Abraham: When people use the word “teacher”, the vibration that matches the word often feels more like asserter than it does like allower. But, the ideal teacher is one who is an open vortex through which desire can be satisfied, where an asserter is one who has information that they are wanting to impart.
Jerry and Esther visited with a magnificent founder of a wonderful school, *Sudbury Valley School in Massachusetts. And he offered something that was so clarifying to Esther. He said that their teachers never say, “Well, Johnny, don’t you think you would like to learn to read?” because they are understanding that unless Johnny is asking to read, that the effort that everyone makes is going to be uncomfortable anyway.
The ideal teacher is one who understands that desire to know is natural, and is someone who stands by ready to offer examples to satisfy the desire of the student. What made you realize it wasn’t working out? Guest: Behavior issues with the kids, they were not liking the restraints Abraham: The kinds of things they said to you were, “We thought it was going to be a whole lot more fun. We thought we were going to get to do more of what we wanted to do, and we thought we were going to get to choose.” And that’s the way you felt when you were born, you thought you were going to get to choose, that was the bargain.
And then somebody else says, “Well, here you are, and you don’t get to choose. You don’t get to choose where you sit, or when you come, or how long you sit there, and you don’t get to choose what we think about. You don’t get to choose when you talk, and you don’t get to choose what we talk about. In other words, you are not free, you are our captives. And we are here to assert good stuff into you.”
And they say, “Ah, give me a break! That’s not what the bargain was. I came understanding that I am a creator. I came knowing that I get to choose.” It takes years to beat that out of them. It takes years and years before they are willing to sit there and be quiet and do only what is supposed to be done when it is supposed to be done. It takes a long time to conform you into your unhappiness.
Oh, it is so delicious! When you have an environment where children feel free, where they get to choose, and you are brave enough to ride it out. In other words, at first they’ll choose all of the things that you have been convinced are wrong. But when you are brave enough to let it go far enough that they actually do identify their own personal desire, and then you stand as the loving implementer of their desire — you would never go back to any other form.
The other never worked. It doesn’t work even a little bit. It doesn’t work at all. Not even a little bit.
From Abraham-Hicks Workshop San Francisco, CA — 3/17/01