Danny, Emerson, and a Boot in the Britches

“Nah man, I’m stupid.”

That’s exactly what I expected Danny to say. I was filling one of my “free” days by substituting for an English teacher at a local public high school. I learned when I got there, though, that I’d be teaching the kids with behavior problems.

It had been a “challenging” day. The concept of education seems foreign to these students. Several revolted at the idea of having to do actual schoolwork. By mid-afternoon, I ached with discouragement. These were the kids being warehoused, not educated. The system had given up on them. So had many of their parents, too. As a result, most of them had given up on themselves. Danny was one of them.

Danny is a tall young man who, looks much older than the other students, mid-20’s maybe, not his actual age of 17. An aide told me Danny had issues with self-worth; often acting the “alpha male,” okay with people he trusted, but lashing out whenever he felt someone was trying to embarrass him. Playing the role of “the bad kid” was Danny’s primary defense mechanism.

Ralph Waldo Emerson’s wisdom can connect
us with both nature and our inner selves.

The class assignment was to analyze a passage of Self Reliance, Ralph Waldo Emerson’s essay exploring man’s relationship with nature and the duality of our own existence – the fact that we have, in a sense, two separate personas. The first is the person we present to the world. The other, however, is the person we really are, deep down, the person we keep hidden from others and, all too often, from ourselves. What luck! I saw an opportunity to lead these low achievers to look within and hopefully begin to find their true value as human beings.

I saw the mental gears grinding in Danny’s eyes as I led the students though the essay’s purpose. Later, checking with students as they wrote out answers to worksheet questions, I asked Danny if he could see Emerson’s point on nature’s influence on our lives. That’s then he answered with his “stupid” self-assessment. I saw it as an open door and took a chance, getting three inches from his face and speaking in a quiet but very firm voice that only he could hear.  

“Look at me. You are NOT stupid. I can see it in your eyes. There’s a lot going on in there. I know it. And you know it, too. Start being the real you.”

Danny blinked and looked away, sheepishly, like he just got caught stealing the last cookie from the jar. No one had ever challenged him like this before, to look so hard in the mirror.

Danny’s really no different than any of us. Sometimes we all need a “boot in the britches” to get us to look in our own mirrors. We get this from time to time, from people who care for us – friends, spouses, parents, our children. Even God. Yes, God “talks” to us. Sometimes in whispers; sometimes with sledge hammers. He asks us to meet him where that second persona lives, deep inside each of us. What’s important is that we pay attention. That’s how we eventually become the persons God wants us to be.

I heard from one of Danny’s teachers recently. He’s more focused, she said. More patient, more tolerant, too. Incremental changes lead to larger transformations for Danny and for us, too. All we have to do is listen. Or, put another way, “Whoever has ears to hear ought to hear.” (Mk 4:9)