The Teacher Mindset Coach

This is part one of a two part series about the lessons I’ve learned from losing my mom. Today I’ll be talking about grief and the definition of death. Next week, I’ll talk about relationships and joy after death.  Please stay tuned and subscribe to my podcast so you don’t miss it.  My ultimate goal is to help others during one of the most challenging times of being alive; dealing with death.

Over the last year since my mother passed away, I’ve paid very close attention to my experience.  I tell people all the time that I am so thankful for the coaching skills I had when my mom started to get sick and when she passed on.  Those coaching skills were what guided me through that experience at the time of her death and up to this point a year later.

For those of you who are going through hard times, I want to let you know that you are not alone in this, there are people like me who are ready to help and, most importantly, the ultimate truths that are best for you are inside you if you are willing to slow down and listen to yourself with compassion.

This episode is going to be a way for me to share some of my practiced thoughts, some of my realizations and some of my routines that I have cultivated over the last year or so.  I know this will help you with grief, loss and the overwhelm of unexpected change or added responsibilities.

First, let’s talk about what I have learned, so far, about grief over the last year.  For the longest time, I was convinced that there were stages of grief that I would go through, much like a race, with a starting line and a finish line. Grief would start, I’d go through it, and it would end.  Many of you already know that this is probably not the grief experience for most of us.  It was a widely accepted explanation for a while, but everyone will go through it differently.  And allowing myself to be open to grief being whatever it was going to be helped me loosen the reins on myself when I was stuck wondering, “What stage am I going through right now?  Am I denying?  Am I negotiating?”  Me personally, I hate being fit into boxes. So I think I’m just going to rebel against a widely known definition of a life experience, especially when I’m about to go through it and I’m scared.

This was the part of my mindset work that started when I realized my mom may have been in decline. I was open to learning from grief coaches on podcasts and audiobooks as I spent hours in the car driving down to visit my parents while my mom was sick.

It's important to notice these patterns in your thinking because, if you pause and listen to yourself, you’ll be able to shine light on your current thinking and then make decisions on whether you want to continue to think that way or make some changes.

One of the most powerful realizations I had about grief came to me through a podcast with Krista St. Germain who is a life coach for widows.  She was explaining that grief will take it’s own shape.  Grief will present itself and won’t follow a set pattern for each of us.  

When you’re ready to dive deeper you might want to go looking for current information about grief.  There are tons of free resources out there and I’ll link some of my favorites in the show notes. 

Don't be caught without a plan. Make your Mental & Emotional Health Strategy Plan with me before going back to school!  Click on the link to schedule your time.
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Get a hold of my Cards Against Educators game to strengthen your community of fun-loving, supportive educators.  Start at CardsAgainstEducators.com

Go to my LinkTree for more resources:
Copy & Paste: https://linktr.ee/teacherstresssolution

Back to student testing data… what I’m noticing teachers are doing is going through testing times of the school year, looking at student data results and potentially beating the crap out of themselves for the students who aren’t meeting the mark.

I’m not suggesting that teachers defer to toxic positivity here.  If a student is failing and you have a thought about it that makes you feel terrible, it’s time to pause and pay attention.  It could be that the thoughts that come to you on auto-pilot about students in your class who are failing aren’t very supportive.  Here are a few examples: “I’m not a good teacher.  They’re not able to learn.  I don’t know what else to do.  I don’t know how to teach this kid.  They’re on their own.  If they’re not getting it by now, I can’t help them.  I’m not cut out for this.  I should have tried harder.”

For a person who speaks kindly about themselves first, then about their students, maybe the thoughts are constructive such as “This is part of their growth.  They’re starting to catch on.  Look at what they’ve done already.  I know they’re not passing yet but I’m confident they will next time.  I know I’m doing the best I can and I will keep doing the best I can.  I have faith in my students.  It’s ok.  This will give me good insight on some new things I can try in the classroom.  I can collaborate with some other teachers to focus in on these areas that need growth.  This’ll be fun.  I’m up for it.  That’s what I’m here for.”

One article I found online uses the term “toxic productivity” where a student, or teacher, mind you, connects their worth as a person or professional to the output, or productivity, they create.  For students, it’s not just passing grades but perfect grades.  

https://www.idahoednews.org/voices/cycle-of-toxic-productivity-the-problem-with-our-school-culture/

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www.teachermindsetcoach.com
IG - www.instagram.com/teachermindsetcoach

Don't be caught without a plan. Make your Mental & Emotional Health Strategy Plan with me before going back to school!  Click on the link to schedule your time.
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Get a hold of my Cards Against Educators game to strengthen your community of fun-loving, supportive educators.  Start at CardsAgainstEducators.com

Go to my LinkTree for more resources:
Copy & Paste: https://linktr.ee/teacherstresssolution

Success Toxicity is the net negative commitment to a definition of success that EXCLUDES the positive by-products that come from failure because of this flawed but systemic notion that failure is bad, will only harm us, and will ruin our futures.  

