022 - Pit Pony Gareth Isaac - Classroom to Mindfulness Teacher

In this deeply introspective episode of the Pit Pony Podcast, Sharon and Sarah sit down with Gareth Isaac, a former sociology teacher who left the classroom after 4 years - overwhelmed by exhaustion, stress, and a profound sense of disconnection. Gareth candidly shares how he navigated the physical and emotional toll of burnout, his struggle to recognise what was happening to him, and the journey that followed his decision to leave teaching.

Now a mindfulness teacher, Gareth explains how mindfulness became his anchor, helping him reconnect with himself and redefine what it means to live in the present. From coaching young football players to facilitating men’s mental health groups, Gareth is using his experiences to empower others.

Expect honest reflections on:

• The pressure of perfectionism and people-pleasing in teaching.
• The impact of burnout on the body and mind.
• The transformative power of mindfulness in finding clarity and purpose.
• The societal challenges of male mental health and why it’s so important to talk.

This episode is for anyone grappling with stress, change, or a sense of being “stuck.” Gareth’s story is a testament to the strength found in vulnerability and the healing that comes from reconnecting with yourself.

For more information about what Gareth is doing, please visit:
https://www.garethisaac.co.uk/from-stress-to-strength

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Edited with finesse by our Podcast Super Producer, Mike Roberts of Making Digital Real

Transcript

Hello, and welcome to the Pit Pony podcast with myself, Sharon Cawley, and me, Sarah Dunwood, in which we talk to teachers from all walks of life who exited the classroom from what they thought was a job for life and thrived on the other side of teaching. Coming up in this episode. It never really felt real. 

It felt like a dream, like a lot of my life has possibly. It felt like I was somebody else sleepwalking through, and like in a coma. And that moment, with all its imperfections, depending on what you think perfect is, felt real.

Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Pit Pony podcast. Thank you so much for joining us today. Today, we have Gareth Isaacs with us. 

Gareth is an interesting story, and one I think you'll really, really enjoy once we start to get into it with Gareth. Gareth started teaching in his 30s. Not one of these born to teach teachers that we've interviewed in the past, but he, in 2014, in his words, sleepwalked into the profession. 

Naively going into the classroom, he told me. A sociology teacher. In 2014, school paid for him to qualify through Teach First. 

And then in 2017, he found himself in a school in leafy Hertfordshire. Not a toxic school, not a horror story by any stretch of the imagination. But he stayed for one year and half a term. 

Interesting, that one year and that half a term again that we keep hearing about. And then he left the profession. So, welcome Gareth. 

And what are you up to these days, please? Thank you very much for having me. So, these days, I'm a mindfulness teacher, which may or may not mean much to people who are listening. It certainly will by the end of it, Gareth, because we will get into exactly what that means in a minute. 

But before we do that, Gareth, can you take us back to 2017 and how after what is a relatively short time in teaching, you left the classroom? Walk us through that decision-making process. It wasn't really a decision that I made consciously with my head. It was a decision that was made for me by the body. 

So, it was very weird. It was after the first half term after the summer holidays, it coincided with me feeling like I was starting to get the hang of the job and starting to know what I was supposed to do. And because of the way I approach teaching, that meant that I was working even more than I was before, trying to get all the lessons absolutely perfect, planning all the PowerPoints from scratch, just everything down to the finest detail. 

And yeah, so in many ways, that first half term felt really good compared to the other years I've been in teaching when I wasn't anywhere near as confident. And I knew I was tired, but you're always tired when you're a teacher, aren't you? And the half term happened and that stop then allowed me to perhaps notice how I was feeling. And I felt very weird. 

I didn't know how to describe it. I probably, I still find it hard to describe. It was like it wasn't me. 

That's how it felt. It was a bit eerie, really, a bit scary and it wasn't a nice feeling at all. And everything felt a bit like a dream, a bit hazy and a bit, yeah, it was just really weird. 

But as I tended to do, sort of batted it off and cracked on. The school that I was at is in Hertfordshire. My family came down to visit the weekend before we went back to school. 

And that's when it just, I really noticed because I was with them that something wasn't right. Just felt very, very odd. Not anything that I'd ever felt before.

It was a physical thing where it just like, again, like I wasn't really there. Like I was somebody watching me go about the day. And it was, again, quite eerie and disconcerting.

I've spoken to quite a few people in my time. And one of the words that they, they use is disassociation. They felt they disassociated themselves with their life. 

Does that resonate with you in any way, that kind of concept that I've just talked about? Well, it does now because it makes sense to me. And also that's a word that's been used. So I, which I'm sure we'll talk about later, but I subsequently had some therapy. 

And again, that was a word that was used there. It was a word that was used by the GP. Yeah, that pretty accurately describes it, I would say.

And when your family came down and you could feel that something wasn't right, did you talk to your family about that? Did you? No. No. I knew you were going to say that, my friend. 

You are not an original. So you chose not to talk to your family about that. And I think that's quite common.

I didn't think that was even an option. It didn't occur to me. And that might be partly because I'm a man and you don't, I've perhaps been taught to not share that sort of information. 

But more than anything, I was just confused. I was just, I didn't really know what was going on myself. So I, yeah, I didn't say anything. 

