by Phillip Starr
It’s true. We’re all students, we’re all teachers, and we learn and teach all of the time.
Just as students learn from their teacher, so their teacher learns from them! Or he/she should, anyway. I’ve always said, “A teacher who cannot or will not learn from his students is in the wrong business.” Students unknowingly teach their teachers. All the time. This is the main reason why teaching enables us to progress further on the martial path, so long as we’re willing to learn from them.
Even if the student doesn’t altogether understand something that the teacher is trying to teach, he/she unconsciously teaches the teacher. Simply being a good student is all it takes. As the teacher presents new material, makes corrections (no matter how small), demonstrates how to execute a given movement correctly… these and other facets of teaching, whether it’s a group of beginners or more advanced pupils, can and often do enable the teacher to learn more about whatever it is that he’s teaching.
Many years ago, a young aikido student who had been training under the founder, Morihei Uyeshiba sensei, had to move to Hawaii. Distraught over having to leave his instructor and fearing that he would learn no more about his art, he wrote a letter to his mentor, asking what he should do, His teacher replied, telling him that he should teach in order to facilitate his progress in aikido.
The young man did so. You may know his name; Koichi Tohei became one of the best-known aikido instructors in the world. His skill was truly amazing.
At the end of each class, my students thank me for teaching them (in Chinese, of course) and I say the same thing to them. I have learned a great deal from my students over the years; much of which I likely would never have learned without their unconscious assistance.
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