Chopping Wood and Carrying Water

BY ANDREW DAVIS, HEAD OF SCHOOL

I am normally a great sleeper – out cold in less than a minute with few, if any, wakeups in the night. On a rare occasion, though, I will find myself awake for an hour or two in the earliest morning hours (#ThisIs48?). Late last week I happened to have one of those nights. My return-to-sleep strategy is to listen to an interesting podcast that isn't too engaging. Last night's podcast was too interesting, and instead of putting me back to sleep, it got me thinking about this blog post and a human intelligence skill we must continue to develop in our students: doing the work of work.

There is a lot of talk about “finding your passion.” And as someone who has found my passion – educating children – I know how motivating it is to come to work feeling a tremendous alignment between my vocation and my avocation. And, I fear, that the focus on “finding your passion” might send the message that we should only work when we are passionate. At around 3:35 in the morning, I listened to Andrew Huberman say, “You find your passion by getting good at effort in things that you're not passionate about... You can't just sit around waiting to be passionate.” Rather than fall asleep, I perked up and nodded (rather than nod off). 

While we may want our students to be passionate about what they do, we need to teach our students that: 

1. You don’t just start passionate. You work hard at lots of different things and, in time, you develop passions. This summer, Robin shared a parent-influencer post saying that you shouldn’t have your children practice an instrument just because they are passionate about it. You have them practice so they develop competence, and once competent, they might find a passion. You have to work without passion to find passion.

2. All work – including passion work – involves work. About teaching, I used to say that I would teach for free, and I got paid to grade and write report card comments. I appreciated Huberman’s take on this in the early dawn hours: "If I just really don't want to do something... I say, all right, it's chop wood, carry water. I'm doing it just to do it... You finish, and you feel pretty good about the effort." Everything I do, including things I am passionate about, requires chopping wood and carrying water. Not only do I have to do it, I also have to do it well.

This year, we are focused on the MTS value “Celebrate the Journey.” As I told the students at our opening Gather, there will be many positive moments of celebration – the 4th and 5th grade musical, a basketball win, or a “publishing party” in humanities. Challenge, though, is where much (all?) of the learning truly happens. And we need to celebrate the moments of challenge. 

Please join me in celebrating the journey of chopping wood and carrying water. And talking less about “passion.” And if you have any suggestions for interesting but not too interesting podcasts, I clearly need a new one. 

TGIAM is the blog of Andrew Davis, Head of School. TGIAM = Thank  Goodness It's Almost Monday.