Respect for the Broken Bits

In our house we don't throw away much of anything, especially if we think it would make an okay plant container or an addition to a future mosaic tabletop. This got me to thinking. . .

I had a little conversation before yoga with a teacher friend. We were talking briefly about kids and bad behavior and entitlement and the such. While I deal with this stuff every single day, it always leaves me a little bit rattled--sometimes just mad.

So yoga started and I could not turn my brain off to the topic--faces and names and situations went through my mind. It always hurts my heart. I know behind every kid is a story, and most of them are not the fairytale type.

I am amazed, but no longer surprised, when I hear about the broken heart a child carries. I witness this so often--it usually takes the form of a mouthy girl or a withdrawn boy, or a blatent bully. It doesn't matter who the kids are, it's always there.

And it's there in the lives of parents. And also in the lives of teachers.

I wish school was a place where we could honor and respect the broken bits in all of us. And I wish that we could accept the fact that teachers do not have the magic super glue to reassemble all the broken bits--at best we gently move around the broken pieces into a mosaic.

I want to learn how to honor the brokeness in myself and others.