Resilience - Trait or Choice

Back when I was a student teacher, I was placed in a 5th-grade classroom to complete my three-month teaching requirement. It was supposed to be a short placement, a stepping stone. But life had other plans.

When I first stepped into that 5th-grade classroom, I was full of energy and excitement.

It was my student teaching placement, a three-month requirement—and I was ready.

Better yet, things were going great.

The lead teacher was there. My university supervisor was supportive and had my back. The students responded to me. I felt confident.

Actually, I felt unstoppable.

“I’ve got this.”

That was the voice in my head. Looking back, it was my ego talking. Because just a few weeks in, everything changed.

The lead teacher went on FMLA unexpectedly. And just like that, I went from student teacher to full-time long-term sub.

I faced a lot of behavior challenges - defiance, drama, shouting, constant disruption, students walking out of class.

There were fistfights.

A bomb threat.

You name it, if it could go wrong in a classroom, it probably did.

Some days, it felt like nothing I said or did made a difference. I spent a lot of time crying - in my car on the way home, at home when I replay the day in my head, and again on the way to school. I’d walk out of the building emotionally drained, wondering if I was cut out for this. Not because I didn’t care, because I cared so much and still felt like I was failing.

And yet, every morning, I showed up.

Not because I had the answers. But because I couldn’t walk away from the chance to try again. To do better. To figure it out.

To teach - because I still loved it.

One day, a student who had constantly challenged me, talking back, disrupting lessons, refusing to follow directions, broke down crying after class.

Through tears, he told me his parents were getting divorced. He wasn’t angry at me. He was hurting, confused, and overwhelmed. His behavior wasn’t defiance, it was a cry for attention.

That moment hit me like a slap across the face. Not out of shame, but out of awakening. I realized I had been trying to manage behavior without understanding the story behind it.

I needed to listen more, not just to what my students were doing, but to why. That shift changed everything.

What kept me going were their faces, innocent, reactive, and deeply human. Their behaviors weren’t random. They were mirrors of what they had seen, experienced, or lacked. They weren’t testing me; they were asking me to understand them.

Every night, I’d go home exhausted, then spend hours searching for new strategies, rewriting lesson plans, or just mentally replaying the day trying to understand what went wrong, and what might work next.

I didn’t have all the tools.

But I had a deep belief that those students deserved someone who wouldn’t give up on them. And I wasn’t ready to give up on myself either.

What I didn’t know then was that this was another lesson in resilience, even though I didn’t have a name for it at the time.

At the time, I thought resilience was something people either had, or didn’t. I didn’t realize it was a decision I was making every single day.

Because resilience didn’t look like strength back then.

It looked like showing up with puffy eyes and a Plan B… again.

It looked like trying something new, even when nothing seemed to work.

It looked like believing change was possible, even when progress was invisible.

What I’ve learned since is this:

💡 Resilience isn’t a trait. It’s a choice.

A choice to stay.

A choice to care.

A choice to lead, especially when it’s hard.

That classroom didn’t just shape my teaching. It shaped how I lead.

How I coach.

How I speak.

How I meet people where they are, in business, in leadership, in life.

And the truth is, most of us are navigating our own version of that classroom. Trying to lead, solve, guide, or grow, while holding things together behind the scenes.

You don’t have to have all the answers. You just have to keep choosing to show up.

Because resilience isn’t found in the big wins. It’s built in the small, everyday decision to try again.

👋 I’d love to know:

What’s one moment that taught you the real meaning of resilience?