Don’t teach to teach

Hey Plebbles,

how are you?

About 10 years ago, Rob and I attended a seminar with a Tibetan monk called Tulku Lobsang in Barcelona.

It was at a time when I identified as ‘spiritual, not religious‘, and I was following gurus’ words, spreading them, because I wanted to be like them and teach others the ‘truth’, even though I didn’t quite understand the true meaning of their words.

For instance, Tulku said things like ‘Don’t teach to teach‘. I understood on a very superficial level what it meant but didn’t know how to teach without teaching.

Forward 10 years, I now understand. Last weekend I spoke as a guest on a podcast - on the BitcoinDailyShow (I speak during the last 90min) - where they asked me lots of questions, the listeners could speak, too. One thing I said was that if you want your child to be a certain way, be a good role model. If you don’t want them to smoke, stop smoking. If you want them to like sports, be active. Instead of preaching or forcing them to do something they're not into.

But what I missed to say is that, we shouldn’t model behaviour just because we want our children to do the same. Don’t teach to teach, remember?

The best way for our children to learn something, is indeed by them watching us do it but it doesn’t mean we have to force ourselves to do or be something we’re not. We’re not our behaviours anyway, but by consciously trying to be brave, kind, strong, clever, honest, diligent, resilient etc, - whatever you want your child to be - we’re teaching to teach.

The best learning happens in moments that we don’t control, when we’re not actively teaching. 

But first, let’s see how to reach this state of teaching in a non-doing manner:

To teach by not actively teaching we must look at ourselves closely to either stop being what we don’t want our kids to be (over-consumers of tobacco, alcohol, food, social media, work etc), or be OK with doing all these things. The reason we don’t want our kids to do these things is because we judge them as something negative, even though, when done in moderation, it’s ok to smoke, drink, use social media, work etc. As we can’t control our own behaviour, we project this weakness onto our kids and want them to avoid them all along. 

The most certain way for your child to over-use in the future, is by telling them Not to do it and them seeing you doing them uncontrollably. Wouldn’t you agree?

Therefore, the only way to stop smoking or to smoke in a healthy manner, is to find the reason for you to smoke in the first place and why you can’t stop. This you do by meditating.

Meditation means to observe and get to know the Self. 

When you’re about to or doing something you would prefer not to do, feel into your body and listen into your mind without doing anything about it. 

When you find yourself practicing playing the guitar in front of your children because you’d like to initiate their musical desire, be honest to yourself and simply sit with this thought and the emotions that come with it. 

If you’re wanting to teach your child how to swim and find ways to get her into the water, bribe, motivate, manipulate in any way, you’re teaching to teach. 

If, on the other hand, you absolutely love to cook and would do it regardless of who you’re with, where you are and what else is being on offer as an activity, and your son comes into the kitchen asking if he can help, and you remain in the state of ‘I’m cooking because I enjoy it and I’d be just as happy if my son didn’t help me or didn’t enjoy cooking as I do’, he would learn and you’d be teaching without an agenda. 

When you do something for the sake of it, and somebody joins in out of curiosity or interest, it is a wonderful way to connect and to learn for both parties. This type of learning and teaching - in a neutral and natural setting - is what you can expect to happen at APTB.

I won’t be doing anything at APTB hoping that other people will come so I can teach them and they can learn. All I will do at APTB will be for my own enjoyment, for APTB and for others, when they ask for my presence or help. And everyone else working at APTB will know to do the same.