Tag: quote

Dream as though you’ve never failed.

This quote has followed me for over a decade. I heard it in Grade 9 (when Jonathan Howard came to visit a local elementary school). I used it as my yearbook quote in Grade 12. It is currently in my room on my letter board! I’ve reflected on it many times over the years, and at first I didn’t see much wrong with it — but there is a slight flaw, so let me explain. You see, the quote can be taken as this idea of pretending you’ve never failed, and thus means you aren’t learning from your mistakes. I do believe it’s important to learn from mistakes, absolutely! … But how I’ve chosen to look at this is not about forgetting your failures, but rather keeping that courage in order to follow your dreams. I know how tempting it is to want to quit when you try and try and continue to struggle — I’ll use my writing as an example: I’ve given up and come back to it many times since I was 13! I do tend to fix my past mistakes, and I believe my writing process improves every time I come back to it, but my confidence was always on the lower side (more-so when I was a teenager; I’ve gotten more confident in my 20s). I need to remind myself about this quote constantly — fix my mistakes, move on and continue to dream with confidence.

Time comes to those who make it, not those who try to find it.

My sorority sister, Elena, is a productivity and lifestyle design coach. I follow her Facebook page and blog pretty frequently — she’s incredibly inspiring (at least to me)! This was a quote by Jen Sincero that Elena posted on her Facebook page; she talked about this quote to explain something she’d been wanting to get back into for awhile — reading.

“At first, I couldn’t find the time ANYWHERE. Then, I decided to MAKE the time by getting up earlier and reading for at least 30 minutes every morning.”

This is a practice I’ve been implementing myself, as part of my new-year-new-me; I’m turning my computer off an hour earlier than I used to (around 10pm, sometimes earlier). Instead of trying to go straight to sleep — which rarely works, since it typically takes me anywhere from 30-90 minutes to fall asleep! — I spend 30 minutes reading (or more, if I’m not too tired) that the old Kaitlyn would’ve spent on the computer. Teaching is not an easy profession — it takes a lot of time management and organization! If I want to continue pursuing my passions, like reading, it’s important that I MAKE time for them (but not taking time away from priority tasks).

To learn to read is to light a fire; every syllable that is spelled out is a spark.

I’ll admit, a lot of these quotes will be book-related. This one comes from Victor Hugo, whose work I’m not too familiar with (I know of a couple titles, just haven’t read them yet), but I saw this quote in a reading planner and fell in love with it. I read with a young girl last month, and hearing her sound out some of the words and then getting them right warmed my heart — it was an honour to be next to her through this process! As someone who has been so driven and determined to teach high school English, I’ve never considered these milestones before — like the fact that students need to start somewhere in their reading journey (since most would come to the secondary level being able to read). Part of my Teacher Mentor’s expectations  in this practicum is for me to take on a group of students during guided reading, and my personal goal for these guided reading times (besides the obvious: guiding the students through reading) is to treasure the moments of student reading success, to be excited by these sparks that will (hopefully) light a permanent love-of-reading fire.