New York Times columnist, David Brooks speaks about the dual nature of the self in terms of an external self and an internal self. The external self is driven to build, create, and innovate, while the internal self, driven by a moral logic, seeks to do good and be good. The result is that we end up with two sets of virtues: the résumé virtues and the eulogy virtues.

The résumé virtues are the ones you put on your résumé, which are the skills you bring to the marketplace.The eulogy virtues are the ones that get mentioned in the eulogy, which are deeper: who are you, in your depth, what is the nature of your relationships, are you bold, loving, dependable, consistency?                        David Brooks, TED2014

This creates a dilemma that Brooks admits in his own life and it echoes at times in my own: Despite desiring and seeing the importance of eulogy virtues, I often spend a great deal of my time thinking about my résumé virtues. And there are only so many hours in the day.

The root of the problem of having two distinct sets of virtues, and the challenges this presents, is directly informed by the value placed on these virtues by others. This is where we, as teachers, parents, role models, and social elders, have the opportunity to help quell the storm that can potentially rage inside of ourselves, our colleagues, our friends, and our students as we battle to satisfy what must be done to satisfy our external, economic logic, and what must be done to satisfy our internal, moral logic. I see this opportunity as two-fold.

First, we have the opportunity to educate. Character education has been been alive for a long time, despite ongoing debates as to its success and the proper form it should take. Maybe it doesn’t have to be a prescribed program of development, but certainly if students learning that a growth mindset is an important part of developing academically, then teaching them the importance of a growth mindset in terms of character development is also important. The following video is a great place to start:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3nT2KDAGOc[/youtube]

Educating can also come through role modelling. This is probably more talked about by our ability to role model for our students, but certainly this is just as true for others in our lives.

Secondly, we have the opportunity to tip the scale more holistically toward valuing those eulogy virtues, thus helping to align them more, potentially reducing the competition with Brooks’ idea of résumé virtues. In the discussion-based classroom, there is lots of emphasis placed on not only learning, but also on fairness, open-mindedness, sharing, courage, and leadership skills. TRIBES and other community-building activities, whether on the school-level or the classroom-level, aim at connecting us into a learning network by developing and valuing those skills that go beyond learning to the very core of how we regard, and thus interact with, others. Everything from the texts we choose to the interactions we have in class mark philosophical positions, whether we’ve considered that implication or not. Focusing not only on the work students do, but also on how they do that work, not only in terms of process but also in terms of mindfulness, can help reduce the perceived conflict between our internal and external values.

I also find strong connections between Brooks’ meditation and the need for proper work-life balance. Some people like to have a genius hour, others like to have a glass of wine and some family time. Regardless, this time is most often described between time spent teaching and working and time spent doing whatever else you want to do. Brooks’ language has helped me to also frame work-life balance as between résumé virtues and eulogy virtues and the more I can incorporate thinking and developing my moral values into my work, the less I will feel that those two types of virtues are mutually exclusive.

Hopefully no one is reading this thinking that I’m only now realizing that teaching is a moral act. Instead, I’m suggesting that by increasing the value we place on eulogy virtues, and by conducting our activities with mindfulness and caring, we may be able to help us satisfy both sides of ourselves – the internal and the external, the moral logic and the economic logic – in turn, modelling a path for others. Merging the two as much as possible might help us reduce the competition between the two and also bring help bring more moral logic from the internal to the external where it can be shared and spread.

So how do you celebrate and value the moral in your classroom?

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlLWTeApqIM[/youtube]