Gurus and Teachers

At its core, meditation is as simple as any task could be, yet it inspires so much fanfare surrounding experts. I suppose you could just sit, but it seems that no one begins meditating that way. Nearly everyone I’ve met learned from an expert—guru, master, teacher, or what-have-you. I’m learning meditation from a very experienced teacher, but it would be fair (and relevant to this week’s learning theories topic) to ask what a meditation expert can provide to a novice.

Let’s explore a few of the reasons to revere experts that are discussed in chapter 2 of How People Learn. As the authors explain, “experts notice features and meaning patterns of information that are not noticed by novices,” which applies to meditation in a deep way (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2000, p. 31). Becoming more proficient in meditation can feel like trying to swim in a field of grass. It’s awkward and you don’t feel like you’re really making progress. So it is helpful (critical, really) to have feedback about your experiences. My teacher is always making meaning of our personal experiences. She nods as we describe our troubles and then explains why and where we are stuck. Her experience allows her to make sense of our struggles and prescribe solutions. Falling asleep while meditating? Try a different time of day. Your mind refuses to relax? Try focusing on your breath, eyeballs, belly button, or heartbeat. Truth be told, I would have already given up on this if I didn’t have such an encouraging and positive teacher with an eye for patterns.

Another key ability of experts is knowing “the kinds of difficulties that students are likely to face” and tapping “into students’ existing knowledge to make new information meaningful” (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2000, p. 45). It’s not enough for a great teacher to repeat monologues (particularly for meditation). An expert teacher must be able to guide students’ learning through likely pitfalls, while making what students do know work for them. It’s no easy task, but I’ve been really surprised how well my mediation teacher does this. Using my naïve perception from a month ago of what a successful meditation student would be able to do, I would have thought of my whole meditation class and myself as complete failures by this point. But my teacher was not in the least bit surprised how far we’ve all fallen short of our lofty goals. When we reported to detail how poorly we’d done this week, she only prepared us more for similar struggles.

My expert meditation teacher also connects our difficulties with other difficulties. Meditation is like exercise or any other self-improvement—it takes dedication, practice, and self-forgiveness. Our teacher encourages us to ponder what has made us successful in these other areas and apply it to meditation.

How did you become addicted to exercising?

Well… doing it everyday no matter how much I hated it.

Exactly! That’s what you have to do for your meditation.

It’s a big help to really get metacognitive about your resistance to sitting and clearing your mind, which I’ve gotten better at this week. Having a teacher (and considerate peers) can really foster that sort of thought.

Where How People Learn discussed the great powers of experts, Ambrose touched on some of the blind spots or blunders of experts working as instructors. And I must admit I’ve been guilty of being a blinded teacher in classes I’ve taught. My meditation teacher is very good at not being blinded by her unconscious competence (perhaps she forces herself to remain partially conscious by being open to learning new things), but I have met and seen people who mediate well and assume it is very easy to do. Many of the videos available all over the Internet are great, but some assume a lot of component skills and practice that a beginner would really not have. How long is too long for a beginner? Well probably more than 10 minutes, but a lot of people on YouTube don’t seem to know that. It’s a critical part of being able to teach something—understanding the steps that are needed to get where you are. I believe it is what separates professionals, or even academics, from teachers.

I’m grateful to have an expert to learn from. My teacher is actually really excellent and supportive. I’m making great progress because of it. I typically get burned out on self-improvement stuff so fast, so having the scaffold built by a teacher really helps me stay focused and improving my skills at an appropriate rate.