Have you ever thought that our minds cannot truly grasp size? Strange question, isn’t it? Let’s take a deeper look into size and see if you come to the same conclusion that I have. This will be a post that is going to blow your mind, and you are going to want to share this with your friends.
I think the best way to start is to think of a goldfish swimming in a fishbowl on top of your counter. The fish’s whole world is within glass walls. To this fish, his glass bowl is his world and everything outside it is his universe. The fish can look outside the bowl and see your living room. To him, your lamp might as well be his sun or the north star. When you show up to feed him, you are an alien from another world taking care of him.
Now we are not fish, this is just to show a point to you in the simplest term that I know how. We live on earth and, unlike the fish, we cannot see our whole world. Here is my next example of size. I live in a house, on a piece of property, in a county of a state (Arizona), located in the United States, in North America on the earth. If we break it down like that, we start to get an idea of size.
Let’s take our examples and expand them even farther. Our home planet is located in our universe. Scientists know now that there are multiple universes. However, they have no idea how many universes there are.
A science teacher ask his star pupil, “What is beyond our universe?” The student replies, “Another universe. ” The teacher agrees, but pushes the student farther by asking, “And what is beyond that universe?” The student once again responds, “Another universe. ” The teacher agrees with that statement as well and then ask, “That is what top scientists now know to be true, but what is beyond that universe?” The student thinks of all the studies he has done and simply says, “Nobody knows. ” Even though I have used fictional characters to make a point, this shows how size overcomes us.
With all the technology today, we still have places on this earth that we have yet to discover. Think of the amount of people on this earth, and yet there are places we have yet to be. The earth gives us a small indication of what size means. Telescopes and unmanned spacecraft have shown us the far reaches of space, yet we have no idea how far it goes. We haven’t found where space ends or if it ends. So size is the one thing that humans have yet to overcome.
I know this post is quite different from my normal writing, but I want to give you a picture of just how great out there is. Next time you are looking to the stars, remember this post and feel special about yourself. You were given a chance to live in such a wonderful place that has no boundaries. And as you look at the stars so far away, just think how special you are to be given such a great gift.
One last thing I will bring up, I made this post relatively short on purpose. Do you believe it would have made a difference if I were to make it longer? Maybe I should use the word “bigger” instead of “longer” or would that just emphasize the size of the meaning to this post? Think about it friends and share this with your friends. I am excited to see what kind of responses I draw up with this thought of mine. Do you believe we can overcome size, or do I have you thinking about it? Until next time, take care.
I have demonstrated in a couple of posts before, trying to come up with the best way to show how important our words are. In these before posts, I don’t believe I have gotten my point completely across to the satisfaction of my readers. In this post, I will attempt to explain how important your words are to you and your health differently. As I have been known to teach others in various ways, I refuse to quit until my students have received the full benefit of knowledge I have gained through years of study and a life filled with learning the hard way. I now am committed to pass along as much knowledge as possible before my time here on earth ceases to exist. For everything I teach someone else, I learn double the amount. So I’m not trying to show how smart I am but to not only pass something onto you, but gain knowledge for myself.
A teacher, who cannot learn, should no longer attempt to teach. I must explain here that I have never taught in a school atmosphere other than a time I was a trainer for a truck driving school in Tucson, Arizona. I have however taught multiple people in every career that I have ever been a part of. Furthermore, I know you have heard the old adage “those that can’t, teach”. I personally have always been against this saying! Additionally, I believe a teacher should not teach a subject that they themselves cannot do. The main reason for this is obvious, how can you teach what you don’t know? And yet there are so many that break this rule every day. So it is up to you and me to pass on knowledge as we have learned to those that need to know. So let’s dig in deep and try this lesson one more time. If need be, I will find another way to teach this lesson if this one doesn’t get the rest of you on board that may have missed it the first couple of times we discussed this.
