Dear Parents and Guardians, 

Welcome back to the strangest school year I have ever experienced! I hope your daughters are adjusting well and getting back into the groove of school even in this new format. I have been incredibly impressed with this community and have been reminded often just how resilient kids can be! 

Since this pandemic started, I have been able to read so many great books, but the one that resonated with me and I think would be so beneficial for our students the most is Get Out of Your Head: Stopping the Spiral of Toxic Thoughts by Jennie Allen. I don’t think the author knew that her book would be coming out during such a difficult time in our history, but just like everything else in life, God had a plan. 

Throughout the book she speaks to so many of the negative thoughts that run through our heads every single day. Am I good enough? Am I smart enough? Am I pretty enough? Am I lovable? She centers each chapter on a different emotion we all face and the choice we have to give into that emotion or choose God instead. 

She describes exactly what those emotion can do to us if we let them take over through this process:

• Our emotions dictate our thoughts.
• Our thoughts affect our behavior.
• Our behavior seeps into our relationships
• And those broken relationships have consequences.

I will use her example of self-pity to explain this spiraling process in more detail because during this time, we have all struggled and maybe are still struggling with this emotion. 

When we are feeling self-pity (emotion) that emotion leads us to think that we are victim to our circumstances. (thoughts) That thought leads us to consistently complain (behavior) and that behavior causes us to place blame (relationships) on other people in our lives. When our relationships are built on blame, we live consistently unhappy. (consequence)

But here is the good news…we can choose to change those thoughts, behaviors, relationships, and consequences. We can reverse that train of thought. It won’t be easy, but it can be done! Here is the switch: 

We start to feel self-pity (emotion) and we CHOOSE TO BE GRATEFUL. Because we are grateful, we start to think that our circumstance are an opportunity to meet God. (thoughts) When we believe that we act with gratitudeand our relationships are built on forgiveness. (relationships) The consequence from building those relationships is JOY. (consequence) 

She encouragers her readers to turn the spiral upside down on emotions like anger, stress, shame, constant anxiety, insecurity and more. There is a consistent theme throughout the book that calls us to stop thinking about ourselves, get out of our heads, and choose God. 

I do not have enough pages to list all the research that shows the positive effects that gratitude and serving others has on people. She argues, and I agree with her, that modern self-help focuses too much on the self and not the help. She states, “We are not made to think more good thoughts about ourselves. We are made to experience life and peace as we begin to think less about ourselves and more about our Creator and about others.” With so much information at our fingertips, and as depression and anxiety statistics continue to rise, why would we not pay attention to this research and give it a chance? During this very difficult time, can we turn our thoughts outward, be grateful for what we do have, build better relationships with each other, and find rest and peace by turning to God. 

As always, please do not hesitate to reach out if you need absolutely anything!

Sincerely,

​Kayla Brown
Dean of Students
469-232-1805