life – Page 2 – Clementine Fraser

This week I was challenged by Tiffany Crystal to write a post on something I have encountered or experienced that I’m pretty sure no-one else would have.

I really struggled to think of something.

I’m not the only person to fall down Mt Ngauruhoe. I’m not the only person to have scars all over their face.

I’m not the only person to run off stage crying before her solo song (oh god, I hope I’m not the only one…)

I’m certainly not the only person to have a bad relationship and a broken marriage.

I’m not the only one to have to face illness of loved ones or the suicide of close friends.

I’m not the only one to get in the middle of two massive teenage boys fighting and get them to back down (“Back off. Pretty soon you’re going to hit me, and I really don’t think you want to hit me. You need to back away”)

I don’t even know if I and my flatmates are the only ones to face a possum coming down our chimney and the police coming to our rescue (Yes, that happened. Yes, it was as embarrassing as it sounds)

I don’t even think I’m the only one to ever face the embarrassment of going for a cheek kiss when the kaumatua is going for a hongi and ending up kissing him on the nose.

This made me think about how ‘unique’ my life has really been. Maybe all the important and defining and funny moments are just the same as everyone else’s.

But then, a student said to me the other day:

“Miss, when are you going to write your autobiography?”

“Oh, I don’t think I’m nearly interesting enough for an autobiography!”

“I think you are, Miss.”

This made me think about stories, and voice. There are lots and lots of different stories in the world, but really only a few that get told time and again in different ways. What makes a story truly unique is the person telling it – their voice. We hear often as writers – no-one can tell your story the way you can. It’s the same for life. No-one can live your life the way you can.

It’s like if I had a whole heap of pretty blocks and paper and glitter and pipe cleaners and glue and asked a group of people to each make something that represented them. They would start with the same materials, and what they built might be similar, but each would be different, depending on their vision and their skill.

That’s life.

It’s actually really reassuring knowing that we share more than we don’t. When things were very bad with my marriage and directly after we separated, and I was struggling to understand what had gone wrong, I found a website where many people had shared very similar experiences to mine. It was at once saddening that others had gone through the same thing but a huge relief to see my story played out again and again by strangers. We don’t feel so alone in our experience if we know others have felt it too.

I am, however, possibly, the only one who has rung back a number to leave a message stating ‘Hi, it’s Clementine from the Auckland University History Department library here, just calling to let you know that Hitler and Germany invaded Warsaw on the 8th of September. Have a good day.’

So there’s that.

What about you? Have you encountered or experienced something you think it’s unlikely that others have? Let me know in the comments!

inspiration, life, self care

The masks we wear – how they help, and how they hinder.

March 8, 2018March 8, 2018 Clementine Fraser

“Put your game face on”.

Often we don’t share our vulnerabilities or our inner selves with everyone. Some of us have different personas, different masks, for different situations and groups of people. Masks are pretty common, even when we think we’re an open person.

There are many reasons we wear masks. Probably the most common is for protection.

We wear a mask that hides who we really are to protect our authentic self from the hurt of rejection. It is vulnerability that we hide by avoiding the acknowledgement of what worries or frightens us. So, for instance, we maintain a facade of brightly smiling ‘I’m fine thanks’ when inside our loneliness or insecurities is a burden.

We wear a mask to try to keep up with the expectations of other people – filters on selfies, make up on before leaving the house, never asking for help or directions.

Some people wear different faces in different surroundings so that, for instance, work mates never see their raver side and their raver friends never see their serious academic side.

We take on roles as well, that are masks of a sort. These can be affirming but can also lead to imposter syndrome – everyone tells me I am good at something so I behave as if I am but.. what if i’m not??

When we wear a mask we can feel ‘safer’ but at what cost? Research shows that when people wear a physical mask that conceals their identity they are more likely to engage in behaviours that are anti-social and unlike themselves. I’m not saying that putting on your game face to protect yourself from rejection will lead to anti-social behaviour, but I do think it can be an obstacle to being that authentic self, and therefore an obstacle to making strong social connections.