They didn't notice anything wrong with me, which is interesting. That weekend, we did meet up with my head of department, who became a friend. She was the psychology teacher at the school and been brilliant with me that whole first year, really helped me a lot. 

And we met up with her and her husband and a little girl. And that evening, when I was back home alone in the flat where I was living, I decided that I would tell her the following day. So this was the first day back at school.

I would tell her after the, at the end of the school day. And I didn't, I had no idea at that point what would happen after that. I just felt like she needed to know. 

I probably just felt like I wanted to tell somebody and I trusted her. So I, I did, I taught that first day with nobody else knowing that I felt odd other than myself. And funnily enough, during the lessons, I just slipped right back into the role that you play as a teacher. 

And the lessons were absolutely fine. They went quite well. It was as if everything was fine. 

It wasn't until sort of break time, lunchtime, when it was like, oh yeah, I'm still feeling really odd. I'd forgotten about that. So yeah, at the end of the day, just said to her, do you, do you mind if I have a quick chat? I found that because I, I talk about the Sunday scaries and the fear of the return after a half term or a weekend and, and what it was with me, like, like you, I couldn't quantify what was wrong, but I knew it was not right. 

And it was only my strength of character that kept saying, this isn't normal. This isn't normal. And I practically became nocturnal. 

So I couldn't get to sleep on the, on the, of an evening. Then by the time I finally dropped off, I'd go into the sleep of the dead. So I was fighting to wake myself up in the morning. 

So I was constantly on this catch up running on empty. But the weirdest thing ever was the minute I drove through those school gates, there was almost a sense of relief that I was back there. And I've never fathomed that Sarah, have you got any insight on exactly what Gareth's just said there, when you're in the mixer and doing it, that's the bit that feels normal, despite the fact you're in this twilight zone.

I think I'd completely normalized all of it in my head. And it's only, and I've said this so many times, it's only with time and distance away from it that I look at it now and go, none of that was normal. None of that staying up till midnight, working, not being able to switch off and get to sleep. 

But I just accepted that as that was part of being a teacher because I'd never, I was like you Gareth, I was, I was the absolute perfectionist, do everything over and above and reinvent the wheel quite often because I wanted it to be mine, not, not something that I'd adapted from somewhere else. And I did that right from the get go, starting in 1995. And I'm going to use the phrase, I think I gaslit myself from the first year of my career, that that was normal. 

And I mean, one of the things I remember Gareth saying, and this would be of an interest to you Sarah, am I right in thinking that the year this was happening and you'd won the kids around, you got the best results you could ever have expected? Yeah. Just briefly though, to go back to what you were just saying, it reminds it, the word institutionalized springs to mind. And I was thinking about the Shawshank Redemption.

I don't know if you've ever seen that film and about how you get used to that, that situation that's not normal and not natural, you might say. And then you can't cope in the outside world. And for me, looking back now, that definitely was the case that my whole experience of a teacher was not normal. 

And I don't think healthy, and I wouldn't choose that for myself now. But at the time, it wasn't a case of me having a thought, this isn't normal, something needs to change. I didn't, that didn't even enter my mind. 

I didn't question that. I just, I just continued and carried on like a zombie, not like a person. I think there's parallels. 

I've a number of people in my life who, who've been in the army or in the armed forces in one way, shape or form. And that is, is common in terms of that, that, that adjusting to civilian life, not army life. And, and I know then they're not comparable, but that experience feels comparable of, of coming out of something into, into something different. 

And I, I know Sharon, what you were saying, and, and we'll go into this conversation with Gareth about the best results, because that was the irony of the year that I exited was the, the best results I'd ever had was the year I exited. Yeah. And as I say, with the case of that half term, it wasn't that I was dreading it or anything.

I think I'd just, again, I was numb to that sort of thing by that point, but it was just with me and the way I experienced that, as I say, it was a physical sensation. It just felt very odd that again, something wasn't right. I had no idea what it was. 

And I just felt I had to tell somebody, but yeah, it was, it was a difficult first year at that, at that school in many ways. Um, and particularly for the year 13 A-level class, because obviously they'd had their year 12 with another teacher, my predecessor, who's like, um, very experienced of 20 odd years. Um, and then there's me as a, still a relative novice. 

That's certainly how it felt walking in, which obviously they, you know, they're kids and they're not stupid. They, they, they can recognize that. And yeah, managed, I think up to, to an extent to win them over if you, if you want to say that.

And, um, obviously I'm sure there's, there's some of them that still didn't like me, but you know, the odd, I think generally you could say that and, um, got to a point where I got really honest with them. That was a real, real big turning point with that class during the first year, you know, in quite a vulnerable way, just sort of said how it was. Um, and yeah, they did get really good results. 

I'm still not convinced that was anything to do with me. I think that says a lot about my own perception of myself, maybe, but they did apparently the best results in the school that year. And when I heard this during the summer, when my head of department, the woman I already mentioned told me this, and obviously she was really, really happy and was like, Oh, because that was her first year as a head of department. 

And she was like, Oh, I'm so grateful. And you've done so well. And this is, this is so brilliant. 

