Better to Laugh

One of the reasons I love teaching so much is that moment when a student comes up with an answer you totally were not expecting. Yesterday, I was teaching Nutrition and Wellness class and the topic was stress. I passionately described how pushing down stress, frustration, anger, and pushing it down, and pushing it down, and pushing it down, instead of dealing with it, is like a pressure cooker. My hands were pushing down the air, pushing down, pushing down, pushing down. I asked what happens when you keep pushing down stress and let it build up like a pressure cooker, and a wide-eyed teen boy replied, “You get shorter?”  I totally did not see that one coming.