The Beginning of Year Three

Tomorrow morning, I will put on non-yoga pants, brush my hair for the first time in a week, and drink enough coffee to make myself coherent. That's right! It's the start of the fall semester. Since tomorrow also marks the beginning of my third year as a college instructor, I thought it made sense to reflect on the 3 most important lessons I've learned so far about teaching:

1. Be yourself- The summer before teaching my first class, I went shopping for "professional-looking" clothes. I even went as far as cutting my hair and dying it (RIP long hair that's still growing out from that mistake). Finally, I asked that my students call me Ms. Brooks instead of calling me Alexia because I wanted to appear as an authority figure.

Then on my first day of teaching after reading through the syllabus, I had a student raise his hand and say "can you tell us a bit about yourself? How long have you been teaching?" Oh shit, he's found me out. He knows that I've been a teacher for five minutes. Get out of here, I thought to myself.

Instead of telling this student that I had just graduated, I told him I'd been teaching for "a while." It wasn't entirely made up, I mean, I had taught a 3-week summer course prior to this course, but that 3 weeks certainly didn't equate to "a while." Truthfully, I didn't feel confident about myself as an instructor. I was 26 at the time but looked like I could have been one of their classmates (hashtag blessed), and I felt that the new clothes, new name, and new hairstyle would erase all of that. Well, it didn't.

What I realized about halfway through my first semester is that I was an authority on the subject being discussed, regardless of what my students called me or what I was wearing. So I ditched the dressy pants for jeans, stopped worrying about how young my hairstyle made me look, and started letting my students call me Alexia. It feels great not having to hide who I am anymore.

2. Know that you will make mistakes- This goes hand-in-hand with lesson #1. For the first two years, I wanted to teach content that I knew was going to work 100%. I asked my colleagues for advice and help with assignments often, and it was motivated by the belief that I couldn't make a mistake.

I realized this summer that this is a completely unrealistic way to thrive in the workplace, and life in general. Making mistakes leads us to learning what we want and don't want for ourselves. Plus, these last two years of teaching other people's content has made my class, at times, feel like it wasn't my own. I couldn't justify why I was making students do certain assignments because they weren't my assignments. For the first time this semester, I'm teaching two courses that I created alone. I know I'll make mistakes, but I am excited to learn something from it. 

3. Set boundaries-During my first semester, I heard that if you aren't working hard, then you don't care about your job. I internalized this to mean that I had to work 50-60 hours a week even though I only had two classes and wasn't even classified as a full-time lecturer. I remember assigning an essay to my two classes with only a 48 hour window for me to return the drafts to them. That's 50 essays in 48 hours. I sat in my house wanting to cry because I didn't think I could get them done. In the end, I did, but I feel like that, coupled with the fact that I was responding to emails whenever I got them (even if it was at 2am when I had gotten out of bed to use the restroom or have a glass of water) told my students that I was available to them 24/7. And I don't want to be. 

It took me a full year to realize that I was more than my job. I write, I run, I have a boyfriend, and I'm a pretty serious Netflix watcher.

I walked into my second year of teaching with a new attitude: my students would get my full attention, but it would only be within a certain time frame. Now, going into my third year of teaching, I've revised that policy even more. I tell my students in the syllabus that I am available by email M-F before 6pm and that if they email me on weekends or after 6pm on weekdays, there's a very good chance I won't respond. I feel pretty good about this policy. I think setting boundaries can teach students to set their own.

Cheers to everyone starting back tomorrow, and thanks for reading! I'd love to hear what lessons you've picked up along the way in the comments section below.


Images via 

How My Mom Taught Me About My Body (and Why It Was Important)

A few weeks ago, I was in a park and overheard two women in their early fifties talking. “I can’t stand my thighs. They are so gross and jiggly. I can’t even let [my husband] touch me most of the time. I feel so ugly,” one of them said.

A week or so later, I was looking up quotes on Pinterest (a treasured form of procrastination) when I stumbled upon one from Kate Winslet:

   “As a child, I never heard one woman say to me, "I love my body". Not my mother, my elder sister, my best friend. No one woman has ever said, "I am so proud of my body." So I make sure to say it to Mia [her daughter], because a positive physical outlook has to start at an early age.’

Immediately, I was reminded of the two women in the park, which then led me to reflect on the type of “body dialogue” I heard when I was growing up.

My mother had me when she was 18.

My mom looking like the badass she was/is.

Growing up, I don’t remember ever hearing her talk badly about her body in front of me. In fact, I can't remember her talking about her body at all unless I had questions.

Even though she was silent about her body, she didn't hide it from me. She'd change in front of me in the dressing room or at home and supervise my showers when I was little (to make sure I didn't eat the shampoo), but during all of those times, I never heard her say that she hated her thighs or her waist or any other part of herself. 