I didn't tell her this at the time, of course, but at the time I thought to myself, I don't care. I'm not bothered, which is a terrible thing to say in many ways, you might say, because we're talking and it's not obviously that I didn't take responsibility for people's education and people's grades, but perhaps that they weren't the main reasons that I was burning out. That was more to do with people pleasing possibly again on reflection in hindsight. 

Uh, but yeah, the actual, for me personally, the motivation was obviously not particularly there to get, to help kids get good grades, which is a terrible thing to admit possibly, but that's, that's the truth of it. It's really interesting listening to you because I've written a couple of things, a couple of things down. You've, you've described imposter syndrome to a degree you've described, and I've written down for myself that the struggle with describing the physical feeling, because I think I know what that physical feeling was, but it's really difficult to articulate. 

It's like your body's functioning without who you are being present. And that, that there's, that there's somebody else inside the physical body. That's not you. 

You're outside of it. That's the only way I, I am recognizing what you're talking about. And it is, it is kind of disassociation and it's almost that the imposter is inside your physical body and you're watching it happen. 

And that that's, I've been trying to think how to kind of capture what I think you were feeling. And that's the only way that I can relate it. I think that's accurate. 

And I think there is, you know, the body has its own intelligence and it was trying to tell me something because the mind was not, it was not switched on to asking questions or thinking that this wasn't what I wanted to do or that I had a choice to not do it. That never even came into question. And yeah, I, and that's the interesting thing as I became more how a teacher should be or how I thought a teacher should be, I became that role. 

And so I did completely lose myself. Yeah. You get further and further away from who you actually are.

And so, because, because of that, you, things like self-care go out the window because it's, it's not like you're operating as a human, you're just operating like a machine. So it, again, it didn't even occur to me to, to look after myself with regards, sleep, eat, rest, a social life, communication with others outside of the school setting, didn't even occur to me. Wow. 

There's, there's so much there. And when actually you think about it, it's such a quick, quick period of time, you know, Sarah talked about 30 years. You're, you're probably talking three or four years here for that to happen.

Yeah. Yeah. And the, the burnout, if we're going to call it that, I think was a continuation from the first school that I was at, you know, I don't, I never wish to point the finger of blame on anything or anyone anyway. 

Um, but yeah, I certainly couldn't do that at the second school I was at. It was just the situation, the circumstances, what I brought to the role of teaching through my own unhelpful thoughts and beliefs that I'd Pited up long before I ever started teaching from very, very young, like we all do. And again, I only know that now through having had some therapy and having that, having a light shone on that.

It was just the way it played out. And I'm actually weirdly enough, very grateful for it. What I would like to say is, you know, it seems to happen quite quickly, but I should imagine I'm right in thinking that you didn't just tender your resignation and then everything like in a poof of a miracle. 

Gareth Isaac was back fighting fate. Let's go on to the next project. What was the aftermath like when you left teaching physically, emotionally, financially? What was that period like immediately after leaving? So it depends what you mean by leaving and as, as in when leaving was, because technically I left teaching after that first half term, I didn't know it at the time.

Going back to the conversation with my head of department, she suggested that I go and see a doctor, which I'm forever grateful for. At the time I was confused and thought what are you on about? And she also said the words, I think you might need a bit of time off, which at the time I said to her, you've got to be joking. I can't do that. 

I've got all these responsibilities and commitments, got all this stuff I've got to do for the kids, thinking I was so important. And went to the doctors the next day, the doctors, I explained how I felt. She, she was brilliant in my opinion. 

And she said, it sounds like you're experiencing exhaustion, stress with some mild anxiety and depression. And she said that I was going to have two weeks off. She signed me off work for two weeks, which at the time, again, I couldn't believe. 

And I was like, absolutely can't do that. You know that. And she was obviously stuck to her guns and said, no, that's what's going to happen. 

And little did I know that from that day that, that two weeks kept being prolonged and turned into a year, a year that I was signed off from any sort of work. As it turned out, it turned out to be forever with regards to school teaching. Again, I had no idea of this at the time. 

It was strongly advised. Once I'd said, reported back to my head of department, she said, I think you need to go back and stay with some family back in the Midlands where I'm from, which I did. And that year was very weird. 

And when I look back at that now, it's like, because it was, it was like a year of being in a dream. There was, there was a point in that year where I was put on some medication, sertraline, and that exacerbated those feelings. Is that the right word? Made those feelings stronger of feeling completely out of it, like a, like a zombie, like a, like I was in a dream world. 

My sleep was all over the place. I was just not present. I just wasn't myself at all. 

And it was just this aftermath of burning myself out. And then yeah, something had been worn out there. So that first year was very, very odd. 

I did go back to work. I've, I've, um, I've coached football for many years and I went back to work for a football coaching company that I'd worked for previously, just part-time initially. Yeah. 

So obviously before then overrunning my tail, I had made the decision to leave teaching that came, you know, the, the, although I was a zombie during that year, that was the year I had the therapy. Um, I went and saw a private therapist. Uh, I had a few little communications with mental health practitioners that were, that were free. 

