A new year's resolution

It was with a start of recognition when I saw my friend's blog entry, written in sadness a few months back. A fellow teacher, she bemoan that all she has done for the past few years is really to work. Work, work, work, because everything has been so emotionally draining---and this is precisely why I wanted to fly free...I couldn't stop myself from obsessing about every logical fallacy my students wrote, I tried my best to help them think, but at such a high price. S. told me disgruntledly many years back she started out that way too, then realise mid-way that students don't really care as much as we do, and the toil that it would exact would be too high. Now, S is a great teacher--she taught me so much!---and by all standards, she is responsible, but I see that she is right...sometimes we have to spend more time for ourselves.

I became so tired, I barely had time for my family. I was so emotionally drained all the time, i felt vulnerable, I had to retreat back into my shell, into the quietness of my room and self. Meeting people, anyone, made me fear the dissipation of my tired and vulnerable work-exhausted self. Oh I wanted to hang out with my family and friends too, but i was just too tired and drained everyday--and i pushed that off. I thought my escape route lay in going off to study, but now, I guess, I have come to realise, it was that I had been too much of a perfectionist, because really, a little fuzzy thinking will not have killed my students. The price of ruthlessly eradicating every logical error, explaining at length in each of their essays has also meant a heavy price i paid. It's odd, but it took the strange and difficult problems of the past few months to realise that I am good at problem-solving---I made the difficult decision to move so many times---because I know what should be done and can muster up truckloads of willpower to do so---but I have neglected to even rest and play. It took being sick so often here that made me see that the price of trying to problem-solve efficiently, with lack of care for my tired self has been tremendously high.

I resolve to take work less seriously from now on. It sounds disgusting and horrible---I don't mean I'll swing to the extreme of not caring, but having these few weeks of time to think---enforced by my long bout of flu which has rendered me tired and too tired to quickly get my essays and assignments out of the way as I am too exhausted----has made me realise this isn't what I want. i don't want to be constantly achieving things---either marking obsessively as a teacher, or even doing a string of things.

It's true that at your deathbed you kind of think through what you want in life. I was and am ,by no means on my deathbed---good grief---but I have come to wish, I learnt to play harder. Oh I looked playful, I seemed to always be up to some mad joke, but I really played and enjoyed myself very little not just over the past few months but the past few years.

For me, then, it's to rework the balance...and for 2008, i hope to say I have achieved better balance, I have learnt to smell the flowers and relax more. 2007 has taught me much, that perhaps as I strived so hard at work and then to get into a different track, I have run my life on the basis of efficiency, and found that it doesn't matter that much to me, after all. I hope, trust and pray it isn't too late.