Thursday, April 23rd, 2009

A Real Teacher is Always a Student

Over Choclate mountains USA

A man off to a diving exploration via air travel identified himself as Mark and with a smile asked if he could sit next to me. He is a teacher at a university in the engineering field. While waiting for our flight I asked him how he found his year of teaching.

“Pretty flat,” he said, referring to very quiet students. “Not every entertaining.” Although he measured this year’s student crop as ‘reserved’ he admitted to them “we are here to learn from each other.” I found it rather unique for a teacher to say that. Perhaps I was quite programmed under the old British school system in my childhood and had the exposure to authoritarian rule for the most part.

There were those teachers that you could get very close to and they would share their world with you. They would be “one of the boys” practically. I recall one of my teachers, who would play football with us outside of school hours and tell us how much he liked the Mamas and the Papas as much as we liked them. He was cool and we learned from him while at the same time we (his students) met with the usual formal protocol.

My new made friend, Mark, a professor seemed to exude that kind of vibration of warmth and humility and command a respect simultaneously. It is like the mountains I look at below me during the flight. They look beautiful with their peaks and valleys. It’s a great texture.

Someone can be a top executive, top in his field, be a king or a queen or a guru but if you can't be a little human, can’t share or express some friendship you can be as flat as a prairie.

Mark admitted that his students although a little non- responsive, were people he respected and loved. He struck me as being a real teacher and not just a cash earner who passed some exams some years back. I spoke to him of dharma and karma and of after-life. He was thoroughly interested which is one of my main points. He was a teacher who is still a student. Once you give up inquisitiveness you are a dead man.
Happy diving, Mark!

4 Km