“If you judge people, you have no time to love them.” Teach Different with Anonymous Author

Transcript

Steve (00:57)

Welcome to the Teach Different Podcast. We have a guest today that will be Lisa, who we’re going to introduce in a moment. I’m here with Dan as well. And, let’s just get right to it. Dan, why don’t you share how you met Lisa, which is the beautiful thing about life, how spontaneous it can be at times. And then we’ll get, you know, right to the quote, learn about what Lisa’s all about, and away we go. So, Dan, how did you meet Lisa?

 

Dan (00:29)

Awesome. So I was in Colorado, I was in Longmont, visiting my daughter and granddaughter and her husband. And I was on my way back to the airport and I was at the Boulder downtown station. And I was just sitting there waiting for the bus to take off. Then Lisa was just sitting next to me on my left and I… I don’t know, just struck up a conversation and asked what she was in here for, in Boulder for, and she shared some just fascinating experiences. And I learned very quickly, she was from Vienna, Austria. And how cool is that? So Lisa, first of all, welcome to the Teach Different podcast. Why don’t you just share a little bit about who you are and what amazingly cool organization that you represent.

 

Lisa Hofer (01:19)

Well, thank you for having me here. It’s so funny that like one week ago I was in Colorado for the first time and we had this conversation and now we’re here having this podcast. So what brought me to the States was a fellowship that I’m joining. It’s from the Watson Institute and they gather entrepreneurs all over the world that are working on mental health for children and youth especially. So that’s why I was there. And that’s also my organization I have here in Austria in Vienna. It’s called Rauszeit, which is a German word. But what we do is we focus on connection and on families. We bring families together, kids with their parents, and we organize retreat experiences for them. We do from two to four days in nature, connecting them first with themselves and then with their family members. And we also do like little workshops. They are just like one or two hours in the cities to have a more sustainable community we’re building that’s all about connection and building resilience and mental health through getting stronger relationships.

 

Steve (02:43)

How do the families find you, Lisa? Like, how how does that work?

 

Lisa Hofer (02:48)

Yeah, that’s a good question. So I was a teacher for the last seven years and also a yoga teacher for kids and families. So I already know like a lot of families in my network and a lot of teacher colleagues, but also we connect a lot with other organizations working in Vienna with families. Well, they think like, hey, could this be a great idea for your clients, for your people you’re coaching, for your parents you’re working with and families who joined us they will tell other families. So we just started last October. So we’re still like evolving and building community.

 

Steve (03:28)

Coming up on your birthday.

 

Lisa Hofer (03:31)

Yeah. That’s true.

 

Steve (03:33)

Yeah. Well, I mean, word of mouth just makes sense to start off. So you taught for seven years, and what did you teach?

 

Lisa Hofer (03:41)

I was a teacher in primary school. So in Austria we teach like all the subjects, but I focused a lot on inclusion, like kids with special needs. And we also had always like a class with kids from different ages, six to ten years old, all mixed in one classroom. And with kids with special needs. So we had like a lot of alternative methods.

 

Steve (04:09)

So the the age range of you know your initiative, I mean, is it safe to say that it’s anywhere from what, six to eighteen, six to fifteen? How old?

 

Lisa Hofer (04:22)

We start with like five year olds and we go up to fourteen. Although we had like, you know, when they have siblings we say of course they’re welcome because we work with kids like separately as well.

 

Steve (04:35)

That’s great.

 

Dan (04:35)

Yeah. And we got to talking, Lisa and I got to talking about what her work is. And then I was sharing a little bit about what we do at Teach Different. And we were kind of looking at each other like, this is too weird that we’re really building communication skills and healthier people through better communication together in different ways. And so there was a natural connection between what you’re doing Lisa and what we’re trying to do at TeachDifferent. And we had a really good like two hour conversation on the bus ride up to the airport. And what a cool, spontaneous way to meet somebody.

 

Steve (05:15)

And here you are.

 

Dan (05:16)

I’m so glad you’re here. I mean, it’s so great.

