Experiencing the Student: On Being Present in the Classroom

“All Real Living is Meeting.”

-Martin Buber, I and Thou

What is experience? Who am I? Who are you? How can I know you? How does a teacher meet their students where they are? These are questions that are enormous in both breadth and depth. Yet, they are some of the most fundamental questions that one can ask. Indeed, they have been asked by philosophers, psychologists, and educators for centuries. While immediately primary to all of us, the question of what experience is has a deeply contested history. Through an exploration and study of experience, the relationship of Self and Other, and the problems and possibilities of being present to the Other, we teachers can learn to become facilitators of mutual relations to meet our students in our classrooms. As a means of narrowing this project, we will focus primarily on Dewey’s Art as Experience, Buber’s I and Thou, Arrien’s The Four-Fold Way: Walking the Paths of the Warrior, Teacher, Healer, and Visionary, and Hook’s Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom as aids to conceptualize what an experience is, how to be present to the Other, and how to meet our students in the classroom milieu.

Experience

When one thinks of the word experience and its potential meanings, a near infinite number of ideas, images, memories, and thoughts are sure to occur. In fact, understanding what experience is is an impossible project. It is impossible because we are always already experiencing Beings. All is experience. Even this statement is largely redundant since ‘all’ and ‘experience’ here are synonymous in meaning. A more accurate way of putting this statement would be using the single word: experience or is. However, while we do not have to, should not, and cannot endeavor into a project of such magnitude, we can and will benefit from a close study of particular kinds of experience via analysis. In his work on aesthetics, Art as Experience¸ American philosopher and father of progressive education, John Dewey, works to parse out different kinds of experience—namely, what it means to have an experience. Dewey writes, “An experience has a unity that gives it its name, that meal, that storm, that rupture of friendship. The existence of this unity is constituted by a single quality that pervades the entire experience in spite of the variation of its constituent parts” (Dewey, 2021, p. 38). Here, Dewey provides a condition for what is required of an experience to be known not merely as particular by contrast to what it is not—something we see in the work of Jean Paul Sartre. Rather, the experience is known by its unitive quality. Dewey doubles down on this condition in stating: “No experience of whatever sort is a unity unless it has esthetic quality” (Dewey, 2021, p. 42). So, not only does an experience require a unity, but it must also be of an esthetic quality. What should me make of this if we are good inquirers and students of philosophy? The apparent question must be what is meant by ‘esthetic’ here?

Before providing our own thoughts and guesses on what esthetic may mean, let us first consider what Dewey has to say: “The enemies of the esthetic are…the humdrum; slackness of loose ends; submission to convention in practice and intellectual procedure. Rigid abstinence, coerced submission, tightness on one side and dissipation, incoherence and aimless indulgence on the other” (Dewey, 2021, p. 42). This passage illuminates and provides insight into an important understanding of experience. Here, an experience is not ‘humdrum.’ It is not ‘convention’ ‘incoherent’ and ‘aimless.’ An experience as esthetic possesses an intentional and meaningful quality; however, this is not a meaning that comes from a detached reflection upon the experience at a later time. It does not rely upon any intellectual procedure. The esthetic quality of an experience is one in which language struggles to name. It is one of fullness, unity, and richness. It is full of being and aliveness. Dewey continues in stating, “The esthetic or undergoing phase of experience is receptive. It involves surrender” (Dewey, 2021, p. 55). The use of the word surrender begs the question, surrender to what? Rather than simply answering this question by stating that it is a surrendering to the experience or what it experiences, it is important to notice that a dynamic is being introduced. Phenomenologists call this dynamic intentionality; that is, experience is always directed. In his seminal work, Being and Time, Phenomenologist Martin Heidegger provides an elaboration on how this plays out: “...Dasein itself--and this means also its Being-in-the-world--gets its ontological understanding of itself in the first instance from those entities which it itself is not but which it encounters 'within' its world, and from the Being which they possess” (Heidegger, 2008, p. 85). Dasein, the subject of Being-in-the-world, is always already in the world. The ramifications of this understanding are deep and complex. The world is not as neatly cut up between self and other and self and object as one is inclined to think in their ordinary experience.

