I listened to a podcast last week in which the teacher being interviewed had amazing energy. Amazing in the annoying sort of way – the way in which, as I listened, I had to constantly talk myself down from being annoyed and jealous and cynical in order to refocus my attention on the fact that what he was saying was actually worthwhile. Framing my experience in this way obviously says more about me than about the energetic teacher, but I wanted to provide this frame because I think it’s important to recognize when something is difficult. It’s important to call out my own dichotomous will to be my best while simultaneously thinking that it’s all a ruse.

What I gleaned from this teacher’s story was that he believed we should each choose things to be fanatical about. He said to be fanatical about the things you love, choose those things wisely – and at most choose 3 things – any more than 3 and a person knows how to do many things, but only halfway well. (paraphrased)

During the same drive (I went in to my classroom last week, hence the return of podcast wisdom), I listened to another podcast in which an author being interviewed said that at one point in her career, she realized she had to stop apologizing for her existence and to recognize that she was an expert in something. Her advice was to give yourself permission to own your expertise.

After listening to these podcast sages, these are the subsequent blogging results. In an attempt to embrace the part of me that believes wholeheartedly in a few good things, I am choosing to be “fanatical” about 3.

1. Family
2. Church
3. Education Reform

AND – I am going to give myself permission to own the expertise I gain through experience, research, reading, and practicing, these things.

The facelift of this blog is the first attempt to move in this direction. I’ve created categorical menu’s at the top of the blog, so that readers can identify which topics they might be interested in reading, however, I can still blog about all of them without apology or explanation.

The secondary result of this is that this will be the last blog I share with most social medias. I will keep my automatic twitter feed, however, if you’d like to follow along and read any future blogs, please either follow me on Twitter(@rdetrick1), or subscribe to the blog. If you choose neither – no worries.

Here’s to new, old, and revised beginnings – and more writing.

Happy Monday All.