 

Lisa Hofer (05:19)

I think it’s great too and we found so many similarities in different approaches, but kinda doing a similar thing.

 

Steve (05:28)

And we’re we get to do, I guess, our approach today, like our framework. Who I know that Dan, I’m sure you shared with her the four moves.

 

Dan (05:39)

We did a conversation on the bus.

 

Lisa Hofer (05:41)

Yeah.

 

Steve (05:41)

Good, good. Okay. Beautiful. So we’re all like experts at this point. We know what we’re doing. And for anyone out there that’s new to this, I’m gonna do a quick review, really quick, about how this this method works, the four moves, and then we’re gonna go right into an anonymous quote, which I really, really like, and it’s gonna be a really good one for the teach different method. But what is the teach different method? Four moves claim, counterclaim, essential question, and then storytelling. All right. Now, storytelling, you can supplant that with sharing experiences related to the claim, counterclaim, and essential question. It’s kind of that strand that runs throughout the move. And it’s not linear. Okay, you’ll see in the conversation. We’re going to start out with the claim, but you bounce around in it with a good conversation and it just kind of holds it together. And then hopefully you get something out of it, like an experience where you get to know someone better. You challenge yourself with some deeper thinking and you ask really good questions and you’re really curious about, you know, new things. So that’s what happens when it’s working. And away we go. Okay. Enough of this talk. Let’s have a conversation. Here’s the quote. And again, it’s from an anonymous source. If anybody can find anybody attributed to this, let us know and we will make sure that we get the proper attribution. But we weren’t able to track it down to any person, but it’s very, very thought-provoking. Here it is. I’m going to read it twice. And then maybe Lisa, you can kick us off just by saying what you think it means. And you know, you can go into the claim and then away we go. No script here. Here’s the quote. If you judge people, you have no time to love them. If you judge people, you have no time to love them. Lisa, what are your thoughts? We have a quote on our hands.

 

Lisa Hofer (07:50)

So I love that quote. The first thing that came to my mind reading it was like, if I judge someone, I’m kind of setting a boundary. It feels like closure. So I stop being curious about someone because I already think I know who they are and I think I know their story. So there’s nowhere to go from here. So I think when we’re talking about strangers, like people we don’t know. And we judge them, of course, like we all judge. That’s a human thing to do. It’s also something we can come back to later, but it’s also a good thing to do sometimes. We stop being curious. We don’t ask questions, we don’t ask like maybe why are they like they are right now? we just assume Coming from our own stories and our experiences, we just project our thoughts to these people. So I think it’s true that when you close you take the chance to love someone, get to know someone. So I think there’s a lot of truth in that.

 

Dan (09:07)

That’s a really interesting, beautiful interpretation of this. When you judge someone, you close off to them. You close down something.

 

Steve (09:19)

Boundary.

 

Dan (09:20)

You set a boundary and you close something down where love is about opening up and becoming more free. That, wow, that’s great. I really liked that. Yeah.

 

Steve (09:32)

No boundaries. You know, love right when we talk about love, it’s like endless, timeless, no boundaries. You’re always searching for more. You’re never you never have enough. It’s effusive. There’s so many words we attach, but we don’t ever say, yeah, it’s got limits. Yeah, we better close things off here. And not be curious about something. I mean, I’m interested in the connection between a lack of curiosity caused by judging and how love is there’s no room. If you don’t, if you’re not curious, you can’t extend yourself to love. You know, I’m thinking of philosophy, the love of wisdom. Just that philosophy is based on curiosity. That was immediately what I thought when you brought up that word. Okay, so I’m going all over the place right now. But I heard you say boundaries. I also heard you say that it might make sense that we set up boundaries. Okay. Dan, you could have set up a boundary in the bus. Right? Like you could have just been like, I don’t know who that is. But I don’t know if we want to get to the counterclaim right away. I don’t know. What are you thinking?

 

Dan (10:57)

Well, no, let’s have other people weigh in on this. I mean, Lisa, are you thinking based on what we’ve said?

