we just recently wrapped up a series in
october november december it was on
relationships and it was so well
received and what was interesting to me
is that a lot of other topics kind of
came up in the midst of looking at
abandonment of betrayal and being alone
and so on and one of the things I was
looking at was these parallels between
intimate relationships what we call
intimate relationships and
student-teacher relationship and my
question was is there a difference
obviously there's a difference between a
committed relationship and an open
relationship when it comes to student
teacher and and then what spurred that
even further was I was overhearing a
conversation with a couple people and
one of them was talking about these
profound experiences they had with this
particular teacher just really just
life-changing and it was it wasn't just
one it was many experiences and I was
just in all listening to the story and
then a couple minutes later this person
said Oh so-and-so is coming to town as a
different teacher I'm gonna go see that
person if you know it's a very tricky
thing I think it's a kind of promiscuity
that happens because you get a
taste of really an intimacy with
yourself that a particular teacher is
supporting and and if it's not a deep
enough taste for you then i recommend
that you actually check out other
teachers and find somebody that supports
you so fully in surrendering to yourself
because what will inevitably what must
happen is your own internal denial of
that surrender and your internal turning
away from yourself and if you're in a
committed relationship with a teacher
you will go through some hellish moments
but you won't escape and in that
non-escaping you will discover yourself
more deeply so what I've seen in our
culture and our subculture is that there
are some incredible teachers around and
they're available and so we have a
smorgasbord of teachings and teachers
and so we take a bite of this we take a
bite of that we take apart this and that
is good at the beginning stage to find
out what really resonates with you but
with maturity and with the recognition
perhaps if you are doing that then there
comes a time for a commitment and I can
only speak from my experience of course
that I had many teachers before i had
Papaji as a smorgasbord and it may be a
couple of years I would stay with him
our teachings like the tibetan
buddhism and zen buddhism and New Age
kind of teachings and I benefited from
every one of them and yet something was
still calling out and and from that
something I actually prayed for a
teacher and i ended up at papaji's
doorstep and there was a recognition I
stop here and in that there was already
surrender and didn't mean that i didn't
feel like i gotta get out of here at
certain times
oh he doesn't love me or what does
this mean I mean of there's room for all
of that to come up like in any
relationship but i knew i wasn't moving
and because that was that teaching, to stop,
it is the teaching ,stop, so I committed
to that and i can just say from my own
experience that that commitment reveals
itself to be a commitment to love into
truth not necessarily to pleasure not
necessarily to new truth I just tell a
brief thing I come back from Papaji I
was having meetings around and it was
just a second wave of that I was
actually in maui and somebody
came up to speak and started telling me
about this fantastic teacher in
India who could confer immortality on
you and she could tell i wasn't
interested and she said I'm so shocked
gangaji you used to be so open I
thought you would be open to this and I
really just had to say in the heart of
hearts
I'm not looking for anything else, I'm not
even looking for immortality
I'm happy this teacher serves you
but if you're telling me so that I will
go join up
it's just not there and I realized when
I was telling her that that is the
teaching that the Papaji offered in that
I'm extending to people to stop right
where you are to stop your search you
shouldn't stop your search until you
had a taste of what is here but once
you've had a taste if you stop then
you're consumed about that taste and
that's intimacy and that's commitment
well so many people I've heard described
these amazing moments of stopping with
you and then if there is an inclination
of like oh I'm gonna go see so-and-so or
I'm gonna watch this youtube if that
impulse is there
I wonder if there's just a doubt in the
original stopping that just starts to
arise
maybe I mean that's that takes a very
specific kind of inquiry to tell the
truth about that because it's quite easy
and sometimes it can be true to go
no I'm just really drawn by this
particular person like came up on my
facebook feed or whatever you know you
can't make the judgment for anybody else
but you can tell the truth for yourself
that's why I share that story with
myself. I went to multiple
teachers until I found my true teacher
and i also had many relationships until
have found my true relationship
so it's a it's something only you can
know for yourself but it's also the
willingness to tell the truth to
yourself are you escaping something or are
you in fact really being augmented by
different voices and maybe you're not
into a committed relationship with the
teacher, maybe. It's not for everybody I I
know for myself it was necessary but
that doesn't mean it's necessary for
everyone maybe you don't need a teacher
at all and there's no formula for it but
if you are if there's some mysterious
force that draws you to someone
a teacher, a lover, a mate, a friend to be true
that's really the thing and if it's
to that and to go all the way with that
skirting off to other relationships other
lovers other teachers is a way of
avoiding going all the way, then tell the
truth and then you have the choice to
stop
something gets generated when you
find your teacher whether it's a
mountain or a person, living or dead,
something gets generated that is a
threat to the construction, a threat to the
fabricated built identity and we find
reasons why well this is not my teacher
anymore
oh I thought you were all-powerful I see
you really are just human being so you
couldn't be my teacher and in truth I'm
not your teacher we are all at the feet
of the Satguru and we all play
different roles for each other in that
there's another section later on in that
clip that struck me part of this
terror is the surrender to the teacher
you were talking about is in not really
surrendering to the teacher you're
surrendering your concept of yourself
letting that go and letting that go can
be terrifying
yes and let's say it is terrifying because we
know that in relationships like that
where the power seems to be unbalanced
and the teacher has a power and you
don't there's often an abuse misuse I
mean that's what cults are about
brainwashing and so it's very
intelligent to recognize what is meant
by surrender to the teacher and then
you're you're aware of the person in
