Think Different

We are on the road today as this is the May long weekend in Canada.

I found this poem the other day and it spoke to me. I love being in the classroom. It is a creative place where I do not worry about pegs and holes. I grew to call my classroom the geometric paradigm where we learned to find the pegs that fit each of us any given day. This poem is a part of Apple‘s advertising.

Without those who do not fit in some way, who cause a certain amount of discomfort, and seek ways to change things up are we able to innovate and create. It is both uncomfortable for those who try to bring about change and to those change impacts. To make it work, we all have to be a little crazy together. Here’s to each of us who embrace a bit of craziness and weirdness.

Here’s to the crazy ones.

The misfits.
The rebels.
The troublemakers.
The round pegs in the square holes.
The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules.
And they have no respect for the status quo. You can praise them, disagree with them, quote them,
disbelieve them, glorify or vilify them.
About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them.
Because they change things.

They invent. They imagine. They heal.
They explore. They create. They inspire.
They push the human race forward.

Maybe they have to be crazy.
How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art?
Or sit in silence and hear a song that’s never been written?
Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels?
We make tools for these kinds of people.

While some see them as the crazy ones,
we see genius.
Because the people who are crazy enough to think
they can change the world, are the ones who do.

Unknown's avatar

About ivonprefontaine

In keeping with bell hooks and Noam Chomsky, I consider myself a public and dissident intellectual. Part of my work is to move beyond (transcend) institutional dogmas that bind me to defend freedom, raising my voice to be heard on behalf of those who seek equity and justice in all their forms. I completed my PhD in Philosophy of Leadership Studies at Gonzaga University, Spokane, WA. My dissertation and research was how teachers experience becoming teachers and their role as leaders. I focus on leading, communicating, and innovating in organizations. This includes mindfuful servant-leadership, World Cafe events, Appreciative Inquiry, and expressing one's self through creativity. I offer retreats, workshops, and presentations that can be tailored to your organzations specific needs. I published peer reviewed articles about schools as learning organizations, currere as an ethical pursuit, and hope as an essential element of adult eductaion. I published three poems and am currently preparing my poetry to publish as an anthology of poetry. I present on mindful leadership, servant leadership, schools as learning organizations, how teachers experience becoming teachers, assessement, and critical thinking. I facilitate mindfulness, hospitality retreats. and World Cafe Events using Appreciative Inquiry. I am writing and researching about various forms of leadership, how teachers inform and form their identity as a particular teacher, schools as learning organizations, hope, nonviolence and its anticipatory relationship with the future, as essential elements to teaching and learning. Academic publications can be found at Ivon Gile Prefontaine on ResearchGate

15 responses »

  1. Ivon, I have nominated you for the WordPress Family Award http://drbillwooten.com/2013/05/19/nomination-for-award-teacher-as-transformer/ for the fine work you have done with your blog. Thanks, Bill

    Reply
  2. Thank you for hitting the nail on the head at an opportune time for me 🙂

    Sent from my iPhone

    Reply
  3. Thank you for being one of the crazy ones, Ivon! I hope you have a great trip an that you stay crazy after all these years.

    Russ

    Reply
  4. fransiweinstein's avatar fransiweinstein

    Oh, I so agree. It is the mist wonderful, inspiring, hopeful message. The world sure could use a lot more of those people right now.

    Reply
  5. Awesome- it’s all a matter of perspective- you see…:)

    Reply
  6. Genius is as common as the air we breathe. I constantly remind myself of this in my classroom. Thanks for sharing this Ivon!

    Reply
    • I talk to my students about the concept of the extraordinary found in the ordinary. Quite often, what becomes routine is overlooked. Only when I take a moment and reflect do I realize that without that thing or person my life would be less. You are welcome and thank you for the wonderful comment.

      Reply
  7. I was on one of those courses once where we had to draw a symbol to represent ourselves. We didn’t have more than about 30 seconds to think about and complete this task. THEN we learned that we had to explain it to the group!
    I’d drawn a hexagon on the basis that those who are addicted to sorting square pegs and round holes – or is it the other way round? – anyway, those peoiple who have to pigeonhole everything and everyone never know what to do with me.

    Reply

Leave a reply to russtowne Cancel reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.