A friend of mine – my business partner, Peter Cook, actually – once passed on some wisdom from his meditation teacher that’s always nagged away at me. Pete is an ordained Ishaya monk and one of the sharpest minds I know, which is a combination that tends to produce advice worth me begrudgingly listening to. His teacher’s insight was about the difference between being 98% committed to something and being 100% committed.
You’d think the gap between those two would be negligible. It ain’t.
98% commitment is exhausting, because it requires a decision in every single interaction about whether this is the 2% exception. Is this the moment I let it slide? Is this the kid, the day, the circumstance when I let an old habit rule? Those micro-decisions accumulate. And they happen fastest when you’re most tired, most stretched, most limbic – which is precisely when your practice is most visible to students and most consequential for culture.
100% commitment, counterintuitively, is way easier, because you’ve already made the decision. There’s nothing left to weigh up.
I think about this a lot in relation to teachers implementing restorative practice.
Most teachers who commit to RP 2.0 are, if I’m truthful, 98% committed. I mean that respectfully too – 98% is a long way from nothing. They use affective language. They run circles. They ask the restorative questions. They’re genuinely trying, and it shows.
But there is a 2%. And it almost always shows up with “That kid” and at “This time of year” too.
Sometimes it’s when the behaviour is serious and the whole staff is watching. Or when the class has been defiant all day and you’re running on fumes. Or when a parent is demanding blood and the path of least resistance is to reach for a detention or a good rant before calling it done and dusted. Or when the situation is uncomfortable enough that the old punitive default starts to feel not just acceptable, but justified.
That’s where the 98% teacher grasps for the exception. And that’s the moment that matters most – not for the teacher’s reputation, but for the student’s understanding of how the world actually works.
“That kid” is expert at finding your 2%. They test every adult to locate exactly where the consistent response ends and the conditional one begins. They want to know what’s real and what’s performed. When they find the 2%, they file it… and they return to it later.
The teachers I’ve watched build genuinely restorative classrooms over time aren’t superhuman. Far from it. They’re not naturally calmer or more patient than anyone else. They’ve just reached a point where what they believe and what they do line up, even when things get tough. And that 2% exception? It’s no longer an option.
That’s 100% commitment. It’s a decision every teacher can make, and with the pressures of Term 4 upon us, I reckon it’s one worth making now.
Keep fighting that good fight,
P.S. There’s been plenty happening behind the scenes at Real Schools lately, and I’m itching to tell you about it. We’ve got some exciting things coming that will make our work with schools even better, whether you’re already a Partner or thinking about becoming one. Keep an eye out for it next week.
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