Through the Looking Glass Re-membering, Reflecting and Rearranging with 2020 Hindsight

2020 was a year of disruption, upheaval, grief and loss. The events of this past year had  personal, political and global impacts. It was a year of crisis and trauma that most of us long to bring to a close and leave behind for new horizons and new hopes. It is reasonable and natural to want to simply leave this year behind and never look back. And yet, at TeachWell, one of our core precepts is that we must first examine our own beliefs and attitudes before we can teach or model for others. We’ve moved out of  2020. Now is the time to recall our personal experiences of the events of this year and integrate them into our own social emotional well-being in a way that can be transformative for ourselves and for the ways in which our education systems operate. 

The pandemic left us emotionally vulnerable AND precariously receptive to the events that rolled out under the  heavy veil of the Coronavirus. It framed -our experiences of campus closures, Black Lives Matter, wildfires, and the 2020 election. It revealed a specific (sometimes darker or distorted) lens through which to reflect. We are afforded an opportunity by the events of this past year. By seeking meaning in the happenings of this year, we can move forward into action that leads to personal and political growth. Grief expert Dr. David Kessler describes finding meaning as our ability to find meaningful moments in the midst of upheaval and loss. He suggests that we identify meaningful moments in the unprecedented events of 2020 and that these meaningful moments will reveal pockets of light in the darkness. By finding these meaningful moments, we will come out of this more likely to have “post-traumatic growth rather than post-traumatic stress.” 

Finding meaning requires more than simply recalling the events of this year. We must “re-member” them. Narrative therapy refers to re-membering as a special form of recollection in which we recognize the self, not simply as an individual, but as an “interconnected web of relationships'' that shape our identities. Through remembering we can rearrange the assumptions and expectations about our personal beliefs and relationships with others to inform how we want to move forward with action. Through personal and political re-membering we are able to spin a new fabric into the core of our existence and weave that fabric into a new way of thinking about and seeing the world. In his victory speech, newly elected Senator Raphael Warnock quoted Dr. Martin Luther King, “We are tied in a single garment of destiny. We are caught up in an inescapable network of mutuality. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” I believe that through re-membering we can realize personal and political transformation. 

When we recall campus closures and distant learning, we must name the meaning in the dedication and determination of educators to teach – despite their own steep learning curves and formidable obstacles to delivering their lessons.  And we must recognize the meaning in the personal attributes of each educator that led to their resilience and significant successes throughout the school year. We must re-member the glaring inequalities, previously hidden just below the surface of our school systems that when revealed, left families and children without access to education. And, we must re-member the desperate feeling of not being able to reach students and the subsequent time lost in each child’s education. 

When we recall the deaths of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, along with the previous deaths of countless innocent African Americans, we must re-member our understanding of racism, systemic racism, and generations of racist trauma it imposed. We must re-member what it means to be an anti-racist and each of our personal calls to engage in the ongoing struggle for racial justice. We can find meaning in the courage of those who raised their voices in protests, who took a knee below the military-like police lines, and who refused to rest until the conversations about reform and restoration finally moved into political action.

When we recall the wildfires that set the earth ablaze, we must re-member the power of Mother Earth to lash out against the abuses imposed on her through our careless human habits. And we must re-member our personal responsibility to slow or reverse the inevitable course of climate change. And still, there is meaning in the heroic acts of firefighters and first responders. Light is revealed in the moments when neighbors took in the displaced.

When we recall the elections of 2020 we must re-member that Democracy is a personal and political action, not a static entitlement to freedom. We must re-member that our system worked because of the moments when volunteers made phone calls, counted ballots, and withstood unjust harassment and intimidation. There is great meaning in the unprecedented voter turnout of Americans in both political parties. And there is a light of hope in the meaning that our courts upheld a fair democratic election process so that every vote was counted. The people, not politics, determined the outcome of this election. 

TeachWell will re-member the deeply human and relational impact of these events, integrating the lessons learned into our core competencies of social-emotional wellness. Our commitment to educator well-being has been fortified by the tireless efforts of teachers and administrators over the course of this year who demonstrated the power of belief in self and others to overcome obstacles and strive for self-efficacy. We have gained a deeper understanding of how grit facilitates growth mindset and the courage required to look at failures as the path to greater success. 

We were moved to examine our own identities, values and beliefs to deepen our social awareness so that we authentically engage with our clients and colleagues in meaningful ways. We learned to practice what we teach about self-management through mindfulness, time management and stress management in the midst of terrible disruption, an ever-changing landscape, and tremendous uncertainty in the field of education this year. As we move into 2021, we integrate, with intention, the lessons of this past year into the supports and opportunities we offer. We move forward with courageous action and a confidence in our collective human experience. We move forward with a light of optimism.