What Dewey is getting at here is that an experience reveals this truth to us. Dewey states, “An experience has pattern and structure, because it is not just doing and undergoing in alternation, but consists of them in relationship” (Dewey, 2021, p. 45-46). One who is experiencing an experience is doing so as a relationship. There is an intentionality to consciousness in which one’s very ontological constitution is made up of the Other in the world. This is an important contrast to what the father of Phenomenology, Edmund Husserl, suggests in his Cartesian Meditations as he introduces the concept of the epoché: “The epoché can also be said to be the radical and universal method by which I apprehend myself purely: as Ego, and with my own pure conscious life, in and by which the entire Objective world exists for me and is precisely as it is for me” (Husserl, 1977, p. 21). If what Dewey and Heidegger are saying is accurate, such a staunch and individualistic understanding of the experiencing subject cannot possibly be one that brackets ‘ego’ from the world—at least not as far as one who is having an experience. If what Dewey and Heidegger are saying is accurate; that is, if it resonates with our own experience, there is no pure conscious life nor an ‘objective world’ that is all mine. Dewey concludes his investigation in stating, “Experiencing like breathing is a rhythm of intakings and outgivings. Their succession is punctuated and made a rhythm by the existence of intervals, periods in which one phase is ceasing and the other is inchoate and preparing” (Dewey, 2021, p. 58). There is dynamic and relational quality to this esthetic and unitive experiencing. Echoing what was stated earlier about the aliveness of an experience, Dewey utilizes language that describes experiencing as a breathing thing. It takes and gives and has a rhythm to it. In fact, as one reads this language, one is drawn into having an experience of discussing experience. In being with and reflecting on this experience and our newfound concepts and understandings, the questions that arise include: what is happening with this experience—with this relating? Is there a way to increase these kinds of experiences? Who am I in relation to the world and how can I better this relation? The subject of which we will now proceed to.

The Relation of Self and Other

Now, if we are to understand the experiencing self, what was previously referred to as Dasein or ego (which for our purposes here will be referred to interchangeably although there are vast differences in all three concepts historically from thinker to thinker) as something that is inherently relational, it is important to investigate the relation and the relating if we are to understand experience, increase these kinds of experiences, and better our relations within the world. In the Russian philosopher and literary critic, Mikhail Bakhtin’s Problems of Dostoevsky's Poetics, Bakhtin writes: The very being of man ... is the deepest communion. To be means to communicate ... To be means to be for another, and through the other, for oneself. A person has no internal sovereign territory, he is wholly and always on the boundary; looking inside himself, he looks into the eyes of another or with the eyes of another ... I cannot manage without another; I cannot become myself without another. (Bakhtin, 1984, p. 287) From the opposite end of the Earth, Bakhtin picks up on and echoes the very same discovery we have encountered thus far when considering the experiencing subject in the world. However, this notion of an experience is deepened and broadened in interjecting that an experience, in and of itself, is what is most fundamental to human beings; that is, this relating, rather than being a relation among other relations, is the relating that is most foundational. Bakhtin describes the being of the subject or what is often referred to as subjectivity as one of communion. In other words, what it means to be is a question of experiencing the Other. When we reflect upon those experiences that appear to us as most real or most alive, we are able to uncover something that which is typically hidden—especially for those of us living in the highly individualistic cultures of the West. In Critical Psychologist Edward Sampson’s book entitled Celebrating The Other: A Dialogic Account Of Human Nature, Sampson directly addresses this phenomenon stating: “We act as though any form of investment in another person, object or activity threatens autonomy. Our culture teaches us that we must guard ourselves again losing ourselves to “the other”, in whatever form that other may appear: that is, losing ourselves to another person” (Sampson, 2019, p. 37). Here, Sampson helps us to realize and understand that not only are these kinds of experiences hidden—they are culturally constituted. As good products of the enlightenment of rationality and science and as practitioners of the Husserlian epoché, the fear of the loss of autonomy and individuality has further removed us from the Other and from authentic Being-in-the-world. However, there is hope for us—for that which has been hidden can be found. While we never lose communion in the world, as it is most fundamental, just as it can be snuffed out and made alien, our relating can be rejuvenated and increased.