There is a way to say things in a way that will make you feel a certain way, and hard to change that feeling. For example, if you were to say, “I am sad”. You have just painted yourself in a corner of being sad. Now, if you change that a bit and say, “I am experiencing sadness”. You have now given yourself a way out. You can now go from sadness to happy right away if you so choose to. Instead of locking the door on an emotion, leave it cracked a little, just in case you would want to allow another emotion to enter the room. Without allowing yourself some form of change, you will lock yourself into the room with no way out! Of course, this works both ways. Even though most find it is easier to become sad than it is to become happy, we need both of these emotions. For full disclosure, I and people that try to stay with the positive side, have learned it is easier to become happy than it is to become sad. The last sentence was just food for thought!
How would one mourn the death of a family member or close friend without sadness? How would we be able to move on from this loss without mourning? Without the use of all of our feelings, we would become less than human. Furthermore, we must have a way to change emotions as needed depending upon what is needed at the time. So if we lock ourselves into one emotion when another is needed, we won’t be able to change as needed. And how do we lock ourselves in? That’s right, by locking the door on the emotion we are in. Now, what is the fastest way to lock that door? By convincing ourselves to stay in one emotion. And how can we convince ourselves of this? Yes, with our words. When we voice what we feel, we tell ourselves, that’s it. Why and how do words accomplish locking that door? Here is where it gets interesting. Who on this earth do you believe more than you? Nobody right? So you spoke the words, you believe you and you even heard the words by the one you trust the most, you! Boom! There it is, your words are more powerful than anything you possess.
Here is another example that most of us can see very clearly in our day-to-day life. I can’t lose the weight. I have to eat that chocolate cake. My body needs that soda. I can’t do it! Well, you are absolutely right, you have just told yourself what you can and can’t do. You have just received the best intelligence that you can get on this earth. You have not only closed the door, but you pad locked it, took off the door knob and plastered over it!
Why do people look to and get excited by motivational speakers? The answer is because, they convince us to change our minds about something. And what is the #1 thing they ask us to do? They tell us to speak the words, shout the words, write down the words and repeat this saying every day! Why? Because, you have to convince you! The speaker is just giving you the tools to use. The person on the stage cannot convince you if you decide not to believe it. You have to not only believe it, you have to convince your mind, this is the way. The only way for this to work is to speak it. The more you say it, the more you will believe it.
There is always someone out there that ask me, “What about people that can’t speak or those that can’t hear?”I answer the same way all the time, “Is sign language, not, a form of speech?” “Are vibrations through touch not a form of hearing?” We may not hear or speak the same way as others, but as humans, we find a way! I hope this puts an end to questions about people that have a different way of speech for good!
I hope this post has taught you how important your words are. I can’t express how important and how much this lesson weighs heavily on my heart. This is so important to understand. I am constantly fighting myself to follow what I am trying to teach here. This is not a natural thing for us to do, especially in this day and age. You must continue to work with using your words carefully every day. If you want to accomplish anything worthwhile in your life, you must get this process right. If you don’t, you will find yourself falling back into the same thing you have fought so hard to get away from. This can include losing weight, getting out of debt, or even creating a new lifestyle. Trust me when I say, “It is a constant battle, but one that is worth fighting“. I believe in you, now you need to believe in you and change whatever it is to achieve what you will. Until next time, take care and God bless. Remember, we are all in this together.
There is a saying, “Those that can’t do it, teach it”. The shorter version that I have always heard is “Those that can’t, teach”. Either way it is said is just plain dumb in my view. How can you truly teach someone something without being able to do it yourself?
Now I’m going to pick on teachers in the public school system a little bit here. I have had four children that I have watched go through the public school, two of which are still attending. I have found multiple times where teachers are teaching subjects that they themselves don’t understand. I will not tell which years or the names of said teachers. I am not here to condemn anyone. I am simply going to address things that I have witnessed through the years. If you are reading this and are one of these teachers guilty of this practice, I hope you will adjust you teaching methods accordingly.
