We’re their success, or, Honouring our teachers.

This past week, two good friends of mine lost teachers who were tremendously influential on whom they have become today. Those friends are good, kind people. This post is written in respect to their grief, and as a reminder to the rest of us to be grateful for those who have made us who we are.

I talked a couple of posts ago about standards of greatness. How to define greatness is a question that has bothered me for a long time. I know I want to be great, but I’m not entirely sure what exactly greatness means.

Greatness could mean wealth, or fame, or power. Let’s go deeper though; rather than asking what greatness is or how to get it, let’s ask why we want it. Some will immediately say they want greatness in order to be happy. Not every great person is happy, and depending on your definition, not every happy person is great.

I would say the vast majority of us want greatness for the same reason: we want to be remembered. We want to leave a legacy. The danger with not defining greatness is that we open ourselves up to pursuing any avenue towards this end goal of being remembered.

Teachers have no such problem.

Teachers, whether they instruct inside or outside the classroom, know their standard of greatness; while it does not exclude wealth or fame or power, it does settle for these things either. The teachers I’ve been lucky enough to have have been successful in music, architecture, masonry, archaeology, and business; these are all fields my teachers pursued and left. They wanted to leave a legacy, and found these were not the field in which they could make this happen.

Teachers leave a legacy through their students. Teachers define greatness as creating better people. Teachers are not often remembered around the world or in the annals of history. Yet they and their lessons live on in their students, and in the people their students teach, and so on. Our teachers are great. Our teachers leave both the smallest and largest legacies imaginable.

To my friends who have lost two of their most formidable instructors, you honour their memory every day. You were privileged to have role models like them, and I’m sure they thought equally of you as students.

And to the rest of us who still have our teachers to talk to, what’s a quick email or phone call to say thanks? Teachers love to create better people, and showing gratitude is a hallmark of the best people.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some emails to send.

Editor’s note: If you have a topic idea, I’d love to hear from you! Suggestions can be made in the comments section or on Twitter @JeremyDeMello.