Inspiration

For 21 years, I have been teaching medical students.
Initially I thought I need to teach them knowledge, knowledge, knowledge.
But along the way, knowledge has become available at our fingertips.

A good teacher is no longer a provider of knowledge.
A good teacher is a guide.
A better teacher still is one who can inspire.

But if we want to inspire others,
motivate them and even share values,
that is not an easy thing to do.

Sometimes we tend to get too excited about our own beliefs, opinions, and get judgmental.
If that happens, we miserably fail to motivate and inspire and rather demotivate the students.
Especially in the field of medicine, so often we are dealing with difficult situations.
Most of these situations demand a lot of strength from doctors and students emotionally and spiritually.

As a teacher I feel these issues have to be addressed.
The way we address these issues is very important.
We do need to listen more than speak
We do need to ask questions more than give advice
We need to be more sensitive and less judgmental.
We need to put our ego aside and teach with soul.

All these things are much easier said than done.
and even though we often try to be good listeners,
all too often we may impose our own opinions and judgements.
We may hurt some feelings along the way and
our well intended inspiring session may become a demotivating session in the end.

I often pray for guidance during my teachings.
I know that sometimes I have truly failed to inspire
I know that sometimes I have inspired students too.

Perhaps it is OK to make mistakes, as long as we learn from mistakes.
I am a normal human being and like positive feedback and
do not like much to read negative feed back
But it is the negative feed back that allows us to grow;
it is the negative feed back that allows us to learn from our mistakes.
I do not get upset about negative feedback
I honestly admit that I do not like it
but I still embrace it as an opportunity to learn and improve myself.

I have not lost my ideals along the way
I still want to become the best teacher in the world
The best doctor in the world
The best father in the world
The best husband in the world
The best brother, the best uncle and so on
For each of the above I have a long way to go and time may be much too short.
I am aware I may not achieve any of these goals in my lifetime but they remain ideals to work towards.  :)