Teacher’s book is for your reference. The book is not the teacher
First subject I would like to address is math. When a teacher is teaching math and they have to look in the back of the teacher’s manual to be able to give the students the correct answer, you as a teacher need to study before teaching students. I am completely flabbergasted that there are teachers teaching math when they themselves don’t understand how to get the answer. I understand there maybe times that you need to refresh your own memory but, you need to do this before getting in front of your class. You know what you are going to be teaching your students the day before. Spend a little time the night before refreshing your skills. If you do this, your students will gain a greater respect for you and you will be a genius in their eyes.
Next subject I will discuss here will be gardening, agriculture, farming or whatever the school decides to call it. If you are the teacher of this sort of class, you must know how to use the farming type tools before you teach your students. A simple tool like a shovel used incorrectly can cause injury to your students and possibly get you in a world of trouble to boot. Don’t condemn a student that is working on a farm and using a tool correctly in your class because that’s not the way you think. If you don’t know the proper way to use the tool, do some research. Research in this day and age is extremely simple. All that is needed is to go online and look it up. It’s not like it was before the internet, where finding the answer was somewhat more challenging.
There are other things that I have seen through the years that were taught by teachers, where the teacher didn’t know the answer. There is nothing wrong with not knowing. The smartest people in the world don’t know everything. You must learn yourself as well as teaching others. This is not just for school teachers. I’m picking on school teachers just because it is easier for me to show examples. If you are on the job site in a construction zone and teaching the new guy, these examples also hold true. If you find yourself in this situation, you better know what you are doing or have the mental fortitude to tell your boss that maybe you could use some more training yourself. This will keep you and your fellow workers safe and efficient.
So above I have basically talked about all the bad and why this must change. Now let me give credit where credit is due. I have met and observed some very good teachers. These teachers are school teachers as well as trainers on job sites. A trainer on a job site that knows what they are doing, not only is able to teach the new employee how to do a job correctly but also is there later for questions if needed. I have a true respect for these people and they truly deserve it.
School teachers are in position to mold a young mind and help their students have a successful life. The teachers that take this to heart and really want their students to succeed, are put on a pedestal by their students. These teachers will always hold a special place in their students lives. These teachers have my utmost respect and it is well deserved.
Every adult can look back and find one or two special teachers that made an impact on their lives. I had a couple of these teachers that I think of quite frequently. They were and are special to me today. They really cared about their students and felt if their students went on to do well in life, they had done their job. I remember some teachers but not for good reasons. These were those that thought of teaching just as a job and were just looking forward to summer break.
If you think back to both of these kind of teachers, I would be curious if you have the same reflection about them. The one thing that really hits me is, I can remember the caring ones. I remember their names, the way they looked and even sometimes the tone of there voice. I can remember special times of things that happened within the school walls. I can remember how much they wanted me to truly understand what they were teaching me and how their eyes would light up when I finally understood. The other teachers that were there just as a job are hard to remember. If I try real hard, I may be able to remember their names but with great difficulty. I can’t remember what they looked like or how they sounded. I don’t remember any special times. It’s almost like I never really knew them at all.
If you are a teacher or you are training someone at work, please take into consideration which kind of teacher you want to be remembered as. Are you there to help or just there for the job? Do you really want to teach or do you just like the summer vacation every year? I want you to really think about this because, it would be nice to see students remember all their teachers later in life and not just one or two.
Tell me what you think on this subject especially if you are a teacher. I look forward to reading your views. Take care and Remember, we are all in this together.
I have been a teacher, not in the traditional sense, but I have taught in many of my occupations. This is about one of those teaching experiences that maybe went not quite as expected.
First off, let me explain something about haulage trucks and rain. These are two entities that are polar opposites. When the rains come to the mines, one thing is true, all haul truck drivers are in for an adventure. While the rain keeps pouring from the sky, haul trucks drive just fine, but when the rain stops and the dirt on the road becomes more like clay, it is like driving on ice. There is no feeling like sliding down the road in a machine the size of your house with no true control. Just as one tops the hill and is ready to head down the other side, the driver tenses up, especially in the buttocks’ region. There were many times I thought I might actually have to call out mine rescue to remove the seat from my butt. After about six months or so, it becomes more of a game than a total fear of life ending drama.