I have written before about seeking to be as authentic in life as possible, so it won’t be a surprise that I am in favour of shedding masks to show people who we really are. I am a very open person and have, 9 times out of 10, never regretted showing people who I really am and how I really feel.

Masks that help us:

Firstly – sometimes we do need to conceal our emotions. It isn’t appropriate for me as a teacher to let my inner turmoil be apparent to my students. I’m very fortunate in that my workmates are friends, but in many workplaces too there is a level of professionalism that requires stoicism. This doesn’t mean that we don’t ask for help if we need it, more that a mask of stoicism helps us function in a professional setting despite significant emotional stress.

Secondly – fake it til you make it. Masks can be helpful in convincing us that we can actually do something.

“Dress for the job you want”

Research has shown that when children dress as batman they are more focused in class and attempt all tasks, therefore being more likely to achieve all tasks.

Those of you who have read my post on overcoming fear will remember that when i was 15 I fell down Mt Ngauruhoe, smashing open my face. This left me with a lingering fear of steep slippery slopes. When I returned to the mountain as a teacher, I knew I could not have a break down in front of my students. The mask of a competent and in control adult slipped over my face and I was able (with the help of another adult on the trip) to face my fear and walk across the saddle.

As with many things in life, it’s how we use our masks that determines whether they help or hinder us. The moment they restrict us from feeling able to access help, or from being who we really are, then we know we should probably drop them.
Dropping your mask can be scary, but it can also be liberating.

life, Personal, self care

When you suddenly feel sad

February 26, 2018February 26, 2018 Clementine Fraser

I’m mostly a happy and positive person. Sure, I lose my temper and get frustrated and fed up, but mostly I stay positive and cheerful. It’s part of how I see myself and how I present myself to the world.

But sometimes I get sad.

Sometimes I don’t know why I get sad. I just do.

It’s a dark cloud but I don’t feel it around my head, I feel it around my heart. It seems to constrict it, squeezing out the positivity and the optimism and the self love. It leaves behind a tainted mush that makes me feel unsettled.

Makes me feel sad.

It isn’t a big deal for me – I am fortunate that my sadness is not depression and I have a good life so it isn’t situational. Sometimes I just have waves of unhappy.

The thing about waves of sadness is that they’re just like waves of joy – they are transient. Both extremes wash over you, pulling you into the riptide or sometimes just lapping in the shallows. But they go. They might leave you surf battered, or in a beautiful floaty tranquility – but they go.

Sadness comes. It comes for all of us and we often don’t know why.

A friend once told me that sadness and happiness often don’t have a reason. They just are.

So what do you do while you wait for the tide to recede?

If it’s a particularly dark bout you might need to hang on to something or someone. Get some help to pull you back to shore.

If it’s the kind of sadness that makes you wonder if you need some sleep – you probably need more sleep.

Other things we can do to combat the sadness is to let it out – like writing this post – or combat it with active focus on the good things – like the Happy Jar, or talking with people we love.

I think, for me, the biggest thing is recognising sadness for what it is – an emotion that will come in, muck things up a bit, and then, after a short or long while, go away.

life, Personal, self care, teaching

Building Relationships – Brick by Brick

February 21, 2018February 22, 2018 Clementine Fraser

Relationships, good, bad, professional, peripheral, are at the heart of human existence. I’m not even talking about romantic relationships, but the connections between us as humans. It is what drives community, positive workplaces, and is (I believe) central is giving us a sense of belonging and wellbeing.

I build relationships pretty easily. I really like people and I’m mostly fairly confident (or at least I seem so). I like to think I am kind. I’ve really focused on building relationships with students over the last decade of teaching – our students have a really strong appreciation and need for relationships with teachers. They need to know that you care, and that they have become a part of your extended community. So here are some of my top ideas for building positive strong relationships

Learn Names:

This is huge. Every year I have to learn about 150 new names in the first week of Term 1. I do it pretty quickly and feel terrible if I get a name wrong or I blank. Knowing and using a person’s name tells them that you think they’re important enough to remember. I once helped a boy on the playground when he was trying to make the right decision to not retaliate against a bully. I asked him his name. Every time I saw him after that I addressed him by name and we would stop and chat. It’s been two years and he still looks delighted every time I see him and say hi.

