True Teachers

[Gerard]

[Clarity]

Thank you for posting this.

 

I've had the good fortune of having several excellent teachers in this life time.

 

A few things I've discovered:

 

1. Intuition is very important in finding the teacher you need

2. Time, place and person cannot be ignored

3. Life is really the best teacher we have

 

It has also been my experience that the best teachers don't teach because they want to teach (ego), they do it because there is a real need.

[manitou]

I'd go even a little further and say that life finds us the teacher if we are impeccable to the best of our ability. Being impeccable in this regard would be the ability to still the inner dialogue (only after many years of meditation is this possible), the earnest desire for enlightenment (or whatever one wishes to call it), an understanding of right action, an understanding of telling the truth as they perceive it, and the ability to not judge anything as either good or bad. But above all, one must be teachable. This involves ego, or losing it. If one considers that he/she has the "answers" and no more questions, then there is a barricade to finding the Center. The student must remain open minded; a true teacher will always be a true student.

 

Gerard, thank you for posting that. It was like a drink of cool water.

[Vanir Thunder Dojo Tan]

Words to take to heart, Thank you.

 

 

Perhaps the best we can do, for the time, is trust in the tao and let things come as they will, and when we are ready, we will recieve that which we are ready for. as per the will of the way.

 

 

It's the best i can think of anyways

[yugenphoenix]

Thank you for this. As Manitou said perfectly a drink of cool water. I'm still lost in the dry wasteland so this is a track pointing the way to salavation. Thank you sir.

[Cat Pillar]

Has this been posted here before? I recall reading something, if not the same, at least very similar.

 

Regardless, it's a cool article, and I thank ya for posting it, Gerard.

[Jetsun]

It's worth considering that some of the crazy wisdom teachers are regarded as some of the best in history, in that approach they say that the job of the teacher is to insult you or rather insult your ego and press down on your beliefs without mercy. So if you have a belief that the teacher should be a clean perfect guru they might act outrageously in order to destroy that belief in you, they will play whatever role is necessary to teach even if it is against normal social conventions. One example is Drugpa Kunley of Bhutan who would teach by destroying peoples prudish attitudes around sex and fun and he was known to enjoy alcohol and many different women while teaching the Dharma through poetry and despite teaching that controversial way in a conservative county he is still considered a saint and worshiped today because his impact was so great and he led so many people towards enlightenment. So if you have too rigid a view of what the teacher should be then you may end up missing the teaching altogether.

[dwai]

It is also perfectly okay for one teacher to "graduate" one's student o a higher level with a diffrent teacher. Bottom line is to not get caught in new agey clap-trap and be cler about what your motivations for learning are

[Birch]

It's worth considering that some of the crazy wisdom teachers are regarded as some of the best in history, in that approach they say that the job of the teacher is to insult you or rather insult your ego and press down on your beliefs without mercy. So if you have a belief that the teacher should be a clean perfect guru they might act outrageously in order to destroy that belief in you, they will play whatever role is necessary to teach even if it is against normal social conventions. One example is Drugpa Kunley of Bhutan who would teach by destroying peoples prudish attitudes around sex and fun and he was known to enjoy alcohol and many different women while teaching the Dharma through poetry and despite teaching that controversial way in a conservative county he is still considered a saint and worshiped today because his impact was so great and he led so many people towards enlightenment. So if you have too rigid a view of what the teacher should be then you may end up missing the teaching altogether.

 

Meh, I'd be careful with that one :-) I wonder how much fun the crazy teachers actually have and how the society frames them to keep on doing what it was doing in the first place.

Is this the right point to suggest that society is a distinct entity from people Probably not, but I'll put it in there.

And no, I don't care how 'crrrraaazy' you are in your so-called wisdom. If you have to resort to mistreating people to get an enlightenment message across, nope, not buying it Do people still sign up for that shit? Guess they do :-)

[Jetsun]

Meh, I'd be careful with that one :-) I wonder how much fun the crazy teachers actually have and how the society frames them to keep on doing what it was doing in the first place.

Is this the right point to suggest that society is a distinct entity from people Probably not, but I'll put it in there.

And no, I don't care how 'crrrraaazy' you are in your so-called wisdom. If you have to resort to mistreating people to get an enlightenment message across, nope, not buying it Do people still sign up for that shit? Guess they do :-)

 

I'm not sure I would put up with such a teacher I guess it depends on a lot of factors about whether I have faith in them or not, but there is no doubt that the crazy wisdom teachers have been influential. For example Chogyam Trungpa more or less laid the foundations for Buddhism in the West in many ways, he was the original teacher and inspiration behind people like Pema Chodron and Tenzin Palmo and many of those teachers who have books in all the local book shops and opened the eyes of many people to what Buddhism is about and yet he was an alcoholic womaniser.

