickly just get this conversation going, I've got to get moving as we always are. And then I looked in her eyes. And the look in her eyes was that look of I need you, I need to talk to you. And so I stopped, we went to a place we would sit quietly, we had a conversation, and the conversation we had broke my heart. And this is a 14-year-old girl. That looks like they've got it all together, everything on the surface looks great. And what she shared with me, still makes me feel just so sad to think that what she was dealing with in her life. And in her mind, I couldn't understand it. And I didn't have any skills for it. What I wanted to do in that moment, was to just sit and cry with her. But then I realised that's probably not very helpful to have the teacher crying student crying, I'm not ideal. And so what I did is I just listened, got myself together, got her together, and went and sought help. But it was one of those moments, Kelly that once you see it, you can't unsee it. It's going from that what you don't know you don't know, to I know. And I can't just see it in her I can see it everywhere, I can see the issues that people are facing in the classroom, but also in my staff room, with the leadership with parents. And that led me to complete my Master's in Education and Student Wellbeing over 10 years ago now. And I couldn't believe that this whole body of research was there, and waiting for us to use to help people feel better and function better. And I got quite frustrated at that point. So why aren't we learning this? And why aren't we teaching this because we can feel and function better? If we are explicitly taught. Just like we could learn literacy and numeracy we can learn to be well and navigate the ups and downs of life.
Kelly: There's so much to unpack and looking at obviously, that's what kind of drew me to you know, wellbeing and like, Oh, someone else is out there like me who's left the classroom. I loved teaching like I've thrived in that room. My kind of thing was when I first left was you know, I wanted to make it or not when I first actually when I first started, I want to make a bigger impact with young people so they can feel confident and safe and resilient. And you know, fresh-faced 22 year old 21 year old comes out of uni thinking that she knows everything. I'll just say like I had no idea when I first started. And you know, as a head teacher, I wasn't really well being I was in the Catholic system. So I was a partial coordinator, the 10 at first and then your aid so did it for four years. And some of the things that the kids disclose to you, you know, are quite heavy and we're not trained to deal with that, you know, about self-harm. Anorexia, marriage, you know, broke up, like you said, not even had one young girl who she came up to me said, I'll miss my dad's really abusive to mom and to my, me and my sister. I'm like, How can you? You know, how can you ever have kids and be like that? And, you know, I was still you know, I hadn't had kids myself. So that's okay, what do I do with that information? Where do I go next? And I think, you know, I saw her later on when her sister was in Utah. Mystery changed my life that year. If it wasn't for you, you're probably wouldn't be here. I'm like, okay. All right. That's interesting. And, yeah, I don't think we realise the impact you're making on the young people at the time, but you kind of reflect back and go, well, educators have a bit of a heavy load, but also we can have such an impact on these young people that we work with.
Meg: And being able to manage that is quite a skill. So in my early years of teaching, I would stay awake at night, I would stay awake at night thinking about the students, I would carry their issues like they were my own personal issues. And over time with more skills and understanding. I started to separate what was mine to own, and what was theirs to own. And so I could support them in much healthier ways compared to my early teaching, where I just wanted to fix everything. I wanted to solve everything, or take them back to my house and say, Let's just have a nice dinner. Like let's have two weeks of just normal life. And that's really not helpful because their reality is their reality, and they've been in reality their whole life. And so our role is to have a little bit of distance so we can support them and scaffold them in a way that's appropriate for them and meet them where they're at. and support them in a way that's meaningful for them. Not so it just comes in line with what we hope for them for their life moving forward. Yeah.
Kelly: And we could kind of go into that whole rabbit hole of how we support young people in their well being. But of course, we were hoping to talk about teacher well being, and I think it has to kind of happen together, you know, it's, it's not separate, you can't delineate, you know, the two, the two jobs or the two roles, you have to support your well being as well as the well being of your kids. And I think, conversations that we continue to have around, you know, student well being is really, really powerful. So I suppose to have that kind of track of that baggage, you know, we talked about the kids coming, you know, with it with a with their baggage to school, how to teachers kind of switch off from that baggage. And you know, like you said, you spent hours at night thinking about the kids, both with the kids and with our work with educators workload, do you have any advice around how they can just switch off and now it's, you know, you can just Flick, flick the switch, shut the laptop down and just put it away? But what in reality, what does that look like for teachers? Do you think?