 

Lisa Hofer (11:05)

Yeah, so I think it’s true, like love is an open source. It’s letting someone in. Love allows us to get know like people and the world because it comes from a place of truth and just honesty. And there is no judgment with that because when you go to the place of love in the moment, then you’re understanding. Giving someone space. So yeah, I think it’s true. And I’m also interested in this curiosity conversation. Like if that’s needed and how much? And To love someone is also to be curious about them. To wanna get to know them.

 

Dan (12:00)

You know, I remember on the bus, Do you remember the quote that we used on the bus?

 

Lisa Hofer (12:07)

I remember the example I gave you.

 

Dan (12:09)

That’s okay. Where I was going with that is you shared a story, maybe it wasn’t part of the conversation, but it was sometime during the bus ride about your father and how your father was an extremely patient person. And this quote actually made me think a little bit about that and how love, he didn’t seem to be someone who is very judging and of people, he kind of let you be you. So I don’t know if your parenting experience could connect with this. Is there a connection there?

 

Lisa Hofer (12:52)

Definitely like as you just mentioned, my dad, he’s like I’ve always like really seen him from the place of love and understanding, which is a total gift. So of course what comes to my mind right now, like he’s this super generous person, and accepting everyone so much that coming back to the boundaries sometimes there are not enough boundaries, right? Yeah, but of course, like growing up like this, I totally felt accepted and loved. Yes.

 

Dan (13:39)

Interesting. So are you suggesting Lisa that perhaps he was too far on the side of acceptance that maybe he could have set boundaries a little better?

 

Lisa Hofer (13:57)

Yes. And that’s not just me talking in like a parenting style, because setting boundaries for me is also taking responsibility. for his life. Boundaries are also a way of love because you tell people who you love like what your boundaries are. So it’s also about self-acceptance and self-love here.

 

Dan (14:20)

Now that seems to be a little bit of a counterclaim, Steve. Would you agree that judging and setting boundaries is an expression of love.

 

Steve (14:30)

Yeah. There are so many books out there that talk about the need to set boundaries. Because when you don’t have boundaries, you lose your sense of self and you don’t protect yourself. And I guess I want to be careful in my mind with the quote, because the quote says judge people. Setting a boundary and judging them, I’m not thinking those are the same. So I’m not trying to rescue this from the counterclaim, but I would say that judging is another level. It’s absolutely setting a boundary and closing you off to someone, but it’s going that extra mile and having something to say about. you know, someone else’s life that doesn’t show any curiosity, any empathy, any patience with maybe they’re having a bad day. So I’m gonna rescue the claim. That was my purpose.

 

Dan (15:43)

Well, I think it depends on what you’re judging them about. Someone is drinking heavily, has a huge drinking problem, and gets themselves into trouble and gets critical and hurts people, would judge them. You would say, I’m setting a boundary right now. I’m not going to participate in that behavior. And so I am cutting you off because what you’re doing is harmful to others and to me. So in that sense, you’re judging people, right?

 

Lisa Hofer (16:21)

Right. I think that’s the most important difference with judgment. You can judge someone’s behaviour, but you don’t judge them as a person.

 

Steve (16:33)

Thank you, Lisa.

 

Dan (16:34)

There you go.

 

Steve (16:35)

You took the words right out of my mouth. Thank you.

 

Lisa Hofer (16:38)

Like also in school we do that a lot, right? but we try to do it like okay, your behavior is not right but you as a person are. So that’s when we as people like we start having these beliefs. I’m a selfish person, I’m a lazy person, I’m this. Because some people create stories about us. Like as a student, you think like, I’m not intelligent. I’m so slowly because they always say, like, you’re doing that, you’re doing that. But that’s just like maybe one part of the behavior, or maybe just one day that it happens like this. That’s such an important difference. thing with children, but like with everyone. Yes. I can love you and I can still judge your behavior, but I’m still seeing you as the person, but I judge this and it’s okay, right?

 

Dan (17:37)

Right. Right. You can judge. You can still judge as long as the judging doesn’t go into who they are as a person, but it’s the behavior that they’re exhibiting. So that’s the, that’s in this quote. I’m realizing when you judge people, if it’s just the person, but a lot of people think of actions that people take as part of who they are. But it’s important to keep that separate. I think that’s great. Yeah.