It wasn't particularly helpful for me personally at that time. Obviously it can be amazing and lifesaving for many people as I well know too well now, but somebody knew of a local private therapist who'd been highly recommended. So, um, I went to see her that was completely life-changing.

So that was all during that first year when I was still in a zombie state. I think you've, you've touched on two things there that again, very, very common threads in my experience and Sarah's. People resist going to the doctors and they resist going to the doctors for a couple of reasons. 

Number one, they don't genuinely think they'll meet the requirements of being signed off, which is just utterly laughable because they walk in there and you can practically say to a doctor, now I'm a teacher and they go, right, how long? And that teacher just sits there and goes, well, like you can't really articulate it and you've normalized it. Go to your doctor. Because sometimes sitting opposite a medical professional behind a desk is the message you need to hear, which is, this is not normal and you are unwell and you are going to become very, very unwell. 

So I always recommend going to the doctor. The second thing is you talked about therapy 100%. I have been in therapy practically for the last 10, 15 years. 

There doesn't even have to be an acute mental health crisis. There's different coaches, different therapists, same with my children. They've had therapy. 

It's about finding the right therapist. Don't have your first toe dipped in the water with therapy and go, well, that was rubbish. No, it wasn't.

It just wasn't the right fit for you. And I mean, good God, if we lived in America, it's calendared in, isn't it? What we're doing today, we're going slimming world. We're doing the weekly shop. 

We're going to the therapist. And it's not, it's getting better, I think. But therapy as a means of coming through what you've come through, I would recommend that to anybody. 

And yourself, Sarah, you've had some great, powerful experiences, haven't you, along your healing journey? Yeah. And I think that's where I wanted to come in, because it's about finding the right thing for you at the moment. So listeners won't have been able to see me nodding along furiously in relation to your experience with sertraline, because that was my experience with sertraline.

It actually amplified, but made me numb at the same time. But I know for other people it has worked. And I think that's always the thing with different people's experiences are their own experiences. 

And we can only ever make a judgment about our own decisions based on how things impact us. So for me, I did have talking therapy and an extensive coaching, which actually turned into more like therapy in a lot of respects, even though it wasn't. And to the point where actually I was able to remove myself from the medication. 

And that's the way I see it rather than the medication for me, because the medication didn't actually help me. It just made me flat, but gave me a whole pile of other consequences. But for other people, it might well be the thing that works. 

So I really wanted to come to that point of don't stop with the first thing that you try. And I think that's what you've articulated, Gareth, is you found the thing that worked for you at the point in time where you needed it. Well, whether I found it or it found me, again, a bit like with teaching, I just felt like I got really lucky or unlucky in the case of teaching, you might say. 

But it is what it is. I sort of fell into it. I fell into it all. 

I didn't feel like it was a real conscious decision. I don't think I was in a place to make many conscious decisions, really. Yeah, I'm very hesitant to offer advice to anybody about anything, to be quite honest with you, because what do I know? Certainly, yeah, it did have very similar effects by the sounds of it from what you've said, for me. 

As you say, it could be absolutely amazing for other people, I'm sure. Therapy, there's therapy and there's therapy. Again, I probably just stumbled across a therapist who I absolutely connected with from the very first session. 

And I loved it and felt like, oh, why haven't I been doing this before? This is exactly what I've been needing. I can actually talk about what I'm experiencing. I've never told anybody this stuff before. 

Yeah, again, it was the realization very early on that, yes, of course, teaching is a very stressful job. But it was what I brought to it that made it very unhealthy. And also, there was a lot of moments of clarity, if you like, during the therapy. 

One was that I realized I never actually wanted to be a teacher. I did it because I thought I should, because other people thought I'd be good at it. There were elements of it that I did really enjoy. 

And that was mainly the classroom stuff. It was the out of the classroom stuff that took over and overwhelmed. So that allowed me to make that decision at one point during the year. 

Also, I should say coincided with me not getting paid as much anymore because I've been off for so long. So that also influenced that decision, it has to be said. And yeah, not being able to afford the flat where I was living and that sort of thing. 

So again, that influenced that decision of moving out of Hertfordshire. But I knew that that was it for me, for school teaching. I knew it wasn't for me. 

I didn't know what I was going to do. I had no idea. And I wasn't in a mental state at that point to work that out or to try and navigate that. 

But you find yourself football coaching. Yeah. You dip your toe back in to a certain extent. 

So how do we go from leaving the classroom, building yourself back up to therapy, some sports coaching? How does Gareth Isaacs move from where he was then to the mindfulness coach that you are now? Walk us through the next epoch, the next chapter. Okay. So that football coaching job, I went back to that too soon in retrospect. 

I still wasn't ready to go back to work. I was still out of it. I'd come back and lived in the Midlands and the doctor that I saw there said, you're all right now. 

Not you're all right, but you can do a little bit. And I think he was perhaps wrong about that. But it happened. 

The football coaching job then finished. And it was during the lockdown times when like a lot of people that forced pause, stepping away, reflection, planning, noticing what's really important happened. And I was able to actually think a little bit more, just think straight, because I couldn't do that in that first year that I was off, particularly on the, on sertraline.

And mindfulness had been introduced to me by the therapist. And I responded particularly well to mindfulness practices that she did with me. I then met somebody who had quite a similar experience to me, but I had done it a few years before. 

