After more than 25 years of teaching, I still find myself wrestling with questions about the content I teach. And I’ve discovered there’s something surprisingly satisfying about that.
This article is part of our Craft of Training & Speaking Series — tools and techniques for anyone who teaches, facilitates, or speaks to move people to think and act.
It is also part of our Being Human Series — stories and insights on values, self-awareness, judgment, relationships, and how we are experienced by others.
Who knew a little angst could be so satisfying?
Training on Repeat
One of the best parts of writing a training course and delivering it many times is that you keep getting better at it.
Sometimes friends wonder how I can run a course I wrote in 1999 or 2012 and not find it boring when I run it today.
How could it be boring when you meet entirely different people, with different life experiences, goals and feelings?
The questions they ask or the things they say can freeze my brain in a good way.
To the point that I have to stop and say, “I never thought of it like that. Let me write that down!”
There’s another side to training on repeat.
It’s working through angst.
Angst Is a Feature, Not a Bug
I remember when I first started teaching business strategy, I wrestled with the difference between a metric and a key performance indicator.
- Did that difference even matter?
- If it mattered, was I shortchanging my students by not bringing it up?
- How could I confidently explain the difference in a way that was both helpful and memorable?
In German, the word Angst can describe anything from everyday fear to deeper anxiety. In English, we’ve borrowed the word to describe a more particular sense of apprehension or inner unease.
Call me a drama queen, but I regularly experience a little angst over the content I teach.
Since this isn’t a Marvel movie, I don’t have the fate of human existence in my hands.
But I know many teachers like me who care enough about their students to agonize over the details.
When the angst hit over the difference between metrics and KPIs, I called up a friend in management consulting, touched base with a university professor I knew, and read some books.
It took a few weeks, but that ball of yarn finally untangled in my head. And when it did, I swear I could hear angels singing as the fog lifted.
Now I get to share the outcome of that journey from angst to hard-earned clarity with others.
And smile while doing it.
How Passion Reveals Itself
I recently rewatched the famous MIT video “How to Speak” by Professor Patrick Winston.
Towards the end of his wonderful talk, he shares that your audience can be inspired by seeing your passion.
That observation really struck me.
And perhaps one way your passion for teaching comes through is in a willingness to order a side of angst and somehow enjoy it.
To work through the uncertainty and come out on the other side.
Because I think your students can tell.
Continue Exploring
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Thank You for Reading
I regularly share stories, strategies, and insights from our work across Contact Centers, Customer Service, and Customer Experience. If this article resonated with you, I’d be pleased to stay connected.
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Daniel Ord
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