Teacher/Student Relationship
Submitted by Charlene Jones on Thu, 2006-08-24 15:16.
The Teacher/Student relationship defines the heart of meditation. One cannot make progress without a teacher, anymore than one can effectively and certainly understand dream world without a guide. Yet the culture, in this case Tibetan, which spawned the encoded Teacher/Student relationship, with monasteries and even a few impoverished nunneries, with lineages and "recognition" ceremonies reveals itself very quickly as false.
The basis for the view of Teachers as Superior Beings lies in the same mud we western people often reject in corporations: money and power.
A quick review of the material available on the net through sites like americanbuddhist.com, or a more prolonged investigation into, for example, Penor Rimpoche's carefully worded denouncement of Steven Segal, a western man Penor himself "recognized" opens the can of worms: money buys title, even in the exotic world of Tibetan Buddhism.
What are your ideas about Teachers and the role they play in your life?
If you have not challenged yourself to define and work with this one central idea, you are not truly working with meditation, with a teacher, or with yourself!
a special place
Last spring I saw a play where one of the characters is supposedly a naive young girl or woman who doesn't quite fit into her community. At one point she says something to the effect that "Whenever I don't feel comfortable here I just go off to my own special place....Oh! It's OK! Everybody knows me there."
This is why I need a teacher, because I've been introduced to that special place and yes, they all do know me. Intimately. I am at a serious disadvantage because I realize I don't know these people at all. The teacher is like a guide, the welcome wagon. "Here's so-and-so and they are married to the police officer. If you need butter, the store is down here. Yes, somebody does live in that rickety old house but they aren't home today. We'll come back." I need a teacher to introduce me to the neighbourhood but the teacher does not live in my body.
I still need to get to know these people myself, not just on a first name basis or to point out to others, but to really get to know them. The same goes for the thoughts and concepts in this special place. At some point, I may discover that the teacher's knowledge of all this is different than the experience I have with it.
Then perhaps, dialogue happens. Then perhaps, change happens, for student and teacher. Perhaps the question to ask is about the journey. Is the teacher still on the journey or do they feel they've "arrived"? I would like to say that if a being is sitting here in a corporal body then they haven't arrived but perhaps I've just slipped off to my own special place.
Dang! Lost again. Teacher?
Catherine
Reply to a Special Place
Yes,right on the mark Catherine. The inner geography responds to our inner senses in much the same way as outer geography. Likewise, a guide knowledgable in seeing, hearing, and describing the inner geography is just as or more valuable than an outer guide.
Rather like a tour, no?
But more than that the teacher is there to prompt you to see differently. What you might yawn at, the teacher might jump up and down with excitement over.
Where you might turn away, seeing only the trivial, the teacher might demand further investigation.
This takes trust.
Trust between teacher and student grows with their continued relatedness in much the same way trust with anyone grows. The vital difference is the teacher's role as one who challenges you, who demands the best of you, and who remains solidly
dedicated to your growing.
These are tricky factors: in our culture we often believe that one who challenges us, who is difficult or "prickly" is simply "not nice." We turn away in search of people who will support our already well known versions of truth and reality and most of all, WHO I AM.
As one Tibetan teacher, Norbu, puts it "Students come to a teacher seeking what they Want, not what they truly need. What they need from the teacher may be very raw, very naked, even painful. But what teacher is brave enough to give their student what they really need?"
A good teacher is not interested in what you already know as true; a good teacher is not so interested to agree with your attitudes.
However, the opposite extreme in our culture from avoiding people who are difficult or who challenge us is to fall under the spell of someone. We see this often in the cult of Tibetanism.
I know some very good and extremely compassionate Tibetan teachers. I have also witnessed the utter stupidity of western students of all ages who smile and agree and fall blind, suddenly overtaken by a day or a week of teaching, who abandon all critical thinking in an ignorant belief that the teacher is god.
The teacher is not god. I have witnessed in the Tibetan teaching the repetitive strain that the teachers ARE god that they are the enlightenment.
Again to quote Norbu "Most teachers are not brave enough to give their students what they need. You see we (most teachers) have agendas." Part of the agenda may be the worship of the students, the money of the students, possessions, power, many temples as a sign of their status.They may claim they want your enlightenment but what they truly want is your indentured servitude. Watch a teacher like you would a used car salesman!
While some teachers may be attained, or realized, or enlightened, we have to get the situation very very clear: no one else gives you enlightenment.
No one waves a magic wand and makes your progress happen.
Human consciousness forms itself through careful, diligent and consistent crafting.
Like any craft it requires a life time of dedication
of the ups and downs of learning and unlearning, to gain perhaps a small notion of what is possible, to be able to produce a small portion of what might be considered acceptable.
The truth is you and only you in your unique body with your unique personal history can make the unique statement you are meant to make in this world.
The teacher is here to help guide this uniqueness into being.