A Quickie On When Small Is Large

 Good morning, night, evening, whatever. We back. It was an adventurous six weeks of eating interesting things, being in interesting places, and meeting interesting people. But, it’s good to be home. Kinda. While Susan and I don’t have to sleep literally on the plywood boards that double as mattresses in the dorms at Zhengzhou University or on hard mattresses characteristic of all the private homes, guest houses, and even five star hotels, our biological clocks are still twelve hours earlier in China. It makes for interesting times. Last night, for example, at 2:30 am EST, as if Susan and I were back in Shanghai’s New Heights Restaurant having lunch, we were wide awake, sipping wine, nibbling on shrimp, and starting to catch up on recorded TV shows we had missed while away. We’ve got to get things right since we’re driving out to the mid-west in a few days for a family gathering.

 Anyway, I found 1837 e-mails waiting for me. Yes, 1837! I forget to set my Outlook on “no mail” and deliberately got near a computer only on the rarest occasion while in China. Though I exercised my index finger and quickly erased most of them, I was struck by three. Two were a deeply touching “thank you” from students, one of whom was in China with Susan and me. The third was from a professor in Ohio.

 “What great difference can I really make? I’m only one person,” this professor had written way back at the beginning of May as I was flying over the Pacific in response to my last Random Thought on first year students. It’s something I hear and read all the time. It’s something I occasionally say to myself when I’m about to get down. Then, I think of such people as these two students. God, I wish I could violate confidence and let her read the two student e-letters. But, thinking of what those two students had said, every answer to her question that I came up with boiled down to simply that so often what we think is small can be unusually large and what appears to be insignificant at the moment can often be great.

 I have a quote from Mark Twain near my computer. It says, “Life is too short to be little.” As a cancer survivor, all I can say is, “Ain’t that the truth.” For me, each day is a unique moment of opportunity in time too precious to be forgotten, too beautiful to be ignored, too meaningful to be without purpose. Sometimes the opportunities that seem the smallest are the most magical and magnificent. Small opportunities can go largely unnoticed. They’re are all around us. It’s the reverse of fishing. Forget going after the rare whopper. Cast for the everyday small ones and don’t let them get away. Even with small opportunities we can create something big. Every encounter, every challenge, every relationship, every situation is an opportunity to give of yourself in the service of others. Each day brings with it new ways to make a difference in people around you.

 That’s not always easy. It takes discipline, commitment, awareness, creativity, humility, preparation, time, effort, resilience, and patience. I was reminded of that last week. I had decided to hike up Yunnan Province’s daunting 3,000 foot Liming Mountain that topped out at almost 10,000 feet above sea level. I hesitated. I didn’t know if I was in shape to make it since I hadn’t exercised in six weeks. The guide wasn’t sure this 66 year old body could do it. Nevertheless, I gave it a whirl. “What the hell,” I told Susan, “If I had to turn back ten minutes into the hike, I would turn back.”

 It didn’t take but a few steps into the hike for my lungs to tell me that I wasn’t superman and in that rarified air I wasn’t going to leap a tall mountain in a single bound. But I found the secret to making it to the top. No bounding, just rhythmic plodding. To hike successfully to what’s called its “thousand tortoise” summit, I just had to patiently and slowly take one small step at a time in a steady cadence. And yet, as I took one small step after another, each slowly lost its insignificance as it became an essential contribution to a great hike.

 Now, you say you can’t do that for each and every student? You say you can’t do it all? You say you don’t have the time? Maybe. But, the plodding was not the real secret to making the climb. It was my attitude. Yep, it’s all about attitude. As I hiked that mountain, my mind and heart were already at the summit. And, I discovered where they went, the rest of me, especially my lungs and feet, followed in their footsteps; that as I imagined being on the summit, I was already well on the way to reaching it. Remember, I didn’t know if I was in shape to make the physical climb, but my imagination was in shape to make the mental and spiritual climb. I set it free and it freed me of limitations. I allowed it to walk the releasing positive path instead of the enslaving negative one. I let it be my guide. It became the push and pull. It gave a purpose to each one step I took. It allowed me to make the climb. It upgraded my vision. It raised my expectations to the heights of that summit. Step by step I made it to the top. And, you know what? All this is not exaggeration. I still vividly remember that as I stood on the tortoise rock formations of the mountain’s pinnacle looking down the vastness of the Yulong Gorge, I uttered a “damn!” I was overwhelmed by a sense of accomplishment and fulfillment. My imagination had shown me not just who I could be, but more importantly who I was. And, I will always remember that during any encounter with anyone at anytime in any place.