Meg: So I'll give you an analogy. It comes from adaptive leadership, and it's called the dance floor and the balcony. So when we're in school life, we're on the dance floor. We're busy. We're walking through the corridors we say a student thing, Oh, I've got to say you say your staff. And I've got to say, oh, actually need to go toilet Oh, hang on, which room Am I in? Where am I meant to be today or miss are in this room. It's constant, we're on this dance floor. And it's Go, go go, we're not thinking too much. We're reacting. We're in the moment, we're busy. And to move off the dance floor is hard. It is so hard for us. Because we think just one more. Just one more task. One more job, one more activity, one more thing. And so it can be so hard to move away from the dance floor. And when we do magic happens, because we have the ability to walk off, walk up the stairs, and look down on the balcony. And when we look down on the balcony, we can say, Ah, it's okay. Nothing's as urgent as I think it is. I don't have to do this right now. I can do that tomorrow. And so for staff that are finding it really hard to switch off, I encourage them to find ways to just gently move off the dance floor, get up on the balcony, reflect on what they've done for the day or the year and remind themselves that that is enough. Whatever you have got done today. That is enough. And whatever you get done in this year, that is enough, and give yourself permission to settle, to completely remove yourself knowing that once you've had some time to recalibrate, to reset, you can enter that dance floor. And you can do it so much better. Because you haven't just been racing over time and time again. Now the challenge with this is you have to have enough energy to get off the dance floor. And that sounds almost like a paradox. We think, well, I'm running on it. You're running on adrenaline, you're on autopilot, you're reacting, you're not generally making conscious choices. And so the way that we make conscious choices is we have to charge our battery first, we have to acknowledge that we're human beings, not human machines. And human beings have five basic needs that we need to meet each day to help us charge our battery. And that is sleep, movement, nourishment, rest and connection. So when our battery's charged, it's much easy for us to make good decisions, we can get off the dance floor, we can stop, we can put our laptop screen down, we can have conversations, but when our battery is flat, it is so hard to stop. That's when we find ourselves doing more and more. And then we get busier and busier. And then we get less productive because we're then procrastinating feeling like we're so busy that we're getting nothing done. And this is what happens towards the end of terms where everybody's rushing around. They're so busy being busy, but they're actually not making much progress.
Kelly: Yeah, so you kind of have to backdoor it from the dance floor and make sure. But I think it's also important to, you know, to realise that, like you said, we can't do it all we do, there's no you know, I think a lot of us and I know for me when I was in the classroom, there was no off switch to me and it's still a little bit like that in business that I'm like, Okay, what's next thing you know, I just love Go, go go. But I think it is really important. I've learned to go, Okay, it's not urgent. No one's gonna die if I don't respond to their email or the Instagram message is going to be okay. I think you know, I think things will happen without me. And I love that analogy of like looking down and of course you can't kind of see it. Everyone's still working. Everyone's still dancing, having a great time. Without you like, it's okay, things will be alright. And I think, you know, if I kind of connected with you before, maybe I wouldn't be in this position to kind of go well, I'm not a machine, I do have, you know, the ability to switch off.
Meg: And that's what brings me so much joy is when I see an educator that's feeling a little bit desperate, a little bit wobbly, they want to stay in the classroom, but they don't know how, because the behaviours that we've displayed to this point, are not going to keep us here, we need a new set of behaviours. And so I love working with educators to support them, to find out where their limits are to be able to pull back to be able to make better decisions, to stop themselves and say, just because I can do it, do I need to do it? Is this leadership role still serving me? Would I be best to go back to the classroom? Because when I think about my values, it's actually more aligned with me to be back to the classroom? Or is it time for me to move schools and to have those kinds of conversations so you're not throwing the baby out with the bathwater?
Kelly: So if, if, if so, you know, I serve community Family Studies, teachers in New South Wales, PHP, teachers, we kind of we advocate for our kids to these to do this, but we don't often practice what we preach. What would you kind of, were the, like, the first step for them, if they're feeling a bit under the pump like this, especially this time of year at the time of recording, it's Christmas and 2020 to 713. So it's crunch time. It's like, okay, just want to finish the holiday, I get to the holidays. Do you have any advice for teachers that are maybe feeling like that, like, what's the first thing they can do?
