El arte de la enseñanza

El arte de la enseñanza

The teaching profession

September 27, 2019

By: Gina Yoryet Román

“El arte de la enseñanza, como cualquier profesión, no es ÚNICAMENTE cuestión de adquirir habilidades. Más bien tiene que ver con el proceso de deconstrucción (cambio personal), estructuras internas y la reconstrucción en el trato a cada elemento (estudiante), y sus necesidades, su historia, su formación académica, sus prioridades y objetivos.

Esto significa que yo tengo que evaluar constantemente mis valores personales, motivos y objetivos, y debo estar dispuesta a realizar cambios positivos necesarios, a fin de crecer como profesionista y mejorar día a día, en cumplimiento de entregar ética, honestidad, transparencia, y sabiduría. Puedo llegar a estar altamente calificada y educada, pero SIN un deseo genuino de servir a los demás, mi carrera, uno de mis más fuertes sustentos en el ámbito profesional e intelectual, con el tiempo se convertirá en una carga insoportable.

Mi objetivo es ser realmente una gran ayuda a los demás, incitarlos y persuadirlos para llegar hacia un mañana mejor y más prometedor para llegar a la plenitud del aprendizaje.

Esto es el efecto de la reciprocidad – soy un elemento importante en la enseñanza y sirvo a los demás a través de Dios y de mis habilidades. A cambio de esto, estoy en paz conmigo misma profesionalmente. Además, este premio me impulsa a luchar por ser mejor, ya que el verdadero significado es vivir para los demás.”

 “The teaching profession is NOT simply a matter of skill acquisition. It involves a process of personal deconstruction and reconstruction in dealing with each element (student) and individual’s case, prior history, needs, and objectives.

This means that I must constantly evaluate my personal values, motives and goals, and I must be willing to make any necessary positive changes in order to evolve as a professional and improve day by day in pursuance of delivering ethics, honesty, transparency and knowledge. I can become highly skilled and educated, but SANS a genuine desire to serve others by considering their needs, my career, one of my strongest professional sustenances, would eventually become an unbearable burden.

My goal is to genuinely be of assistance to others, entice them and persuade them to reach towards a better and more promising tomorrow to reach the learning process in its entirety.

This is the effect of reciprocity – I am an important element in the teaching field and I serve others through my skills. In exchange of that, I am at ease with myself professionally. Furthermore, this reward propels me to strive for better, because real living, is living for others.”

Gina Yoryet Román

Me Olvidé de Vivir

Me Olvidé de Vivir

September 26, 2019

Me olvidé de Vivir

Julio Iglesias

“De tanto correr por la vida sin freno
Me olvidé que la vida se vive un momento
De tanto querer ser, en todo, el primero
Me olvidé de vivir los detalles pequeños

De tanto jugar con mis sentimientos
Viviendo de aplausos envueltos en sueños
De tanto gritar mis canciones al viento
Ya no soy como ayer, ya no sé lo que siento

Me olvidé de vivir
Me olvidé de vivir
Me olvidé de vivir
Me olvidé de vivir

De tanto cantarle al amor y la vida
Me quedé sin amor una noche de un día
De tanto jugar con quien yo más quería
Perdí, sin querer, lo mejor que tenía

De tanto ocultar la verdad con mentiras
Me engañé sin saber que era yo quien perdía
De tanto esperar, yo que nunca ofrecía
Hoy me toca llorar, yo que siempre reía

Me olvidé de vivir
Me olvidé de vivir
Me olvidé de vivir
Me…”

Writing is a blessing

September 9, 2019
Written on Sunday September 8 - Journal Day 5

Granting that I was unable to sleep last night and several nights earlier in the week, today I woke up feeling very hopeful and capable. “I got this!” I know I will narrow it all down since there’s not so much tension and anxiety between “Isaac” (Sakai Learning Management System - Brock University)  and I anymore! 
Now I can at last say that Isaac and I have come a long way since our paths crossed.

Based on personal experience, it is certainly NOT the best idea to compare prior relationships, but this “Isaak” really got me, just like Mike had me cornered and subdued a few years ago at one of my first simultaneous interpretation events. There's no comparison between Alfredo, Mike and Isaac!

With this in hand, I rest assured that Isaac and I will have a positive and fruitful relationship for as long as it shall last. 

