Sometimes We Don’t Agree With Our Teacher
(this applies to all teachers)

Buddhist teachers have two sides to them; the Buddha side and the social side. Actually, we all have two sides to us; a Buddha side and a social side. We are all teachers and students!

Teachers, like all of us, project either: form with little substance, or substance with little form – or a good balance of the two, which is rare.

‘Form with little substance’ means formal academic education, but without the ability to explain the practical psychological steps to pure awareness.

‘Substance with little form’ means experience of pure awareness, but without the formal academic education to explain the psychological steps to pure awareness.

‘Balanced between the two’ means someone you can truly talk to and they can empathise. The only teacher who represent this (as far as I can tell) is your own mind!

Synchronistic karma presents us with all three, and so we need to adapt in every situation.

We need detachment when engaging with teachers; as Tai Situpa Rinpoche, one of the regents to the Karmapa, said to my wife. “The teacher-student relationship is not a marriage.”

Teachers are like fire. Get too close and you will be burnt. Stand too far away and you feel no warmth. It’s the same when meeting people; three to five minutes is enough. After that, we start getting involved and emotions such as jealous, pride, anger, fear or boredom start to raise their ugly heads. We all need space, and not to be smothered.

Always stick to the essence of the teachings. This is what we need to understand. If we are near people who are only interested in blowing thigh bone trumpets, wearing brocade and hugging, smile and move away! 😀

If one enjoys the social side, that’s fine – but it’s also fine to ‘get’ the teaching, appreciate the teaching and the teacher, and then leave. The social side may involve inner circles, committees, organising, politics, rules of engagement 😀 and…money…“How big do we want the temple and shrine?” There are those who want to be near and dear to the teacher. If you enjoy this side of the community, that’s fine – but it’s also fine to just leave and practise what was taught.

A strange side effect

Perhaps the teacher annoys us. He or she annoys us so much that we are constantly thinking about them, and complaining about what they do and don’t do; “Why does he allow this or that to happen?”

Of course, if this gets too much, we can just leave and find another teacher. But then again, this may just be part of our habitual behaviour that we have to face at some time.

Although being annoyed at the teacher sounds negative, the point is that this dissatisfaction is constantly on our mind. That’s not such a bad thing, is it? 🙂 In life, there’s always something to complain about, something that causes us suffering, but we are still connected. There’s no running away.

There is something that still draws us, and something we just want to put right. We may even think that the teacher is being led astray by the ‘inner committee’. This may or may not be the case, but it is the teaching – and our own awareness – that are important. There is nothing in the teaching that says we have to agree with the process! It’s meant to cut through our habitual defilements which, to the ego (the sense of clinging fixations) is highly disagreeable. We merely have to be aware that the teachings and rituals are all to remind us of our true perfect nature – pure awareness. Practice is about the tool of mindfulness, and mindfulness is about remembering. Once we remember, we drop the practising!

On our death bed, we might even think, “Why doesn’t the teacher love me the way I want to love them?” That tells you everything that you want to know about your true intention. It’s love, and has always been love. Love is challenging, and love can hurt. Underneath it all is love.

As a student, we wish for unconditional love from our teacher.
As a teacher, we wish to express that unconditional love.
We are all teachers and students.