..which will indicate for you the quality of writing on this post. However, I have been thinking about something this afternoon that I don't want to forget about.
This afternoon, I attended our interfaith clergy association, in which we met with the new superintendent of schools in the city in which I serve my church. We have a fabulous school system.
The Super is amazing-super. I was so impressed with his facility of educational theory and knowlege and content, while being totally down to earth.
We talked about stress on our teens. He flipped the conversation to stress in our culture--and that yes, schools have a role to play in thinking about stress, but he wanted to go deeper-to talk about stress as a cultural issue and what causes stress--
and he thinks it's fear. Fear.
Parents fear for the future of their children, fear of failing, fear of wanting the best, but not getting it....
fearing what the world will be like in 10-20 years.....
Fear.
What do you think of this? (I am not representing the brilliant way in which he articulated this, so it might sound a little facile.)
I thought it was sort of theological, in a way.
Jus' sayin'
I completely agree with this. Things are just terrifying: in our country, our world, and on our planet, and people are scared spitless. I think it wears our resistance down (like immunity) so when we are raw and stressed from fear, then any other thing that comes up can cause us to totally fly off the handle.
ReplyDeleteI am reading a lot of Henri Nouwen these days.
I am convinced that many people in our country are overwhelemed by some real fears, but mostly by fears that perceived, misinformed media hype, and self-interest protection
ReplyDeleteI think that fear, perceived or real, is a huge contributer to stress. I also think that modern society is prone to stress because of the kinds of work that we do that lead to us always being in a stressful "planning" mode. It used to be that you made plans, then did a concrete action (like building a fence, harvesting a field, etc.) Now it seems like we are locked in a perpetual state of planning for the next thing, with no completion and no rest.
ReplyDelete