This is also why some teachers go through so much emotional turmoil when things "aren't working out" with student performance.  The teacher's performance is "failing" because the test scores aren't where somebody said they should be.  Then we get the conversation of "developmentally inappropriate" coming from teachers in an attempt to feel validated and better about the job we're doing.  But what if we could feel better about the job we're doing REGARDLESS of the progress monitoring scores our students put up?  

Tune in next week for Part II of Success Toxicity where the rubber hits the road for teachers and how we talk to ourselves and our students about their test scores or productivity.

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www.teachermindsetcoach.com

Don't be caught without a plan. Make your Mental & Emotional Health Strategy Plan with me before going back to school!  Click on the link to schedule your time.
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Get a hold of my Cards Against Educators game to strengthen your community of fun-loving, supportive educators.  Start at CardsAgainstEducators.com

Go to my LinkTree for more resources:
Copy & Paste: https://linktr.ee/teacherstresssolution

Last week, I hinted at an episode about toxic positivity so that’s what I’ll be talking about today.  Before I started my research online, I wrote down a few ideas of my own that I had on this topic.  My main theme in this discussion echoes much of my beliefs about self-responsibility, self-creation and self-actualization.  So it may come as no surprise that my ideas, my thoughts regarding toxic positivity is that it’s an inside job.  It’s an inside job in its creation and in the solutions for fixing it.

I’ll start with sharing my ideas with you then I’ll move to what I found online about toxic positivity .  Then we’ll get to the solutions and how to use this information for you instead of against you.

Toxic positivity comes from the inside to present outward to the world.  Toxic positivity does not come from outside of you to affect what’s on the inside.

Toxic positivity is when we feel obligated to be positive when we don’t want to be.  But this is always an inside job.  No one can force us to feel anything, positive or negative.

If you’ve got a deer in the headlights look on your face right now, not only are you in the right place but you might want to listen to some of my earlier podcast episodes about thoughts and emotions.

Toxic positivity is also an attempt to escape the discomfort of negative emotion but it has a compounding effect because of the lie we try to force ourselves to believe that life should be 100% positive all the time.

Psychology Today defines toxic positivity  as, “...the act of avoiding, suppressing, or rejecting negative emotions or experiences. This may take the form of denying your own emotions or someone else denying your emotions, insisting on positive thinking instead.”

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/toxic-positivity 

To me, what helps us understand if we are experiencing toxic positivity  or not is to ask ourselves how we truly feel when we turn down the external voices and find what resonates within us.  If we can do this, toxic positivity  will fade away and we will hear our inner voice so much more clear.

The Psychology Group defines toxic positivity  as, “...the excessive and ineffective overgeneralization of a happy, optimistic state across all situations. The process of toxic positivity results in the denial, minimization, and invalidation of the authentic human emotional experience.”

https://thepsychologygroup.com/toxic-positivity/ 

Don't be caught without a plan. Make your Mental & Emotional Health Strategy Plan with me before going back to school!  Click on the link to schedule your time.
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Get a hold of my Cards Against Educators game to strengthen your community of fun-loving, supportive educators.  Start at CardsAgainstEducators.com

Go to my LinkTree for more resources:
Copy & Paste: https://linktr.ee/teacherstresssolution

The Sunday Blues can be a mystery for professionals working a typical weekday job.

The Sunday Blues can also be an opportunity for us to take something that we think is as inevitable as the order of the days on a calendar and question everything about it.

To be clear, the goal of this episode is NOT to train you on how to get rid of the Sunday Blues or turn it into feeling 100% positive and joyful every Sunday at 7pm.  The goal of this episode is to use something that can be universally experienced as an example of how you can take a habitual way of feeling and start using your brain to make conscious decisions to feel it on purpose or to choose to feel a different way.

This episode is about empowerment.  This talk is about how you can take something seemingly small and not harmful, like the Sunday Blues, and practice creating different feelings with your thoughts.

Don't be caught without a plan. Make your Mental & Emotional Health Strategy Plan with me before going back to school!  Click on the link to schedule your time.
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Get a hold of my Cards Against Educators game to strengthen your community of fun-loving, supportive educators.  Start at CardsAgainstEducators.com

Go to my LinkTree for more resources:
Copy & Paste: https://linktr.ee/teacherstresssolution

My To-Be List

1. Be my authentic self
   1. No people pleasing - “I can’t control what others think of me.”
   2. No being people pleased - “My compliments to myself are most important.”
   3. Watch for indulgent emotions - “I can feel emotions and not indulge in them.”
   4. Pour into myself first - “I am 100% worthy, 100% enough, 100% fulfilled by what I believe, think, say and do.”

1. Be a Campus Servant as the Librarian
   1. Help kids fall in love with books and reading - “This is the most fun place on campus for kids and for me.”
   2. Provide resources to all - “I enrich the educational experience with what I have in the library.”

1. Be a Support to Teachers with Mindset Coaching
   1. Wednesday Support Group - “Teachers need a place to go where they can get support with what bothers them.”
   2. Fun Committee - “Fun at work is a requirement and I know how to bring the fun.”
   3. Staff meeting workshops - “Teaching others about mind management and emotional management is one of my superpowers.”
   4. District level support coming soon - “My teachings and my programs are what my school district has been waiting for.”