 

One of the main teachers I study G.I. Gurdjieff some would say taught in the crazy wisdom style and he would often host dinners where he would do a "toast to the idiots" where everyone around the table would have to toast to whatever type of idiot they got classified in, which may seem insulting but it is a meant as a humbling reminder that we are all idiots because nearly all of us do the exact opposite of what we need to do to be happy, so you can take the insult on the chin and laugh about your own idiocy along with everyone elses, or you can close up offended with your pride hurt. So I think it's possible that insults to the ego can be done in a skilful way.

Edited September 30, 2011 by Jetsun

[宁]

i'd like to know more about these 1-2-3-4 initiations.. from the article i got that they are universal, not belonging only to a culture.. is that correct?

[Birch]

I'm not sure I would put up with such a teacher I guess it depends on a lot of factors about whether I have faith in them or not, but there is no doubt that the crazy wisdom teachers have been influential. For example Chogyam Trungpa more or less laid the foundations for Buddhism in the West in many ways, he was the original teacher and inspiration behind people like Pema Chodron and Tenzin Palmo and many of those teachers who have books in all the local book shops and opened the eyes of many people to what Buddhism is about and yet he was an alcoholic womaniser.

 

One of the main teachers I study G.I. Gurdjieff some would say taught in the crazy wisdom style and he would often host dinners where he would do a "toast to the idiots" where everyone around the table would have to toast to whatever type of idiot they got classified in, which may seem insulting but it is a meant as a humbling reminder that we are all idiots because nearly all of us do the exact opposite of what we need to do to be happy, so you can take the insult on the chin and laugh about your own idiocy along with everyone elses, or you can close up offended with your pride hurt. So I think it's possible that insults to the ego can be done in a skilful way.

 

"host dinners where he would do a "toast to the idiots" where everyone around the table would have to toast to whatever type of idiot they got classified in,"

 

That's just called having a good time IMO :-)

I found the Gurdjieff mentioned in the only book I read about him 'Meetings with...' highly intelligent, pretty arrogant and somewhat lacking in heart. But that's my very personal reading. He also had a bit of thing for drinking. That's in the book.

 

Alain Watts was another alcoholic womanizer. I liked him. He was a brilliant guy, funny with it.

 

What's with the buddhists and drinking ;-)?

 

This ego-business isn't sitting so well with me these days. I have insulted myself with my attempts to rid myself of it a bit too much. I'm such a heavily-influenceable idiot that I bought mindfulness practice and ego-destruction hook-line-and-sinker.

[blueandgreen]

My teacher was barbara peter a senior instructor.

she was the best tao instructor I ever came across,

her yoga lessons were always very boring, just the inner smile,

six healing sounds, packing, then she would say and now close your

eyes, and she did some kind of meditation I think shooting the pearl,

and everytime I was shocked, I got completly knocked out, it was like being pulled out

the body with such energy and force, it was just so strange and out

of the experience box, at that time i never measured it as something special

because I was not looking for something. it was just "tao yoga". later/

10 years I met her, she opened a healing center at the time(chi nei tsang), and I asked her if I could

have yoga with her, at that time I was too lazy to travel to her place so

I asked her if she could come to my place at a given time. she said sure, and again

out of the box, I did not even know this was possible, I just asked.., so she would

come to my place at 10 o'clock, I would wait, then in the horizon a massive whirl wind

of belt channels would come to me and on the top really small she would be standing,

really crazy, then the same experience.

she was so normal and a completly nobody in

here appearance and that is why she never had students, also she could not explain a thing,

just nothing, really frustrating, she always just gave trivial answers, I just assume she was sealing the senses

24 h a day...

so she opened a healing center and did shi nei tsang,

 

I think she passed away a year or two ago, she was the same tao generation students as ron and g heart.

 

What I want to say is I do not think there is such a thing as a teacher, that you "get" and can grasp and can go to and

learn everything and then leave with everything. It is more a situational meeting, not plan able

[Bubbles]

I think she passed away a year or two ago, she was the same tao generation students as ron and g heart.

 

Do you have any information about why she passed away so early in life?

Sounds like a lot of HT senior instructors are passing away despite of all the practices.

Any imbalances in HT curriculum or a curse thrown on them?

[de_paradise]

This is too limited a view of what or who a teacher can be, truths mixed with idealism, and a dash of level four dogma.

