Week 1- Do not criticize, condemn, or complain
This first principal wasn’t very hard for me, especially at school. I haven’t gotten into any situations in which I might do one of these restricted behaviors, nor did I try, not as part of this project, but I have always naturally avoided conflict. I just got back from Winter Break so I haven’t had to work on any group projects with students whose ideas are far from brilliant yet. To tell someone that their idea is absolutely terrible without actually telling them that would be hard, and a challenge I will inevitably have to face. Just not this week.
Most of the conflicts in which I had to think about this principal were with my sister. She is the perfect converse of me when it comes to the aspect of my personality that I mentioned earlier, I avoid conflict and always have. She seems to almost seek what I try so hard to escape. She always is chattering on about the latest fourth grade drama. I can’t imagine my experiences were so different than hers. I’ve come to identify three things about us that make this so different.
The first of course being that she does look for drama, and while I never understood why, some people are naturally like this. Another is something that I have witnessed: she can make big things out of little things, which is really what causes most of our fights. I was really amazed at how well this principal worked, there were so many instances this week in which she tried to pick a fight (which I shamefully admit, usually works) and I right away diffused it. One example, one that may sound foolish, but just imagine yourself in my shoes, with a younger sister who thinks she’s older, and honestly, most of the reasons sisters fight are foolish. She had given me a piece of gum a week prior and I thought nothing of it. But of course, she decided that now was the time get back what she gave. She came in and with her demanding voice she requested that I give her a piece of gum in return. Usually I would take the approach of telling her that that was stupid that I had to repay her for the gum she gave to me, then told her to leave her, but condemnation isn’t allowed. I calmly explained to her how generous it was of her to give me the gum last week and how she’s so generous that a never expected to have to give her something in return. In the end I did end up having to give her a piece of gum (which I really should have just done in the first place) but at least there was no yelling.
The last reason she seems to have so much more drama than I did is something that’s always fascinated me about her is she shares everything with our parents. I never shared anything with them! I still think about one time when I was about five, hiding under the coffee table because I didn’t want my dad to see that I had a band-aid on a scratch, and of course now it would be silly of me to hide a band-aid from them, I still have the same traits today. I share practically nothing about my life with my family and really not much with my friends either.
I’ve just don’t open up, it’s just always felt natural just keeping things to myself and really that’s what I would rather do. That’s one of the reasons I was reluctant to do this blog, if I don’t tell my family about my week and interactions, how am I supposed to tell strangers? Not only that, but I was worried I would have to be fake to people. Among some of the worst things that can be said about you is that your fake. After reading the first chapter, I decided that I would’t be fake, just monitored. So after some reading and some talking in to, here I am. Just don’t get me wrong, I’m excited to spend the next year here.