So burnt out from teaching, discovered mindfulness, mindfulness had completely transformed her life like it has mine. And that was the first step. Just winding back a bit now, because the term mindfulness is something that has a definition, but something that means different things to different people.

Just for clarity, Gareth, what do you mean and understand and would like our listeners to understand with the term mindfulness? It's a very difficult question. I know, that's why I've asked it, my friend. Come on, get into it. 

Because, well, I'm hesitant to answer it because I don't think it is for me to tell people what it is, because it's not something that you understand with information, which sounds weird. No, it doesn't. But it's like, it's not something that I would teach in the way I was taught to teach at school. 

I wouldn't personally go to somebody else's mindfulness class, if they'd read a book about it, but I'd never practiced it and never experienced it. It's an experiential thing. And for me, despite what I've just said, and despite what some people may be thinking regarding what I've just said, it's completely not what I thought it was.

So as opposed to me saying exactly what it is, I'll tell you what it's not. It's not woo-woo hippie bullshit, where people sit around a room cross-legged with flowers in their hair. Maybe it is in some places. 

That's not my experience of it. It's certainly not my experience of it with the teacher that I have. So the person who I mentioned earlier, who had that, we had that in common, that experience, she introduced me to her teacher, who she'd done a mindfulness teaching course with. 

And he, because of his upbringing, probably I would say is very down to earth. And his approach to mindfulness has allowed me to see how practical it is and scientific, it could be said, and not pie in the sky, airy-fairy stuff. And yeah, it's absolutely, for me, having discovered it, there's no going back now. 

It sort of underpins every element to my life, and in a very helpful and transformational way compared to how my life was. Having said that, mindfulness is not about transformation. So this is another misconception.

People come to mindfulness classes to be saved, to be cured, and to like experience this like zen state of getting rid of all their problems. And it's not that at all. It's just it's bringing your attention to what is in the here and now. 

And whilst that is happening, what happens quite a lot is you become more aware of just how much attention you give to thinking. And the vast majority of that thinking is self-centered thinking. And it's not your fault. 

You've been programmed to do that. Some thinking that we do is practical and useful or creative. And that's amazing. 

And the mind is a brilliant tool. And that's what it is, a tool. Unfortunately, we don't put that tool down when it's done its job. 

And we give it absolutely over. We overemphasize its importance and try and use it to work things out that can't be worked out. Like, for example, why does that person not like me? Or why am I not feeling great today? I thought I was supposed to feel great every day, stuff like this. 

And just, yeah, it's for me, practicing mindfulness, meditating, which again has a lot of misconceptions, that word, I would say, has allowed me to see just how much time I've spent overthinking, trying to work things out, trying to make sense of everything, trying to make everything fit, trying to get all my ducks in a row, trying to control everything. And you can't. Go on, Sarah. 

You're smiling, you're nodding. Go on. What's your response to that? Well, I mean, you can't get ducks in a row when actually your ducks are psychopathic squirrels running around like lunatics, which is what's going on in my head most of the time. 

I just think it's really interesting to hear someone articulate how difficult it is to articulate what mindfulness actually is, because I think it's so deeply personal when you come to it that it's really refreshing to hear somebody say, fundamentally, I cannot explain it to you because it's a state, isn't it? It's how you are. It's the quietening of the mind. It's really difficult to pinpoint what that is without it becoming like so many things are in school. 

Oh, there's a shiny thing. Let's do that. Let's bolt that onto the curriculum. 

Let's do that as a strategy. And that's not what mindfulness is in its truest form. So I was just really, I was delighted, to be honest, that you went, no, I can't answer that.

What meditation is, according to my teacher, is sitting doing nothing. That's it. And people go, what? Well, why would you do that? And the thing is, it's like, unlike any other class that you might go to where you would expect to learn new skills, mindfulness is often about unlearning, unlearning the unhelpful stuff that you've Pited up and coming back to what's already there, what's been there since birth for all of us. 

I think it's really interesting, the concept of sitting and doing nothing, because as teachers, that's something that in my personal experience, we're not very good at because we feel like every minute of our waking day needs to be in inverted commas productive. I must be doing something. And there's guilt associated with sitting still and doing nothing and not actually having anything going on in your head. 

It's difficult to do because we don't learn to do that from childhood, do we? You're always on the go. And I also think there's a misconception about doing nothing. Oh, well, I've done nothing this afternoon, just sat in front of the telly. 

I've sent off a few emails. I've just, yeah, no, that's not doing nothing. It is. 

It's about a work ethic. It is. It's about those predetermined self-beliefs about what is right and how we should behave in many respects. 

So, yeah, it's the perfect non-answer, if you will. It was absolutely superb. So you start exploring this. 

You're on your own personal development, your own personal journey. You say that at the start of this that you're now teaching mindfulness. So you've moved into you facilitating. 

What exactly is it you're doing? What are you up to at the moment, Gareth? I'm doing that, which is probably quite an annoying thing, Sharon, because before I answered that question, there was something else I was going to say. I've just forgotten what that was. It was to do with... Oh, yeah. 