The reason this matters is because I think that the women in our lives (mothers, older siblings, grandmothers) help us form our physical outlook, whether positive or negative. 

Take the women in the park as an example. If their kids are used to hearing the same conversation I overheard them having, the kids may, on some level, internalize the dialogue as “my body is shameful" or "I should always strive to make sure I am socially acceptable.” 

  

My mother’s silence about her body allowed me to learn early on that my own body was not something to apologize for or obsess over. Sure, this physical outlook was later challenged by bullshit high school conversations about the importance of the “thigh gap” (a result of MTV and MySpace), but when I entered my home after school each day, these conversations were not echoed by my mom. 

The media is already going to create plenty of negative feelings for a lot of young women. When a person can make their eyes brighter, their skin lighter, and their waist smaller in under 5 minutes using an Instagram filter, it’s bound to cause insecurity for the everyday person scrolling through their feed. This is why it’s imperative that this negativity and shame is not further validated by parents or adult figures. 

I have a 14 year old cousin who is starting high school next month. Already, she spends most of her day on Snapchat and Instagram, and even if she isn't saying it out loud, I know she's starting to cultivate her own ideas about her body in comparison to other girls her age. Knowing this, I do my best to be body positive around her.  Sometimes when we go swimming, I'll think, "man I feel bloated" or "I wish I didn't have cellulite on my thighs", but she never hears about it. Instead, she sees her 28 year old cousin who is not ashamed of her body. 

So whether you're someone who feels comfortable saying, "I am so proud of my body" whenever kids are present, or take more of the silent approach like my mother, by maintaining a positive physical outlook, you are playing a part in shaping a person's individual body image. It may be a small part, but I think it's an important one. 

6 Simple Ways I've Found Happiness

I feel like I've had the best summer ever, and it's not even finished yet. I wanted to share the 5 things that have made me the happiest these last 6 weeks. 

1.  Waking up early- If you know me, then you know that I like to sleep. A lot. I used to think that the day didn’t actually start until 11am because that was the time I got out of bed to begin my day. As I’ve gotten older, however, I’ve realized that if I wake up at 11am, I will only get about 6 hours of “the day” to be productive before it’s nighttime and I have to start winding down for bed. Despite feeling this way, I wasn’t willing to forgo sleep to wake up earlier. One reason I was sleeping so late was because I would stay up until 2am in an effort to get some quiet time. After my recent yoga retreat, however, I realized that I can get the same quiet between the hours of 6am and 9am. Waking up at 6am also means that the days are longer and I’m more productive. And the final bonus is the great afternoon naps I’ve been having lately.

2.   Spotify- I had Spotify Premium back in grad school, but that was before they’d worked out some of the major issues with the app, so I deleted it and never thought about it again. On a recent drive to Northridge to look at the university, my boyfriend downloaded the app so we could check it out. It wasn’t long after our trip that I decided to give Spotify another shot, and I have to say how much of an essential it’s been to my productivity this summer. In the mornings when I’m doing yoga, I’ll put on a Shavasana playlist, and when I’m writing, I’ll put on something from their Productive Morning playlist. Spotify has become a big part of my summer morning writing routine, and I love it.

3. Our French Press- My boyfriend and I finally got tired of drinking shitty Keurig coffee, so we invested in a French press. Not only are French presses 1/5 of the cost of a Keurig machine, they make incredible coffee. Laying in bed each night, I get excited knowing that when I wake up, I get to have quiet time and a good cup of coffee. 

I especially love drinking out of my badass
Harry Potter mug. Albus Dumbledore is
 a wise wizard

4.   Hiding my cell phone- Visiting Hawaii last month showed me how much I miss when I’m on my phone. When I came back, I didn’t want to become a slave to it again, so whenever I've started feeling like I’m on it too much, I just put it on a shelf or in my nightstand. Having my phone out of sight makes me focus more, and whenever I get an urge to “connect” I have to get up (which usually doesn’t happen because the couch is so comfortable).

5.   Asking for approval-This is a big one for me. Because social media allows us the ability to compare ourselves to friends, family, and strangers, it is not abnormal that people have become insecure. In the past few months, I’ve learned that trying to conform to other people’s expectations is the reason for a lot of my anxiety. Plus, allowing people the right to access your personal life means allowing them the right to comment on and make suggestions about how you should live.

6.   Yoga- Yoga has been a game changer for my mental well-being. Unlike running, yoga allows me to be present and still. Instead of constantly trying to run faster and chase after a new goal, I’ve found that yoga has been teaching me acceptance for the body I bring to my practice, and in turn, I’m slowly starting to learn acceptance for the body and mind I bring into my everyday life.

Thanks for reading! I'd love to hear what you do to stay happy.