"Reflectiveness"

Living the American Dream doesn't leave much time for "reflectiveness." In a society that values competition, productivity, and busy-ness as much as the United States, it can be hard to find time to reflect. Teachers experience this pressure heavily, as they rarely clock in 8-hour days. A professor once told me that to be a teacher, "you're already committing to donating half of your salary: you get paid less than half as much as you deserve, and you put in more hours than you get paid for." Being a great teacher requires a huge time commitment from the teacher. Being a student is also a huge time commitment as well. Most students (grades 1-12) are in school for 7 hours, and when they get home, they still have several hours worth of homework to do (not so much for the younger ones). Personally, as a college student and music ed. major, I have learned that I need to be working on homework/assignments almost every minute of my day that I don't spend in class in order to get to bed by 10:00 each night (this is quite a challenge!) Teachers and students live in a world where there is ALWAYS something to do - something to get ahead on, something to fix/re-do, something to plan. This is a reality of each position.

However, I believe that it is very important for both teachers and students to plan consistent times of reflectiveness into each day. I believe that it is the DUTY of both teachers and students to do this for several reasons:

1.) We need it! Our minds need time to rest, process, and organize. Learning comes out of reflectiveness. If we never stop, we never reflect, and we never learn or analyze. We just keep on living like robots (or animals, for that matter).
2.) Life isn't going to get any less busy - if we wait for this to happen, we will never experience reflectiveness.

For me, I am most reflective when I am alone, and my surroundings are quiet. When I minimize outside distractions as much as is in my power, I have the greatest chance of being able to think and reflect clearly. Although I am far from being a morning person (I'd like to be one!), I set aside 6:45-7:30 every morning for myself before class to sit, eat my breakfast/drink some tea, and read my Bible/journal. My roommate is still asleep and all is quiet. I depend on/look forward to this time every morning even though I am usually kind of sleepy. As teachers, students, and plain old human beings, we NEED to take some time to reflect each day or the time that we DO spend trying to accomplish things will be in vain.