Jo Westcombe
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Hello Ankur, Thank you for reminding me of your boat analogy, which I loved when you described it a session or two ago.
And thank you for working through (afterwards and now in writing) what happened last week in the breakout room. I think we were all rooting for both of you and I know that I am grateful for you exploring this “critical incident” that we might all face, as you did together in plenary.This week, I feel ready to teach meditation 1-1. On Saturday, though, we witnessed the distress of one of our sangha members who didn’t feel in the same place. As Elizabeth W pointed out, both these feelings shall pass.
These shifting attitudes to personal competence or aptitude reminded me of a metaphor. Here’s a story, or you can scroll down two paragraphs for the message!
At some point on the long residential English courses I used to teach on, a business person who had been using English in international business for years would often say “I don’t know what to do. I just can’t speak English any more”. They had reached the so-called “crisis day”. Their confidence just fell apart.
What we trainers used to employ was the analogy of a ski course. We’d tell the story of a generic student, Matthias, who is a perfectly good skier. He’s probably been skiing all his life. And then he meets a potential romantic partner – who happens to ski very well. Matthias wants to take them away on a winter weekend, but realizes he needs to brush up on his skiing skills to impress them, so signs up for a course with personal ski instructor Bernhard. After a couple of runs, Bernhard says he notices that Matthias does this odd thing with his sticks, then he asks him to try putting more/less weight on one ski, then gets him to practise some other micro move to correct some other issues … Matthias starts to panic, then to despair…
The point is that we have probably all been practised and “fluent” in some skill for a long time. But if we start unpacking the moving parts to investigate each separately, with feedback, then the analysis might feel very unsettling … “I didn’t know I did that!”, “Why did I ever think I could ..?”.
Once the business students start conversing in English again, or Matthias gets back on the slopes, or if we take our meditation teacher training to the cushion every day, the fluency begins to return, but with a stronger foundation. These are results that come from looking purposefully at the internal workings and incorporating tweaks or updates or insights into our practice. We begin to notice the micro moves more not because we are bad or suddenly worse at what we do, but because we have woken up, studied them and are are starting to see things from a deeper place.
Hello Anita, Thank you for this and for the reminder that teaching (if we choose to go there) is a journey, too. Good intentions are what count. Having fixed expectations or goals at the beginning of the journey might not be wise. What actually happens on the journey might surprise us!
“If I tried to exclude money from parts of my life connected to dharma, it would feel like saying the dharma is somehow separate from the rest of my life where everyday things happen.”
Thank you for this, Colin. I think it is very helpful way to explore this.Hello Clif, Thanks for this helpful analysis. I agree that money is fascinating and complex – also the vocabulary we use to talk about it. I wonder what would happen if there wasn’t any money at all. What motivation shifts would we see?
For meditation to thrive in the modern world, where most of us do not live round the corner from a Buddhist monastery, and in terms of the eight-fold path, teaching meditation for money would seem to be a good example of “right livelihood” – providing it is taught for the benefit of others and not simply in order to cash in on an appetite for McMindfulness.
My income comes from teaching – a meaningful profession which is not generally well paid. I have learned that comparing contractual details or hourly rates is a terrible idea. Whose work or qualifications or experience is “worth” more? Who actually gets more? Does the administrative worker in the department (however much of a support they are) actually earn more than me although they don’t have graduate qualifications and never worked an evening or a weekend or experienced the emotional labour of teaching?
In that sense, money as “value” is already slippery. But equally, it is part of the deal. I teach for my livelihood, and I expect something for it, not just as “my bread and butter” but something to pay something forward to help me to live for perhaps the last quarter of my life without being a burden on the state. My income from my meaningful livelihood is protective and existential.
I am not intending to become a meditation teacher who gets paid, but I am excited for others in the group who might be establishing themselves as professional meditation teachers. The world could certainly use this.
