How to understand if a route has a heart

Many ask me how to understand if a teaching is valid. Genuine teaching has a dual objective: to have a precise, objective, and universal content to transmit and to be a “living” system. When a teacher relies on a valid system but does not live it firsthand, the route has no heart. It could also be said that it is dead or “mummified” teaching.

Besides the objective content, the instructor must have the ability to interact with the subjective characteristics of the student or athlete.

The primary characteristics an instructor should have consist of the ability to manage three aspects:

• Knowing how to explain the execution and especially the reasoning behind the techniques
• Knowing how to demonstrate them correctly
• Knowing how to correct and identify the Focal Point (FP)

But above all, an instructor should be consistent. If one is not inclined to teaching, they should not teach: many teach for reasons other than vocation. Frequently, instructors verbally explain things that turn out to be different or even contrary to what they do when climbing. This is an indication that something is seriously wrong. Many try to teach the Method’s techniques without having mastered or understood them. Others pass them off as their own inventions, even changing the names of the various progressions or positions. Such things are typical of poor teachings. A teacher who relies on someone else’s work without understanding it well and without citing sources, poorly copying and executing the original techniques, what kind of values can they transmit? Inconsistency is one of the main causes of the degeneration of this historical period