Am I the one teaching?

Something I've been noticing in my teaching lately is a shift in how I think about a class going well - or not.

When I first started teaching, I made it all about me.

If a class felt connected and meaningful, I took credit for it. If it felt flat or awkward, I took responsibility for that too. Everything was filtered through the question: How did I do?

Over time, that perspective has softened.

The longer I teach, the more it feels as though a class has its own intelligence. The sequence that emerges, the words that arise, the pace of the practice, the moments of spontaneity and insight - all seem to be influenced by something bigger than myself.

Sometimes I walk into class with a plan and leave having taught something entirely different. Sometimes a theme emerges that wasn't there before. Sometimes the right words arrive at exactly the right moment.

Where do they come from?

I don't know.

What I do know is that I seem to have far less control over a class than I once imagined.

There is something happening between people that is difficult to measure and easy to dismiss. We tend to value only what can be perceived through the senses, quantified, or explained. Yet most of us have experienced walking into a room and immediately sensing tension, ease, excitement, or sadness before a single word is spoken.

The students are not passive recipients of what I have to offer. They help shape the experience. The class is not something I deliver. It is something we create together.

Somewhere along the way, I stopped feeling like the source of the class and started feeling more like a vessel.

My responsibility is to show up, prepare, pay attention, and be present. But what moves through the room - the insights, laughter, stillness, challenges, and moments of connection - does not belong to me alone.

This realization feels both humbling and relieving. If a class is extraordinary, it isn't entirely because I taught brilliantly. If a class is difficult, it isn't entirely because I failed.

So am I the one teaching?

In one sense, yes.

In another, perhaps I am simply a vessel for something that emerges when people come together - a field of attention, presence, and possibility larger than any one person in the room.

The longer I teach, the more I trust that.