The economic chaos of the last two years has presented major challenges for college students. As professors at a large public university, the authors are accustomed to monitoring the broader social and economic climate for students so that they can swiftly identify "teachable moments" and seize those moments to improve learning. But what is a teachable moment in these trying times? What is the lesson of the moment? And who learns the lesson? When the authors started teaching years ago, they used to chuckle at the excuses students gave for missing class or producing less-than stellar work. As the years have progressed, the climate has changed, and the laughter has died in their throats. Nothing is funny about the life circumstances of their students now. The environment does not seem to be conducive to learning, though the numbers of students flocking back to campus have increased significantly in each term that they have been members of the faculty. Throughout the semester, the authors had listened, consoled, comforted, suggested, prodded, chastised, and encouraged students, awed at the hardships they were enduring. The authors, their students, and their colleagues have all learned lessons the past semester. They have learned from one another by keeping their hearts, minds, and ears open for the lessons that tumbled around them unchecked and uncensored. In this article, the authors discuss what real teaching means when students' complex lives are filled with real crises: flexibility and understanding.