My priest said something during Saturday night’s mass that really resonated with me outside of religiosity and spirituality. He said, “We get ready, but we aren’t really prepared”. He was speaking about Christmas, but these words took on a larger meaning for me. Like usual, my thoughts lingered toward my profession. I asked myself, “Do I just get ready, or am I actually a prepared social work educator, practitioner, and researcher?” The answer that immediately came to mind was “I feel like I am constantly getting ready, almost nonstop for what my profession throws at me”. I then wondered if my constancy translated into competency and preparedness. I set my thoughts aside last night to transcribe, not quite sure how to answer my own question.
I woke up to a text message with some alarming news from one of my clients. I knew that I had to set aside all that I had planned in my day to address this situation adequately. Before I reached out to my client, I not only got ready, but I prepared myself to ease my client’s distress. I was mindful of my preparedness this morning, but honestly I’m not always prepared for my various social work roles. I don’t know if it’s possible for any of us to every fully prepare for our profession. It’s just so unpredictable at times. We are also human beings that make mistakes too. I thought back to a time recently, where tiredness translated into me being ready, but not fully prepared for a family session. Or how tiredness again, had me ready, but not prepared for my final interview with a participant. I realized that constancy leading to tiredness, definitely negatively impacts my ability to be prepared. Then I started thinking what does this mean for me and my profession as a whole, and social work education specifically? My answer was mindfulness. I was prepared to deal with a difficult situation today because I took the time to mindfully plan how I would intervene. I felt prepared to collect data for my dissertation because I mindfully, in an almost painstakingly way, got myself ready to implement my research. I think sometimes social work, or any work really, becomes habitual and that is the space that requires our attentive preparedness. We need to get creative, be different, pay attention more closely to what is around us, express care, and cater to our profession instead of engaging habitually in any social work related activity. This is especially true in regard to social work education. I truly believe that we do our very best to prepare students for a challenging profession by getting them ready. For example, I have spent the past few days getting ready to make a social justice quilt with my class. I had to make a list of what I needed, buy the materials, find images to print, practice transferring an image to fabric, figure out how to mirror an image using Word, share that knowledge with my students, and then cut 23+ quilt squares. Tonight, after I finished transcribing, I searched for the perfect Theatre of the Oppressed videos. I carefully got ready so that I could prepare students to become creative advocators. I’m not just ready or prepared, but I am also excited to see what they come up with. I know that as long as I am a social work educator, I will take the extra time to mindfully get ready so that I’m prepared to prepare my students for a profession that likes to keep you on your toes. I know that I am not alone, and that many social work educators carefully ready themselves to prepare students. Social work educators reflect deeply on their own education, practice experiences, our profession and its values. Social work educators throughout the world carefully ready themselves through mindful preparation to prepare students for a beautiful, but difficult profession. However, and I think most of us can relate, no matter how much we try to prepare students, sometimes all we can do is get them ready for social work. Students must take the steps to prepare for social work. However, because social work is unpredictable and we really go into the trenches with people, there is no way to prepare for everything. We still keep trying. The point here is that we all do our best, even when we are tired. And although I, or you, or future students might not be prepared for every situation, at least we are ready. We are ready because of Schools of Social Work across the world. We are ready because of our Codes of Ethics. We are ready because of past social workers. We are ready because of our educators. We are ready because of our students, they are educators too. I then realized, while writing this blog that it does not matter if I am a “ready” social worker or a “prepared” one. What matters is that I keep trying to actualize our profession’s mission- to enhance societal well-being for all of its members. In closing and because tomorrow is Theatre of the Oppressed day in class, I just wanted to remind all who are reading of a very important truth. “We are all actors and we are all spectators to our actions and the actions of others” ~Boal. It is choosing to act and reflecting on those actions that make us who we are.
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