“That was your last chance” I told her after her third exam supervision with me. She had come with a client of hers for a bodywork session, evaluated by me as her teacher.
“You lost your own confidence when your client felt doubtful” I told her, “you backed off rather than touching him and you didn’t show him how to transform the moment with his own strength” I could see how much she was trying to hold back her tears. “I’m sorry” I said, “but I can’t let you have the diploma based on that particular session I’ve just seen”.
Her client was a gifted singer whose shyness was affecting his ability to become successful. He wanted her to teach him how to improve self confidence and he clearly achieved great results in the six month personal development process they had worked through together. I was her teacher and I knew that she had done her best. I knew that the client was extremely satisfied with the work they had done so far and I also knew that she was terrified of exams.
But still what she showed me was not enough for her to receive her diploma. I was guided by my teachers to check my student’s work according to given set of requirements that had to be fulfilled. On the few occasions when I had argued that some students should receive a diploma even if they ‘failed’ the exam, I was told to not compromise, and I didn’t. Therefore my role, in situations as this one, was to harden my heart just a little bit, to tell her that she would need to repeat a seminar and work on her weaknesses, if she wanted to try again and come to another exam.
Looking back at those situations, all I feel is regret. Unfortunately I can’t change what has already been said, I can’t turn back time and even if I could reach out today to those people I failed, I wouldn’t be able to take their hurt away; a justified hurt for people who invested money, time, energy and great love in learning a profession, only to be told they had failed by the same person who taught them.
The process I have been through personally in recent years involved asking myself many questions. Among them: How can I, as a teacher, create the best conditions for my students to learn and show me their work? Is there another system of evaluation more fitting than exams? Is there a correct or right way to give sessions of personal development? Who best evaluates the effectiveness of the practitioner’s professional work? Is it the practitioner, the client, the teacher or somebody else?
I had a discussion with a friend of mine – a contractor who builds houses. His experience spans more than 20 years – more or less the same amount of time I have spent experiencing processes of personal growth with clients trying to achieve their goals. Yet his work needs to be evaluated because people’s physical safety is of primary concern. “It’s the building inspectors who assess my work when I build a house. It can only be them – experts that can understand the quality and professional standards of my job.”
But is there an expert that can evaluate the emotional safety, or the feelings of a person; their sense of achievement, their personal victories and satisfaction with their own results? Is there an expert that can evaluate the mechanics of the practitioner’s work, even when the client is satisfied with what was accomplished?
In my recent years of practice, I have considered these questions. I haven’t continued to evaluate students in the same system I learned initially, but instead I asked many more questions to try to get a deeper understanding of their work. I wanted to know from their clients how they felt and to share with them in their achievements and accomplishments. I was less interested in pointing out to them immediately what they could improve on, or how they could do something differently. I started to realize again and again that each practitioner has their own way and their way, though different from mine, is often perfect in its own way. Sometimes I found it difficult to follow their line of thinking, but if I paid attention and listened closely enough, if I was patient enough, then the real magic of their own way could simply reveal itself to me.
When I stopped being the one that has to judge their work, but rather share in it with them – suggesting some new directions without enforcing them – my heart grows and I feel great love for my profession, for the creation of my new school and methodology, for the students I have taught in the past and the ones I am yet to meet and for the many clients that have and can benefit from their own unique paths of learning.
I think that the only people who can truly evaluate the process of personal development are the clients themselves. When the client of a practitioner I taught tells me things like ‘these sessions will change my life’, I can only proudly smile and be happy that I have been able to play some part in the positive direction their life has taken.
