Miss Thang! (Thing)

I had an interesting realization on my third day of sesshin. I was noticing how often my teaching came up during zazen: how often I thought about my lessons, the kids, what the parents thought of me, etc.
"Wow," I thought. "Being a good teacher is really important to you."
"Well, duh," I responded. "Of course being a good teacher is important to me. What would I be if I weren't a good teacher?"
And then I thought about it. What would I be if I weren't a teacher? What would I be if my identity weren't caught up in how my students felt each day, whether or not the lesson went well, how the parents felt I was doing in terms of keeping their kids engaged in and excited about school.
"You'd just be your self," I suggested.
"My self?" I thought for a second, and freaked out. "Who would that be?"
And I had no idea. Who would I be if I weren't a teacher? Who would I be if I weren't all the things I hope and desire and want to be? How would I know if I was doing okay or being right or living the way I was supposed to if I weren't all those things I thought I was supposed to be? Who would I be if I weren't trying to be what I thought I was supposed to be.
And that's when I realized that I wanted to be a thing. I wanted to be a teacher, I wanted to be a good person, I wanted to be a good friend, I wanted to be someone you can rely on. I wanted to be all those things that I could evaluate, that I could use to judge myself, that I could use to determine if I was safe, accepted, and right.
Being my self? That was scary. Who knows what being myself is? Who knows what that's supposed to be? Being a teacher, a good one, that's easy. It's not that it's easy, it's that it's clear whether you're doing it well or not. But being your self, especially when you don't know who that is, is totally wild. You have no idea whether you're right or wrong and so you can make mistakes and mess up at every turn. Being yourself is really vague so I think I wanted to be a teacher- a thing- because it was clear, it was easy, it was definable.
But in the end, when I thought more about it, about who I would be if I weren't a thing, if my identity weren't defined by my ability as a teacher; I realized, that I'd just be me, being a teacher. My identity as a teacher would be secondary, it would be part of who I am, but not all of who I am. And to be honest, it really is who I am. It's true that I'm a teacher and it's true that I think a lot about how to be a good one but in the end, I'm never only going to be a good teacher or a bad teacher and I'm never going to be either of them; I'm only going to be me.
I think it's normal to want to be a thing. I think it makes sense. But I realize that I'm not. I'm really messy and all over the place and I have good days and I have bad but I'm not a thing, I'm not fixed, I can't ever be good or bad, it just doesn't work that way. All I can be is me.