Thread: Teach. It's how we grow.

They say you don't truly understand a thing until you've taught it. I believe there is much wisdom in that statement. It's very easy to make habits, create a comfort zone, and stay there. Teaching something takes us out of that bubble of the safe and known and forces us to see things from someone else's point of view so that we can help them understand what we're trying to show them.

Each time we step outside our safe zone and teach someone something, we learn something, too.

So, why am I pointing this out? Because I believe that there is more to this community than just getting out there and having fun. I believe that if we show others how to enjoy their time here as much as we do, we will increase everyone's enjoyment of our servers and our community. We will learn new things about ourselves and how we have fun. And, most importantly, we will continue to foster this community as a place where the people we enjoy playing with will always feel welcome.

How do we accomplish this? We show patience with the uninitiated, the pubbies, and the unwittingly ignorant. We take the time to welcome the new faces we see on the server and in the community and help them increase their skill and understanding of our rules and founding principles. Remember, we were all pubbies once.

In the spirit of improving our community, I challenge each and every person who reads this to take a few moments over the next few weeks and show someone the ropes. It can be a pubby in your squad; it can be someone who's new to TG; it can even be someone who's posted a thread on the forums on a topic that's already been hashed and re-hashed. And if you find yourself getting annoyed or upset, take a brief moment to remember how you found TG. Think about where you are now and where you started. Who helped you get to where you are? Who recruited you? Who explained to you why we don't let the opposing team into our uncaps? Where would you be if they hadn't taken the time to do that? I guarantee that will give you an extra measure of patience to explain to the pubby in your squad why he needs to stick with the rest of you.

In closing, I would like to thank Zoticus, MajWood, and many others for being such great teachers and influences during my early, early days at TG. Bravo zulu, guys.

See you on the field.