[Aaron]

I think this was a very good article. In AA they have sponsors that help new people. I wanted very much to be a sponsor when I first started the program, feeling that I had so much to offer. Now after years of sobriety I loath the idea. The difference between then and now is that I understand clearly that the majority of the people I sponsor will never make it and that the rare few that do can often times make it there without my help at all, in fact if anything they are helping me.

 

I also refuse to answer questions, in fact I expect them to make the decisions themselves. If they ask me what they should do, the best I'll do is tell them what I have done in a similar situation and if I haven't experienced that situation, send them to someone I think has.

 

The key to being a good teacher is understanding what you can and cannot teach, what you can and cannot do and ultimately what your student's capabilities are.

 

The best professor I ever had in college told me that my poetry was crap and that I needed to concentrate on my fiction. You know what, he was right and probably saved me from a lifetime of frustration trying to be a poet.

 

Aaron

Edited October 18, 2011 by Twinner

[Informer]

I think this was a very good article. In AA they have sponsors that help new people. I wanted very much to be a sponsor when I first started the program, feeling that I had so much to offer. Now after years of sobriety I loath the idea. The difference between then and now is that I understand clearly that the majority of the people I sponsor will never make it and that the rare few that do can often times make it there without my help at all, in fact if anything they are helping me.

 

I also refuse to answer questions, in fact I expect them to make the decisions themselves. If they ask me what they should do, the best I'll do is tell them what I have done in a similar situation and if I haven't experienced that situation, send them to someone I think has.

 

The key to being a good teacher is understanding what you can and cannot teach, what you can and cannot do and ultimately what your student's capabilities are.

 

The best professor I ever had in college told me that my poetry was crap and that I needed to concentrate on my fiction. You know what, he was right and probably saved me from a lifetime of frustration trying to be a poet.

 

Aaron

 

Or sniped the worlds greatest poet!

[Birch]

Do you have any information about why she passed away so early in life?

Sounds like a lot of HT senior instructors are passing away despite of all the practices.

Any imbalances in HT curriculum or a curse thrown on them?

Are they?

The only thing that came to mind on this one was -oxidative (sp?) stress and lung cavity issues from over-focussing on one type of breathing.

Shot in the dark.

Oh, then all that retention stuff.

[Informer]

Are they?

The only thing that came to mind on this one was -oxidative (sp?) stress and lung cavity issues from over-focussing on one type of breathing.

Shot in the dark.

Oh, then all that retention stuff.

 

Isn't it your turn to make a topic yet K ?

[Birch]

Isn't it your turn to make a topic yet K ?

About?

[Informer]

About?

 

I don't know about what. It seems like you should be up to bat tho.

[Birch]

I don't know about what. It seems like you should be up to bat tho.

Now, why do you say that:-)?

[Informer]

Now, why do you say that:-)?

 

Oh, I dunno, maybe because you very rarely make one?

[RiverSnake]

People say there are so many fake gurus or teachers out there, but in all honesty i have never studied under any or run into any. Perhaps i just never attracted them to me or perhaps it was just luck. Just my experience i guess.

Edited October 18, 2011 by OldGreen

[Aaron]

Or sniped the worlds greatest poet!

 

Heh... for nostalgia's sake, I pulled the first poem I ever published off the web. Here it is. You can decide for yourself.

 

 

How Long Ago

 

Earlier today, my brother sat in the living room watching porn,

he asked me at one point to put some music on,

And I wondered why, until I heard the notes

drown out the moans, the groans, the grunts, from the TV,

till everything was one monochromatic sound.

 

I remember when I was young and slept in the far room

back in the corner of the house. I would bundle up in blankets

and listen to strange sounds drifting from my parents' room-

I could not sleep till the creaking died down,

till I was sure the world would not turn inside out.

 

When I was older and sat in church, I recall a girl

who would show up in her white Sunday dress.

She was two years older and had already passed to the threshold of sin.

I would sit in the pews, my eyes pulled from the pulpit,

to dart at her legs, the small part showing beneath the slip.

She would cock her head and look at me smiling,

knowing what I was looking for, what I had not yet found

That dark piece of youth that sinks down through the sky,

quits tousling the hair, leaves kisses goodnight behind.

 

My brother is through with his movie now,

he sits looking at girls passing by to the pool.

I watch and think how long ago it was when I could look

and see nothing but the color of a bathing suit.

 

--------

Hard to believe I wrote that almost fifteen years ago... time does fly.

 

Aaron

Edited October 18, 2011 by Twinner