Nobody knows it but you've got a secret smile and you use it only for me (Semisonic)

Max Nayman on Unsplash

Recently, the blogpost below by Seth Godin got me thinking:

And who are you really?
There’s a desire to celebrate our “authentic” self.

But perhaps our considered self, the one that shows up when we’re doing our best to be consistent, generous and professional–that’s our authentic self. And the voice that slips out when we’re tired, stressed or busy is simply an incomplete and lesser version of who we actually are.

We’re the sum total of the interactions we choose to create and the changes we contribute.

Now, I'm not sure about this.

As I wrote on my Wozza's Place blog, I consider my professional self to be part of my authentic self because it's part of the sum total of who I am right here, right now.

But it's just a part because my professional self (Principal of two OneSchool Global campuses and teacher of English to a class of Year 10 students) is a role I adopt between 6.45am (when I arrive at school) and 5.00pm (when I leave for the day).

Between those hours I certainly aim to be doing my best 'to be consistent, generous and professional', but it's a role unlike other roles I have adopted (blogger, husband, friend, brother, father and so on). 

I'm sure if you asked the variety of people I interact with in my various roles they would tell you some different things about who I am.

Also recently, I was asked to supply 500 words on who I was - reading that piece which focussed on my professional life is very one sided (my career, academic achievements, why I love my job) with a few cherry picked things about me that have become a kind of shorthand over the years - Beatles/Arsenal/Star Wars.

It didn't get to the nitty gritty of who I am, that wasn't the brief. Social media won't help you much either - that's all designed to present certain self-images, right.

I feel some Walt Whitman coming on (from Crossing Brooklyn Ferry):

Appearances, now or henceforth, indicate what you are,

You necessary film, continue to envelop the soul,

About my body for me, and your body for you, be hung out divinest aromas,

Thrive, cities—bring your freight, bring your shows, ample and sufficient rivers,

Expand, being than which none else is perhaps more spiritual,

Keep your places, objects than which none else is more lasting.

So round and round and round I go, and where I stop I don’t know (Edgar Winter Group)

This post is about some great teachers. But first some back story.

I had some dental work done this week and while I was waiting (unsuccessfully) for the anesthetic to kick in I had time to chat with my dentist - a lovely Hungarian lady called Monica.

I asked Monica about when she had decided to become a dentist. She answered that she trained to be a dentist as a mature student; she'd flirted with other jobs before deciding that that would be her career.

She said, "No one can decide what they really want to do when they are 15 or 16 years old".

And I said, "I knew I wanted to be a teacher when I was 12". She was amazed.

Mr. Lindsay at Manukau Intermediate was my initial inspiration. He was a mathematics' specialist and a young enthusiastic guy but he was only my actual teacher for a short time (I had the deeply unpleasant experience of having Mrs. Kay for the bulk of those two years at intermediate).

When I went for my out of zone interview for Mt Albert Grammar in 1970 and the Headmaster (Mr. Hall) asked me if I had a job in mind for when I eventually left school I said, "I want to be a maths' teacher".

My father (another Mt Albert Grammar old boy) who came to the interview with me must have looked at me in an interesting way. I don't remember articulating this desire to him or my mother before this interview.

So my bliss found me aged 12 in August 1970.

I love the fact that I'm a teacher. It's all I've ever wanted to be; I know, in one form or another, it's all I will continue to be. 

Anyway this post was spost to be some great teachers so here's a random gallery of some great teachers who are no longer with us that have sprung to mind in the last five minutes. That would be Siddhartha Gautama (a.k.a. Buddha), Jesus of Nazareth, Walt Whitman, Frank McCourt, Confucius, Henry David Thoreau, and, finally, with the TV show Lost in mind - John Locke (you'll be able to suss who's who).