How Do You Engage Resistance?

James Robinson • August 1, 2024

Getting past obstacles and following your curiosity...






From June-November, I'd throw on a backpack and go rucking in silence in the morning for the first 3 miles.  The act of doing the first three miles in quietude is significant as a personal practice. The weight on my back is felt for the first half-mile, then it’s normalized, almost unnoticeable. With the exception of having to heave up on the straps to reallocate the weight every few hundred meters, I barely think about it. The silence forces me to listen to the ambient sounds around the neighborhood-- birds, traffic, car doors opening and closing, the random conversation of other walkers.


Because my listening is tuned to the frequency of the world around me, so is my sight– it follows the sounds.  I’ve put 104 hours on the road in the last two months , and have encountered and absorbed a myriad of information and insights, whether I’m conscious of it or not. For instance, today I noticed the bars covering the entrance of a tunnel. I’m surprised that this is the first time I’ve noticed. 


In the evenings, there are sometimes families flocked near the tunnel. Like most of the neighborhood, they likely don’t know where it leads. The tunnel could lead to the Harpeth River, by going under the busy Carruthers roadway. Or it may lead to Alabama. We don’t know.  Parents sit on the drought-brown pockets of grass on the knoll, in conversation, watching the kids, keeping them safe, then take a few glances at their cell phones. The kids explore the trickle of water, flip stones, play, and stick their faces between the bars to see what’s beyond the tunnel’s entrance.


The bars are there for safety. They exist to cause resistance, preventing people from getting into the tunnel to explore it and journey to the other side, wherever it may lead. But that’s obvious, right? Regardless, here are some insights from that walk:


  1. The Bars are illusive: The message of the bars is, “Do not enter. Danger lies ahead”, and yet the gap between each bar is wide. I’ll be 50 years soon, and I'm small enough to get between them– if only I can overcome my mind and push myself to explore. With almost 100% certainty,  kids have tried it– especially if their parents aren’t supervising. Resistance is like the bars at the tunnel’s entrance. Resistance tells you “you can’t”, but when you look at it closely, you can get by it– the gaps are big enough– all it takes is a little courage.
  2. The Tunnel will be uncomfortable: Getting past the bars is only the first obstacle, then it’s time for the journey. The tunnel is an uncomfortable 36 inches in circumference, which means a person either crouches the whole way or positions himself to crawl on the damp concrete– not knowing what’s on the other side. There will likely be discomfort. The bigger you are, literally and metaphorically, the more uncomfortable it is.  It takes commitment and courage to get to the other side– and there are no guarantees. 
  3. No Guarantees: What’s on the other side of the tunnel could be a quarry, a garbage heap. or a site so unimaginably beautiful that you rejoice in what you find. But there are no guarantees. That’s why it’s important not to get attached to the outcome. There are many tunnels to explore and this is just one of many. While you may need to take your courage to another tunnel to explore,  at least you now know that your courage works and is strong. SO long as you have resilience, you should be ok.


Noticing these small lessons in the real world is powerful. The weighted, silent walks help me learn. However, my favorite part of the walk is the last 1.5 miles, when I drop my backpack off at home and continue walking. While I became used to the weight the first few miles, I become aware of the weight as an unconscious burden at the end. Ridding myself of that burden makes me feel free, looser, and able to float through the day– which is why I start everyday the same way:  light, unburdened , ready to serve and maybe 1% wiser. 





Precious Metal Notes

Venturing into the Courage Gap, #1

By James Robinson • February 21, 2026
context In an earlier post, I wrote about the need for a self-inflicted sabbatical from educational leadership in 2024. The time-off allowed me to step back, read, study, think, and create at a level I've not known in years. Although we went without my salary for six-months, the data reflects it was also the most stress-free time in recent years-- likely driven by the walks, meditation, prayer and just leveling myself to a position of just learning again. The openness matters. During that time, I created a series of talks, titled The Courage Gap: Another gap in education that a consultant can't close. Originally, they were called "Career-Suicide Notebooks", the reason being my plan was to walk away from education all together. Instead, what I learned will inform my work for years. I've heard it said that Buddhist monks can see the world in a grain of rice. After being immersed in education for several years, I see the world in a school ecosystem. Often, schools enter my creative work and the way I think about creativity enters my work in schools. The first video is called 33% and it looks at the proficiency scores of 4th grade students on the NAEP Assessment. Additionally, it looks at the broad economy that works to maintain the status quo. It's a very performative video, very low-brow-- but it sets the context for the rest of the talks. Moreover, many of the issues can be extrapolated across sectors.

Lettuce Entertain You: Why Fluency Matters

By James Robinson • February 21, 2026
Lettuce Entertain You “Lettuce entertain you” is a classic line from an old reading assessment passage. When kids read it aloud, assessors listened for more than just smooth delivery—they hoped for laughter, or at least a chuckle, as a sign the pun landed. Too often, though, the reading was fluent but flat. No chuckle meant the joke flew right over their heads; students weren't picking up on the playful language. In one district, coaches and a principal were so eager for better results that they printed t-shirts featuring “Lettuce entertain you” with a cartoon head of lettuce. The goal? Prime students to spot the pun. It backfired into a perfect illustration of two broader lessons that apply far beyond reading: Fluency goes beyond word-calling and prosody—it's also about the fluency of ideas, vocabulary, and real understanding. Outcomes aren't a competition; chasing short-term wins can undermine genuine mastery. Fluency In reading instruction, we often emphasize how smoothly words flow from a student's mouth—rate, accuracy, expression. But we under-discuss the clearest marker of comprehension: real-time emotional responses. A laugh at a pun, a gasp at a twist, or a puzzled frown when something doesn't add up—these are the tells that a reader is truly processing and connecting with the text. Genre knowledge matters too. In a mystery or whodunit, fluent readers adjust tone for foreshadowing or suspense. True fluency integrates decoding, word knowledge, genre conventions, and quick comprehension. This isn't unique to reading. Fluency of ideas—the ability to recall and apply mounds of knowledge fluidly, under pressure, with little time to look things up—is a universal hallmark of expertise. A doctor in the ER doesn't have minutes to Google symptoms; they need instant recall of anatomy, pharmacology, differentials, and protocols to make life-saving calls. That's fluency in medical knowledge. A chef in a busy kitchen doesn't pause to consult recipes mid-service; they fluidly combine ingredients, techniques, flavors, and timing to plate perfect dishes under the heat of the line. That's fluency in culinary craft. An artist doesn't deliberate over every brushstroke in isolation; in flow state, they draw on a deep reservoir of techniques, composition principles, color theory, and intuition to create without hesitation. That's fluency in creative expression. States have experimented with measuring aspects of this in reading. Tennessee came close around 2020 with a foundational literacy fluency component on the TCAP ELA assessment (especially in Grade 2). It was a simple yet powerful timed task: students read short, grade-level statements and quickly marked YES or NO to indicate if each was true. In a minute or so, it gauged decoding speed, basic vocabulary, and instant comprehension—exposing gaps that many elementary programs overlook . See the snippet below: