It's STAAR testing month in Texas:
About 70% of students “pass.”
For 3rd grade, passing starts at just:
35% in reading
41% in math
That means nearly 30% of students score below even one-third correct and still often move on.
Then everyone acts shocked when students are years behind and graduate unable to read.
During my first year of teaching, there was a veteran teacher near my classroom with nearly thirty years of experience. She was methodical, well prepared, deeply professional, and ran a calm, well-managed classroom.
One day, I watched our assistant principal—someone who hadn’t taught in a classroom for over a decade—reprimand her for the way she managed her students.
I was stunned.
Sadly, this wasn’t an isolated moment. It reflects a pattern that shows up far too often in education: veteran teachers being treated like children by people who haven’t run a classroom in years.
Getting treated for ADHD is the cruelest prank in medical history.
Doctor: "You have a severe disability that makes administrative tasks, memory, and consistency nearly impossible."
Also Doctor: "To get help, simply fill out this 12-page packet, mail it back, call insurance, and remember to physically drive to the pharmacy every 28 days."
Me: "So I guess I'll just die then."
Of course you received a negative eval. You called it Think/Pair/Share when we specifically told you during our welcome-back PD that you must now refer to it as Turn and Talk. I mean, do teachers even know what teaching is?
I used to love my wife because she earned it.
When she was kind, I was kind.
When she respected me, I respected her.
When she didn't—I didn't.
Marriage was a transaction.
A balance sheet.
I gave what I got.
Nothing more.
Then one Sunday our pastor said something I couldn't shake.
"The way you treat your wife is the way you treat the Lord."
I thought he was being poetic.
He wasn't.
That night I looked at my wife.
Really looked.
She was exhausted.
The kids had been brutal.
The house was chaos.
And I was keeping score.
Waiting for her to earn my kindness.
That's when it hit me:
I wasn't loving a woman.
I was worshiping myself.
Every act of service I withheld was worship I stole from God.
Every cold shoulder was an altar to my ego.
Every "she started it" was a prayer to my own righteousness.
Marriage isn't a contract between two people.
It's an offering to the One who made them.
I started loving her differently.
Not because she deserved it.
Because He does.
I served her when she didn't thank me.
I pursued her when she pulled away.
I led when I didn't feel like leading.
Not for applause.
For an audience of One.
She noticed.
Not right away.
But one night she said:
"You're different. What happened?"
I told her the truth.
"I stopped loving you to get something back."
"I started loving you to give something up."
She didn't understand at first.
Now she does.
When you love your spouse as an act of worship
Everything shifts.
The scoreboard disappears.
The transaction ends.
And marriage becomes what it was always supposed to be.
A daily death to self.
A living sacrifice.
An act of worship disguised as a Wednesday night doing dishes.
Your spouse isn't your enemy.
They're your offering.
Treat them like one.
Welcome, Roadrunners! This fall, the UTSA Honors College is welcoming 10 new Top Scholars, 22 new Terry Scholars and 13 new Texas Leadership Scholars, each ready to make a bold impact in Texas and beyond.
Learn about the college's newest cohort of distinguished scholars: https://t.co/zmRHJiozF5
@UTSAHC
What’s it like to call an MIT residence hall home—as Heads of House? At McCormick Hall, it’s joy, fun, and life shared with hundreds of students. Read more: https://t.co/yOxVDLi588 #MIT
I don't know who needs to see this but not talking about your special interests because people don't want to hear about them is a form of masking... and internalized autism... and can cause extreme (autistic) distinct anxiety.
Everyone needs to read this...
The Empty Boat Mindset:
A monk goes out on a boat in a small lake to meditate. After a few hours of uninterrupted silence, he suddenly feels the jarring impact of another boat bumping into his.
While he does not open his eyes, he feels the irritation and anger building within him.
“Why would someone do that? Can’t they see me here? How dare they disturb my meditation?”
He opens his eyes, ready to shout at the person in the other boat, only to realize that it is empty. It had come untied from the dock and was floating in the middle of the lake.
In that moment, his anger and frustration disappears. After all, you cannot be angry at an empty boat.
The story offers a powerful lesson, which I call the Empty Boat Mindset:
In life, you’re going to experience countless collisions. With people. With environments. With chance circumstances outside your control. Each of these collisions will threaten to derail you. To stoke the fire of anger, stress, and frustration. To knock you off your path.
The truth is that the negative emotions that grow inside you are rarely from the collision itself, but from your perception of the negative intent behind the collision.
If you convince yourself that every collision is a deliberate action by a bad actor, negative emotions will control your entire life. In others words, your interpretation of the collision creates your own poison.
The Empty Boat Mindset is the reminder that most of these collisions you experience in life are with an empty boat. There is no negative intent. There is no desire to harm. They are simply the random collisions of objects floating along on the lake of life.
Interestingly, when you embrace the Empty Boat Mindset, you reassume control over your own boat. You’re no longer prone to the spiraling emotional effects of chance collisions. You are a seasoned explorer, ready to adapt to whatever the seas throw your way.
So, the next time you feel a collision and find your negative emotions growing, pause and ask yourself a simple question:
Am I just getting angry at an empty boat?