So that unhelpful belief with regards to being productive, if we dig a little bit deeper there, it could be argued that the belief there is I am not worthy unless I'm being productive. I am not good enough unless I'm being productive. And again, that is not specific to teachers. 

Probably most people have learnt that unhelpful belief. Again, that's society, our parents, whoever it was, passed that on to us. And that was certainly there for me when I was teaching. 

I didn't know it at the time. But there's lots of other ways I've felt unworthy and not good enough. And then I've looked for proof of those beliefs. 

And of course, when you look for the mind will find proof, it joins up the dots and says, oh, yeah, you're not good enough because of that and because of that and because of that. And that's maybe quite a natural survival technique, you could say. So, yeah, again, mindfulness allows you to see those beliefs. 

And it's not a case of trying to force positivity or trying to argue against them. Like, no, you really are good enough or you're just enough. You don't have to do anything because you won't believe that necessarily, especially when you're in that moment. 

It's just going, oh, yeah, there's that belief again. And then again, you come back to the here and now. Sorry, Sharon, what was your question? No, it's OK. 

It's absolutely great because every time you speak, more golden nuggets come out. So it's absolutely great. What I said to you was that you obviously went on your journey to discover your experience of mindfulness, but you've moved now across into teaching and facilitating this for other people. 

Tell us a little bit about what you're up to now. So mindfulness teacher training course, which was very, very different to school teacher training, very different, especially the way my teacher did it. And I loved it. 

That was a year. I finished that last July. So as we record this December 2024, that's been like nearly a year and a half.

And yeah, I've been lucky enough to have the opportunity to start leading mindfulness classes, particularly at a place called the Loughborough Wellbeing Centre. Little plug there. So that's Loughborough is very close to me. 

I live in Leicestershire. And yeah, the Wellbeing Centre is a place where they have lots of different sessions on with a focus on mental health and well-being. So, yeah, I've been delivering sessions there, just general mindfulness and work there, just do a few sessions there. 

There's other sessions that I do there as well. The first one I did there was a men's mental health group. Sometimes we do mindfulness in that, but generally we don't. 

That's just a general men's mental health group. And I work there as a freelancer, a sessional worker. So I'm a sole trader, work for myself and currently pursuing two particular offers by way of teaching mindfulness. 

One of them is to do with a big passion of mine, which is football, going back to the football coaching. So I'm still involved in football coaching. I obviously must love that. 

And the team that I currently coach is an under-21s team in Leicester called LFE, which stands for Leicester Football Education. And I volunteer coaching for them. So as well as the football coach, I'm now also the mindfulness coach for that team.

And so I'm looking now to work with young football players who are in professional academies to help them with their game and also just general stuff. So on and off the pitch, but initially specifically is performance based with mindfulness practice. And then the other offering is a non-sports related one where it's specifically for men.

Um, and I'm already involved in two men's mental health groups that are in person, one of which I just mentioned at the wellbeing center. But the one that I'm looking to facilitate myself would be a monthly online group specifically for men who are, or who have experienced stress and specifically work related stress. Obviously, again, I, I will be coming from a place of experience there as opposed to, you know, reading a book sort of thing. 

And, uh, there will be elements of mindfulness in that, but again, it won't be all mindfulness. And that's, that's something where, again, with what I know now and the experiences I've had since leaving teaching, I can see that the certain aspects of being a man, the way that I've been socialized, I think that, that brought me to that point of burnout, stuff like not talking to anybody, not even thinking I needed to talk to anybody that anything was wrong and just cracking on. Do you think, I mean, that was 2017, 2018.

Do you think post COVID now into 2024 with organizations like Andy's man club, for example, do you think we are making the moves in the right direction where male mental health is concerned? Do you think we've shifted from that big boys don't cry mentality that we all grew up with? Do you think we're moving in the right direction, Gareth? I don't know. Maybe it would seem, it would seem like from my experience, men seem to be more willing in a certain environment to talk about certain things that perhaps they wouldn't have done years ago. I would, I would say it's probably still the case for a great majority that they don't do that.

And again, it perhaps takes sometimes the point of no return, the point of breaking, when you then feel like you've got nothing to lose and then you perhaps learn to do that. And you, and again, you perhaps see things for what they are. You see the masks that you, that you wear, the metaphorical masks, the front that you put on to hide certain things.

And again, I know this is not specific to men and every man is different and everybody experiences things in different ways. But I think there are certain things, as I say, with regards to the way men are socialized, that's a big generalization in itself, but there's certain values and norms there that make it quite difficult to express how we're feeling, make, you know, communicate with people, which is so important. And I've, you know, I can see that now and now because I've been through what I've been through, I'm not this, I'm not playing a role. 

I'm me. I'm actually a human being and willing to be vulnerable, willing to be imperfect. It's still there. 

Those, those, it's not like it's never there. Those things try and trip me up and try and come back and get me sometimes, but I don't stay there for very long anymore. The mindfulness helps with that. 

And so because of that, I'm sort of, I'm, I'm, I'm allowing people in a lot more now and can actually have meaningful relationships, which I never had before. Not really. So yeah, I mean, with my experience of the men's groups that I'm already involved in, one at the Loughborough Wellbeing Centre, and then one fairly new one, which is called Fireside, which I was invited to do by a woman called Evelyn, who runs a charity called Peace of Green. 

