The Power of a Personal Philosophy

I've blogged before on personal branding - if you haven't read it please do. As I was creating this website I had to think about my personal philosophy. Most educators at some point reflect on their educational philosophy. It's important because it helps guide how you approach teaching and learning, but I think it's worthwhile to think more broadly. Here's a neat article that goes over some of the points below [ehow link]:

1. Reflect - what are you about? Ask your trusted colleagues. Look at your work.
2. Write down the words that represent these ideas
3. Arrange them into a paragraph with a sentence for each word
4. See if you can reduce this into a few short, powerful  and engaging phrases
5. Lastly try and think of one word that captures the entire philosophy - a word to live by

What might this look like?
Words that embody what I am about: hard work, achievement, mentoring, sharing, giving, life-long learning, being involved, paying it foreward. 

Check out my Landing page to see how I did. For those who are embarking on creating their own websites here's some tips on what your landing page should look like [article link] 

Having a powerful personal philosophy will help align your actions with your values. Everything you do should come back to "what am I about?". If you can distill this into one word - even better! I am still reflecting on my one word - as a Meducator I think it will also have to work as an acronym :)