What I Couldn’t Do Until I Started Working with Children
During the beginning of my adult years, I couldn’t exist in the moment. I couldn’t sit still to work, and I couldn’t sit still to rest. For many years I thought I was the problem. I thought I just wasn’t enough. Why could everyone else do office work, but I couldn’t see a presentation through to proper completion? I would work myself to burnout at tasks that I couldn’t stay engaged with, then I would receive feedback that my efforts were wanting. It was entirely demoralizing. The more that happened to me, the more and more I struggled. It was a losing battle. I stopped being present and began existing in a detached haze. But then something magical happened: I started work in early learning and suddenly I started mastering all the skills I wish I’d had sooner.
Prioritization
Though some folks can learn the art of prioritization in office settings, working with children is what taught me how to do that. Children’s basic needs must be met by those in charge of caring for them. It became my job to determine which kind of need and which child’s needs had to be met first, so I learned quick to judge levels of urgency and act accordingly. A spreadsheet riddled with errors can’t signal to you it needs to be addressed before you move on to another task, but an upset kiddo is harder to miss.
Creating Structure
Meeting the needs of children requires structuring their day. As one of the folks in charge, I am forced to create and maintain that structure—and doing that helps me too. To stay on target with their natural rhythms, free play is at a certain time, and then calm play helps them bring down their energy, and then lunch must be served on time so they don’t get hangry, and then we make sure they nap or at least rest to restore their energy levels for the latter half of the day, and so on and so forth. As I assist in helping the children transition from activity to activity, I become more adept at judging the length and effort required for different endeavors and adjust my expectations accordingly. The structure I provide for them is the same structure that teaches me what is reasonable to do in a particular time frame and what is not, no matter what the task in question is.
Living in the Moment
Children always require full attention, as opposed to office work… which you can neglect for a little bit until your procrastination comes to bite you in the ass. I must be fully engaged with the children I care for because they can sense when the one they’re with isn’t really there, and things will quickly go awry (sad and closed-off kiddo, crying, tantrums, spinning out of control, etc.). When I’m with a child, my mind is on them, my eyes are on them, my words are directed at them, and I am listening to them. Before I disengage with a child, I always try to remember to tell them I was happy to listen to them, or work with them, or play with them and that I have to go check on someone else now. I am fully there in that moment with the child, and as someone with racing thoughts and wandering mind tendencies, that is a feat and a half—and something I couldn’t do in an office no matter how often I took meditation breaks.
It’s amazing that children were the ones to teach me the skills I hadn’t mastered in all my previous experiences. Prioritization, creating structure, and living in the moment were the things I was shaky at for so long. Now that I’ve finally developed mastery of those crucial skills, I’ve had time to delve into my strengths, my weaknesses, and my desires for the future. I feel like a massive weight has been lifted off my shoulders, and the nagging voice that tells me that I’m the problem and that I’m not enough has gotten a little quieter. I can do so much more now that I could ever do before! I look forward to taking all my children have taught me to my next endeavor, whatever that may be.