This article is related to Tutoring, but we need to go over some basics first.
We are to some degree, the sum of the people around us.
If we are surrounded by artistic people we tend to be more artistic, surrounded by intelligent people tend to be more intelligent, surrounded by negative people… we’ll we tend to be more negative.
If you feel bad after being around a certain person, no matter how good they seem, this is probably not a good match.
This can be really simple. A person who is always pointing out the faults in your ideas or projects etc is obviously not going to make you feel good.
However, can be so counter-intuitive that you can have a person who seems like they’d be willing to do anything for you, but any interaction with them just drains you.
Either way, you don’t really need this in your life.
The same situation applies to taking on students. Most students and parents are great, but once is a while you’ll find someone who you just don’t have a good feeling about or they are asking more than you can deliver or there seems to be a personality conflict. You don’t need to take them on.
When I’m first asked to work with a student, I talk to them and their parents on the phone and find out what their goals are and whether they are willing to learn. I get a good feel of the student before I decide to take them on, and if I don’t feel that it’s right, then I won’t.
Only take on students you feel you can help. Trust your feelings. I’ve only declined to work with one or two students out of thousands but it was always the right decision and I suggested another option that I thought would be of more benefit for them.
It shouldn’t happen often but when it does, trust your gut.
Taking on this point of view could make tutoring much more fun and beneficial for you and your students, and if you apply it in life, give you much more licence to be yourself.
If you have so few students that you feel you need to take on everyone, then you need to get more students asking for your tutoring!
I recommend downloading and applying the Successful Tutor cheatsheet and working on getting so many student requests that you can pick and choose.
Greetings! Very useful advice in this particular article! It is the little changes that produce the greatest changes. Thanks a lot for sharing!