I’m always preaching ACCOUNTABILITY to young people and adults alike. How people would be so much more authentic if they could just take responsibility for their actions. Yet, there’s a fine line between accountability and self-punishment. Honestly, if someone woke me up to go over and over and over again the details of a mistake I made, I’d never want to hang with them again. Here I am though…stuck with me, with this mind. So, what do I do?
The answer is: I don’t know. If I break down my transgression (two nights ago is was inviting friends to a simply awful and overpriced restaurant – plans I had made a month in advance, without doing enough research about the restaurant). It ruined my night and I grew more and more angry about spending my hard-earned money on that crap! This event – this ‘mistake’ woke me up and had me feeling guilty, ashamed, and regretful. In the wee hours of the morning, I simply couldn’t talk myself off the proverbial ledge.
When I get like this I tell myself – in 24 hours you won’t feel this bad. This is temporary. Nobody died! I didn’t hurt anyone’s feelings (just their wallets). It’s so very small in the grand scheme of things. The nagging feeling, that voice, eventually stops its chatter and I can fall asleep again. Sometimes I repeat a mantra: “I love you…I love you no matter what…I love you…” This helps too. But so far, even though I meditate and teach about it (along with self-love) I still can’t always control my monkey mind…especially at 3 am. As they say, ‘we teach what we most need to learn!’
FOUNDER OF !MPERATIVE EDUCATION
After attending UBC and earning her degrees, Jodi taught full-time for over ten years in the public school system creating student-centered curricula to guide her students towards a more knowledgeable and loving view of themselves and others. Jodi introduced topics of bullying, discrimination, mindfulness and positive relationship habits into her classes and celebrated students’ achievements as if they were her own.
