Routines, habits & all of us

I had a lot of different ideas about what to write for this week.

Eventually, I’m sure, I’ll write a post about every single thought, but this morning I had another idea pop into my head because of a movie I watched this weekend.

I saw this random movie on Amazon Prime called Puppy Love.

It was yes, a romcom, as we all know, we watch them from time to time.

It seems I read a lot of murder mysteries but watch romcoms or lighthearted movies for the most part these days.

Not sure exactly what that’s about but that’s a whole other topic.

Anyways, the movie was about 2 people who match on an app and their dogs fall in love and you can probably guess the rest, and I won’t tell you the middle, in case you decide to watch it. No major spoilers here.

In any case, the piece that resonated with me primarily in this movie, had to do with the routines and habits one of the characters had developed due to COVID and honestly, just life. The ways in which he moved in this world just based on his preferences.

Even the lead female character had choices she had made and the way she chose to move in this world based off life experiences.

Since I said no major spoilers here for the movie, what I’ll say is, that it got me thinking about how we all chose to move in this world and the judgement we sometimes receive from others for it.

Far too often I have found we forget to listen and understand why others chose to show up the way they do and just judge.

We judge the things we don’t understand.

We judge without asking the right questions.

We judge without allowing others to feel comfortable enough to share their narrative and perspective.

We judge without thinking and the impact of that judgement is astronomical.

Here’s the thing though.

We all have routines and habits and how we choose to navigate the world based on our own personal experiences and honestly the experiences life throws at us.

Due to the pandemic lots of folks have figured out different ways to navigate the world based off that one experience we were all faced with.

And far too often we forget that trauma is experienced and navigated differently by all and the impact trauma leaves behind is felt differently.

I have routines, so do you. It would be untruthful to say we don’t.

But, I wish we were more understanding and open to understanding the routines and habits of others.

At the end of the day, do the routines of others really matter if they don’t significantly impact our lives? Focus on the world, significantly here.

Maybe, just maybe, if we operated from a space of empathy and understanding, we’d be just a little bit closer to understanding each other and showing up with compassion for one another.

I try to keep this mindset in my work.

Understanding the routines and habits of our students and understanding how they came to be likely only helps our work rather than hinders it.

And maybe, just maybe, they feel a bit more understood in the process.