Be a teacher
I think many girls at their young age want to be a teacher. I also thought about it (though I also wanted to be an artist as I loved to draw): being a school garden teacher, kind and smart, probably like my sweet teacher Lourdes, the reality I knew back then.
Then we all grow up, start to know new amazing possibilities to work with, start to get very confused and uncertain about them, and choose one “ok” job to start our adult life. Destiny (luck, or effort, or whatever you want to call) makes its job to show us one path that looks suitable at that time.
Being a teacher didn’t seem it would match my personality, as I am a hands-on person, that don’t truly enjoy reading academic articles for too long. I thought that to be called a teacher, I had to have a high degree, study for decades, be an expert (the best in the field) and teach at a school or university. Head inside books, hard path, with little practice and lots of theory.
Over the last days, I have started to give a new meaning to the act of teaching.
Austin Kleon wrote in his work Show Your Work that there is a certain magic in having an amateur spirit since we are constantly learning in this fast speed world we live in.
Amateurs [are] just regular people who get obsessed by something and spend a ton of time thinking out loud about it… Raw enthusiasm is contagious. The world is changing at such a rapid rate that it’s turning us all into amateurs. Even for professionals, the best way to flourish is to retain an amateur’s spirit and embrace uncertainty and the unknown.
And also, he wrote about teaching that I feel it is true in so many ways. For me, knowledge is un unlimited resource: it doesn’t matter how much you share, you can never lose it.
Teaching people doesn’t subtract value from what you do, it actually adds to it. When you teach someone how to do your work, you are, in effect, generating more interest in your work. People feel closer to your work because you’re letting them in on what you know.
Yesterday, I was with my colleagues in our weekly English conversation class. It is free, it is open, and it is fun. We share inspiring videos, read business news and laugh a lot together. No pointing at mistakes, just one helping another.
In our last class, we saw a video with comedian Tim Minchin talking about his 9 life lessons, and guess what was number 6? Be a teacher. In his speech, he says:
Be a teacher. Share your ideas. Don’t take for granted your education. Rejoice in what you learn and spray it.
Hope it inspired you all to share your ideas.
Don’t be afraid, we are all amateurs in this life.
Originally published at https://beatrizrcunha.wixsite.com on July 9, 2020.
