[Agape] Loving Your Teachers

As I write this, my best friend is halfway across the world on a Fulbright scholarship teaching English and implementing art practices in classrooms in Kolkata, India. I cannot help but think of the influence she is having on those young girls who walk into her classroom every day. We all have had those teachers who have changed our lives. They are those teachers and mentors of ours who have spoken into our hearts and who have transformed the way we see the world. They are the mentors who have taken us under their wing, who have held our hand and have guided us through troubled waters to our very own safe harbor. As we continue to walk through life, we still have teachers and mentors. In every phase of life, we continue to have those people that will teach us, that will speak into the depths of our hearts, and that will gravely impact our lives. So, how do we say thank you to those who have invested in our lives? How do we love our teachers and mentors?In loving our teachers, we should give ourselves room to grow and to complete the work they have started in us. Our teachers and mentors see potential in us. They see our strength, they empathize with what we have been through, and they empower us to draw upon our will, to push beyond the walls around us, and to achieve the wildest dreams we have set before us. They listen to the desires of our hearts and they go alongside us to provide us with tools so that we can transform our dreams into realities. It, then, becomes our responsibility to complete the work they have started in us. We must believe in the potential they pointed out to us, we must draw upon the strength that they first uncovered, and we must use our unique skillsets that they carefully refined in order to reach the mark that they helped us set for ourselves. Then, we must believe that we can push past those marks so that we are continually creating new marks for ourselves and new goals for us to achieve. The responsive love we show to our teachers, then, is an active love, one that requires us to honor the work our teachers have helped us achieve and respect all that our teachers have encouraged us to be. In order to do this, we must allow ourselves room to constantly push our limits. We must allow ourselves enough room to believe in our full potential, and not only to believe in it, but to act upon it.After seeing the work our teachers have started in us come to fruition, we should support and enable them to influence others. This requires further action on our part, not only to support them through adhering to the work they have started in us, but through advocating for them and supporting their own growth. In drawing upon the ways in which we were inspired and influenced by our teachers, we must act in order to fuel their spark and passion so that they can continue to inspire others. In some ways, loving our teachers may mean that we take action in community matters, that we use our voice in political rallies, or that we volunteer some of our time in order to form a coalition of strength around our teachers and mentors. In other ways, loving our teachers may require us to simply be there for them: to listen when their hearts are weary and their minds are tired, to comfort them when their souls are burdened, to rejoice with them when they tell of their victories, to reassure them of their impenetrable strength, and to remind them of their invaluable influence. Seeing the evidence of the influence that our teachers and mentors have made on our lives should inspire us to surround them with all the support they need in order to continue to impact the lives of all those around them.Furthermore, in supporting our teachers and mentors, we should carry the torch that they have passed on to us so that our light spreads to everyone we meet. Through guidance, encouragement, support, and refinement, our teachers have fueled the fire within us. Through teaching us, believing in our potential, and challenging our convictions, our teachers and mentors have sustained the light we carry around. In certain times, they have kept our fire ablaze, fending off anything that would dim our sparkle and put out our flame. In other times, they have been the constant wind behind our flames, so that our fire burns that much brighter and more resolutely that it can be seen in even the darkest corner in the room. So, we use our fueled fire and our refined light in order that we, in return, may add fuel to the fire of others. In carrying our torches, we use the light that our teachers have shown to us and imparted on us so that we may influence and teach those around us.So, reach out to a teacher, to a mentor, and say, “thank you.” Thank them for the energy and time that they have poured into your life in order to watch you and enable you to become the person that you are today. Thank them for how they have loved you and strengthened you without asking or expecting anything in return. Thank them for seeing the light within you and for fueling that light to watch it expand to the lives of others. But, when words may be few, take action to show them your gratitude and to love them by supporting them in return. Take action to love them by fueling their fire and sparking their light so that they may continue to carry their torches to the ends of the earth.Thank you, teachers and mentors; your selfless love and insistent strength spread light to the depths of the world and your influence goes beyond any and all bounds.