Bringing Joy Back to Teaching: Claiming the Right to Educate with Dignity

These days, I feel more connected to education than ever. Creating through Brujitales has brought back the joy of teaching, of guiding, of imagining new ways of learning. But it’s also made me reflect on how easily that joy can be taken away.

Teaching is one of the most deeply human professions. There’s beauty in explaining, listening, and sparking curiosity. And often that beauty survives despite everything: despite bureaucracy, unrealistic expectations, lack of recognition, or the emotional load we’re expected to carry in silence.

It’s not that we’ve stopped loving what we do. It’s that the system demands we do it from a place of exhaustion, guilt, and invisibility. We’re expected to give everything without even being guaranteed the basics. As if caring for others didn’t require being cared for, too.

And no, it doesn’t all start with teachers. It’s not just about setting boundaries or learning to say no. We need laws that protect us, fair systems, and sustainable working conditions. We need school leaders who lead with empathy, who understand that respect and basic human decency are non-negotiable, and that teacher well-being is not a luxury, it’s the foundation of meaningful education.

The teacher crisis is not new. It has taken different shapes throughout history because teachers have always existed. But that doesn’t mean we should accept this crisis as normal. We shouldn’t normalize teaching on the verge of collapse, as if it’s just part of the job. What we should normalize is teaching with joy, with support, with dignity, and care.

We want teaching to be a conscious, empowered, and respected choice. We want people to enter this profession with hope, not fear. We want it to be known that yes, it is possible to teach from a place of joy, but not if all the weight is placed on our shoulders. We need to do this together, with support, with dignity, with real spaces to name what hurts and what we dream of.

Because we don’t want to just survive in education. We want to live it with meaning.

Educator burnout