Better Than Me

I live close to the beach and typically run alone early in the morning. However, on Saturdays, most runners drive to the beach road to do their long runs. It is a social event and not uncommon for a stranger running at the same pace as another runner to strike up a conversation.

A few Saturdays ago, I was running on the beach road and ended up running with two other runners. One introduced me to the other by saying, “This is Tom, my better-than-me.” He went on to say that Tom was his running partner because Tom is faster and pushes him to be better. As I headed for home, I just couldn’t get that phrase out of my head. In life, don’t we all benefit when we spend time around people who are better than we are?

In my teaching life, Jen McDonough is my better-than-me. Jen juggles teaching full-time, literacy coaching, two kids, a husband, family, and friends, and yet she is always pushing herself to grow professionally (she even looks cute and put together while doing all of it). Jen is the one I talk to when I want to bounce ideas off someone or need another perspective. She pushes me to try new things, even when they feel uncomfortable. When I have a crazy idea that I’m dying to try, she jumps in to try it in her room too so we can talk about how it worked in K–1 versus grades 3–5.

Teaching can be isolating. Instead of avoiding the better-than-me people in life, perhaps we should run alongside them from now on. Likewise, we should throw our classroom doors and teaching lives open in case we might be someone else’s better-than. If we hit our strides together, it can only get better!