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Copyright © Louis Schmier and Atwood Publishing.
Date: Mon 3/22/2004 2:55 AM
Random Thought: My Garden, the Classroom, and Spirituality
Spring has sprung. Can't sleep. This Levaquin is keeping me off
the streets and off-balance, and I've got a heavy tickle in the back of my
throat from a touch of "yellow lung." That's what I get from breathing
the ochre stained air all day as I played in my bursting flower garden.
Spring has sprung, and so have my Susan's allergies. Sneezing, swollen
eyes, hacking coughs, stuffy noses, sore throats, headaches, grumpies, and
the "miserables" in general are the heralds of winter's end. Billows of
golden clouds are sweeping across the land jaundicing everything and
everyone in their path. The Saharan sandstorms don't have anything on our
South Georgia pine pollen storms. Two days ago, I proved that having a
Ph.D. doesn't mean you're smart. I had my car detailed! Dumb! That
spic and span look lasted about 30 minutes. Now the pines are giving it a
heavy gold plating.
Spring has sprung. Actually, it began with me in December, when
gardening was both a faint prospect and distant memory. I took impish
delight in pouring through the caladium catalogue, imagining the dazzling
color layout, making my selection, and placing my order for 400 of them.
Spring has sprung, for, as is the case every year, my Susan feigned--I
hope it was feigned--stern annoyance when she saw the four cases of
caladiums that had arrived last week before I could hide them from her.
Shhhh! She still doesn't know about the six new roses.
You know, there's mystery and magic in my garden. It's really a
spiritual experience of preparation, planting, tending, and then waiting
for who knows what. I prune, plant seed and bulbs and new plants, divide
and transplant old ones to give them new life. I don't know which are
going to germinate, take root, grow, or bloom--or when. All I can do is
have faith. But, no matter how many years I've been gardening, I am
always filled with awe and wonder and joy. Every time I see a seedling
peek out through the earth, a dormant flower unfurl a leaf, a stem
triumphantly emerge from a clump, or a bloom burst open, I get emotional.
For the garden, is such a sacred life affirming place. When I see all
this, I am calmed and soothed with a feeling that all is good and right.
And, I am thankful for the restorative balm of the garden's comfort.
Don't tell me spirituality has no place in the garden. Or, in the
classroom for that matter. The classroom is no less full of sacred life
than is my garden, and I get no less emotional. Every aspect of the
classroom has meaning and purpose. The classroom sparks a sense of
spirituality and life. Taking delight in each of the spiritual processes
of preparation, tending, nurturing, waiting, and then giving thanks as a
teacher is no different from a gardener in the garden.
Now, I'm not going to define what I mean by spirituality. I did
that a little over a year ago when I wrote that "spirituality" was a word
in "My Dictionary of Good Teaching." I don't think, however, that
spirituality automatically has an place in the classroom as some advocates
might argue. At the same time, I don't think spirituality has no place in
the classroom as cynics and critics might argue. A fairer statement is
that the right kind of spirituality can be a very powerful educational
asset, and that better things tend to happen to individuals that
consistently are embraced by spirituality and lesser things tend to happen
to those who do not.
Now, what do I mean by the right kind of spirituality? It was
Joseph Campbell who said that the greatest barrier to a religious
experience is organized religion. It's not particularly different in
education. Spirituality shouldn't be in the classroom if it's a
deadening, "ho hum," put you to sleep, organized, structured, predictable,
routinized, ritual "you gotta do this" spirituality that acts as a barrier
to an educational experience. But, as I find more and more from the
profound impact of a simple exercise we do at the beginning of the class
called "The Chair," if it's a "wake up" spirituality, a "freeing up"
spirituality, and a "let's see what's inside you" spirituality, you bet it
has a place. A prime condition for a spirituality, be in the garden or
classroom, that is an alarm clock for me and an awakening for so many
others up is simple: not knowing what would happen next, learning to
trust yourself and others enough that you let go, take a shot, relinquish
control, and let it happen. You let your potential and that of others
begin to emerge to take you and them wherever it goes. You let your and
their "I can't" and "It's not me" and "I'm not comfortable with that"
arduously be replaced by a "Let's see." When you do, a surprising and
excited "Gee" so often makes its appearance. With this kind of
spirituality, you don't insist on a particular "right way," on control, on
order, on quiet, on comfort, on convenience, on guarantee. The spirit of
the classroom should not be a place where the spirit is stifled, where
it's fenced in, where everything has become a yawning formality, where
class attendance is doodling rote and where stale "this is the way to do
it" certainties are numbing. Many times I think that the formal lecture
format--and even the controlled discussion format--and the formal
note-taking and test-taking and grade giving format far more often than
not keeps both professor and student from experiencing the vexations of
challenged thinking and feeling and doing, where they curl up and allow
themselves a paralysis instead of a flexing of their muscles. Sometimes I
think far too many academics' attitude about what they do or are supposed
to do are like ivy: they cling tenaciously to their point of view.
Yet, mystery is at the heart of education no less than it in the
garden. It's called "unique potential." There are things in the
classroom that are beyond imagining. It's a place, like my garden, where
almost nothing is impossible. There are long journeys being taken, some
seen and others unseen, in that limited space. The classroom is fraught
with those opportunities of proverbial "teachable moments" that often
arise unannounced and unnoticed and all we can do, if we want to make a
difference, is to have faith that sometimes, in some manner, at some
place, what we say and do will really matter. It's a "who knows what will
happen" happening; it's a "who knows" whether our high hopes and the best
of intentions will really make a difference; it is based on a faith of
ultimate impact that will occur beyond our desire, our knowledge and
awareness, and our need for certainty. People who don't understand this,
who can't deal with life's essential "don't know," try to cover their
anxiety with proofs that this or that happens with scientific studies,
with testing, with assessing, with evaluating, with accounting for, with
having fixed goals. Real education, however, is not really a testable
here and now. At it's core, it's not about the transmitting and gathering
of information. It's essence is far more about transforming than
informing. The heart of an education is about changing lives. It's what
I call a "down the road" and "who knows" and "let's wait and see"
process.
The classroom should be the place where a stirring and freeing,
not a numbing and chaining, of spirit happens. The classroom should be a
spirited place of freshness, of becoming less certain, of more unlearning,
of being "forced" to wonder, of being encouraged to create, of searching
for the richness of oneself, of exploring the vast abundance of the world,
of individual thinking, of being surprised by one's inner possibilities,
of being awake, of excitedly being at the edge, of being open to each
moment's pearl. In a classroom, the person, the process, and the goal all
should be shrouded in mystery and magic, in awe and wonder and joy, in
taking delight no less than they are in my garden.
Remember the chinese proverb that says, "He who plants a garden,
plants happiness." Do that in the classroom and I guarantee that more
than once in a while all your efforts will be affirmed when years later
someone gives you the wonderful gift of telling you that you made a
difference and changed his or her life. Then, take pause and give thanks.
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