There are still times, no matter how many years you drive one of these big machines, that you will have that scare put back into you. Here in Arizona, where I drove in the mines, we have a monsoon season every year. Sometimes the monsoons aren’t too bad, other times they are downright fierce. This instance is during one of the bad ones.
I trained a lot of haul truck drivers during my time working in the copper mines. Almost all drivers taught, but I taught more than the average amount. I’m not sure if it was because of my ability to talk to almost anyone and find out what works best for them, or maybe I just had a death wish. Some trainees would get behind the wheel and scare the trainers. I only had this happen to me one time in twenty years teaching to drive these trucks. I may and probably will write about that time in the future. This post however will be about the teacher scaring the student.
Whenever we got some new drivers in the mine, one thing we always told them, was if they made it through the monsoon season, they would be alright as long as they wanted to do this job. Once every couple of years. It seemed like we would get a new batch of students during the monsoons. This was the times the students truly got thrown directly into the fire. Learning to drive a haulage truck in the worst possible circumstance is very difficult, not only for the students, but for the trainers as well.
One day at work I was told that I would be training John, (truth be known, I can’t remember his name. This was many years ago). The rains had been bad for a week or so and the mine roads were a complete mess. John was excited to get started. He told me that he had driven many types of equipment, but never in a mine setting or anything as large as a haul truck. I explained how the rains affected the trucks and how bad the roads were right now. It didn’t seem to phase him. Maybe this guy will do alright, I thought. I have, and still do believe, the only way to learn to drive one of these monsters is to get behind the wheel and do it. I never allowed a trainee to just ride around all shift watching me drive. The first day it’s ok to ride and watch for half a shift, but after that, it’s time for the student to drive. This day was the exception.
I believe there were thirteen students that showed up that day. All the driver’s that would have trainees with them, including myself, decided, the students would just ride today. This was going to be a suck your seat up the butt kind of day. If the students didn’t quit today just by riding, then maybe they would make it through training. When the experienced drivers were worried, then I could just imagine what the students were going through. These poor trainees were going to have the ride of their lives and didn’t even have to buy a ticket!
The first half of the shift was a circus. Drive up the hill, slide down the hill, and hope you didn’t hit anything. The bosses all parked their pickups at the top of the mine to watch what was happening below. There was no way in the world they were going to be on the road with us, doing everything we could to keep from playing bumper cars! I was doing fairly well keeping my truck out of the ditch, which was quite the challenge. I told John once that it was his turn to drive, and his eyes got huge until I said that I was just kidding. With a sigh of relief, he said under his breath, “Oh, thank God!” I laughed and told him that even I wasn’t that big of a jerk.
Maybe six hours into our shift, one of the shovels went down, and they had to start another one up. This wasn’t that big of a deal except, the road to the shovel hadn’t been worked on all day and I knew it was going to be extremely slick. The rains were turning on and off all day, keeping the roads in terrible condition. This road hadn’t been worked on today by road crew because they had their hands busy with all the other roads. Dispatch told me to let them know the condition of the road, so they knew whether they needed to pull someone to work on it. I knew It was going to be bad, but I didn’t know it was going to be that bad.
I stopped at the top of the hill, looking down the other side, and told John, this is going to be the best ride in the park today. John let out a small groan, which is what I would’ve done if he weren’t here with me. I have to keep up good appearances for the student, I thought to myself. Slowly we started down the hill. I knew it was going to be slick. I knew we were going to slide. Furthermore, I knew that my butt would try to eat my seat. Furthermore, I also knew that I had a trainee in the seat next to me, and I had to play it cool, so I didn’t scare him into quitting on his first day. What I didn’t know was how awful it was going to be and how hard it would be to keep my cool for John’s sake.
