Teaching

Real teaching is a paradox because it is an illusion. It doesn’t exist.  Galileo said: “You cannot teach a man anything; you can only help him to find it within himself.” Teaching, in the sense of conveying an insight to another person, is an impossibility. Information, in the form of words, can be communicated; insights, on the other hand, are incommunicable even when they are perfectly expressed in words. The obstacle is not in the imperfection of language, for people learn invaluable lessons all the time even with little or no involvement of language-based communication.  The obstacle to learning is simply that one is not yet ready. This is evidenced by the fact that if one is not ready to learn a particular lesson, one would not learn it no matter how many times it is repeated, how eloquently it is taught, or how competent the teacher is. One learns only when one is ready, and one learns by finding (i. e., discovering) the truth of the matter for oneself and within oneself. The role of the teacher is to figure out what lessons the student is ready to learn, and then to facilitate the learning of those lessons whenever possible (and to stay out of the way when there is nothing to be done). At other times, the role of the teacher is to figure out what lessons the student needs to learn, and to help prepare the student to become ready for learning those lessons.