If you forget someone’s name, just ask. I had fantastic neighbours a few years ago. One particular wonderful couple my ex-husband and I would often chat to. We’d met up at a bar and introduced ourselves and would often say hi to Gregor over the fence. One day I came straight out with it. “Gregor, I’m so sorry but we’ve forgotten your partner’s name.” He looked intensely relieved: “Oh thank god because we’ve forgotten your husband’s name!”

Being honest about your forgetfulness and making a renewed effort to remember is appreciated. It builds relationships.

Be Welcoming:

I have always thought of myself as a friendly person, but I’ve become aware that in some situations I can appear quite intimidating or unwelcoming. I was at a writer’s conference and sat at a dinner table with a well known NYT bestseller of whom I am a MASSIVE fan. I watched her as she worked, very naturally, to put people at ease and ask them genuine questions about themselves, their writing, their lives. One of the women she was making feel welcome had sat next to me earlier and I’d only got as far as discussing her very fancy spectacles. Seeing how this author I admire so much put so much effort into connecting with this older woman made me question how much I had really tried to overcome my reserve and draw her out.

As a result, I try really hard with students to show a welcoming face when I see them around the school or they approach with a query. I don’t usually have to try hard, it’s more a case of remembering sometimes. None of us feel comfortable when people are (or appear to be) unwelcoming. It is hard to build relationships and connections when people are too nervous to talk to you.

friendship james-baldwin-276255-unsplash

Remember stuff about them:

The same top author whom I so admire remembered what I was writing about the next time she saw me. It made me feel like a million dollars.

When I remember what students do outside the classroom (sport, music, job) or even just remembering that they were doing a maths test that one time I relieved their class and making the time to ask them about it – that’s several bricks laid in the relationship build.

Showing people that you remember what is important to them shows them that they are important to you – such is the stuff that great relationships are made from.

It also gives you stuff to talk about!

As a teacher, it means when you’re in the playground and you need to move a group of boys on from playing ball where they shouldn’t, you can capitalise on the relationship you’ve made with a couple of them and they will get their mates to do what you’ve asked.

Listen to people:

I’m a talker. I always have been. My mother explained to me when I was young that if I was going to talk so much I had to become a good listener. Being a good listener to me means actively hearing what someone is saying. Letting go of the ‘waiting for my turn’ half tuned ear and giving someone your complete attention.

We all want to be heard.

Being a good listener also means noticing when people need you to stop talking.

Being a good listener also means noticing when people are trying to be heard or to speak and allowing them a space to do so.

Being a good listener means that you will become someone people feel comfortable opening up to. That openness and connection is integral to a good relationship.

Laugh with People:

Sharing a joke with someone builds an instant rapport, an instant connection. It breaks the ice and shows that you have more in common than you do otherwise. Crowded trains are normally silent places full of people ignoring each other. When I was in London I was on a train that was getting stopped constantly on the way into Earl’s Court. The driver started making jokes, snarky comments on the delay, silly puns. We all began laughing, and then we began chatting, and we were still laughing and chatting about it when we finally drew into Earl’s Court. Some people left and others hopped on. The new people couldn’t quite understand why we were all so cheerful and relaxed. More than one looked as if they were wondering if they’d stumbled into a private carriage. Humour builds connections.

I use humour a lot in the classroom. I do it without thinking, but it is something that I recommend to other teachers. I’ve often said that our boys in particular really need you to have a joke with them. This is not to say that you aren’t firm and hold to your boundaries – they want you to be strict but they also want to know that you will laugh at their stupid jokes, that you will make stupid jokes and crack up yourself. Humour is a great equaliser.

