At some point in life, we are all a teachers.
As autumn is upon us, we are all brought back to the days of
remembering that first day of going back to school. That first day of starting
junior high, traveling back from summer break to college, or perhaps even the
first day of kindergarten. We remember the anticipation of who would be in our
class, would we get the ornery Mr. Farland or the ever loving Miss Schimtz?
Would our best friends be in our class or would we be lab partners with Brock
Hoffman? And what, oh what, would we wear entering those doors as an awakened
human being from summer vacation?
I’ve never had children and I’ve never been in an
educational field. I think I was a peer mentor in high school and I’ve trained
people on a job but it wasn’t until this past summer that I started teaching.
I entered the acting class and observed the eyes that gazed
upon me as though I could map out the path to their dreams and provide the
concrete answer to “what will my future hold?”. There is a slight, who are we
kidding, major difference between being a teacher to a class of unwilling high
school wanna-be’s and obedient adults. Little did they know, as I entered that
class, that I was looking for someone who could offer me the same life
leading lessons and the same answer to what my future would hold.
As the weeks went on, I felt giddy with the delight as I saw
them improve. They did their homework, committed to the tasks at hand, and
became much more aware of their craft and what it entailed to achieve their
goals. Six weeks in, however, we hit the ever-present roadblock of frustration.
Everyone seemed as though they were struggling, not just with class, but with
life in general; myself included. Lesson plan be damned, we had an old school,
campfire pow-wow. Keep in mind it was an acting class; we're allowed to do that.
As we went around the room expressing our frustrations in
life …a new job taking up our focus, a new baby taking up our nights, and the
death of a parent swallowing our hearts…we came to Liz. With sympathetic eyes
and a tale of being married for over 20 years, she shrugged her shoulders apologetically
and said, “You know, I don't have a lot of problems. All I can say is that my life isn’t everything I hoped for….but it’s better than
anything I could have imagined”.
It wasn’t a mantra or an e-greeting on facebook. It was an
honest moment that answered the question of “what will my future hold?” What I
had been brought there to teach, had been taught by the student.
Life is not always about your next success, or how far you have come. It's also about what you’re
able to observe and learn from those around you. School is always in session for adults. Who will your next lab partner be? Will you and your best friends always be in the same class? Will you have a good teacher or a bad one? Regardless, if you participate, your life will change. Without getting into too much "life is a journey not a destination" talk, there is something to be said for just embracing the moment. So relish in the good and embrace the pains, and look at that guy sitting next
to you on the Metro. He might teach you a thing or two. That's how we grow.
