Stress, a Spice in Every Teachers’ Life

“In times of great stress or adversity, it's always best to keep busy, to plow your
anger and your energy into something positive ” said Lee Lacocca.

This quotation is very applicable among us teachers. Our profession was

regarded as the most challenging yet noblest profession. Though it is not financially
rewarding, we teachers work very hard as a sign of commitment and dedication in our
profession. Yet it is inspiring to note that we enjoy our career even though we invest
countless sacrifice in our teaching profession. We are professionals who are slaves in
our school works. This is one of the reasons why perhaps we do not have time for our
personal life. We are slaved making our lessons plans, day in and day out. Aside from
being career people, we are also immersed with family responsibilities when we got
home from work.

After school work, family activities await us at home. Sometimes we lose touch
with our family including our friends due to the fact that we render full time services
and commitments to school activities. In other words, the role we play in our
community and in the school is crucial. Commitment to work and family obligations
causes rivalry in our attention which could lead us to stress and sometimes it can lead
us to burn out.

We need stress though not much and not for a very long time for our body
becomes alert when there is good stress. It motivates us to jump over the challenges
that life may bring however many of our activities cause the unhealthy stress that
unconsciously the teacher refuses acknowledge. It is a common scenario hearing
somebody says that he is under stress, and worse he does not know how to deal with
it. Sad to say there is no easy way and no bright solution yet available that would
effectively free people from the harsh and tedious effects of stress to man. Ironically
too, what one considers stressful is stimulating to others. That is why dealing with
stress effects depends to a large extent on the creativity and discipline of a person.

But what really is stress? According to Colella, Hitt, and Miller (2006) "stress
can be defined as a feeling of tension that occurs when a person assesses that a given
situation is about to exceed his or her ability to cope and consequently will endanger
his or her well-being." The hassles, deadlines, frustrations, and demands of modern
life have made stress so commonplace that it has become a way of life for many
people. In small doses, stress can help people perform under pressure and motivate
them to do their best.

In school, we are surrounded with many stressors that if we cannot

manage them properly it could lead someone to health risk especially those who has a
very low self-esteem. An example of these is having a heavy workload. Too much
teaching workload can drive teachers to get burned out and stressed especially if our
school head requires us to be constantly up in our toes in beating deadlines for paper
works. In this case, if we have little or no control over our working habits and cannot
seem to stop ourselves from working beyond what in our minds and bodies could take,
chances are we could experience burnout.

Even during hard times, I don’t consider stress as a hindrance in performing

my job but I consider it as spice which I need to work with, to become efficient and
effective in performing all my tasks. It is true that everything we encountered in our
daily life depends on how we look at it and how we deal with it. Now, I simply add
stress as a flavour in everything I do now and I was able to realize now that “Stress is
really a spice in a teacher’s life”.

Republic of the Philippines

UNIVERSITY OF NORTHERN PHILIPPINES
Tamag, Vigan City

GRADUATE SCHOOL

IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT
 OF
THE COURSE
HUMAN BEHAVIOR IN
ORGANIZATION
(DL MGT. 244)

An Essay Entitled

“Stress, a Spice in a
Teacher’s Life”

Submitted by:
MARLYN A. IBRAO

MAED- EM STUDENT

Submitted to:
CRESENCIO B. VELASCO, MBA, MPA

PROFESSOR