I Am Not That Important

And how grateful I am to have learned that lesson. I know I am loved, but I am just not as necessary as I would have myself believe. The over-achievers and type A people out there will know just what I am talking about. We like to do things ourselves, make the decisions, solve our own problems. Most of the time, that works, but occasionally, even the most awesome of awesome people need a break.

I've had a trying last couple of weeks, so it's a bit of a relief to realize that it is not actually my responsibility to be in charge of everything. 

I've been pretty sick this week which is unusual. I've been so sick that I haven't been to the barn since Monday. I go to the barn every day. Not just most of the time. All of the time. Since Izzy arrived in January, there have only been a handful of days that I haven't seen him, and most of those days happened this week.

It has killed me to not check on my horses. I (erroneously) feel that if I don't make an appearance, my horses will wither away and die. Without me, they will be lonely and miserable. No one can clean their poop or look them over for new bumps and scrapes as well as I do. In short, they need me.

It turns out, that while they do need me, they will survive without my presence. I received three texts yesterday (other boarder, barn owner, next door neighbor who feeds) all verifying that my horses were still alive and doing well. It was actually a relief to know that I can be sick and that the world will not stop spinning because of it.

The Divine clearly needed to impress upon me that while I am very important as a human being and that my presence here on Earth is noticed, I am not THAT important. One lesson was not enough.

Just like I feel that my horses can't make it without me, I feel the same way about my students. I missed school on Tuesday and Wednesday and was absolutely certain that my students had either caused a riot or forgot everything they've learned this year - state testing begins on Monday. And to make matters worse, they had a different substitute teacher each day which almost guarantees chaos.

So even though I was feeling pretty crappy, I dragged myself to work on Thursday morning so that I could mop up the carnage and plan for the afternoon and Friday. Teaching is one of those jobs where being gone means your life really sucks when you get back to work. 

Imagine my surprise when I read the notes left by the substitutes. BOTH of them thanked me for allowing them to be in my classroom. They both felt that this was the best fifth grade class they had ever worked in, and one even said that my class made teaching fun!

Wow. Just wow.

Again, I was shown that I am not so important that the world will crash without my presence. Reading those notes gave me such a feeling of peace and relief. I don't have to do everything myself.  

I arranged for yet another substitute to do the second half of Thursday and all of today. I don't know how the day will go, but I am not going to worry about it. They'll get through the day without me. I also really want to go to the barn today, but if I don't make it out there this afternoon, I am going to trust that the Divine has things under control. 

The sky will not fall if I spend one more day on the couch. I'll talk to you all later - Netflix and I have a date (we've gotten pretty chummy this week).