Sometimes I sit in the car park grasping my coffee, staring at the steering wheel, and wonder when it all changed. Why don’t I enjoy teaching anymore?

I can still remember the rush of my early years. I’d spend half my weekends sketching out lessons, cutting paper, and sticking things down to create my own worksheets. I’d lie awake rehearsing the first day of term like it was opening night on a stage. There was so much hope wrapped up in those moments, so much certainty that teaching was more than a job, it was my vocation.

For a long time I thought it was me – that if I just tried harder, got more organised, or “found the joy again” it would all click back into place. But the thing is, it’s not that simple. The job has shifted, and so have I.

The Shift I Didn’t Notice At First

For years I told myself things would get easier if I just hung in there. Next term. Next year. Next curriculum. But the changes kept coming. Admin piled up. Tech platforms appeared and disappeared. Behaviour expectations swung with every new policy. And the weight of holding whole classrooms together seemed to land more squarely on my shoulders each year.

It wasn’t that I stopped caring. It was that the enjoyment I once had was slowly being buried under everything else.

When I walk into my classroom now, I sometimes feel like a stranger in a place I used to know by heart. The posters on the wall don’t spark anything. The laughter still happens, but it doesn’t carry me through like it used to. I miss the version of teaching that felt alive.

Carrying The Guilt

With all of that comes guilt a heavy, quiet guilt that creeps in at odd times. I’ll compare myself to the colleague down the hall who talks about teaching with passion and shining eyes, or I’ll hear the classic line from friends: “At least you get the holidays.” And then I start to wonder if I’m the problem.

My inner voice can be brutal: maybe I should be more grateful, maybe I should push harder, maybe good teachers don’t feel like this.

But the guilt doesn’t actually fix anything. It just keeps me stuck, tired, and second-guessing myself. What I’ve realised is that guilt is just a sign that I still care. If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t feel it at all.

Redefining What Enjoyment Means

Some days I think maybe I don’t hate teaching. Maybe I just don’t enjoy it in the same way anymore. And maybe that’s allowed. Enjoying teaching at this stage of life doesn’t have to look like staying up late laminating things or volunteering for every committee.

Now, teaching might mean drawing a line and leaving my marking at school. It might mean choosing part-time instead of running myself ragged. It might even mean giving myself permission to walk away altogether.

There’s a gentler version of enjoyment that doesn’t ask me to burn myself out. A quieter kind that leaves room for me to have a life outside of the classroom.

I picture it like this: it’s Friday afternoon, the bell rings, and instead of dragging a bag of marking to the car, I leave it all on my desk. I walk outside into the cool air, notice the sky changing colours, and feel light enough to breathe again. That feels like enjoyment too.

When Letting Go Feels Like The Next Step

There are days when I think the most loving choice would be to let go. Leaving doesn’t erase the years I’ve given or the lives I’ve touched. It just means I’m listening to myself now.

It’s not an easy thought – to step away from something I’ve built my whole identity around. But I remind myself that it’s okay to want something different. It’s okay to grieve the loss of what once was. And it’s okay to imagine a future where I wake up without that knot in my chest.

Sometimes I ask myself: can I still see myself doing this in five years? If my body tenses up and the answer feels like dread, I take that seriously.

Conclusion

So here I am, someone who used to enjoy this work with everything in me and someone who doesn’t feel that way anymore. It’s a hard truth to hold, but it’s also freeing.

Not enjoying teaching anymore doesn’t mean I failed. It just means I’ve changed. And change doesn’t have to be a shameful thing. It can be the start of choosing myself, whether that means slowing down, setting boundaries, or finally stepping into something new.