Experiencing the Other

Before addressing the question of how to rejuvenate or increase this kind of experience—this kind of relating—it is imperative to identify and analyze the problems and possibilities of experiencing the Other. Entailed within the question of increasing this kind of relating is the presupposition that such a relating is even possible. As we have seen, many, such as Dewey and Bakhtin, affirm the possibility of such experiencing and even encourage its cultivation. However, this is a contested notion, and it is not without its criticism and skepticism. On the other hand, others might believe such criticism to be absurd as it runs in the very face of experience itself which is primary and self-evident.

Anticipated Problems

It is not surprising that skepticism of such experiencing has frequently come from the analytic sphere of philosophical inquiry. Movements such as logical positivism largely influenced by what is now called the Vienna Circle pushed for a kind of epistemological verificationism which asserts that all that can be meaningfully spoken about must be subject to logical and empirical verification. In the first page of the preface of the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus by the analytic philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, Wittgenstein famously states: “What can be said at all can be said clearly; and whereof one cannot speak thereof one must be silent” (Wittgenstein, 2014). It is this emphasis on clarity and specificity in language that we refer to; that is, if one cannot speak of something plainly and clearly, it is not only meaningless to speak of, but it is prescribed that one ought not attempt to do so as it would be a waste of one’s time. However, what Wittgenstein is guilty of is a frustration arising from wanting the finger pointing to the moon to be the same as the moon. In his book entitled Old Path, White Clouds: Walking in the Footsteps of the Buddha, Vietnamese Buddhist monk, Thích Nhất Hạnh, repeats a warning from the Buddha to his students: “A finger pointing at the moon is not the moon. The finger is needed to know where to look for the moon, but if you mistake the finger for the moon itself, you will never know the real moon. The teaching is like a raft that carries you to the other shore. The raft is needed, but the raft is not the other shore” (Hạnh, 1997, p. 317). This profound teaching agrees that the act of speaking about experience directly is always tangential; however, it does not carry with it the pessimism and dismissal of Wittgenstein. While it is indeed difficult to speak of an experience, we can circle around it in such a way that meaning and communication can and do take place—as is the hope of this article.

Further complication of discussing the experience of the Other can be found in the philosophical schools of deconstruction and poststructuralism. Finding their home within the wider umbrella of postmodernism, deconstruction and poststructural thinking share a skepticism and distrust of the grand narratives often found in modernism such as: Enlightenment thinking, scientism, naturalism, world religions, liberalism, Marxism, etc. Following the linguistic turn of 20th century philosophy, albeit differently than analytic philosophers, continental thinkers such as Jacques Derrida and Jacques Lacan began to question the supposed certainty of phenomenological thinkers such as Husserl. In Speech and Phenomena: And Other Essays on Husserl’s Theory of Signs, Derrida complicates the notion of perception, a facet of experiencing, in stating, “The perceptual situation is not comprehended, as Husserl would want it, by intuitions or presentations...And contrary to what phenomenology - which is always phenomenology of perception - has tried to make us believe, contrary to what our desire cannot fail to be tempted into believing, the thing itself always escapes” (Derrida, 1973, p. 104). Again, Husserl falls under critique given his assumption that one’s perception of the world is the objective world rather than how it is apprehended. Derrida, in a critique of the phenomenological project as portrayed by some thinkers, calls into question perception itself given that perception, as explicated by Husserl, is located in a single preceptor amid a network or web of experiences and Others which too are part of this web. What is at stake here is the notion of certainty and how one can be certain of their experiencing as something more than experienced—something objective and universal. It is within this web of experience, of notion and concept, that Derrida develops the idea of différance.

Senior lecturer of French Studies at Monash University, Christopher Watkin, helpfully unpacks this notion in stating, “Derrida coins the neologism différance to indicate that “presence” is always different from itself and deferred with relation to itself. Nothing is ever fully and exhaustively present, as if we had a God’s-eye view or a God’s-mind understanding of it, in other words as if we could see or understand it perfectly and exhaustively” (Watkin, 2019). Moreover, while Derrida’s complication of the epistemology of experience appears to ring true, this should not stifle our intentions to meet the Other. In fact, when we analyze what is occurring here this complication appears to be exactly of the intellectual reflexive type that Dewey spoke of. Rather than working to describe the experience of the Other as experienced—the transpersonal understanding—albeit perhaps limited understanding, this critique aims at the Husserlian project of phenomenological analysis through bracketing and use of the supposedly possible epoché which seeks a kind of Cartesian certitude. Therefore, it poses little if any trouble in the project of having an experience and experiencing the Other as Beings-in-the-world. While we may not speak of the experience in totality or in certitude we surely can circle around our experience, express, and share this.