 Sure, we cannot make a difference in every student’s life. But we shouldn’t use that as an excuse for cynicism, negativism, passivity, avoidance, disinterest, withdrawal, disengagement, disconnection, and inaction. We have to make these efforts knowing that though they may be hard and challenging, “hard” is not synonymous with “impossible” anymore than “challenging” is with “obstacle.” Why? The Talmud has the answer. It tells us that while we are not obligated to complete the work, neither are we free to abandon it. That means we don’t abandon the work because we never truly know if we can scale that mountain, how much work we can accomplish, and who we truly can become. It was and still is and will forever be a metaphoric lesson for teaching never to be lost on me.

Make it a good day.

      –Louis–

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About Louis Schmier

LOUIS SCHMIER “Every student should have a person who wants to help him or her help himself or herself become the person he or she is capable of becoming, and I’ll be damned if I am ever going to let one human being fall through the cracks in my classes without a fight.” How about a snapshot of myself. But, what shall I tell you about me? Something personal? Something philosophical? Something pedagogical? Something scholarly? Nah, I'll dispense with that resume stuff. Since I believe everything we do starts from who we are inside, what we believe, what we perceive, and what we do is an extension of ourselves, how about if I first say some things about myself. Then, maybe, I can ease into other things. My name is Louis Schmier. The first name rhymes with phooey, the last with beer. I am a 76 year old - in body, but not in mind or spirit - born and bred New Yorker who came south in 1963. I met by angelic bride, Susie, on a reluctant blind date at Chapel Hill. We've been married now going on 51 years. We have two marvelous sons. One is a VP at Samsung in San Francisco. The other is an artist with food and is an executive chef at a restaurant in Nashville, Tn. And, they have given us three grandmunchkins upon whom we dote a bit. I power walk 7 miles every other early morning. That’s my essential meditative “Just to …” time. On the other days, I exercise with weights to keep my upper body in shape. I am an avid gardener. I love to cook on my wok. Loving to work with my hands as well as with my heart and mind, I built a three room master complex addition to the house. And, I am a “fixer-upper” who allows very few repairmen to step across the threshold. Oh, by the way, I received my A.B. from then Adelphi College, my M.A. from St. John's University, and my Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. I have been teaching at Valdosta State University in Georgia since 1967. Having retired reluctantly in December, 2012, I currently hold the rank of Professor of History, Emeritus. I prefer the title, “Teacher”. Twenty-five years ago, I had what I consider an “epiphany”. It changed my understanding of myself. I stopped professoring and gave up scholarly research and publication to devote all my time and energy to student. My teaching has taken on the character of a mission. It is a journey that has taken me from seeing only myself to a commitment to vision larger than myself and my self-interest. I now believe that being an educator means I am in the “people business”. I now believe that the most essential element in education is caring about people. Education without caring, without a real human connection, is as viable as a person with a brain but without a heart. So, when I am asked what I teach, I answer unhesitatingly, “I teach students”. I am now more concerned with the students’ learning than my teaching, more concerned with the students as human beings than with the subject. I am more concerned with reaching for students than reaching the height of professional reputation. I believe the heart of education is to educate the heart. The purpose of teaching is to instill in all students genuine, loving, lifelong eagerness to learn and foster a life of continual growth and development. It should encourage and assist students in developing the basic values needed for learning and living: self-discipline, self-confidence, self-worth, integrity, honesty, commitment, perseverance, responsibility, pursuit of excellence, emotional courage, creativity, imagination, humility, and compassion for others. In April, 1993, I began to share ME on the internet: my personal and professional rites of passage, my beliefs about the nature and purpose of an education, a commemoration of student learning and achievement, my successful and not so successful experiences, a proclamation of faith in students, and a celebration of teaching. These electronic sharings are called “Random Thoughts”. There are now over 1000 of them floating out there in cyberspace. The first 185, which chronicles the beginnings of my journey, have been published as collections in three volumes, RANDOM THOUGHTS: THE HUMANITY OF TEACHING, RANDOM THOUGHTS, II: TEACHING FROM THE HEART, RANDOM THOUGHTS, III: TEACHING WITH LOVE, and RANDOM THOUGHTS, IV: THE PASSION OF TEACHING. The chronicle of my continued journey is available in an Ebook on Amazon's Kindle in a volume I call FAITH, HOPE, LOVE: THE SPIRIT OF TEACHING. There a few more untitled volumes in the works..

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