"May your cup be ever empty": I add, look with beginners eyes.

I got the June Toastmaster Magazine, with a lot of interesting articles in it. One I loved a lot, is our International President "May your cup be ever empty". 

What? It is a title that attires already, why should we have empty cup? 

Three British breakfasts  - photo Julie Kertesz

Not even half full? or half empty? To add anything of value to each cup, each learning, we should begin with "empty cup" not a full cup telling "I know enough" or "it was always..." Drop all preconceptions. 

An old adage, I did not know till now: We must empty our cup to get new tea. 
So true! Once I understood, what it meant, that is.

Arrive with an open mind, willing and eager to learn, rather then validate preexisting knowledge. Open to new ideas. True for a training, true for our education program. The one we all have available now. There for all of us. 

Learn by doing. That is the new Toastmasters year. Those are our new tasks. Put people first. Best not forget this one: it is not the "points or club or TMI" first the members! Some forget it, but most of us do not. The pleasure of seeing someone flourish for me it is a huge one. And knowing, I had a tiny part of it. 

Learn from those who come before you and share with those who come after you. 

Empty your cup, when I begun to research it, as I learned from Level 1 "research and present" I found its Chinese Zen origin also described. There is more on Google!

Read of course the origina, the Balraj Arunasalam article in the June Magazine, at the very beginning about the District Trainings. But it is valid also for the new education program, now "public". TMI come out with a new video and a new press release about Pathways. The first public press release about Pathways.