front of you is playing the role of
teacher and and what that person wants
because if the so-called teacher wants
your personality to disappear, wants
all your funds to go to them,
then it's intelligent to be
alerted and to back off, so I support
that questioning what I think we're
getting at here is that there is that
questioning its legitimate and stepping
back, that is legitimate
and then there's something ... the
mechanism of just staying away that's
not legitimate in terms of
self-discovery that there is a moment
like with the lover where you just let
go
what you really go all the way and
that's what's meant by surrender and
then at the next morning for the next
day when you're not in a state of bliss
or you feel very unenlightened or you
you look at your lover and you know who
is this I don't know if I like
this person that you still stay you
don't run out the door you don't bolt
and our tendency is to bolt and then go
find another teacher or lover, that's why i
use the word promiscuity with it
because we understand that we are not
bound by the rules and by monogamy or by
the need to stay with one teacher this
is a different age there are plenty of
teachers but we sell ourselves short when
we we don't go all the way and so that's
the point and then yes there really
is no formula
yes maybe you'll going to see a lot of people
but your heart your commitment and
that commitment is really the test of
when things get bad with you when
old habits arrives with you and
self-doubt comes in when the madness the
latent madness comes back and if you are
actually committed to support you
don't move you can face anything and
that's the
way I understand teacher for me
or guru and so since he was indian
that that meant a lot in India where I
mean we did bend down and kiss his feet
I mean whatever he wanted he could have
but it was already based on recognizing
that he was he was not just an ordinary
relationship in our lives that we would
play with trivially and we would come and we
would go
he was something very special and in
that we honored him and and when you
honor somebody you pay close attention,
that is respect and then that respect is
bounced back to you so you have true
self respect and then you're free and
you can and in that freedom you can smell
(?) you can see what's happening
because you aren't looking to be saved a
you're looking to be who you are
and I think that when you're with the
teacher long enough
that's in your system it's not like the
teacher has to be there or even that you
have to like oh I'm gonna going to watch
Gangaji on YouTube right now or listen
to an episode of the radio show it's
like oh that's in me right, it's not separate
from you, right
yes that's the meeting
that's why i used terms of
lover commitment and the tendency to
promiscuity because there is a meeting
that where you really recognize its
oneself and it's in this experience
split into something called me
but it's oneself discovering itself
that's the teaching in the teacher
and in that we're all students
I wonder if we could look at the other side of
that. There is the thing like Oh
skirting around, a true commitment
and then there's a I know I kind of
maybe I beat this to death and that
other three shows that we've been on
relationships but in this particular
instance I think it's really important
to look at the subject of dependency
because certainly many of us that we
even got on a spiritual path because
we've been walking around wounded in
some way and trying different ways of
resolving that so dependency in a way is
natural this issue of dependency i think
is really important because in many ways
we are dependent on the teacher because
it in the teacher knows something we
don't know and we want it, we feel it and
the only way to get it is to depend on
the teacher to give it to you that's not
finally true of course but that's
experienced because you've recognized I
want this and I don't have it or I don't
know how to access or I don't know
where it is or it doesn't last
however we experience it and we recognize
that in the presence of a teacher of any
form, that that's reinforced that we discover
oh it's right here right here are and so
would say there's nothing wrong with
dependency it's only when the dependency
become some kind of neurotic game which
is, we are back to cults and we're back to
to the relationships that don't serve
awakening relationships student teacher
that don't serve either the student or
the teacher and they have to do
with some kind of playing out the normal
relationships and life and really a
teacher is is not a normal relationship
I mean we have parents but we need to
individuate away from our parents and
with a teacher that it's an absorption
it's actually going the
different direction from my parents are
going into and in true teacher there
there are no strings to that there's no way
you have to nothing you have to pay back
to that it's offered freely, Ramana Maharshi
the great example of that, Papaji and
you can be who you are you can live the
life you're living nothing at to change
but this surrenderer to being
absorbed into absorbing and so you know
i know we do this occasionally is turn
around the meaning of words but I think
we're very afraid of dependence and I
know when I was with Papaji i have
attack of fear of dependence and I didn't
know him only been with him a couple of
weeks and I got what I know what kind of
person is
maybe one of these gurus that is going to
brainwashing things and all of my doubts
started coming up and there was a moment
where I had to just take a breath and
recognize it and I gonna trust my
experience here or am I gonna trust all
of these doubts about what could happen
and i knew in that moment that I was
surrendering and I knew it could be a
mistake that it could be could been
somebody who is untrustworthy but that's
part of the adventure of life there are
no guarantees that it's going to work
normally and easily and and so I chose to
trust my experience of him and I'm
thrilled for that but I also knew in
that moment that trusting my experience
I could have ended up in hell
so I was also trusting something that
was deeper than experience but if I
ended up in hell I could deal with that
too but I didn't have to protect myself
because it's a sense of its really a false
independence of protecting ourselves
from any harm or anything we don't
understand or anything that may not be
what we think we should get that keeps
us away from this surrender into
dependence does that makes sense
yeah i think my follow-up question to
that would be if you're talking about a
true teacher is there such a thing as
too much devotion
well it depends on what you mean by
devotion you know if it's pure
devotion is just love and it's being
yourself if it's an imitation of that you're
still trying to extract something from
somebody and if there's too much of that
you just end up with your head in the
sand