Following the Leader

the leader,
the leader.
We're following the leader 
wherever he may go

That's right sing along with me.

We won't be home till morning
till morning,
till morning
We won't me home till morning
because he told us so.

That's from Disney's Peter Pan.  It popped into my head when I sat down to write this piece and I knew I wouldn't be able to write word one until I purged it.

I have been having a lot of issues this week with someone who used to be my teacher.  I have been trying to separate what I learned from him from how I feel about him so that one will not contaminate the other.  Within the how I feel about him category, trying to tease apart the anger from the genuine affection for someone who made me laugh even as they got me to swallow the icky medicine that would make me all better.  People get angry at one another all the time.  It doesn't necessarily mean that they stop caring for each other.  But when the anger has no outlet and the situation no resolution so that the anger just builds and builds, it's time to re-evaluate.  And that's where I am.

Over the last ten years I have been fortunate to meet and interact with some phenomenal human beings who served in the place of teacher.  I readily stepped into the student shoes because they are familiar and comfy.  I learned quite a bit about shifting my life from that steeped in American got-ta-have-it-now-then-throw-it-away ideology toward one that was more sustainable on a personal level.  I dug through piles of old shit that I had stored and with their help unloaded a cargo container full of BS.  I am grateful for each of these individuals.

At a party over the weekend an acquaintance that I didn't successfully manage to duck nattered on about the manifestation class that I absolutely HAD to take.  I did the internal check and realized that no I didn't have to take it.  That my time following the leader has been over for a while now.  Lots of reasons for that.  But mostly, it's just time to step out from behind them and just be.  I respect people who fill the role of teacher.  So don't get me wrong on that score.  But I just don't feel the need to follow anymore.  There is more out there than what anyone knows.  How will we discover anything new if we are caught up in what we already know?

I have kinda suspected for a while now that the entire world is my 'teacher' if I let it be.  And in some mobius mind bending observation that the same world is also my 'student'.  That those words are static labels that ill define what occurs in real time here in the lab that is planet Earth.  That is the only teacher I want or need right now