Meg: The first thing they can do is to acknowledge it. To acknowledge, I am feeling tired, I'm feeling overwhelmed, I'm feeling stressed. And just notice what happens when you acknowledge it. Your body settles in, ah, you're listening, you're in connection with me. Because as educators, we become so disconnected to our body, we need to go to the toilet, not now. I need to sleep not now, I need to eat not now don't have time. And so becoming connected with your body. And that's where the battery is vital. So you ask yourself these five questions. In the last 24 hours have I had enough sleep for my body? In the last 24 hours, have I moved my body? In the last 24 hours have i nourished and hydrated my body? In the last 24 hours have I had some rest. And in the last 24 hours have I had some quality connection? Depending on the answers to those questions, that's going to determine how you're functioning. And if your battery is at about a one or two, you just focus on the basics. You go back to the basics and charge your battery because once you've got a charge battery, then you can start to make better decisions. Because what can happen at this time of year is we have a depleted battery, a battery that's completely stopped not working. And then we start to make really reactive decisions. We make decisions that are going to have big consequences down the track because we're just done. We're over it. We just want everything to stop, we want to run we want to hide. So we come back to the battery, we charge our battery, then start to look at the decisions and then gently move forward. It's a really replenishing recharging time and no major decisions when we're tired.
Kelly: [laughs] We're gonna regret those ones. And do you think like, you know how teachers always say, you know, I'm putting you right to the end. I've got so much to do so much on my plate. When the holidays come and when they get there, they get sick. But maybe I know we're up here. Most of us are PE teachers who teach CAFS. Do you have any, like scientific information around that? Like, why is it then it's like then.
Meg: It's really common that when we're in fight or flight, that immunity, it's just on. Like, it's just like we we don't have time to get sick. Because we are literally in a fight. As far as our body knows, it doesn't know the difference between a perceived threat, like a deadline and a real threat like a physical threat. All it knows is that it's under threat. And so when it's under threat, it doesn't have time to illness, it doesn't have time to stop doesn't have time for that. Those kinds of things irrelevant. But as soon as you start to settle, then all of the stuff that was happening in your body, and that was on pause starts to flood through. And that's why we get sick. That's why things start to come. So analogy that we can think about is the floods. When the water's going, it's all happening. The recovery part is once everyone stopped talking about it, and then you look through the house like oh, the house smells, it's wet. It's dirty. How am I gonna recover from this and this is the same thing is what happens in our bodies during the term Some time it's go time we're on, we're not thinking about the damage we're doing to ourselves. And then we get to holidays and realise, ah, gosh, that was a big one. Now I'm starting to feel the aches and pains. Now I'm starting to feel sick. Now I'm starting to think about all of the things in my life, I used to laugh about my top drawer, I had a top drawer that anything that was paperwork, personal admin, I'll just have to go in the top drawer because I can't deal with it during term, I have to deal with it and holidays, and then I'll get sick and and I couldn't be bothered doing it. And so it's a really normal and predictable process, because we literally put our mind and body on hold in that 10 weeks. And then we have to all the damage control during the holidays.
Kelly: And I think we need to change that don't mean like, we need to change that mentality that that will come you know, people talk about, you know, don't pour from an empty cup. And I know, I've got a real that that shows that. But you know, I think we need to start having a really good hard look at ourselves and what we're doing right now, not reflect back, you know, in the holidays, and we have that time to kind of go hang on stuff. What are you doing? Why are you rushing so much? I actually found myself today. I'm not in the classroom anymore. I was like rushing back from the shops and like, what am I doing, I'm going home to work, but I don't have to rush everywhere. And I read a great book when I was when I first got shingles. At the school, I kind of finished on rushing women syndrome, Dr. Libby Weaver is amazing. All of her stuff is awesome. I've just you know, will devour that. So I think that's probably a really good place for people to kind of go and watch. I know that you do lots of stuff in schools and on social media to, you know, to raise that awareness because I think, like I said at the beginning, it's not, it's not spoken about a lot. So if teachers are kind of feeling that pinch, you know, maybe into next year. And I know teachers because we're people pleasers, they often feel pressure to do everything. What can they kind of do to really start to advocate for their time, their space, and their energy, especially when they had leaders who are expecting a lot or maybe high performing? Do you have any strategies for teachers around that sort of thing.
