Live and Learn

We are all teachers, and all of us are students, too. That's one of the best lessons I've ever learned. It helps me cope with people who annoy me, or simply don't like. In fact, I find those very people are the ones who have the most to teach me. When I regard individuals who make me grind me teeth, or put me into a slow burn, I ask myself what exactly irritates me right now, and what can I do about it? Try to change and/or teach the offending individual? Hardly. In that case I'd be putting myself in the position of teacher or mentor, the one who thinks they are wiser or know better. Whether or not that is true, it's not a good way to approach life and learning.

Be a student. Live to learn - from everyone and everything. Talk less, listen more. Breathe deeply. Pay attention. I try to live by these simple rules all the time. I'm not always successful, especially when I encounter people who really irritate me to no end - the guy who leans on his horn in a traffic jam, or the selfish old biddy at the cash desk who takes forever to count out all her change, or people who butt in line, or constantly interrupt conversation. These are just some of the minor annoyances. The more someone bugs me, the bigger the lesson I have to learn.

Sometimes I feel the need to teach. That's when I can be a model student as well. I won't call myself a sage, but I can pretend to be - by keeping silent and observing. That's teaching by example. And while I sit in pseudo-sagacious silence, I'm learning as well, maybe not hard facts and information, but something far more valuable than that - patience and tolerance. (Now don't get me wrong. Cruelty and hatred must never be tolerated.) But everyone has something to teach us, whether they do it intentionally or not.

Anyway, that's all I have time for now. I don't want to preach. I was just thinking "out loud."

- G. P.