 

Steve (18:09)

And then you go back to the quote: If you judge people, you have no time to love them. So that’s not behavior. That’s saying that someone is bad. You have no time to love them. If you’ve made that decision, that you’re going to say someone, a person, is bad. So I’m inclined to actually start agreeing with this quote. If we take it literally, I think that that does cut off any ability to love.

 

Dan (18:45)

I was adding actions as part of what people do. I wasn’t thinking of it as just interesting. When you judge people, you’re usually judging something that they do. saying you are an absolutely awful person. You’re saying, you know what, stop treating that guy this way. What you’re doing is really, really bad. I’m judging you.

 

Lisa Hofer (19:11)

That would be the best case scenario if we would just judge behaviors, right?

 

Dan (19:17)

I know, gosh, yes.

 

Lisa Hofer (19:20)

Yeah.

 

Steve (19:21)

May I offer a religious example? There are Christians who believe that if you are not a Christian, You’re not going to heaven. You’re not saved. So you’re judging people who are not Christians. You know, there are Christians that would say you’re a heathen. You’re believing in an idol that’s not True, like you. It’s not just your behavior, it’s your beliefs. when you think about judging people because of their beliefs, in a way that’s a behavior. But I wonder, I guess my essential question would be in that case, could you love someone who’s not saved? You know, could you love someone from another religion, even though they’re not believing in what you know to be true? I don’t know. I just brought in belief instead of action and instead of behaviors. Correct.

 

Dan (20:25)

It is another extension of a person. Right. Lisa, come on in before Steve and I keep talking.

 

Lisa Hofer (20:31)

So I think yeah, it’s another example of action. Like for example what I think of is also like political parties or having I don’t know in Austria when there was the pandemic, okay, there were so many discussions, and you were like believing in this or believing in that. That’s just like it’s not even like world religion, but just disagreements. And that’s where it becomes so hard to laugh sometimes and not just close off and judge. And I think That’s also that’s the thing with like actions, religions, and having different political parties. It’s all about that. You think your own truth. And it’s also kind of protection protecting yourself, right? So this is my truth and it’s the right thing. So I will need to judge something maybe to protect my truth for that. But of course, if we could stay open, discuss with people that have other opinions, with other religions, people that did bad things in the world, you know, I think it could spread of course so much more love than closure and just fighting and assuming things about each other. And being in this protected shell, like, yeah, but I’m in the right team. I know the right thing.

 

Dan (22:04)

Yes. The protection closes down the capacity for love. Protection, you can’t have love without openness, as you said earlier. I like how you move to the idea of protection, out of protection, we tend to judge because we feel safer in some way. And yet when we feel safer, we make it impossible to love because we close it down.

 

Steve (22:35)

And to push the counterclaim, I guess. We’ve talked about behaviors that you should deem bad, not the person. We talked about beliefs that you could deem bad or you disagree with, but you’re not judging the person. Protection makes me think of someone who has caused you harm. Or is wanting to cause you harm? If you judge people, you have no time to love them.

You know, if someone’s wants to cause me harm and has been very upfront about that. It’s gonna be hard to not judge them and say, you’re trying to hurt me. I’m gonna judge you. I need to protect myself. Of course I have no time to love you. You’re trying to hurt me. This is on you. I can’t intellectualize, you know, I need something from you. It’s not just my decision, and I’m not able to make this decision on my own if I feel attacked. You know. So I’m again counterclaim here. I’m just trying to.

 

Lisa Hofer (23:58)

Yeah, of course I get it, like it’s a natural thing to do. But there is one person that really comes to my mind which would like speak against it. I don’t know if you know Anna Frank. She is a woman from the Holocaust, right? So I read her diary. So she I would say could speak out of experience, like meeting all these crimes and really bad people and bad behaviors and this one sentence in her book like in English it’s something like in the end I think everyone has a good heart. it would be like she experiencing all of this. All like family members die, even she did herself like later on, but okay. Still she could choose seeing love behind all this dark brutal behavior right

 

Dan (25:02)

She saw that everybody was redeemable. Everybody was capable of being loved. That’s an amazing quote from that book.

