It was a very calm start to the school year where I teach. In September, both my principal and I were heard saying multiple times, “ I can’t believe how calm and quiet this building is.” That calmness continued throughout the fall. Teachers were able to manage their classrooms. Students ran around and played during recess and P.E., yet seemed to be on task during instructional time. Sure, some issues needed to be dealt with, but they were few and far between. We even had some members of the community comment on the atmosphere in the school. When they were touring the school for the Christmas Door Decorating Contest, they noted the sense of calmness that pervaded.

But then, things began to change.

Toward the start of winter, the energy started to amp up in the school. Our Kindergarteners came out of their shells, and some new students arriving brought a whole lot of energy (along with a whole lot of chaos) into the building. Then hockey season started. Our students, grades 2-6, were suddenly having later nights and were coming to school tired. They began to have less tolerance for one another, and full-blown arguments were arising over minor disagreements.

This was best seen in a group of girls in grades 5 and 6, who were constantly cycling, prodded on by some petty incident, between being friends one day and scream-at-eachother enemies the next. Fast forward to last week. While sitting in the staff room during lunch hour, suddenly yelling could be heard from down the hall. My principal and I jumped into action to see what the commotion was about. Another argument had broken out between this group of “friends” over an issue surrounding snow forts. After months of this emotional roller coaster, this was the final straw. We spelled out the situation for them. We were not going to be spending an ounce more energy dealing with these petty disagreements. We did not care who set foot in whose snow fort. We were done with having the same conversations day in and day out, and so we had this group of girls sign a contract stating that they would be giving up additional school privileges if they couldn’t figure out these issues on their own.

The next day my principal and I were having a meeting. We talked about just how tired we were with dealing with this group’s issues. Finally, a thought crossed my mind and I smiled. How great is it that this is our biggest problem right now? How great is it that 12-year-olds are behaving like 12-year-olds? How great is it that nothing is pulling us elsewhere in the building so that we actually have the time and energy to devote to this?

Most years (probably every year), the same arguments occur over the same minor issues, and all the attention it gets from staff is a small one-and-done conversation as a class. That rarely solves the problem completely, but unfortunately, it is all the intervention that staff have time for as we are constantly running around putting out fires elsewhere. While this constant squabbling was getting under our skin, I was reminded that in my building, I was still in the middle of an extraordinarily calm school year. Calm didn’t mean that I had fewer issues arising, just that the size and gravity of those issues were smaller. 

When I got home, I started to reflect on how this shift in perspective related to my faith and walk with God.

If you are like me, you often feel that God is always giving you some kind of test or trial. It is only when you are either in the thick of a really intense challenge or when you take a step back and look at things fully that you realize that some of the other things that you have faced in the past were quite small or insignificant in comparison. My most recent challenges seem to be my physical health, as I have had multiple injuries recently either through playing sports, slipping on ice, or worse yet…. from sneezing! I tell you, nothing will make you feel like you are aging quite as fast as hurting yourself because of a sneeze!

From all of this, my big revelation has been that by stepping back and acknowledging the actual size of the problems I am facing, how I look at those problems changes. I find that I can even count my blessings better as well.

In my example from the classroom, I was able to appreciate how great of a school year I was actually having when I stepped back and realized just how low-stakes this “big issue” actually was. My thinking shifted from, “only four more months, then it will finally be summer break,” to, “I am six months into the best school year I’ve ever had!”

The same thing can be said about my recent injuries. For a long time, I felt that God was just waiting for one of my aches and pains to go away so that he could hurl another at me. Stepping back, I see now that I only felt this way because I was in the middle of the challenge. In reality, currently this is one of the only issues I’m facing, and so I made it into a more significant issue than it actually was. It is not that this challenge isn’t real, but instead that all of my physical ailments are, truthfully, rather superficial. My health is not at risk. I am just in mild discomfort. I am not having to take time off work or away from family. I just have to pay a little extra attention to my movements.

I don’t know if we ever stop receiving challenges in our day-to-day life. I think that there will always be something to overcome. We just go through seasons where we can hurdle obstacles with ease, as well as stretches where even those same-sized obstacles cause us to trip up and tire out. Being mindful to take the time to step back and see the full size of the trials you are facing make them a lot easier to clear, and can help you keep a smile on your face as you overcome. Sometimes, all it takes is a little change in perspective.