LLN: Inspiration for Teachers - Who You Real Competition Is

Teachers, ever feel like you’re stuck in a race you didn’t sign up for?

In this episode, Grace explains why the only competition that truly matters is the one with yourself. Get ready to let go of the comparison trap and embrace a mindset that celebrates growth, collaboration, and grace—both for yourself and your students.

🎙️ Lunchbox Love Note Bonus Mini-Episode: Just like those little love notes slipped into your lunchbox, this episode is here to brighten your day with a virtual smile and a hug. 

I hope you enjoy this jolt of inspiration and empowerment for teachers! 

And if you appreciate my content, I humbly invite you to "pay it forward" and share this episode with a colleague. Everyone wins 💛

➡️ To get your FREE 🎁 PDF Guide The Professional Teacher's Guide to Saying "No" visit: www.gracestevens.com/sayno

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Transcript

  Okay, welcome back. If you hear that sound, you know that this is a mini episode. My lunchbox love note, which are little moments of inspiration that I trust you will find their way to you.  Just when you need to hear them. Just like that little love note that got stuck into your lunchbox when you were a kid.

Hopefully, maybe as an adult. That, just that little note. A reminder that somebody sees you and values you and wants your day to be a little better. Better. That's what I'm sending to you. A virtual smile, a virtual hug. And here it is. This one,  hmm, we're going to start with an observation. And that observation is, you might not want me as your pickleball partner.

Now, Am I the most competitive person out there? Absolutely not. As someone told me this morning, Oh my gosh, you want everyone to win. And I can't understand why the person said it in that tone. Of course, I want everyone to win.  We play lots of games. We usually play, there's four of us. We do a rotation. We play six games so that everybody plays two games with the same partner.

Like, you know what, well, you know, when I start to relax is when in the first two games.  Each side one, right? So now, okay, now we can all relax and just have fun. Cause everybody won. Okay. They tease me every time I say it, they say, all right, kinder teacher, which I was not a kindergarten teacher, but anyway, that's kind of how I feel.

I want everyone to win and there's nothing. wrong with that. If you're super competitive, yes, you don't want to. You know what? I am the most fun person out there. I will have the most fun. I will notice the most random things and find them amusing. I'll make my partner laugh. I'm pretty competent. I mean, we're not going to go flaming down with a bad score, but we're not going to win every game and I'm okay with that.

All right. So if you're super competitive, yes, do it. Do not play pickleball with me as my partner. However, you might want to buddy along with me on this podcast, because here's what I want to say today. It is a meme I have seen time and time again. It gets me in the feels every time. And the meme says,  you can't compete with me. 

I want you all to win.  Right? You can't compete with me. I want you to win too. Right? I recognize that my only competition is myself. Every day I want to grow, I want to learn, I want to be the best version of myself. I compare myself to myself. I don't get caught up in that comparison trap of comparing myself to other people.

Right? You don't know what their struggles are, you don't know what their journey has been, been oh my gosh on social media please people please it's like a highlights reel of people's lives it is not real life okay don't come don't want to compare myself to that  or the messaging in the media that tells us you know we're not enough we don't have enough be afraid buy stuff it's it's it's not great okay.

I want to be the best version of myself. I want to foster a win win. I want to set myself up to look at did I do a better job today than I did yesterday. What does that mean? Maybe that means, hey, maybe you have a goal. I want to go the whole week without losing my cool with my class, okay? I live in the real world.

I thought I was the first teacher who was never going to raise their voice.  Right, I also thought I was gonna be the first parent who never raised their voice. Let me tell you, how did that work out for me?  Not so great. Okay, so maybe you go, I'm not gonna yell at my class all week this week. Maybe you don't make it all week.

Again I live in the real world I know where we're at okay so maybe make the goal a day hey or maybe if a day is too long you know what I'm not gonna start getting irritated until a third period right you know what I'm saying just be better today than you were yesterday and if you're not give yourself some grace okay.

You don't need to compete with anybody else, just try and be the best version of yourself. So that's number one, sending you that big hug. But then the other hug is, how can we just, just think about this for a minute. Is there a way we can incorporate this into our classroom? Because you know, I understand the way we are set up is competition, not collaboration.

We want collaborations in our classroom. Is there competition? Absolutely, yes. If you're at the top end.  That's where the competition is. Not everybody is going to be valedictorian, salutatorian, class president, class captain,  all the things. That's not going to be everyone.  Those kids are going to be competitive.

But we still need to have a culture in our classroom that is collaborative, right? We need to help, you know, we often see students competing with each other, right? But we While a little competition is good, too much leads to anxiety, low self esteem, fear of failure. What about those kids who are behind?

What about those kids on no matter how well they do on that benchmark test, they are still far below basic. Maybe they moved up 10 points, but they were below basic or far below basic when they took the test last year, last month, last trimester. Now they're taking it again. And  You already know they're still going to be below basic, but maybe they're 10 points closer to being near  the benchmark.

Okay. We need to focus on that. Certainly those students, their competition is themselves.  If they're not in the top echelons of all the people competing to have the highest GPA in the class,  encourage everybody to look at being better than how they did last time, right? Help students understand that success isn't just about being better than someone else.

It's about personal growth. Learning, helping others along the way, how can we create a classroom environment that kind of fosters that, where every student feels valued and supportive, even though every student has different talents, as we know, right, you want to build a classroom culture that celebrates collaboration, right.

And I really think that that is something that starts with you. It's your vibe. It's your vibe that they all feed off. You know what I'm going to say? Your energy teaches more than your lesson plans. All right. So that's it. That's what I want to send out to the universe to you today. Get out of the comparison game and get into the, I want to be the best version of myself.

I'm running my own race game. Okay? And extend yourself some grace. You don't need to compete with others. Your only competition is yourself. You want to be the best version of yourself. Better this year than you were last year. Better this week than you were last week. And if for some reason you're not, then extend yourself some grace and think about how you can encourage this kind of low, Competition, high collaboration vibe inside your classroom.

I mean, this is just. Helping kids be successful in real life. That's what's going to be valued a lot, right? It's going to be valued a lot when they get into the real world  that they need to work together with other people, right? Okay, I believe in you. I know that you are doing the best you can. I want you to know I see you.

You matter. You are doing enough. You have enough, right? You are enough. And you're only competition. is yourself. Until next time, create your own path and bring your own sunshine.