And that one is, is another monthly session, which is outdoors in the evening, in a wooded area, private wooded area, around a campfire, cooking food, eating food, bit of mindfulness, bit of chat, bit of creativity. And it's great. It's absolutely great. 

Like straight away from the first session, people just sank into an atmosphere of, of ease and, and feeling like people were just opening up. And, and it was like, we'd known each other for ages and we were just met for the first time. And there's something about being outside around the fire, looking into the fire. 

So, you don't have to look into people's eyes and just talking, which I think is a big part of that. Wow. So the real, real image.

Stay with there. So thank you for answering that question and thank you for everything, really, what you've shared with us today. So it leads me on, Gareth Isaac. 

Okie dokie. What is your sliding doors moment since leaving teaching to now? Tell us of a time when you did something in that moment that you knew you would never have done had you stayed in that role as a teacher. There have probably been many. 

One, one that sticks out at this point in time is I went outdoor swimming. Somebody convinced me to give it a try. It was completely out of my comfort zone.

I've, I had a, I have a reputation of somebody who feels the cold and, you know, I was a fair weather outdoors swimmer. It was in July when I did it. But yeah, in that moment, in the freezing cold, so not necessarily a pleasant, comfortable feeling, but out of my comfort zone, feeling vulnerable, feeling like I wasn't perfect, you know, feeling like I was out of shape. 

And obviously I'm there with my swimming shorts on and it felt real. It felt like I was actually in the now, in the present moment, living life. And it didn't feel like a, a preparation for something later, which everything else always had done. 

Everything else was always like, well, this isn't the real thing. This isn't it. Cause the real thing, the stuff that's got to be better than this will come later. 

I think, you know, I probably like a lot of people been brainwashed by Hollywood films or something, but anyway, that's another story. But yeah. So in that moment, it was like, this, this is it. 

I'm doing it. I'm living life. And as a teacher, I never felt like that. 

Now, again, I'm not bashing the profession or anything like that. I wouldn't advise people to leave it necessarily, because as I said, I never actually wanted to do it. It just wasn't for me, but because of what I brought to teaching and because of the experience that I had in teaching, it, it never really felt real. 

It felt like a dream, like a lot of my life has possibly. Um, it felt like I was somebody else sleepwalking through and, um, like, uh, like in a coma and that moment with all its imperfections, depending on what you think imperfect is felt real. Wow. 

That's beautiful and very powerful. No, it was very powerful that, and the whole, the whole of this episode has been incredibly powerful to, to hear you talk, to listen to your story. Um, it's been an absolute pleasure, Gareth. 

It really, really has. And I have absolutely no doubt that many people will listen to this episode. They will keep listening to it over and over again and finding something fresh. 

So Gareth, on behalf of myself and Sarah and all of our listeners, I want to thank you very, very much for the time you spent with us today. Thank you. Thank you very much for having me. 

I've enjoyed it. Hello friend. It was, that was a really deep one for me that, it was one that almost sat outside of the traditional narrative and storytelling. 

There was, it, it left me with questions and I don't, what do you, what did you make of that wonderful episode, Sarah? I recognized very deeply a lot of what he was talking about in terms of his own experience. Um, and I think, I think what was, it was an incredibly reflective conversation and we talked to Gareth afterwards, um, in terms of, it's probably the first time he's told, told it and, and, and talked about it in one coherent process. Um, but I think what really stood out for me is that his own reflections on the fact that he didn't know what was happening when it was happening to him in terms of his physical response and, and, and his feeling weird and, and that sort of stuff. 

And it really struck me the, the power that the therapy has, the, the therapy that has worked for him has had on him. And I think, um, I can't remember whether he said it to us afterwards or whether he said it during the episode that, um, he, he talked about not, he's, he's not, I think it was afterwards, he's not the finished article. And we reflected on the fact that, that nobody's the finished article. 

You, you go to the end, not the finished article. But I think when he was trying to articulate what mindfulness isn't and what his perspective about what it is and, and being present and his sliding doors moment really captured that for me, that he, he said it felt real. And if, if ever there was a description of what being present actually means, it was for him, it was that. 

And I bet if we really dug into it, he would have been able to talk to, to us about how the water felt and what he was seeing and hearing and, and, and all of the rest of it. And that for me, that's mindfulness. Yes. 

Is it, is it being in the moment? Um, it was, there was, there's so much to take from that. Um, for me, it was his, his acceptance that the words that kept coming through for me was acceptance. When things are not going right, he accepts that's the way it is. 

He's not trying to get the fix. He's not trying to get to the destination. It's a process. 

And I suspect if, if you met back up with Gareth in about 30 years time, he's just on continual chapters and epochs of a journey. Like he said, the influence of Hollywood, there's no happy ever after there. Isn't that right? You've reached your destination.

You've achieved that goal. Um, life's not life. Life's not linear, is it? It's not linear. 

