Whenever the answer to this question seems to be clear, I reflect and find my focus to be too much on a student's social-emotional well-being, so I shift my approach to more 'academics'. Other times, it's too much on the 'work' and not enough on the person.
It feels like there are multiple battles of prioritizing happening simultaneously. One continuous struggle is getting the student to perform for equity purposes. Another focus is keeping up with or making change as time moves on. Equity and advancement (of the individual, group, status, etc..) seem to become the most important (or gain the most emphasis) as long as capitalism rules the way it does today.
The internal conflict (for me) becomes having the desire to move education's value to "in and of itself" and not to just a means. The tricky balance has been how does one do this without compromising a student's ability to further access resources. (ex. Student interested in philosophy is often encouraged to take the class, but don't think about making it a career.) Immediately, this devalues what could have been a student's passion, purpose, etc.
