Looking Up & Going Back

There are two signs on the wall of my classroom.

Well, to be fair, there are more than two signs in my classroom, but two in particular have caught my attention in the past week. One says, "You are enough" while the other reads, "Be your best self."

I've thought about these two expressions in the past week because I believe both of them fully. I believe my students should strive to be their best. I believe they have an innate sense of what it feels like to be their best...not to achieve their best, but the be the version of themselves of which they are most proud, most satisfied, most secure. There are some days when we just feel good about who we are and how we have navigated the day. Other days pass and we feel like we've been passive participants who merely went through the motions. This is a philosophy: a principle used to guide one's practices. We aspire to be our best selves because we believe it's important.

When it comes to believing we are enough, however, it doesn't mean we're resolving to embrace the status quo and never aspire. Instead, we're adopting a mindset: an attitude with intention. If we adopt an attitude of realizing that we don't have to be anything other than what we are, we give ourselves permission to be our best selves, not as the people we wish we could be, but as the people we are. Right here. Right now. Today.

But can we simultaneously strive to be our best while also acknowledging that we already are enough? Yes. Because one has to do with our actions, while the other has to do with our identities.

There's a saying in Japanese that epitomizes the nature of wanting to be our best.

Ue ni wa ue ga aru.

It translates literally as, "Above up, there is something even higher above up."

It connects to the unattainable pursuit of being our best selves, but also recognizing that we will always see opportunities to improve.  We, humans, are ambitious.

The growth mindset of "I can get better" comes to mind here. We can be our best selves today by simply being ourselves, by caring for ourselves.

Another word, though, comes from the Ghanaian Twi language.

It's just as beautiful.

Sankofa literally means "go back and get it" and is often associated with the proverb, "Se wo were fi na wosankofa a yenkyi," which translates as "It is not wrong to go back for that which you have forgotten."

Ue ni wa ue ga aru reminds us that there is always something higher, something worth reaching for, something to become...but sankofa tells of a truth buried in our pasts...it tells us that what we have done, what we have learned, is sometimes sufficient to show us where we're going. We have histories, experiences, and wisdom, and it is from our pasts that our philosophies and beliefs are formed, and from where our identities take shape.

In our futures, and our presents, though...that is the world of our mindsets, our attitudes and our intentions in each day. We must strive and struggle forward while staying tethered to that which we know is true about ourselves and the things for which we stand, the reasons we exist.

How do we do both? How do I send the message to my 8th graders as I share their trimester grades--and write paragraphs of commentary on how much I enjoy teaching them, how much potential they each have, and how they might endeavor to become the best versions of themselves--that they are enough?

I can't stand grading my students...attaching letters to their growth and progress. But I love telling them why I enjoy having them in my classroom, and the ways they inspire me.

So, how then do I remind them of sankofa, and the importance of reflecting back on the fall, on 7th grade, on their entire experience as a student, as a thinker, as a learner, as an explorer, to better understand who they are today?

How do I also remind them of Ue ni wa ue ga aru and the value of adopting a growth mindset that clamors for the clouds and pursues the impossibility of learning everything, seeking anything, and deciphering meaning in their own lives, always looking up, and out, and onwards?


I think I'll start by making two new signs for my classroom wall.

sankofa

&

Ue ni wa ue ga aru

and I'll give their curiosity the gift of that mere simplicity.