Making manure from an 'oh shit' situation

I was all set. The agenda had been agreed. I had 3 separate sessions all meticulously planned out for the day. The risk assessment had been signed off. I was ready to Do The Thing.

This week, I was at a school for two days as part of their activities week on behalf of a charity which is geared towards preventing young suicide. The objectives of the day were to promote emotional wellbeing, encourage creativity and empower students to regulate their own nervous system. My plan was to do all of this experientially, through getting the students to move around, understand their different states, reframe emotions as signposts to their needs. Scarves, mood cards, laminated photographs were all at hand to be used.

It was only when I entered the room that it became clear that students had been told that this day was a ‘yoga retreat day’. And that most of the students hadn’t necessarily opted in to be there… they just weren’t able to be on the arguably more exciting residential or off campus trips.

We had planned some yoga with a yoga teacher coming in for an hour, but to call this a yoga retreat day? Somehow, somewhere, things had gone awry and I was left with 26 ranging from expectant to disengaged 13 year olds.

What do you do in that situation? What the F do you do?

This is key Frustration Triangle territory.

It would be tempting to fall in to blame - who could be held accountable for this ‘oh shit’ situation? But I could recognise that temptation, and also its futility. I was in the trenches and needed solutions, not scapegoats.

The second option when we’re frustrated is self shame. This is a more tempting place for me and I have to say, was ably supported by one of the teachers who throughout the day would drop truth bombs like ‘They’re just exhausted and want to have fun, all their friends are out having fun and they’re having to learn about their nervous system’. She even at one point went off and printed off colouring in sheets, handing them over to me and suggested ‘Maybe they could just do these instead.’

As I watched any pride I had for the collection of credentials I have tirelessly collated over the years seep away like the energy of 26 13 year olds in the last week of term, I tried to cling onto my dignity as we finished the exercise. Over lunch the teacher asked:

‘What are they doing after lunch?’

‘A creative writing workshop on hope’

‘Oh, they’re not going to be up for that, can you come up with something else?’

And so, the final role on the Frustration Triangle, the ‘Up Your Gamer’ was engaged. I ditched the hope workshop and created a session which passed by in a blur of ball throwing and sweets given out for any students who managed to interact.

‘I’m sorry if I’ve upset you’ the teacher offered up at some point in the day ‘I’m not upset, I’m just frustrated. If I knew the students were expecting a yoga retreat day, I would have framed my day around that.’

And yet, by the end of the day the students fed back about what they had got out of the day:

‘I can notice which state I am in and how to deal with it’

‘I can trust myself’

‘It’s better to speak up than stay silent - to the right people’

‘Expressing feelings in different ways’

‘Lots of ways to get back into a different state’

‘Learned ways to self soothe’

‘It’s normal to feel stressed at some points’

‘It’s ok to protect ourselves’

‘It’s ok to cry’

‘Just listen and not give advice. Your presence is enough’

By the end of the day the self doubter was loud - ‘They are just paying lip service’ it crowed.

It could have been one of those things to chalk up to experience. Except, except.

This was Tuesday and I knew I had to go back in and do it all again on Friday. Yes, please groan along with me. The woman from the charity, who had accompanied me, was not able to come along on Friday. Double groan.

I knew one thing for sure. It was not going to be a repeat performance.

The great thing about living by the Frustration Triangle is that the recognition of the positions means that even if I slip into one of the roles, I don’t stay there for long.

I reached out to a teacher friend who helped me put the day into context aka end of term, end of year, end of enthusiasm for students and teachers alike.

As someone who has practiced yoga for the last 20 years, I had a sudden realisation which eluded me during the day when I was most definitely in more of a fight or flight state, than social and steady.

There are 8 limbs of yoga. Asana - or the poses - is just one of them. As I looked over what we were providing in the day, we were cumulatively touching on 6 of the 8 limbs.

Namaste!

I reworked things for Friday. Reframed what I was doing, added in some role play to help them think about the impact of being distracted, brought in a mindful eating meditation with some marshmallows (clearly the highlight of the day for all!), used my training from addiction psychology to introduce different mindfulness techniques and dealing with triggers and finished with a good dose of glimmer hunting.

We cannot control what stories will be told about us - even when we try to mitigate for every eventuality. When we find ourselves in this position, we have a choice. Hop on the frustration triangle or ground ourselves, believe in ourselves and become curious in how we can use our experience and wisdom to be flexible and remain of service.

There is a saying in recovery: ‘Principles before personalities’. The principle was to ensure the children could engage with the material. It could be argued that based on the students’ feedback I could have stayed with the content from Tuesday. It clearly landed for some. But I needed to be authentic in my delivery and in order to do that I needed to frame the day in a way that helped me to stay present, by offering them something that was congruous with what they were expecting.

Honestly, I don’t know how I get myself in these situations sometimes. As my husband and I often say to each other: ‘the scrapes we get into!’

But I know that about 50 kids got the chance to bypass the shorthand of ‘that’s bad for my mental health’ and at least be invited into curiosity about their own human experience, just for a day.

And that’s good enough for me.

Sat Nam 🙏🏻

Jacky x 🧘🏻‍♀️