There is a middle way for me between charging e.g. an hourly rate for teaching online at one end and “gifting” short meditations in class at the other, and this is the yoga teaching I do in my local sports club. This is voluntary work, or “Ehrenamt”, which might be translated as something like “honourable service”. But there is a nominal sum of around $7 for “my trouble” each lesson, and I was presented with a card (that could also be used to get discounts on e.g. museum tickets) from the local council after a couple of years of service. Clearly, no one sees this arrangement as representing what the weekly slots are “worth”, but the regular commitment is valued, and this recognition means something to me.
A side note, perhaps, but the yoga world – certainly in Europe – suffers from a lack of standardization and licences. Perhaps one day the meditation teaching world could benefit from a standardized system of accreditation that could help teachers and those wanting instruction navigate this complex “value” landscape. This would also come under Protector Principle, I imagine.
Hello Erin, How nice to be able to celebrate that time you had!
What you say resonates very much with me; I’m also feeling pulled in various directions as regards the instinctual drives (toilet paper, teamwork or tête á tête?). From your first paragraph, it sounds as if you thrive on good one-to-one relationships, too. Sorry to suggest there might be a third drive for you to investigate!Hi Natalie, That second story makes me angry. Teaching is such a privilege, but some abuse that privilege and proximity, making one student feel special while probably already eyeing up their next victim. I can quite understand why diving makes you feel uncomfortable.
I don’t think I can describe one particular ideal learning environment, but I know what physical environment works for me. It’s a biggish room with a wooden floor, chairs in a circle and an arrangement of something beautiful and natural in the middle. The temperature is pleasant, there is good light, and outside the room there are spaces to drink tea and go for walks.
We’ve had breakfast, lunch and dinner look good, and there is a programme that has been shared beforehand. The day is not too packed with input, and involves reflection, interaction and laughter (maybe tears, too). There is time and space around the programme for both solitude and company.
A less than ideal learning environment generally makes me sad, frustrated or angry. It’s not usually the physical environment that triggers these feelings; they arise when I become aware that a teacher has zero interest in interacting with their students. The audience exists as a block to project at while delivering the same old script. This builds a lot of resistance in me. As a rule, this type of teacher is generally not to be found anywhere near the circle in the room described above.
Hi Mary, I agree that it is tough when our job is to assess one thing (an essay or a presentation based on objective criteria) but at the same time this output is written by a human (we can still hope!) and all sorts of stories can leak out in the words produced or between the lines that we also have to learn to first process and then respond to.
Just as important as teachers needing to learn how to navigate new technology is needing to learn to deal with the increasing number of mental health issues that students (in my case generation Covid) are facing and will inevitably present.
It doesn’t sound as if your younger self “took the easy way out” at all, by the way. If they had, you wouldn’t have added it to your learning experience bank and be mentioning it here, is my guess.Too remote: I don’t think this happens too much in my everyday English teaching, but of course it is subjective. Once, a long time ago, a student described me as arrogant in anonymous feedback and this still smarts. I think it was because I was trying hard not to “impose my praise” on students. Anyway, this distancing approach clearly failed with this student and I don’t think is wholly compatible with my teaching style.
When I do my “mindful minutes” in my group classes at uni, I do notice that I often avoid eye-contact between closing the sit and getting up to get on with the lesson. This reflection makes me aware of some awkwardness there, causing some distance.
Language can be a barrier, too. In my yoga class, I generally don’t pick up on the small talk before we start, because Bavarian dialect can be impenetrable! I think “connected but separate” actually works quite well in this context, where the participants are concerned with their own practice, body and breath.
Too friendly: Certainly I used to have “too nice” levelled at me by English-teaching colleagues at university, as in “too soft” in terms of grading. I have got better at being a realistic, objective grader, but I can’t help but become fond of many students (who are training to become school teachers), some of whom I accompany for several years. I am genuinely interested in students’ lives, but do pick up on signals if there is no interest in sharing (my teenage daughter gives me practice there).
Ultimately, I think (and hope) the rapport works in my relationships with students and I know this is not a given. I am fortunate to have only rarely, and only as an observer, been exposed to abusive or toxic teacher-student relationships.