Moving on to yet ANOTHER piece of reading material, I sluggishly opened Boden’s Five Perspectives on Journal Writing (Boden, C. J., Cook, D., Lasker-Scott, T., Moore, S., & Shelton, D. (2006). Five perspectives on journal writing. Adult Learning, 17(1-4) pp. 11-15.). To my astonishment, I couldn't agree more with some of the key points about Journal Writing, that’s why I have told my story through my own personal journal throughout the years.

My experience with creating and maintaining a journal has always provided a safe environment, a comfort zone, it has helped me reflect and plan about where I want to go in life next. It’s led me to my next creation and the next. It has enticed me to trace different outlets to approach my next project whether it’s about Health & Fitness, Writing, Spirituality, family, professional or personal aspects, or when it comes to abiding by my ABC’s. It’s been a tool for personal development. It’s helped me formulate ideas through writing and bringing them to life by acting upon them.

Writing has granted me the benefit to hear my own voice, articulate my thoughts and emotions, it’s made me cognizant that there is someone out there who has the same vision, dream and objective.

Through my own personal journaling, I’ve been able to express, process and overcome grief. Self-discovery through writing has been an incomparable journey. Writing has made me become conscious of this endowment (playing with words) and creating beauty and magic with it. Just like I’ve expressed it before, writing changes me and the world around me, it’s encouraged me to see the world from a different perspective. Without writing I would be at a loss, journaling has been a blessing that I cannot fathom living without, even when some of my work has been trashed in the past. 

Even when this and all the courses in the BA in Adult Ed wrap up, I will always keep my journal alive because that is exactly what this writer needs.

When in doubt, Have faith

When in doubt, Have faith

August 25, 2019

By: Gina Yoryet Román

“Fear, uncertainty and discomfort are your compasses towards growth.We must let go of the life we had planned, so as to accept the life that is waiting for us.”

Joseph Campbell

When I was twenty-five, I unexpectedly left the corporate world and set off to a solo venture in an unknown world. All those years, albeit all the hardship I was very fulfilled like never before because I had at last found my path doing what I was meant to do – share my knowledge with others by teaching … or so I thought. Seventeen years later once again, I´ve had to abruptly go on another compulsory hiatus. This time another place, being deprived from one of my greatest passions of all time, it feels as though I´ve committed treason against my essence.

Grandad was always right; he could see right through me when I was a young teenage rebel “with many causes.” He always told me, “young lady, you were born to be a teacher.” For the last eighteen months, his voice keeps resonating in my mind during my quantum of solace. I can’t help thinking that I let him down. Not in a million years did I fathom that at this point when I should’ve had it all figured out, I would be stripped from everything I ever accomplished, just like Bernadette Fox, the protagonist of “Where’d You Go Bernadette.”

When I saw the movie, it really hit home. Her persona resonated with mine, as being housebound and unable to create or fulfill my existence through my spiritual passion, it led to my downfall (I want to believe that this is only a temporary setback). Bernadette was once an acclaimed architect who won the MacArthur “Genius” grant because of her best creation. Once her creation was destroyed this led to her emotional demise. The same way she prided herself with her accomplishments, I glorified all of mine. Until this voluntary transition.

What is there to do when situations like this arise? Is there really light at the end of the tunnel? Will there be a better tomorrow? If so, I would like to know the tomorrow of which day. When that tomorrow comes, I want to stare it in the eye and remain there, knowing that there will always be better times. For the time being, when in doubt, keep having faith and moving forward, for failure does not define who we are. Insist, resist, persist, and know deep down in your heart that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope producesfaith, and faith does not disappoint us - Romans 5:4. 

Hence, we have to be cognizant of our faith to keep our world from collapsing, just like Atlas, The Greek ´Primordial Titan bearing the heavens. I pray to be as resilient as Atlas because even though he is trembling, down on his knees, his arms getting feeble, he somehow makes the greatest effort and manages to hold the world with the last of his strength.

“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

No hay agonía mayor que llevar una historia incontada dentro de ti.”

Maya Angelou

“Nor is there any greater agony than being oblivious to your passion and brushing off your purpose.”

“Ni tampoco hay una agonía mayor que ser ajeno a tu pasión y hacer a un lado tu propósito.”

GYR

"But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."

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Isaiah 40:31