Joe recalls teaching an early course where he was struggling to help a very stuck person access their anger. A student who had just learned the technique from him walked over and helped the person break through in 10 seconds. Joe had gone through something similar 10-15 years prior — it wasn’t fresh in his system. He hadn’t just made the mistake, hadn’t just overcome the thing.
This reveals something counterintuitive about support systems and hierarchy: the most experienced person is not always the best teacher for any given moment. The person who just went through a transformation has fresh somatic memory of what it feels like to be stuck there and what shifted. Their empathy is more precise, their guidance more visceral.
This is why diversification of stage matters in support groups and why hierarchy undermines them. If only the most senior person teaches, the group loses the power of fresh perspective. It also explains why teaching integrates learning — when kids learn something, the first thing they do is teach another kid, and by teaching they learn it better.
“Oftentimes the best teacher is a person who’s just gone through it.”
Related Concepts
- Experiential learning over intellectual understanding
- Coaching expression must be yours not your teachers
- Community is more important than the teacher