016: Emotional Literacy

I imagine the five SEL competencies each on their own continuum. Several times throughout each day, I conduct a quick self-assessment on how I’ve been doing in each of the five CASEL competencies. The reality is, even as adults, we are not always our best selves due to events in our lives. 

Those who are close with me know that (1) I am the oldest of four and (2) I don’t like to cook (at all). Growing up, my parents juggled schedules of four of us in different activities, so there was one dinner meal made, and if you didn’t eat that, you didn’t eat the rest of the night. 

About three years ago, I decided to make shrimp scampi for our family of five. Knowing that two of the boys didn’t eat seafood, I made them chicken. Earlier that afternoon on a phone call with my husband, I shared that I had made a special dinner. Around 5:00 PM, he came home from work with a container of supermarket-made chili and set it on the dinner table. I felt an emotion that seemed like irritableness rise within me. Because of this discomfort, I stamped it down because I didn’t feel like examining it.

About fifteen minutes into dinner, I noticed that one of the boys wasn’t eating. Carlo asked him if he wanted to eat a “sincronizada” - a type of Mexican ham and cheese melt. I felt the several emotions flare up throughout my body towards my husband again. Why was I having such a visceral response? I FEEL emotions strongly, sometimes even before I can process how I feel about them. Because of this, I don’t always respond to, or act on, the emotions until I understand them and can articulate them.

I realized that my feelings were a combination of anger, frustration, and hurt. I was confused that I had such a visceral response to something as silly as chili and a ham and cheese quesadilla! 

After spending the weekend pondering my emotions and subsequent feelings, I came to a different perspective on the situation. In my childhood, my parents made one meal that we all ate. As a first generation, Italian-American, his mom often made 2-3 types of meat to serve at dinner, along with pasta, and about 6-8 different types of vegetables. 

In my mind, I spent time making a special meal for my family to enjoy, even when I didn’t enjoy cooking. It felt hurtful when Carlo brought up store-made chili and offered to make a different meal. I was angry because I didn’t think he was considering the amount of time I spent making the meal. 

When I changed perspective, I realized it was a honest cultural mismatch. He was not intending to hurt my feelings at all; he was responding in a way that he had experienced growing up. 

Cultural mismatches and differing perspectives on an event occur all the time - in our personal lives and in our educational lives. From this experience, I’ve learned to:

     1. Take time to pause. Lean into the breaks between emotions, feelings, and response.

     2. Reflect on emotions (how our body feels) and feelings (our conscious interpretation of emotions).              What physical sensations am I experiencing? What feelings am I processing in my mind?

    3. Engage in conversation to gain clarity and perspective on the event.

As educators, when we discuss social emotional learning, it is often in terms of student competency. One of the ways that students learn about social emotional skills is by seeing it modeled by the adults around them.