A somewhat similar critique can be seen in The Seminar of Jacques Lacan: On Feminine Sexuality, the Limits of Love and Knowledge. Lacan states, “The subject is nothing other than what slides in a chain of signifiers, whether he knows which signifier he is the effect of or not. That effect- the subject – is the intermediary effect between what characterises a signifier and another signifier, namely, the fact that each of them, each of them is an element” (Lacan, 1999, p. 50). Here it appears that Lacan is suspicious not of what is experienced as Derrida is, but rather what it is that is doing the experiencing. To be sure, psychoanalytic literature—especially that of the Lacanian bent—has called into question the notion of a whole and stable self. Beginning with the Cartesian ego, as established by Descartes famous phrase known as the Cogito: “I think, therefore I am,” (Descartes, 2008) (popularly and loosely translated from the Latin: Cogito, ergo sum) Western thought has tended towards an understanding of a complete and unified self. Central to his psychoanalytic project or re-reading of the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, Lacan describes the subject as inherently split by the very fact that he is a "speaking being," (Lacan, 1977, p.269). It is this speaking or entering into language that divides the subject from that of who speaks to that of what is stated. Therefore, as Lacan points out above in On Feminine Sexuality, the Limits of Love and Knowledge, the subject itself is a bottomless chain of linked signifiers. However, this issue can and should be treated in the same manner as the issue brought forth by Derrida; namely, it is of the intellectual reflexive type discussed by Dewey. It is for this very same reason that Jesus Christ states, “Amen, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever receives one child such as this in my name receives me” (Matthew 18:3-5). It is not an intellectual understanding of self and Other than allows the experience, the meeting, the relating; rather, it is an initial submission and surrender to the Other to see and be seen—to know one transpersonally. While our awareness of being split subjects in relation to a web of différance in the world is an interesting and thought-provoking endeavor, it does not subtract from our ability to be in relation to Others in the world as experiencers. In fact, it may open up new avenues of change and how we can be in the world due to our increased understanding of how it is that we are.

Possibilities

After addressing a few of the suspected and anticipated concerns and difficulties regarding meeting the Other, we can now explore the possibilities of this endeavor in consulting the literature as it concurs with and supports what we have seen thus far from Dewey, Heidegger, and Bakhtin. Jewish Existential philosopher, Martin Buber, in his seminal work, I and Thou, takes up this analysis of relating to the Other by first introducing a dualism for how one interacts in the world. Buber calls these two ways of relating the I-It and the I-Thou modes. To help illustrate the difference, Buber states, “The primary word I-Thou can only be spoken with the whole being. The primary word I-It can never be spoken with the whole being” (Buber, 1971, p. 3). The two ways of relating here are fundamentally opposed. This I-It relating is one of treating the Other as an object or as a means to some end. The I-Thou relationship entails an experience where the subject meets the Other with their whole being. This somewhat mystical language may, at first, appear to be vague or confusing to some; however, Buber elaborates on this for his reader: When I confront a human being as my Thou and speak the basic word I-Thou to him, then he is no thing among things nor does he consist of things. He is no longer He or She, a dot in the world grid of space and time, nor a condition to be experienced and described, a loose bundle of named qualities. Neighborless and seamless, he is Thou and fills the firmament. Not as if there were nothing but he; but everything else lives in his light. (Buber, 1971, p. 8) It is important to notice that the I-Thou relationship is not something that always happens between human beings. In fact, it is rare even though this relating is always possible. One can easily think of more examples of human beings treating one another as objects rather than as co-subjects sharing an intersubjective world. When Buber states that in the I-Thou relationship the Other is no longer an individual entity in spacetime, “a bundle of named qualities,” he directly tries to name what the Other is. The experience of the Other here is not one of utterly singular totality. If that were the case then there would be no I to relate to the Thou. Rather, Buber states that “everything else lives in his light.” What is meant by this and what can we take from it in our analysis? This is an issue of primacy and intentionality. In the I-Thou relationship, the Other is of central focus and attention. Therefore, this relating is a kind of being-present-with the Other—a way of experiencing and being-with. What is important is not having some kind of knowledge of the parts of the subject and the Other; rather, it is a practice in giving and receiving. To recall Dewey again, it involves surrender.

