All in Strengths
Spirit of Ruth
Today, I received an award that is deeply personal to me: the Spirit of Ruth award from Sigma Alpha. As I reflected on her life and my story, I realized that there were some fundamental virtues Ruth must have cultivated in her “first act” to allow her to be the woman of worth, she is recognized for in her second act. Identifying these core virtues as faith, hope and love, I share their importance for a young person’s first act.
Marking the Milestone: A letter to the Senior Class of 2020
Of all the schools I’ve worked with, the SpartANS spirit has shaped me the most. The idea of duty, sacrifice and honor of the warriors of Sparta resonated strongly with me in Fall 2016. Those themes of responsibility and connectedness kept me showing up for you in that first year. Witnessing your joy, enthusiasm for learning, commitment to growing - trust of my wisdom - brought me back to life. During the following years, I rediscovered me, tapping deeper into my calling and abilities. Thank you for showing up every day. Thank you for trusting my guidance. Thank you for doing the little things I asked of you; I hope you will recognize them as big things, someday.
Dan's Advice for living in unprecedented times
For me, I sensed that God wants me to think about this related to how I work and how I interact with my students. They don’t need me to recede into myself. They don’t need me to disappear. They don’t need me to come up with a thousand new ways of doing things. They also don’t need me to KNOW ALL THE THINGS - which sometimes I think they do, and that is my greatest source of insecurity as an advisor or teacher when I feel like I’m letting them down because I’m not ‘all the things’ for them…. However, they do need ME.
The real Lenten fast
The point of Lenten fasts is to move us beyond ourselves. While “none of us expected to give up this much for Lent,” if we only focus on what we’ve given up - we have missed the point. If I only focus on doing better for me, then I have missed God in this lesson.
Finding My Voice
As I have been learning to embrace my strengths (talent themes) as gifts instilled by my loving Father, this division I have felt for most of the past 25 years slowly is dissipating. My true self doesn’t lie entirely in “loud Jessica” nor is it solely in a deep pondering soul Jessica. I am both.