To Be Inferior Or Not To Be Inferior

Relating to gurus and lamas shouldn’t be like relating to a leader of North Korea; bowing and scraping and prostrating is totally unnecessary, and shouldn’t be encouraged – it’s a form of mass intimidation, and it’s another’s culture.

We don’t do that to individuals in any other walks of life. We pay respect to a teacher by simply turning up because we’re interested in what they have to say, which means that we’ve made a commitment of time and money. The appreciation comes in the form of whether we go away and practise – and change occurs.

Subservience is not required to realise our true reality. Realisation is not a socio-political event. How did such compliance come about? 

The Buddha saw that all sentient beings are Buddha nature, but for thousands of years, we’vebeen taught that we are inferior.