Buber continues in his analysis, turning now to the question of how does this I-Thou relating happen and how we might have this experience of the Other. He explains, “As only acceptance of the Presence is necessary for the approach to the meeting, so in a new sense is it when we emerge from it. As we reach the meeting with the simple Thou on our lips, so with the Thou on our lips we leave it and return to the world” (Buber, 1971, p. 111). Acceptance here is the key. The experience of the Other is an acceptance of presence and this is dialogical—a flowing from subject to Other. It is something that is inherently dynamic and involves openness to see and be seen. There is risk involved since each time one opens themselves up to another as Thou, there is the possibility, no, the certainty of change as we are affected. These conditions for meeting are imperative to understand and wonderful to be had. For if there are known conditions, they can be cultivated! Existential-Phenomenologist and student of the work of Buber, Emmanuel Levinas, concurs with this assessment in Totality and Infinity when he states, “To approach the Other in conversation is to welcome his expression, in which at each instant he overflows the idea a thought would carry away from it. It is therefore to receive from the Other beyond the capacity of the I, which means exactly: to have the idea of infinity. But it also means: to be taught” (Levinas, 1969, p. 51). Here Levinas echoes the conditions for having an experience or what we will refer to from now on as an I-Thou experience. A feeling and sentiment of welcoming and overflow provides a sympathetic coherence to Buber’s acceptance of presence and Dewey’s surrender to experience. Again, we see language of receiving from the Other and what is more, an openness to be taught by the Other. The I-Thou project is therefore one in which teaching is inherent and following from Buber and Levinas one that is not only possible, but practicable.

The Practice

The title of this article is Experiencing the Student: On Being Present in the Classroom. At this point in the article, one might be wondering where is the discussion on students, teachers, and classrooms? We will reach that juncture shortly—as this reflection and analysis must build upon itself as an architect does in constructing a building. Preceding such a discussion, it is necessary to bridge our understanding of I-Thou relationships to cultivating the conditions for having such experiences. American cultural anthropologist, Angeles Arrien, provides possible suggestions to doing this through four helpful guidelines: “Show up or choose to be present. Pay attention to what has heart and meaning. Tell the truth without blame or judgment. Be open to outcome, not attached to outcome” (Arrien, 1993, p. 15). Let us break down each of this for explication and analysis to inform our praxis. Thus far in our exploration of experiencing the Other we have discussed in detail being present. Arrien calls this “the way of the Warrior” (Arrien, 1993, p. 15). Why the Warrior? A warrior possesses courage and bravery. In fact, Christian Existentialist philosopher and theologian, Paul Tillich, explores this in great detail in his book entitled The Courage to Be. Showing up and being present to an Other is often anxiety provoking. As stated before, it is inherently risky and as Sampson pointed out, Western cultures contain great fear of loss of autonomy when it comes to relating to an Other. How do we show up if our culture primes us not to do so or lies to us and tells us such talk is mumbo jumbo? While these guides are meant to facilitate I-Thou experiences, they are just that, guides. There is no instruction kit. It takes practice. However, the following 3 guidelines can help.

The second of Arrien’s suggestions is to pay attention. Arrien calls this “the way of the Healer” (Arrien, 1993, p. 15). If you think about it, a healer is no good to the patient if the healer does not know what is wrong with the patient. This, of course, is just an example of paying attention. When we meet the Other, it is not a prescription for us to have something to “fix” or be “fixed.” However, when we speak of attention, it is almost always regarding us paying attention. Attention costs us something. It costs us our self-absorption and self-regard. In paying attention to the Other there is a surrender of self to the Other.

