Reflection and Educative Experiences

I have been thinking a lot lately about all the ways we learn about who we are and are becoming and what constitutes an educative vs. a mis-educative experience (Dewey, 1938) in preparation for my upcoming research project. I have also been thinking about the importance of reflection as one of the hope practices in the Nurturing Hopeful Souls resource.

With these two things on my mind, I got up this morning and started to write in my journal about an event that happened some years ago.

This event happened when I introduced a colleague to my father who was visiting me at the Hope Foundation. I noticed that my colleague's 'nice things about my work' seemed to slide off my dad's back as somewhat irrelevant.

Writing this morning, I stumbled upon an astounding awakening about my father's non-pulsed response to my colleague's comments. The revelation was this: It was not important about what I accomplished. It was important for my father to see and hear how I was a kind and caring person that brought a smile to his face.

This represents for me, an example of why it is important to find moments to reflect on the tensions we feel in our interactions. I also believe that if I had not made the time to reflect on what troubled me about this experience, I might have carried around the notion that for some strange reason my dad did not care about who I am and am becoming and that just did not make sense.