Week 2: Compassion

Wow, we're already up to week two. Almost done with the second full week of classes. Crazy! Well, the theme for this week's blog entry is 'compassion.' The quote is by the Dalai Lama, who said "If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion." From my over nineteen years of experience, this tends to be true. One of my good friends tends to judge people and hold grudges...and is often grumpy or irritable. My parents don't know how I put up with her - I guess I've just known her long enough!

A teacher's compassion can make a difference in a student's life. Even if it's a student with a stable home life who gets plenty of affection from family, it can still make an impact. I hate to refer back to my schedule problems again, but that's one of the moments when I had a teacher show me compassion.

I remember I had just gotten out of a meeting with my adviser. Looking back, I realize he did try to help me, but with a school of 1800 or so and three or four counselors, I'm sure it was really hard for him to try and deal with everyone's problems. However at that point, I just felt like he was giving me no guidance. All I wanted to do was go home and cry and get my mom to fix everything. I'm one of the lucky people who cries out of frustration, and that's what it was at that point. I wasn't full-on crying, but I'm sure my eyes were red and watery. I was standing outside the counselors' office area, all red-eyed and unsure what to do, when my pre-calc teacher came along.

I've never been a huge fan of math, even though I've always been good at it, thanks to my dad's genes, but I've always tried to have a good attitude about it. Mr. Conrad was a really fun teacher who managed to make the class itself fun, even if the homework was boring. That being said, I still didn't really know him that well. I'd gone in before or after school a few times to ask about homework, but that was it. When he saw me semi-crying, though, he stopped and took the time to ask me what was wrong. Chances are he had a class he was supposed to get back to, but instead he took the time to stop and talk to me. That little bit of kindness enabled me to pull myself together instead of breaking down out of frustration. We only talked for five or ten minutes, but it did make a difference. He helped me see that it wasn't quite the end of the world.