The third guideline is to tell the truth. Arrien calls this “the way of the Visionary” (Arrien, 1993, p. 15). Being a visionary requires imagination and creativity. It requires openness to ideas and possibilities; however, this is dialogical. When Arrien suggests that we tell the truth, it is without blame or judgement; that is, we bring something to the table—not as all there is—but as a gift. We tell our subjective truth. Surrendering to the Other does not mean to destroy oneself for the other. Again, if such were the case, there would be no ‘I’ in the I-Thou relation. Often, we compartmentalize and only show part of ourselves. We may not even know all our parts, as Lacan suggests, and that is okay because the meeting, as stated before, does not require such an epistemology. In fact, if we are telling the truth, the honest move to both self and Other may be to bring to the relation what one can afford to bring. The meeting should always be what Gestalt psychotherapist Fritz Perls calls a “safe emergency” (Clarkson and Cavicchia, 2013, p. 29). The subject and Other emerge in the I-Thou relation with the ethic of do no harm. For if there is harm, there is no Thou.

The last guideline Arrien provides us with is to not get attached to outcomes. Arrien calls this “the way of the Teacher” (Arrien, 1993, p. 15). For many, this is the most difficult suggestion of them all. How do we care and not get attached? Additionally, for one to not be attached to outcomes, however, does not mean to be indifferent or careless. If anything, it might be said that it is the opposite. For if someone is indifferent and careless of the Other, there is no Thou and if one is not attached to the outcome of the meeting, they sacrifice the desire to control the Other. It is important to note that while Arrien states we should not get attached to outcomes, they state that we should be open to them. To be open to outcomes is to be open to the present experience and the Other as they present themselves. This involves an openness to flow in all its dynamic subtleties, crescendo, upwellings, and undercurrents. Since these guidelines are so broad in nature and non-specific to any one environment or milieu, the applications are as infinite as subjectivity. Therefore, an application of this analysis to the world of teaching is apt.

The Teacher, Student, and Classroom

The word responsibility means, at its root level, being able to respond. No doubt everyone would agree that teachers are responsible for the education of their students. This does not mean that what the student learns is a direct result of what the teacher teaches, but rather that the teacher is able to respond to the givenness or presence of the student as they present themselves—however and to whatever degree that may be. Unfortunately, the notion of responsibility as given here has been replaced with one of accountability; that is, through means of formalistic standardization and I-It relating, teachers are understood as robotic and liable injectors of information and students as empty receptacles for said information. If this is true and right, then who the student and teacher are and what the material is should be universal and without difference. In his widely praised and cited book entitled Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Brazilian educator and philosopher Paulo Freire states, “One cannot expect positive results from an educational or political action program which fails to respect the particular view of the world held by the people. Such a program constitutes cultural invasion, good intentions notwithstanding” (Freire, 2017, p. 95). Indeed, if care for the world of the student is not present, how could it ever be possible to see the student for more than an object amongst objects in the world? If there is no showing up, one cannot pay attention, nor tell their truth, nor be open to all the possible outcomes in the relationship. If the conditions of I-Thou experiences are not present, it would not be a curious situation if students did not care for learning in school.

Following this line of thought, social activist, and educator Bell Hooks, in her work entitled Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom, writes, “As a classroom community, our capacity to generate excitement is deeply affected by our interest in one another, in hearing one another’s voices, in recognizing one another’s presence” (Hooks, 1994, p. 8). Here we see that excitement is a necessary condition for truly being engaged in the learning process, but what would it mean for one to engaged and excited if they are not known relationally? Would such an interaction not be the very same humdrum that Dewey suggests is the anthesis of having an experience? Remember, having an I-Thou experience is memorable. It stands out. For an experience to stand out it must, by necessity, not be humdrum. Here Hooks points out that such excitement—such engagement—is deeply affected by our interest in the Other. Indeed, she even uses the word “presence” herself. Therefore, the conditions for meeting our students as Thou must at least be present in order to present the opportunity to be seen and heard in the learning process. Hooks continues in reminiscence of her own education in stating, “My teachers made sure they “knew” us. They knew our parents, our economic status, where we worshipped, what our homes were like, and how we were treated in the family” (Hooks, 1994, p. 3). What can we learn from such reminiscing? Why does Hooks even mention her own education here? The gravity of knowing that things can be different, have been different before, and are different for some is paramount. Part of the conditions for meaningful I-Thou relationships is paying attention. While not strictly necessary for meeting the Other, knowledge about the Other as presented by the Other is extraordinarily helpful in cultivating I-Thou relations. In knowing who students are, we foster empathy for them; that is, we feel into their world. It is worth noting that this goes both ways. For the student to enter into a genuine relationship, genuine experiences are required, and this means that the teacher must be able to tell their own subjective truth as well. Just as students are not blank slates, neither are teachers.