We started down with a small slide toward the driver’s side. This soon turned into a very large slide. One thing kept popping in my mind, stay cool for John’s sake. So I started explaining what I was doing to keep us on the road and out of the ditch. I explained every turn of the steering wheel, how much brake pressure I was using and how to watch what the road was telling me with the dips and potholes we were navigating over and around. I explained these things all the way down the hill towards the shovel we were heading for. Furthermore, I even told John that was the shovel as we passed the shovel, still sliding for another three hundred yards on the flat and heading towards the berm! The truck came to rest about fifty feet from the berm. I locked the parking break and took a deep breath. John looked as pale as a ghost, and I wasn’t sure that I didn’t as well.
Over the radio came a familiar voice of my ole buddy Pat, who was running the shovel. With a small laugh, Pat said, “Hey Billy, the shovel is over here, come on over and get loaded.” I answered back, “John and I are going to step out for a small break and clean our shorts out first!” I smiled at John to let him know everything was okay. Truth be told, even though I had to play it cool for John, my heart was running about ten times faster than I was letting on. I asked, “Are you okay, John?” He said, “I didn’t mind the sliding and all, but I guess what bothered me was how you explained what you were doing as we were coming down the hill.” I answered, “What do you mean? I just wanted you to get the idea of what I was doing to keep us out of the ditch.” He said, “Ya, but you were looking at me the whole time!” John, I said, “Actually, I was looking at the road, it just happened to be out of your window!” This did not sit well with John, as his pale white took on a light shade of green. Maybe that was not what he wanted to hear, but it was the truth.
We got through the rest of the shift without incident, and I assured John that today was not normal and tomorrow would be better. He shook my hand and thanked me for everything. The next day came and as my shift was beginning soon, I asked my boss where John was. The supervisor told me he was one of the five students that quit today. Well I hated to see John go, but it let me know that he probably wasn’t right for this job anyway. Yes, it was extreme conditions, but that is part of the job.
We all have our limitations. As for John, I hope he found a great career outside the mines. I’m not sure if he just didn’t have the stomach for the job, or if maybe he was just smarter than the rest of us that continued with this line of work. Sometimes you just have to find the right place in life for you. Oh, just to set the record straight, I only lost one other student during training in the mines, and he was the one that scared me, whom I talked about earlier.
Take care, enjoy what you do and remember, we are all in this together.
When I write a post, these are either what I believe in and/or what I have lived through. I always leave my post open for not only agreeing with me but also for those that disagree. I wanted to write this today because I think some have gotten the wrong impressions of why I write the way I do and about the subjects I pick. If you disagree with me and want it to be posted, all I ask is you don’t use foul language. If you can do this, all reviews will be posted! These are my opinions and views that I pull out of my head and my heart. My post are just my way of giving you, my readers, a chance for a fresh view to process on your own or discuss with your friends and family. Also, a word of advice, if your not sure of something you read, do some research. Don’t just take everything to heart because someone published it. They may be wrong.
I may not always be the most articulate writer and this is because of two distinct reasons. The first is because, I want to do my writing as though I am talking directly with you and not at you. The second is because, I don’t use big words myself and it would be unrealistic for me to write in a way that I don’t think or talk. I write from my heart not from a dictionary and I plan to continue to do so.
Incorporating teachings
I do try to put teaching within my writings, using lessons that I have learned. I feel if I am not teaching what I have learned, then I’m just writing for myself. This is not what I want to accomplish. I am a teacher at heart, so I must follow the way I am led. I do write about parts of my life that I have lived through, usually with funny things that have happened. When I write about my adventures, I always let my readers know, this is what I have done. When I write my stories about my adventures, I try to put it as close to what happened as I can. I do try to leave foul language out because I don’t want to be known as a writer of foul language. This is a personal choice and in no way a slam on anyone who chooses another path.
I have written before that I write about things as they come to me and tonight this is where this post comes from. I will continue to write my teachings and my life stories as long as you will have me.
I want to thank each and everyone of you that continue to read my post. I also ask that you let me know if I hit a nerve with you, whether good or bad, so don’t be shy and tell me. If you wish to send me a direct email without it going on the post, here is my email; tailfeathers32@protonmail.com Just make sure you are off my website when you send it. I will be happy to discuss any problems you have with my post. Thank you for reading and Remember, we are all in this together.
