Description: We must maximize our time for self-care this winter break. This week, Dr. Boogren provides some gentle encouragement to accomplish this.
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Transcription: Hi, and welcome to episode 15 of our second season of Self-Care for Educators. I'm your host, Tina Boogren. This week's invitation is to help get you set up for the upcoming break. Oh, it's coming. It is coming. This is typically for most of us, the longest break that we have during the school year. And, I want us to be really intentional with how we use our time.
So, first of all, the fact that you have made it this far during this ridiculous, hard school year means that you're amazing. We're so grateful for you. I have no doubt that you've had so many moments this year where you thought, Nope, I just, I can't do it. I can't do it. Oh, but you're still here and that's something we're celebrating.
And, in order for us to make it through the second half of the school year, I am adamant that we need to take a break, a break, a break, a break where you really shut down. I was playing around with this idea in my head as I was kind of looking at my calendar, and I found myself just scheduling different things because, you know, I have a couple of weeks where I don't travel, and I'm at home, so I can get all the things done.
And then, I thought, Ah, easy, easy, easy, Tina, like, don't schedule too much. Really take a break. And then serendipitously, I am on Angela Watson's email. Angela Watson is amazing. I'm sure many of you know her, I know her basically through her podcast, which is a Truth for Teachers. She has an amazing website, tons of resources, she's a huge advocate for educators ... She does amazing work. And, in this recent email that I got was her invitation asking us to take a sabbatical. Over the holiday break, you know, a lot of us have just more time off during this break than we do at other breaks. And so, let's commit to taking time off.
It doesn't mean that you have to go to a cabin by yourself and ignore your family. Oh, it doesn't that sound nice, but probably not hopeful, but it's, here's what I want us to commit to. And, this is exactly what Angela recommends. No work. No work. You guys set aside time that has no work that you are not working and that you are not thinking about work.
Now, I do think ... If you can find like one day before you go back, you know, in January to get caught up, to do the things that need to be done for school, like one day, hold that. Mark that on your calendar. But then, the rest of the time, don't worry. That's hard. And, I don't mean that we're not great at our job, and we're going to not be prepared again.
This is why I think it's so important to have like a day. For me, it's like a full day that I will spend head down, getting tons of work done to set me up for getting 2022 and January underway. But, for the rest of the time, Let's not work, whatever that looks like for you. Let's not think about it. I actually have my husband call me out on it. Sometimes in fact, he did this over Thanksgiving break. I love my job, and I talk about my job all the time, and that is great. And, it also means that I'm thinking about work all the time, and I need to take a break, too. So, I told him, we had a little vacation and I said, if I start talking about work too much, call me out on it. And he did. I stopped. And, I really just kind of let it go for a while. And, I think that we need to do this. Maybe some of you typically do this over your winter break, but for some of us, this might be new. So, I want you to think about how can you set yourself up to really take a break again?
It doesn't have to be this totally restful meditative in the woods alone kind of thing. Okay. Here. Here's what it is. And I love, in fact, I'm going to just share with you exactly how Angela Watson talks about this. This is an opportunity to be fully present. And what are, if you have plans during the last week of December, without allowing the weight of work responsibilities to pull you up. Let me say that again. 'Cause that's huge. This is your opportunity to be fully present in whatever it is that you have planned during the last week of December, without allowing the weight of work responsibilities to pull you away. You don't have to do anything. You don't have to have an agenda or list or the to-do list, a running thing going on.
It's really ... If you want to spend some time setting yourself up for this, think about the things that you would love to do. What would make you so happy? What are non-work-related things that are gonna fill you up so that you can enter into 2022 feeling excited and rested and ready to go? Maybe it's movies that you want to watch, or you want to take this, this hike or a restaurant that you want to go to, or friends that you want to reconnect with, or a book that you've been dying to read that. Now you finally have time like play around with setting yourself up to really walk away from work for a while.
Speaking taking time off I'm going to walk away from work myself, I'm going to practice what I preach here. And so, we're going to take a couple of weeks off from the podcast. I just want you to be aware. We will be back with our episode 16 on January 3rd, 2022, which I just can't believe I even said that. I'm sitting here just in awe of, of thinking about 2022. So, just know that I'm still here. I'm not going anywhere. I just really want to practice what I preach. I'm going to take a little bit of time off as well. So, I will see you back here on January 3rd to get us set up for 2022.
As always, a huge thank you to Brooke for making this happen. Thank you to Solution Tree and Marzano Resources for this job I get to do. Another year under my belt, which is just crazy. And, for you, my bad-ass self care squad, please give yourself the gift of time of presence and know how grateful I am for each and every one of you we'll see you in 2022.
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