Meg: When it comes to advocating for ourselves, we have to have enough energy to do that. Because we're moving against the tide, we're moving into discomfort when we're choosing courage over comfort which requires a lot of energy. So that battery piece is a non-negotiable. If you really want to have difficult conversations, if you want to be strong to be an advocate, you have to take care of yourself because you can't do it. When you're exhausted. You can't do it when you're reactive. And so when it comes to wellbeing I think about the wellbeing trifecta, these are three elements that you need, in order to back a winner. So the first one is skills. And I honestly believe that a lot of your listeners know what they need to do. If I ask them, What do you need to feel function and relate better next year, they will know something, though, something will pop into their mind, if it's exercise, if it's movement, if it's that yoga class they used to do, or the golf they used to play, whatever it is, we know, but we don't do. So the second element is you need a strategy, you need a system, you need a plan. If you want to feel differently, you need to do things differently, nothing will change if you don't change. So you need to put a system in place. And thirdly, and I think most importantly, is you need support. We're not designed to thrive alone, were designed to thrive together. And you need the kind of support from people that want to see you do well that want to see you thrive, because unfortunately not all of your colleagues want to see you thrive because it's deeply uncomfortable as you're starting to do things differently to put in boundaries to have limits for them to see that because they're thinking oh who's she to go off earlier? Or who's he to go pick up his children my husband never picked up my children and there's so many social elements so that's why we need support from people that really care and want to see us do well.
Kelly: So three S's, their skills what is strategy and support? Yeah, I love that I love that's really good. Our teachers would definitely resonate with that kind of you know, alliteration there so Okay, you've got those skills or you're having a plan of attack but you still have a really toxic school and for me that was made to a tee. My boss wanted me to do X y&z And I did it obviously you know, yes, girl, I completely change your faculty plan I even did when I was I had shingles, our handbook, you do all the things and go okay, you know, I'm ready now. Yeah. I've kind of shown improved, prove to them that I can do it. How do you? How do you move past that when your leaders are so toxic and have I suppose that school culture as well is like that, like push, push push?
Meg: This is a really complex and nuanced discussion, because it depends on where people are in their career, how confident you are. I think about my early years of teaching, and I'll do anything, the principal would ask I do anything anyone would ask, because I just didn't know, I didn't have the confidence. And I just didn't know. But as we move on in our career, we've got more experience, or we may have come from other schools where we've seen things done differently. And so it's about taking time to really think about is it the environment for you, considering the reality as it is, is that the environment for you to do your best work, I've taught in plenty of schools, I'm pretty much the same teacher, but I have been treated differently. I've been treated like just a standard teacher, nothing special. I've been to other schools, and I've been treated really well. You know, just because you're in one school, doesn't mean they're all like that. And because I have the privilege of working with so many schools across Australia, I walk into schools every week, and they are so different. Some principles just make my heart sing, I just look at them. And I smile, because there is so much energy, there's so much positivity, there the principles that have replaced the staff room and got new coffee machines, because their whole strategy is about if I care for the staff, they're going to care for the students, everybody's happy. But I've also been into other environments that that's not present. There's that real competitive vibe around the school, there's the very much the leadership versus the staff. And I want people to really understand that there are so many different schools out there. And there'll be schools that absolutely love your skill set, and will embrace you, you don't have to stay in environments that aren't working for you. And just think about it, the way we look at it for our students, not every school is right for every student, you've got to find the environment that suits you. And if you're in a time of your career, where it's not possible for whatever reason, it's about dealing with reality as it is and what can you do? How can you can control your controllables in this period of time, and that's where I think it's really important to seek external support, if that's external mentors, if that's external coaching, external therapy, somewhere where you can process it, and you can start to create some space between you and the culture because a risk in these kinds of cultures is it chips away at your confidence? And so the longer you stay in an environment where you don't feel valued or appreciated, the longer it chips away at your confidence, and then the less likely you are to make a change.
Kelly: Yeah, and before I hit record, I was sharing a bit about what happened to me and that all completely resonates with me and I think I had the type of culture that it was the coffee machines it was the beautiful staff rooms it was you know, the lunchroom all prettied up in you know, beautiful boat, but underneath there's like you know, the assassinate she my boss was very, very sneaky, very nasty. It was very competitive. People were made to justify the HSC results. You know, literally the first day back she paraded people so yeah, there's two camps I suppose. But I think for teachers, there are plenty of schools out there especially in now like in our times now and look rural and remote schools I get it you know, you might have to move we might have to go you know, to work out a better way for a school that's a little bit further away or whatever it might be, but we will have choice like we don't have to stay in you know, in our current leadership role, teaching the same staff or even in that in that school, I think we do have choice and I get it you know, there are some teachers who feel the pinch financially that they might not be able to make that move for those reasons. But you know, what's a head teacher job, it's not really worth it. If you're spending your time at home, stress and you know, overwhelmed or you know, trying to justify your role, whatever it might be, I think we do have choice and I love you know, you said you can only control what you can control. My teachers know that I talked about the Serenity Prayer. Not the most Catholic, you know, girl out there but that I love that press so much because it has so much value about you can either control what you can control, there's no point stressing about it, and you do have the choice. So as we kind of wrap up, if I if you know if I Um, if my educators are feeling a pinch right now, what can they? Where can they actually go? Like? Who can they turn to? I know you mentioned, coaches, mentors, that type of thing. Where would they start find those people do you think?