 

Steve (25:12)

Even the Nazis?

 

Lisa Hofer (25:13)

Yeah, even that.

 

Dan (25:15)

She saw it even in them.

 

Lisa Hofer (25:18)

So I know that’s like horrible to imagine and I think it’s not possible in every moment to choose this kind of thought. But I really love this quote, it was kinda like a mantra I took for my own life too because it’s so inspiring and I think it’s you know, it’s easy to say from like a perspective that you haven’t experienced such things like, yeah, I believe in the good of people. But yeah. That’s really inspiring too. Because she might think like, okay, you’re a horrible like person to me, my family, this group, but maybe you’re an amazing brother. Whatever. Like, you know, it’s not their whole story, maybe. And it’s so hard to think about that, that it couldn’t be true at the same time, like people doing most horrible things.

 

Dan (26:15)

It’s interesting you say that about Anne Frank and how she’s able to look past this terrible evil of people and to think you have a brother, you have a mother, you’ve cried, been vulnerable before. And then I think of, back to what you said earlier about political parties, how there are people that are committed to their political party that they can’t even accept other people Because they have different views from them. Well, gosh if Anne Frank is able to look at these people and see redeeming positive loving qualities. Well, then can’t other people do that over political beliefs? You know, it seems like it’s so much easier for us to do it. Anyway, your story was very inspiring.

 

Lisa Hofer (27:09)

Or that could be a question, right? I mean, how can we be capable of less judging and staying more open? Because it’s easy to love someone that is on your team, right? Same values, opinions. That’s more easy to do, but how can we stay open to love if that’s not the case? So that could be a question, right? I mean, how can we be capable of less judging, staying more open? Because it’s easy to love someone that is on your team, right? Same values, same opinions. That’s that’s more easy to do, but how can we stay open to love if that’s not the case?

 

Dan (27:26)

Yes.

 

Lisa Hofer (27:37)

Could be more world peace behind this answer. Yeah.

 

Dan (27:43)

How can we stay more open to love?

 

Lisa Hofer (27:46)

Right.

 

Dan (27:48)

A question that organically came out of this interaction. Good.

 

Steve (27:53)

I might even throw in what does judge really mean?

 

Dan (27:58)

Yeah, right,

 

Steve (28:00)

It’s got layers. I th this is where I I like I like just looking up the word judge and seeing what the definition is. And I’m gonna do that while you two continue to talk and then I’ll share.

 

Dan (28:14)

And I’ll go off of that. I think Steve, that is a good question. What do we mean when we say judge? Do we mean judging of beliefs? Do we mean judging of behavior? Or do we mean something else? And in these conversations, Lisa, a lot of times you’ll be talking like we’re talking. and they’ll be a student or an adult, depending on what the setting is, that will say, well, wait a minute, what does it mean to judge someone? And then you’ll have a conversation on just the definition of judging before you can come back to the quote. But that’s a good, that’s a good like tangent to go on.

 

Steve (28:57)

Are you ready?

 

Lisa Hofer (28:58)

Yes.

 

Steve (29:00)

It’s not as bad as I think we were suggesting. Here’s one. Judge is to form an opinion about through careful weighing of evidence and testing of premises. Judge is to think of yourself as being a judge in a courtroom. You’re presumably you’ve listened to everything, like you’ve been open-minded, you’ve been inclusive, you’ve been patient, you’ve heard from everything. You want to know really before you make your decision and form your opinion. But what do we kind of feel that judging is in the day to day? When you judge, you’re saying you’re better than someone. You’re you’re call right people, you’re calling them evil, whereas you are good, you are the judge. And we have these phrases that say, you’re not God. Only God can judge. Only God has enough information. You know, all we have, back to your point, your observations, Lisa, where you don’t know what someone else is going through. They have a good side to them. You might be just seeing the bad side. You don’t have all the information, the evidence. Anyway, that was a trailing thought. I don’t know where to go with that.

