Today was an unexpected day for a variety of reasons. It started off normal with the energy from my students and mustered energy from myself. We were deep into a pretty difficult math test and the students were doing wonderful and then all of a sudden an unexpected encounter occurred with one of my students. 

She came to me crying, trembling and upset and with the quickest pathway my feet could carry me, we traveled down to the nurse together. My class was unattended but at that moment the focus was on making sure the student I had with me was okay, comfortable, calming down and able to regain some composure. 

After about 5 or so minutes down at the nurse, I hurried back up to my classroom thinking to myself: I don't know if I handled this situation correctly. I wonder what my students are doing. Are they laughing? How am I going to center the conversation around love and humility?

And all of a sudden, my thoughts were interrupted by the voice of one of my former student's moms. She happened to be volunteering in the school and was hanging up pictures for the art show. She had overhead what I was saying to the student down to the nurse and how I had a similar experience at one point in time and how though this may seem like a huge problem right now, I promise it is only a small small crumb of a problem when we look at life as a whole. 

Well she looked down from the ladder at me and said: "You were made to do what you do Mrs. Amoscato" And for some reason this just struck me. It struck me really hard. It was the tone in which she said it and the way in which she said it with the smile and how she said it...that struck my heart with whimsy. Because we don't always hear these words in the midst of all the doubters. And sometimes I don't even think we believe them ourselves. 

Her message was so direct and so full of love, I felt an immediate strength to conquer whatever else was happening inside my classroom at the moment it was happening. And my students did respond with a resilience and humility. In fact, I walked into a silent classroom. It was as if the event had never happened. 

My hope for you is that whatever difficult moment you encounter this week, you are able to hear humility and perhaps a voice  that says to you, "That's alright. Just know that you were made to do ...what you do."