By Sarah Cooper
July 23, 2026
Sometimes I find myself justifying with logic what I feel in my gut, translating the body’s knowledge into words. My mom would often say “trust your instincts” when I was growing up, when I was torn between what I thought I should do versus what I felt pulled to do. This phrase applied to a multitude of moments.
Sometimes it was whether to take a trip to see friends that seemed superfluous or too expensive (just about always worth it if I’m on the fence, true then as now).
Sometimes it was whether to follow up with someone, a student or friend or colleague, about a conversation that had drifted off, felt unfinished, or was replaying at double speed in my head (yes, if I’m still perseverating the next morning).
Sometimes it was as big as whether to take a job or move apartments (it all depends).
In the School Setting
At school as an academic administrator, I find my instincts are not always spot-on. (Whose are?) However, especially when meeting with someone who promises to be transformational or could have an immensely positive effect in our community, I often feel a rush of emotion. It’s like a washing over, taking the form of chills or sitting up straighter or a lump in my throat.
In watching a demonstration lesson for a potential faculty member — the best lessons often reveal themselves within the first couple minutes — this reaction takes the form of wanting to cry because the teaching is so good, then holding my breath, hoping that the rest of the half-hour will pass with similar confidence in craft.
What does “good” look like? An eager and easy connection with students, a settledness of spirit. A confidence in one’s own quirkiness, a desire to hear the people in the room and lead them to learning. It might be a smile, a name unexpectedly remembered, a pause to create suspense while asking for a component to a mathematical equation.
When conducting interviews for a non-teaching position, especially when talking with several candidates, this instinct feels more like an actual gut sense, deep in my abdomen, that this person’s impact will be vast and that we would be fortunate if they turned their face toward our campus. Sometimes I need to argue against myself: This candidate has less experience in independent schools (not always a drawback, actually) or wrote a less elegant cover letter. But there’s a spark, an ethic, a mission that draws me in.
Beyond School
This sense of instinct appears in my personal life, too, most notably at moments of transition or change.
At all the Back to School Nights for my two sons, now grown, I looked for the joy of a teacher rooted in their practice who welcomed everyone coming through their door: a middle school English teacher talking about the importance of rotating seat partners, or a fifth-grade teacher describing her students weeding the school garden. These many educators who shaped my sons’ learning created their own classroom-sized gravitational fields that grounded me.
In the late stages of my dad’s life, four years ago, I had to look at the last minute for an assisted living community that would care for him upon discharge from the hospital. With declining health, he had more profound needs than several months earlier, and it was hard to find the right spot. I visited a board-and-care home with six beds that whiffed mortality — then a resort-style retreat too luxury for my dad’s tastes or means.
But then, after filling out a form online from A Place for Mom (well, Dad) at 4 a.m. one night, pretty desperate, I was surprised when a representative called me later that day. She suggested a place across from a teriyaki/burger joint I’d gone to years ago when my husband was in grad school for physics, which offered broccoli and brown rice instead of cabbage atop your chicken bowl, for just a little extra.
When I visited the recommended retirement home at the end of a long school day, after the traffic had taken longer than I’d ever anticipated, I sat in the friendly sales agent’s office and heard: We have space for your dad. We can take care of him. I went through this with my dad. We have your back. Did she say those words? Did I only imagine that she did?
Whatever she actually said, when I stepped into the foyer and saw the open carpeted staircase and sunny dining room, I felt a contracting of my dad’s life but also an opening. I didn’t know then about the coffee klatch of guys at my dad’s table who would trash-talk each other over donuts on Saturdays, and I couldn’t foresee the guiding light of a nurse who would hold my dad and me in her twentysomething presence as I played Spotify favorites in the dark of his studio apartment.
Was “instinct” in this case a comfort or familiarity, a sense of déjà vu? Was it a message from something beyond words? I don’t know if I believe in that kind of kindred spirit or guardian angel. But I know enough to listen
Sarah Cooper
Sarah Cooper is the Associate Head at Flintridge Preparatory School in La Canada, California. She is the author of Creating Citizens: Teaching Civics and Current Events in the History Classroom (Routledge), and her recent writing can be found at sarahjcooper.com.
This article originally appeared on Well-Schooled: The Site for Educator Storytelling.
Website: https://www.well-schooled.com
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