 

Lisa Hofer (30:40)

I mean that’s interesting. It seems to be so neutral. Like when I thought about judging, I assumed it’s like a negative judgment. So this explanation says it’s like neutral. We could also judge in a positive way. Like, hey, I think that’s a great woman. I’m just seeing her on the street, like yeah. But…

 

Dan (31:03)

Yeah. Right. Right. And I think, I think it’s, I think it’s the end of this quote. You have no time to love them that signals, that signals that this is a negative of a person, but you know, it’s, it’s claiming something negative about somebody else. But you’re right. Like you judge a cookie. This cookie is not very tasty. We’re doing that all the time. We’re making observations and then we are coming to conclusions based on our observations.

 

Steve (31:41)

Go with that. Let’s say judging isn’t so negative. It could be positive, it could be negative, whatever. You’re just judging. You’re weighing evidence, you’re forming an opinion. If you judge people, you have no time to love them. This is actually getting more interesting and specific now. When you’re weighing evidence and you’re judging people, you’re coming up with some type of idea or an opinion based on evidence. When you love someone, you’re not weighing evidence. Like you’re not using that part in your mind that’s like adding up, well, they’ve done this and this and this and this, and I know I’m gonna say this. You’re like There’s no boundaries. Like you’re gonna love them even if they mistreat you. You’re gonna love them even if there is no limit to it. It’s not evidence based. It’s more emotional or in another state. So anyway, I’m, what what what’s your struggle, Dan?

 

Dan (32:55)

That depends on your definition of evidence, but no, that depends on your definition of what evidence is. I think evidence could be an emotional connection you have with someone too. You just,

 

Steve (33:05)

You’re so boring.

 

Dan (33:06)

You sense it in a different way. So I know I, you can, I see what you’re saying. Lisa, what do you think?

 

Lisa Hofer (33:17)

I mean now this whole quote like turns up and down. But I yeah, so if someone mistreats you, you could be like, okay. You can when you come from this place of love, you would be more like open like questions. Why did you do that? Like what came to your mind to you know, but so I think we also need judging in the good and the negative way. Because like coming back to the story you started, like from my family experience, like disjudgment or call it boundaries, it’s also love.

 

Steve (33:58)

Right.

 

Dan (33:58)

Judging can be part of the love equation. It’s not always bad. It can be good. It can be neutral.

 

Steve (34:05)

So that’s the counterclaim. I’m trying to think of an experience. I mean, you shared one, Lisa. Dan, do you have anything, just any experience just of that that you know speaks to this?

 

Dan (34:18)

Parenting. An example of what parents struggle with. You know, we are in positions where we see our child do things that we know are wrong and we have to intervene, step in and say, you know what, don’t do this or don’t treat them that way or don’t whatever you are judging their behavior. You’re looking at their behavior, you’re drawing conclusions and you’re opening your mouth and telling them not to do something. I think to what I’m going to what kind of what Lisa said is that if done in a nice way is another way of saying, I care about you. I’m aware of the things you’re doing and I am someone here to love you unconditionally, but I’m going to point out things that I believe are wrong. And that’s my job as a parent sometimes. So anyway, I go to parenting as the example of this.

 

Steve (35:26)

That’s great. And again, that is leaning toward a counterclaim in some sense, in that you can have both. You can judge and love people. It’s okay, you know?

 

Dan (35:38)

Yeah. Right. And the heart, just real quick, and then as you think, the hardest part as a parent is when you come down hard on your kids to then remind them that you still love them. Whether it’s a hug or whatever, that is a dance that you do as a parent that is very difficult and I have no answers to it. It’s a lifelong, but I have a granddaughter now, so it’s gonna be fun to try that out with her.

