The quote "when the student is ready, the teacher will appear" popped in my head several times yesterday. So when it came to mind today, it was followed by a thought of my own: the teacher was there all along, the student was just unwilling or unprepared to see.
I remember a particular area in my life, I've mentioned various degrees in several posts about how I refused to take the relationship advise of a friend when it came to a certain person. My friend would tell me to say or do things and I'd respond "I'm not doing that!" or "I'm not saying that!"; not because I disagreed with her instruction, but because I was unwilling to be vulnerable along with the fear of rejection. Finally, I don't recall what triggered the switch, but I realized how much time I'd lost and how my interaction with this person had grown worse over time. I was able to admit the percentage contributed by me so I can't just chalk it up to "he's crazy" (although he is; yet so am I lmao) or some other dismissive attack to make me the victim in the situation.
I recall many moons ago when I was in love with the designer, Coach. I'd even gone as far as to create my username at the time "MsCoach4Life" or something like that lol. It was so funny to me how many guys would send messages with a spin on it as if I was an actual coach rather then the name would be for handbags and shoes. They'd say "Put Me In Coach, I'm Ready To Play" So as I'm sitting in the bleachers at track practice I'm cheering for the runners and offering quick course corrections so they are able to improve their form. Although you can see a distinct difference between the seasoned runners and the newbies, they still need coaching and guidance at whatever level their on. Otherwise how will they ever improve?
A few times I felt as if I couldn't sit still or I felt boredom creeping in; which is weird for me because I'm rarely ever bored. So in those moments, I ran. At one point there was a little boy in front of me who attempted to jump over a puddle as if it were a hurdle, I wasn't too far behind him and already thought to do that before seeing him. I've made it a practice while running on the street to jump over the squares with writing, as if I am jumping over hurdles. Soon after I developed that practice I began to say that in times of distress, "it's just a hurdle, you got this" and each hurdle/challenge became a bit easier to deal with (for the most part). So as the boy and I both failed to complete our hurdle, I giggled and let him know that I'd done the same, he was slightly in front of me so he hadn't witnessed my attempt. I then waved and passed them on my run, without a word they decided to challenge me. My fellow hurdle jumper fell behind, I decided to slow down to a jog then began walking; once I did that I was able to hear him and a friend discussing my victory. The friend made sure to tell him about being beaten by a girl and how he should try again. Finally I see them approaching and since I already had the lead I continued to walk in order to make it a fair race. Once he's slightly ahead of me I began to run again, as I passed my friend again I had the thought to slow down to his pace. I then told him to push through and to keep his knees up, once he did that he began to surpass me. He won the race, fairly and I made sure to tell him so.
Once I finally returned to the bleachers I continued to cheer for the kids and whenever I saw my hurdle jumping friend I noticed his form had improved. I was proud of him, and the others out there giving it their best or at least trying. I guess that's why I've developed this love for kids, because they are coachable! It's funny, as I typed that I thought of something Jay Z said in "Lost One" -"I heard motherf***ers sayin they made Hov, Made Hov?, Okay so make another Hov"- The thought flowed to the word Duplication; I believe children are actually looking for examples so when they have a coach, trainer, parent, etc. to look up to they begin to duplicate the behavior. This also occurs when they have poor role models or when parents refuse to take the authority and actually parent their children (you know when the kids run the house smh (this leads me to another thought which I will gather and post when the time comes). So imagine if they have an example of success along with the guidance to actually succeed. The successful person simply duplicated themselves. Simple enough, right? Well, here's the thing, the person has to be coachable, they have to be willing to do what's necessary even when they don't feel like it. The thing that happens as we get older, is we begin to resist change, although whatever we're complaining about it's working, it's far better (in theory) to remain comfortable rather than journey into the unknown of change. We don't listen or believe that someone may actually know what they're talking about. Or believe that someone may actually have your best interest in mind and be able to provide objective advise to assist you to another level or a new perspective.
See this is what insomnia does to me -insert slight chuckle here- I really intended to just type that first little thought then as I began to type these other words began to take form. As I sit in the randomness of my morning and My Loves are up and getting ready for school, My #1 comes to me and asks what I'm doing, I explain, he then asks how I learned to type so fast and I explained that I took a typing class in Junior High School and I type a lot since then. So what comes next? He wants me to teach him to type, and guess what? I am going to relocate a website that I found a while back which does free online typing courses, the same as I took back in the day. Imagine the advantage he'll have by having the ability to type professionally in Elementary School #BossShit
It started with a thought...
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