Dear Kids

Great news! Last week, I found out that I am on the Launch Team for Jen Hatmaker's to-be-released book, For the Love. What's a launch team? Basically, I get to read the book early and review it. My review may be printed inside the cover, and I get to promote it on social media and in the ministries in which I am involved. It's basically an all-around-win. To make it better, we have a Facebook group with the #FortheLove people, and I love hanging out with my 500 newest besties all of the time.


Why does this matter today? I just got home from state Beta Club convention which is the craziest 36 hours of the year for my favorite job. Since Monday at 6:30 am, I have been hanging out with the coolest 71 kids in the world. I am admittedly biased, but they're the best of our state, and we showed that by winning the most awards and having the highest attendance at convention.


Basically, I am feeling the feels. In For the Love, Jen writes to her kids, and I hope to do the same. I do not have any biological children, and although I am only 4-7 years older than my high school students, I feel almost as responsible for them as their parents do. So, here goes...


Dear Kids:


I hope you know that I am always proud of you.  Making the grades to be in this honors organization and committing your time to community service in order to maintain membership is astounding. You are dedicating a part of your life to improve your school, your community, and yourself. That does not ever go unnoticed.


I hope you know that I will always support you. Maybe you want to complete a one-year certification and then go into a skills-based job. Maybe you want to go to one of the country's most prestigious universities and excel at a highly professional level. Maybe you wish to travel the world and live life entirely in the moment. As long as you are making wise decisions, I support you. I want you to be happy and to do your best in life.


I hope you know that I am always here for you. I don't want a student - whether one in Beta Club or Drama Club or simply in a class that I have subbed for - to feel as if he/she has no one to turn to in the difficult times, the amazing times, and the times of anything in between. I am cheering for you. I want you to feel secure and fulfilled.


I hope you know that opportunities are always waiting for you. You don't have to wait for someone to approach you and hand something to you. That is rarely how life works. Instead, I want you to seize the day. [See what I did there, #talentoverload kids? ;)]  I feel like my life has been pretty cool, and I would like to attribute that to grabbing opportunities and committing myself to working toward each goal. I want the same for you, but even larger. I want you to succeed. But, not each risk and attempt toward success is met with a positive outcome. Find out what went wrong, and, if possible, make it better next time. If not, know that you did your very best to work toward your ideal.


I hope you know that I will always surround you with a positive atmosphere. I may make jokes that seem silly or dumb or slightly unkind, but I want you to know that I do not actually intend for anything negative to be directed from me to you. That is not the style of education that I believe in. I want you to, again, feel happy and safe. I want you to be surrounded in positivity in order to know how to fight off the negativity when it comes at you. If this means not allowing you to see negative comments on a score sheet from a competition judge, so be it. You can conquer negativity on your own time, but let's keep it positive when it's us.


I hope you will always know this and so much more. I hope to not pass on life lessons directly but indirectly. I hope you realize that life does not always work out perfectly even when you do the steps perfectly, but you can continue to work your hardest to make your own kind of perfect life.


And, in the words of Jen Hatmaker, "Be kind. Be you. Love Jesus."