 

Steve (36:14)

I didn’t really come up with an experience per se, but I’ll just say one thing, kind of building off what you’re saying with the parenting. The looking out for your child and you know, setting boundaries and judging, but loving them at the same time. That can be an internal reality in the parent where. They are doing it for the good of their child. Okay? The optics of it from the child are what sometimes stray, right, from the original spirit behind it from the parent’s perspective. Because if you’re a kid and your parents always telling you what to do and what not to do, that can start feeling like a lack of love over time. If they’re always criticizing you, for instance. Even though they are doing it because they love you, they want you to be better. So, anyway, I was just thinking of it from how the optics of it can get messed up if there isn’t true communication between the two. And I’m gonna throw this out. Love is what creates good communication. Like love is in that communication where you have to step outside of the judging and just say, Look, you know, cry with someone for a little bit. And then you can come back and I don’t know. I don’t know where that went, but

 

Lisa Hofer (37:59)

Yeah. Like adding up to the parent thing, I think it’s like in every kind of connection. Where you can communicate like good with each other, like it’s a friend or like relationship, students, whatever. It’s like I love you and because I love you, I’m calling you out on that. Right? Because

love can have this communication. Because you can deal with it. Because I feel loved, I can take it. It also opens up for this like hard communication. But it’s a dance, right? Like not feeling criticized and it will be different like every day, how you react to that. Because but I think when you really know that you are loved and it comes from this place of love in the moment. then you’re more likely to take that.

 

Dan (39:02)

To take the right, criticisms and the boundary setting. Yes, yes, yes. Well said.

 

Steve (39:06)

Yeah. But be proactive with the communication. Proactive with the communication. Love. You need to share that be proactive. Let them know. Let everybody know.

 

Dan (39:19)

You might have experienced this, Lisa, with the children you taught in the seven or eight years you taught. I experienced it in my 33 years, Steve, 20 years. We have a lot of teaching experience on this podcast. Children who come into your classroom who are needing attention, acting out, often are in homes that don’t set boundaries for them. And they don’t get that part of love. They get too much permission to do whatever they want. That’s where a little bit of the judging or a little bit of the correcting

 

Steve (40:01)

The tough love. Tough love.

 

Dan (40:02)

And the tough love, the tough love can help.

 

Lisa Hofer (40:06)

Yeah. But still like coming back to this. Now I’m thinking about a lot of students. And like the ones with the worst behavior, right? I always tried so much to be like you are loved, but this is not okay and this needs consequences. But it’s not you as a person because then they start like No one likes me, you know, like all of these beliefs are coming in. And it’s so hard, like you said, to be in this dance of like giving person the feeling that they are okay the way they are, but still not every behavior is okay and not to be accepted. yeah. And that’s a really hard balance to create.

 

Steve (40:57)

Very difficult balance. Maybe that’s a good place for us to kind of culminate here. Like this is not an easy back and forth. Judging is something that’s almost natural. We do it out of self-preservation. Sometimes it sets a boundary that’s helpful. It could be good, it could be bad. love is also there and when love is communicated over time, even with tough love and boundaries, you can balance this. So this quote If you judge people you have no time to love them. I don’t want to say we landed on a counterclaim a little bit with an angle, but I think it was a good conversation. What are your thoughts, Dan, as we wrap up?

 

Dan (41:44)

Wrapping up. I mean, I think it was really, really good. Could you share the Anne Frank quote again, Lisa?

 

Lisa Hofer (41:51)

So I know it in German, but in English it should be in the end, I believe that everyone has a good heart.

 

Dan (42:00)

That’s the end of this podcast.

 

Steve (42:02)

With that we conclude. Lisa, thank you so much from Austria. Right? You’re in Austria, correct?

 

Dan (42:07)

Yes.

 

Lisa Hofer (42:08)

Right in Austria and Vienna.

 

Steve (42:10)

It was great to have you on. Let’s have you on again. And we’re connected now. And we’re gonna learn more about your organization. And hopefully, you know, we can combine forces a little bit and share the different resources and things that we learn together. And we really appreciate you.

 

Dan (42:27)

Thank you so much, Lisa.

 

Steve (42:28)

So we yeah, with that, we’ll see you next time on the Teach Different Podcast.

 

Lisa Hofer (42:32)

Thank you so much.