You Make It Look Easy - Connection for Mythbusting and Self-Care

Is this you? 

Is this your mentor?

Is this someone you know?

One year, I remember driving to an all-administrators meeting for middle school principals. It was nearing May of my first year in a new district. No one was in a patient mood on campus. Not the students, not the teachers, not the campus aides, and not me. Seeking just a few minutes to churn through the tasks large and small on my planner task list, it was always an unending stream of “Do you have 2 min?”, “Ms. Simpson is sending a student down to work in the office,” or something coming in over the walkie-talkie suggesting imminent trouble and breaking the flow of concentration. Site plans were due with approval, budgets with amendments were coming through and positions were open with everyone across the district clamoring to contact applicants from the district-wide teaching pool. 

We were fortunate to have our administrative professional development time planned by a highly skilled team of leadership coaches. That was the best gift of that year - to know that I came to a place where I would get rich content that was directly and immediately useful to me as a principal. Things that I could copy into my own format and words, but that would help me support, communicate and justify changes we were undertaking. And I was in a room with colleagues who understood my day-to-day.

This particular May, as a culminating reflective activity, we were asked to make a collage from magazines to depict our year. Supplies were ample and nearly everything, images, and words could be found to capture your year. I don’t recall at all what I created, but I still have the picture on my phone of the collage that showed me that I was not the only one flailing out at sea, that the tsunami of intensity pointed at me on a daily basis as a principal was not unique to me. 

It’s been over a decade and I remember that moment, mostly because I was the newest principal in the room. I had a lot of administrative experience at that point but was finishing up my first year as Principal and felt that everyone else was surely having a much easier time of it than I was. Had it not been for the collage activity, I would have been certain that I was the only one barely hanging on by a thread. But that collage generated A LOT of conversation in the room. I saw the message reverberate through respected leaders who were equity-centered and seemingly unified with their faculty, I realized that there is always more to know and be understood. What looked easy, was the result of 8 arduous years of team building at that elementary school. What looked easy was countless weekends spent pouring over feedback to teachers in a rigorous instructional coaching cycle building a foundation of literacy school-wide. What looked easy was 12-hour days working through messages back to staff and families, until the principal learned how to share the load with his staff. 

The 2022-2023 school year has already ended for you or, if not, it is coming to an end soon. It’s important to bust the myth that there is a thing as easy. Recognize that there is wisdom and there is strategy, but those who are successful and you wish to emulate in their actions and presence have worked hard. It’s never easy, but it can be shared and replicated. 

Go hear the stories of the people who make it look easy. 

Seek those people out and invite them to join you for lunch over the coming weeks as you close up your site. Be open. Tell them why you sought them out and what you see. Then listen. You WILL learn from that conversation. Stay in touch and foster relationships with them now so that they will be there in the fall as you dive back into the school flow. Seeking people out to provide connection and reliability to your situation is a buffer against burnout for you and an act of self-care for you as a leader. 

You’ll gain invaluable tips to make your life as a leader flows with greater ease and likely also learn of the relatable mess behind the scenes for them and how they have managed to put up boundaries and contain the unrelenting demands coming their way.

Either way, you’ll have some more good stories for your collage.