Dear Josh:

I have work experience in the classroom (middle and high school). I am trying to understand your experience in the classroom: are the students treating you disrespectfully, abusively, maybe? Are they doing things like talking to others at the same time you are talking to them? Intentionally creating noise so to annoy you? Making fun of you, calling you names, stuff like that?

anita

Dear Josh:

You are disrespected in the work place. No amount of mindful practice, such as meditation, and no amount of cognitive manipulation, such as changing expectations, will make your experience at work okay, or peaceful. People endure disrespect at work for a paycheck, because of fear of being unemployed and so forth, but they suffer.

You wrote: “I know some may say if I find peace then it will be with me anywhere, but I have to wonder how much I need to endure to prove that point.”- I don’t see how the two can possibly go together: disrespect and peace. Disrespect is a sort of attack on your self esteem, or sense of personal worth. Under attack, you do indeed look for shelter (in the title of your thread). Under attack, you can’t have peace.

In any situation where a person is attacked or otherwise suffers, the person experiences temporary relief once in a while, even without any intentional practice. The brain has to take a break from misery. For example, you are in school and you hear a song during a break. You find yourself enjoying it tremendously, more than ever. The brain took its break.

anita