Lastly, teachers must work to be open to the outcomes of their relating to their students. This means setting aside the temptation to control the student. It involves meeting the student where they are. At this point, it is anticipated that some might call this project impossible or exhausting. “How can I have an I-Thou relationship with all of my students?” a teacher may ask. Remember, do not get attached to outcomes. The meeting of the student is an invitation—a reaching out. Not everyone will reach back; however, teachers are responsible for the offering. They must be response-able. Additionally, Hooks addresses this anxiety in her own work: “I asked students once: "Why do you feel that the regard I extend to a particular student cannot also be extended to each of you? Why do you think there is not enough love or care to go around” (Hooks, 1994, pp. 198-199)? Perhaps the reason for why students might think this is because it never has been extended to them before. Bell Hooks certainly believed that it is possible for us teachers to reach out to all of our students. It might even be argued that this exceptional relating is not exhausting; rather, it is energy and life-giving. Indeed, when we are carefully and lovingly engaged with something rather than acting monotonously, there is a certain vigor and rejuvenation that is both empowering and comforting. Moreover, on the feared difficulty of extending oneself out to our students, it is appropriate to remember the Parable of the Lost Sheep. Jesus states, “What man among you having a hundred sheep and losing one of them would not leave the ninety-nine in the desert and go after the lost one until he finds it? And when he does find it, he sets it on his shoulders with great joy” (Luke 15:4-5). This, of course, is not to suggest that we are the finders and saviors of our students as lost. Indeed, the hope is that we find one another. What we can take from this parable is an understanding that each student is worth our reaching out and the joy that we may find in our efforts to see our students as Thou is great and always worth it.

Conclusion

While the question of experience is monumental, it is not a problem to be solved. Any attempt to capture what experience is, is surely doomed to failure. In fact, if one were to say, “Here! This is experience. I have captured it completely!” one should be weary. This, however, does not mean that an examination of experience is without any merit. On the contrary, as we have seen here, much is to be gained. An examination of the literature can not only expand and strengthen our intellectual knowledge, but much more importantly, it can change our relation to Others and the world for the better. As we have seen, the applications for I-Thou relationships are infinite. Whether we work to create the conditions for meeting in our personal lives with our spouses, partners, and children, or in our professional lives as teachers, counselors, medical professionals, food service workers, etc., our experiencing Others as Thou uncovers a meaningful and enriching capacity to our lives.

References

Arrien, A. (1993). The Four-Fold Way: Walking the Paths of the Warrior, Teacher, Healer, and Visionary (1st ed.). HarperOne.

Bakhtin, M. (1984). Problems of Dostoevsky's Poetics. Trans. Emerson, C. Minneapolis, London: University of Minnesota Press.

Buber, M. (1971). I And Thou. Touchstone.

Clarkson, P., & Cavicchia, S. (2013). Gestalt Counselling in Action. SAGE Publications.

Derrida, J. (1973). Speech and Phenomena: And Other Essays on Husserl’s Theory of Signs. Northwestern University Press.

Descartes, R. (2008, July 1). The Project Gutenberg E-text of A Discourse on Method, by Rene Descartes. The Project Gutenberg. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/59/59-h/59-h.htm

Dewey, B. J. (2021). Art as Experience. Perigee Books, U.S.

Hạnh, T.N. (1997). Old Path, White Clouds: Walking in the Footsteps of the Buddha (13th ed.). Full Circle Publishing Ltd.

Heidegger, M. (2008). Being and Time (Reprint ed.). Harper Perennial Modern Classics.

Hooks, B. (1994). Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom (Harvest in Translation). Routledge.

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