Meg: It depends on which pathway they want to go if they want that individual support. So if you want individual support more than therapeutic support, you go straight to a GP, and the GP, we are able to connect you with different services. And there are psychologists that specialised in teaching healthcare workers, people that understand that emotional load. And I sometimes just smile to myself think, imagine what the education system would be like, if every teacher had the opportunity to do professional supervision, just like therapists do, where teachers get together with other teachers. And they have the supervision where they just talk through some of the issues, some of the things that have popped up, because we would learn so much from that, not just about ourselves, but about others, and learn some really healthy ways to navigate all that emotional load, GP through to therapy for that individual support. When it comes to group support. Working with someone like UK would be amazing. You know, it's specialised in the area that they're teaching in working with someone like me, when it comes to teacher wellbeing, find spaces and they're out there, there's more and more coming out every every week, that support you as a human being, not as the teacher, but as the human. And that may not even be in education, that might even be going down to your local gym, and joining a gym class. Find things that will keep you buoyant. Find things that light you up, that create that magic in your life. Because as educators, we can give school 100% of ourselves and we lose all the things that bring us joy, that keep us buoyant. And so think back on your life. Think back to the periods where you're really uplifted, felt joy felt light, what was it that you were doing? And tap back into that?
Kelly: Yeah, so powerful, really great strategies. I love that analogy. You know, what lights you up? What really do you stand for and getting that support? And going back to what you know, that old you find that person again, because you know, we're not just teachers, when that doesn't define who we are, we don't have to be and live and breathe it. You know, and I am I'm a statistic I that's what I did. I lived in breaks. I loved it so much. I was so passionate. But I think, you know, I love my work now because I get to support so many educators across, you know, state and now the country with my new my new stuff. But yeah, I think it's important just to sit back and go, You know what, it's a job. It's a vocation, but it's also just a job. Um, okay, to finish off, I asked my guests, what is something? Some piece of advice? I'd like to give the younger self? So younger self? And omega, what advice would you give to her?
Meg: Oh, my goodness, I would give her so much advice, because she was a type plus plus, the first thing would be slow down. You've got time. You're not under the clock all the time to actually enjoy the process. I remember a therapist said to me, when I was going through this transition of what am I going to do? I thought this is what I want to do. I'm not sure this is what I'm to do. And he asked me this question, and it was, Who are you when you're not performing? And so that's what I would tell my younger self to slow down. And enjoy. Your life is not a show.
Kelly: Well, yeah, I think we should have had this podcast a long time ago, maybe because there's so many similarities and and hopefully, it's resonated with my teachers. So if teachers educators want to work with you further, where they where can they find you?
Meg: At my website, openmindededucation.com and on Instagram @Meg Derome_ and if they're interested in learning more about wellbeing, my podcast is called The School of Wellbeing Podcast where, each Friday, I share a conversation about wellbeing for educators.
Kelly: Awesome. Thank you so much make I hope my teachers get so much out of these and I know that they definitely will. Thanks again.
Meg: Thanks, Kelly, and I love your work.
Kelly - Outro
Thanks for joining the Learning Network. I'd love to hear what connected with you most about today's episode, take a screenshot and tag me on Instagram and Facebook using @kellybell.coach on Instagram and at @TheLearnNet on Facebook. If you'd like to know more about my courses, resources, masterclasses coaching, mentoring and membership you can DM me over on Facebook or Instagram or head thelearnnet.com. Don't forget to stay connected by subscribing to Apple podcasts or Spotify and if you love today's episode I'd be so honoured if you could please leave me a review see you again next week let's continue to connect learn and grow together to make a huge impact on the students we teach.
Want to work with me one on one?
In my CAFS Coaching and Mentoring, I develop a session or series of sessions that are created with the unique needs of your school and context in mind that are completely tailored based on your experience, stage and journey in
Community and Family Studies.
I acknowledge and pay my respects to the
traditional custodians on whose land I walk, work & live.
This land was and always will be the land of the First Nations People.