We go, we go round in circles, some of them ever decreasing and then some of them expanding, but it, it's, you know, me, I'm, I'm listening for, for what's being said, what's being really said. And I go back to his, um, and his forthrightness about, he never really wanted to be a teacher, how he ended up as a teacher. And I suspect the imposter syndrome, if we want to call it that, that feeling that he had was probably rooted in the fact that it, it was never really what he wanted to do and that he was playing a role. 

And he said, um, now I'm not playing a role. I'm me and I'm willing to be imperfect. And I just saw that was, that was spot on because we're not perfect. 

We have our moments, we have different things go on and, you know, things can turn on a, on a sixpence. That's probably too old and a reference for many people. Um, but I just thought it was wonderfully reflective. 

And I think that's probably why you and I are a kind of, um, looking a bit dazed. I feel stoned. Not that I need to know what it feels like to be stoned. 

Um, disclaimer. Yeah. Not since 1997. 

Anyway. Um, what, what I think is important in that, uh, particularly in this Pit Pony episode is the themes and the common threads that are coming out. Nobody can articulate it with clarity. 

Nobody can really pinpoint that feeling not right. But when you listen time after time after time to people who've come out of teaching, there's an isolation that they don't, they know something's wrong, but they can't put the finger on what's wrong. They can't explain it. 

It's like a physical thing. It's like, I wasn't in my own body. It's like a zombie thing. 

If there's one thing that comes out of these episodes, um, and the whole body of work that we're doing is, recognize that. You don't, you don't always take that moment to go, I am aligned. Everything's right. 

I'm, I'm on purpose. That's, that's rare that you ever get that moment of wonder, but you know, when it's not right and that's enough. I think there's something there for me, because that's the language that you and I use. 

We're aligned. We're on purpose. We, we know when we're on track. 

We know when something, but there's a huge amount of work for each of those personally and individually to, to get to the point of even knowing and understanding and being able to recognize what that is. So it's very, I suspect if I reflected back, there's probably periods of time where I thought that was very much what my reality was, that I was aligned and I was on purpose, despite the fact that I had chronic insomnia and a variety of other things. Um, it's very difficult to recognize it when you don't know that it needs to be recognized.

It's that you and I talk about it and we've talked about it before. If you don't know what you don't know, then you can't possibly do something about it. And something else came to mind for me as well. 

There's a fantastic book and I cannot remember clearly the name of the author, but it was a big thing during lockdown. Um, a book called body keeps the score. Yeah. 

Yeah. Um, which I think what Gareth was describing is, is very much the, the, the premise of that, that, you know, your body does give you clues and signals, but if you're not alert to them, you're not, you're not going to notice them. Um, yeah, it was deep.

It was deep. And he alluded to this as well. And I think this is important, the stories and the narratives that we tell ourselves that we've carried through life.

So if you think about it, um, and I don't know if this applies to Gareth, but it certainly does apply to, to me and a lot of people I've spoken to. When you first go into teaching, if you are from a certain generation, or if you are first generation university and your parents have been blue collar workers, they see this role that you're in teaching as the absolute ultimate prize and the messaging that sits behind it. You have got a job for life. 

You've got a pension, you've got paid holidays, um, you've got all these rights, you're in a profession. So from the minute you enter into that, you're carrying with you the expectations and pride of your parents. And that's what doesn't just form our identity as a teacher, but has some guilt associated when we suddenly go, but my mum and dad, who I trust and love with all of my heart, have told me this is brilliant. 

So are they wrong? And this whole conflict happens within our head that, that it's a gift. This is a prize. This is such an achievement. 

I've told you about my dad time and time again, the pride, help, help my daughter who is a teacher is drowning because it was a respected profession. It still is in many quarters. I have no doubt, but it was massively respected. 

And when you're working in a staff room and environment where everybody else is in this kind of like, Oh, it's great. You feel so alone to then have this visceral response that this, this isn't right. You think there's something wrong with you because you should be grateful. 

You, you get caught up in, there's, there's a, there's a momentum that comes from the weight of external expectation. It carries on pushing you forward, even when you might well be still recognising that something's well out. Um, yeah, I've not got words.

No, but what he, what he has said, um, and what I want to reiterate is there will be many links below this episode, um, to his website, to his clubs. If you're local to him, he's online provision that he's doing, and we will bookend this and, um, with many signposts. Um, if people are feeling the way that Gareth is feeling and particularly with the male mental health issue that we, that we touched upon, but I think, yeah, it's been very reflective.

It's been a very calm and deep episode of the Pit Pony that I truly hope people listening to it, irrespective of gender, age or stage within the profession and take something from that. And even if it means that they listen to what Gareth was talking about and go down their own investigation and rabbit hole, because he said it's a very personal thing. So even if you just take the title of mindfulness or the concept of therapy, and this is the starting point of your own journey as a result of what we've done today, then it will have been an incredibly powerful episode of the Pit Pony podcast. 

So thank you, my friend. I'm going to send you much love and I'll see you on the other side. See you later. 

Thank you as always for listening to our Pit Pony podcast. On behalf of Sarah, our guests and all involved with the production, we're so grateful for your support. Please subscribe to our channels, follow us on social media, and we look forward to seeing you next time when we will have another inspirational story from a fellow Pit Pony who has exited the classroom and thrive.