Be an encourager:

Build people up. Support them. Encourage them and help them to reach their potential. Cheer them on. Don’t sabotage their goals. I think that’s fairly self explanatory.

Be kind:

Those of you who have followed my blog will know that kindness is really important to me. We crave kindness. If you show consistent kindness to people that’s the majority of the battle to build and maintain a relationship won. It is the kindness that I showed to students that keeps them coming back year after year to say hi, even after they leave.

Be vulnerable:

It’s okay to show that you aren’t perfect. It’s okay to show that you don’t have all the answers. It’s okay to not have the amazing Instagram ready life. It’s okay to be vulnerable. My friends and my family know that I am not a perfect person. They know that I can have a temper, that I am disorganised, that I don’t always have the best self-esteem. They have seen me cry. Vulnerability is authentic. It is an equaliser. It allows for a completely honest relationship.

Relationships give us a lot but to get the most out of them we need to put the effort in.

inspiration, life, motivation

Life is better when you find your cheerleaders

February 13, 2018 Clementine Fraser

Life is often tough, in many different ways. Self-doubt, economic struggle, confusion, emotional pain, lack of motivation. They all suck. They all help to convince you that whatever your goal is it is unobtainable.

That’s where cheerleaders come in. Not quite the ones with the pompoms although, you know, each to their own, but the ones who are there on the sidelines, giving their all to help you move onwards to where you want to be.

I was literally writing this post and chatting at the same time (because we love to multitask) to writing friends on Twitter. We were talking about trying to get lots of different tasks done and how its always such a balancing act. What happened next is an example of why I love this community and how important the cheerleading squad is:

The writing community on Twitter is a vibrant and wonderful place! The @WriteFightGifClub is a group of amazing people who have fun and go crazy but at the same time they help with writing questions, beta read for each other, and give both emotional and practical encouragement on a regular basis. I am a happier person and a better, and braver, writer because of them. There are many amazing writing communities and groups on Twitter and finding your tribe, your group of people, or collecting them all (like pokemon) makes for a wonderful extended family of cheerleaders. Writers understand self doubt. They’ve experienced rejection and setbacks. They want to learn, they want to get better, and they want to help others get better. I’m sure it’s the same for many other likeminded communities on Twitter, but I do have to say that writers, in my experience, are particularly kind and welcoming.

It doesn’t have to come from someone who is doing the same as you either. I have a friend at school who knows I’m writing. I’ve been trying to get up at 5am every morning to get writing done before school and this hasn’t been easy for me as I’m much more of an owl than a lark. Whenever I see him he asks if I did any writing that morning; he high fives me when I do well, he listens with interest to my ramblings about my story, he makes it clear that he thinks what I’m doing is worthwhile and that I’m doing it well. He’s not a writer, but because he’s cheering me on he makes me feel like I can do it, like I want to do it.

Encouragement gives us a reason to keep going.

Cheerleaders are like gold. There are always people who will tell you that you can’t do it, or helpfully point out all the obstacles in the way. The ones who lift you over the obstacles or pick you up out of the mud when you fall off them and cheer you on as you try again (or let you cry on their shoulder for a bit when you really just can’t, and then cheer you on) are the ones you want to surround yourself with. I have written before about facing vulnerability and fear and the importance of letting other people help you when you are faced with difficulties you don’t think you could overcome.

The great thing about having a cheer squad is that you become a cheerleader too. There is something wonderful about being able to support and help someone else. As a teacher we do it all the time with our students, and there is a wonderful Ted Talk by Rita Pierson – Every Child Needs a Champion that outlines the benefit to children of this cheerleading, this championing. But we need it too as adults. And we need to make sure we give it to other adults, whoever they are and whatever stage they are at.

Imagine a world where every person had a champion.

We can’t make that happen for everyone, but we can at least do it for the people around us. Take the time to find out what your friends, family, workmates are wanting to achieve, what they love, what they are anxious about. Make the effort to ask how they’re going and to cheer them on from the sidelines.

Find your cheerleaders. Be a cheerleader. Be a champion.