Don't be caught without a plan. Make your Mental & Emotional Health Strategy Plan with me before going back to school!  Click on the link to schedule your time.
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Get a hold of my Cards Against Educators game to strengthen your community of fun-loving, supportive educators.  Start at CardsAgainstEducators.com

Go to my LinkTree for more resources:
Copy & Paste: https://linktr.ee/teacherstresssolution

Planning vacations is a mental game for some of us.
Yes, there's the tactical side of it where you are choosing destinations, length of time, budget, etc.
But then there's the mental drama that almost always goes unchecked.
Especially for teachers.
This episode doesn't go over the steps to planning a vacation but all the mind drama that comes up when you are thinking of planning your vacations.
And I challenge you to plan your vacations first instead of leaving them up to chance or pushing off to "someday."
Don't do that to yourself.

Here are the steps that I'll go into greater detail in the epsidoe"

1. Decide that you deserve a vacation in real life, not just in your imagination.
2. Decide that you can afford it and don’t let money be the reason to not go
3. Decide on a vacation during the school year as well as the summer
4. Decide on your work boundaries while on vacation
5. Decide who you want to bring along or if you’re going solo
6. Decide when and where
7. Decide on the budget
8. Allow for the discomfort, the indecision and nervousness
9. Tell everyone about your amazing plans
10. Keep your commitment and go!

Don't be caught without a plan. Make your Mental & Emotional Health Strategy Plan with me before going back to school!  Click on the link to schedule your time.
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Get a hold of my Cards Against Educators game to strengthen your community of fun-loving, supportive educators.  Start at CardsAgainstEducators.com

Go to my LinkTree for more resources:
Copy & Paste: https://linktr.ee/teacherstresssolution

Let me take you on a trip to one of my favorite places to eat: Chipotle.

Let me explain how I thought my order was wrong, went back so they could make it right, only to find out that I was wrong.

Then I was the one who went back to make it right.

This is the long and short of what Byron Katie calls "living amends."

Making it right.

The kicker: there's no "right" way to do it.

You just do what you know sits well with you.

Don't be caught without a plan. Make your Mental & Emotional Health Strategy Plan with me before going back to school!  Click on the link to schedule your time.
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Get a hold of my Cards Against Educators game to strengthen your community of fun-loving, supportive educators.  Start at CardsAgainstEducators.com

Go to my LinkTree for more resources:
Copy & Paste: https://linktr.ee/teacherstresssolution

Does burnout happen earlier and earlier every school year?

Does burnout happen without warning?

Today, I present my first ever podcast guest, and Burnout Coach, Dex Randall.

Dex is a coach who believes that the suffering people experience from burnout is totally curable and preventable.

He blew my mind several times during this interview as we talked about:

-perfectionism
-connection
-judgement
-the role we play in preventing and treating our own burnout

Find Dex at http://www.dexrandall.com

Listen to his podcast at: https://www.burnouttoleadership.com/

Don't be caught without a plan. Make your Mental & Emotional Health Strategy Plan with me before going back to school!  Click on the link to schedule your time.
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Get a hold of my Cards Against Educators game to strengthen your community of fun-loving, supportive educators.  Start at CardsAgainstEducators.com

Go to my LinkTree for more resources:
Copy & Paste: https://linktr.ee/teacherstresssolution

In this tandem episode, I will help you understand how you are already equipped to create the sense of belonging, the feeling of belonging, for yourself, anywhere you happen to be.

We can create a sense of belonging in places/environments like our classrooms or schools.
We can create a sense of belonging in our own physical bodies.
No matter what.

Its a power, through self-study and thought work, that we have with us all the time.

We can belong anywhere and with anyone we damn well please.

How?

Because our sense of belonging doesn't come from a place or another person.  It comes from the thoughts and beliefs we have in our minds that helps us feel like we belong.

**What's a "tandem episode" you ask?  Well its when one of your podcasting coach friend creates a podcast episode with the exact same title but she goes about the content completely differently than you!**

So the best experience for our dear listeners is for you to listen to and learn from both episodes. 

Listen to Lisa's episode here or copy/paste:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/39-creating-belonging/id1588615392?i=1000569121545

Find out more about Coach Lisa here or copy/paste:
http://www.lisaschwaller.com

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Ready to talk to Ashley, one on one, to get the help you want?

Let's do it!  I'm here to help you, even if its only one session, I know I can help you.

Click here or copy/paste:
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Don't be caught without a plan. Make your Mental & Emotional Health Strategy Plan with me before going back to school!  Click on the link to schedule your time.
https://calendly.com/coachwithwolfe/30-minute-session

Get a hold of my Cards Against Educators game to strengthen your community of fun-loving, supportive educators.  Start at CardsAgainstEducators.com

Go to my LinkTree for more resources:
Copy & Paste: https://linktr.ee/teacherstresssolution