Use Only Enlightened Teachers

In this day and age where there are thousands of so-called gurus, we have to be careful who we choose to listen to because if we make the mistake of following someone who is ego-centered in their true intentions, then we will lose time, money, and opportunity costs (among other things). -- Paul Lenda (Shift)

There are many false teachers and charlatans in spirituality. In all kinds of spirituality. The main concern in this blog is that of post-enlightenment, liberation, freedom from the ego and, even in those pursuits, there are many false teachers.

A false teacher is anyone who is trying to teach you something which they do not truly understand.

Some do it because they want money, or because they want fame, or because they want followers. All of them are lying to you. All of them are wasting your time, insofar as time exists. You need to be wise to find the true teachers and yet, until you truly understand enlightenment you are unable to separate the false from the true.

Take for an example: Buddhism.

There are many branches of Buddhism. From the Tibetan style to the Zen style and everything in between. I am sure there are many enlightened teachers in many of those styles, and yet there are more who are not. 

I have listened to teachers in Buddhism who obviously have no understanding of the enlightenment process, other than that which they have read in books, or been taught by their equally inexperienced teachers.

Enlightenment is not an experience for the ego, just to clarify that once again. 

Enlightenment involves a total absence of ego. The ego is that which is seen to be false, to never have existed, to be merely a convenient construct like all language.

If a teacher is not capable of looking at you and the world from beyond the seat of the ego, then they cannot teach you. If they want your money, or your loyalty, or your worship, or your body then you can be sure that they are not Awake.

I met a leader of a spiritual tradition a few years ago who was teaching workshops and trying to bring people to a point which we would term enlightenment, but had never discovered that they, themselves, did not exist. 

They said all the right words but they interspersed it with name-dropping and tales of their personal interactions with famous people. Some of those famous people truly are awake, but this teacher, this leader, is not.

It is easy to fool people because the people do not know they are being fooled.

Enlightenment is a paradox and only someone to whom it has occurred can understand that paradox. Much of our teaching on enlightenment is misunderstood because those hearing cannot grasp the viewpoint from which we speak.

It is not hard to wake up as long as you are willing to let go of all your baggage. 

There can be no conditions as you approach enlightenment. You cannot hold anything back. You must give up every opinion, every belief, every position, every story because only egos hang onto those.

It has been very hard to write this blog post, to try to clarify the difference between an enlightened teacher and a charlatan. I seek no followers. All my needs are met by the universe because I am the universe. I give instruction freely and I have no time for charlatans.

Truth is the most important thing in a post-enlightenment worldview. This is why the answer to many of the questions people ask me is often "I don't know.", because that is the truth.

In an ego-less world we embrace uncertainty. As a teacher of mine once said many years ago:

"You can either be right, or you can be Awake – the two are mutually exclusive."

As the Mud Settles - Stay Awake!

But so long as you are separate from things, you need everything. To exist as a separate individual constitutes the entire problem. – Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

In the biographies and Writings by the greats of Enlightenment it can seem that they are perfect and live in constant bliss, but in actuality that is not true.

Enlightenment brings contentment. This is not because all of your problems go away. Nothing in your external life changes. Whatever is, remains. The change comes about in your shift of perspective.

Problems simply become situations. – Adyashanti

Even though you are now awake, your ego still exists. An ego is a collection of beliefs, opinions, stories and so forth – all of which are fictitious. As long as the body unit continues to exist, the ego will continue to exist and it will try to drag you back into the dream. That is its function. The ego was created to deal with the dream, by the dream, for the dream.

Watch a newborn infant. They have not yet developed an ego. They have not yet learned about the imaginary separation which they will be taught later. They have no language, they only have Actual Experience. Seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling, sensing is their whole world. They are Awakeness.

Later they will learn their name and the names of those around them and those labels will lead them to believe that they are separate from the world, and thus their ego will be born. The ego's job is to ensure that the particular unit in question, the body and personality which it now believes in, get what it thinks they need.

The process of awakening is the process of seeing that the ego is a fictitious character which we believed was us. Once it is seen for a fiction then the separation that it believes in is also seen as a fiction. The power of the ego is broken but in order for that power to stay broken for the rest of the life of that unit, Awakeness must be continually experienced.

Any thought patterns that arise which contain beliefs or opinions or stories are coming from the ego. Particular warning signs to look out for are the existence of words such as "could, would, should". Feelings will arise and some of these will be the result of the ego's machinations.

If Awakeness perceives a raging flood approaching, the unit's defence mechanism will fire up and a quick appraisal will show that the body-mind unit seems to be in physical danger so a physical response is appropriate. The ego will come up with suggestions for the best way to avoid the danger. Safeguarding the body unit makes sense to Awakeness also, so a response will be selected and action will be taken.

If someone in an email is taunting/mocking the unit, the body-mind unit will fire up a defence mechanism and a quick appraisal by Awakeness will show that the body unit is in no physical danger. The ego on the other hand will see this as a threat and will try to amplify the unit's defence mechanism and will begin to plan its response. Thoughts will start to fly. The ego will desire to chew on those thoughts to produce more thoughts and 'bad feelings'.

If you are fooled by the ego, you will drop back into the dream and you will respond as the ego wants to. You will feel the ego's anger that someone would dare to criticise a being as perfect as you obviously are.

Yes, it will even claim your awakeness as a status symbol for itself, even though the ego can never be awake. You know that is ridiculous, but that is how the ego works. It will come out with sentences like: "You can't say that about me. I am an Enlightened Being. You know nothing. I bet you don't even sit and do zazen!" (Laughing again - I've actually had that one appear)

You will create your own suffering.

You learn to recognise the ego's responses and when you detect one, you do not fight it. If you fight the ego you are giving it the recognition it desires – you are treating it as though it exists. All internal language is the ego talking to the ego.

What you then do instead is experience Awakeness once more.

Take a deep breath and look around without labelling, without language, just seeing What Is. Seeing that there is no separation. There is no other. That the illusion of all the other units is just an illusion and that every one of them is perfect just the way it is, and is acting perfectly from the highest spiritual knowledge which it possesses.

When you view the world as Awakeness, the ego naturally fades.

If you find a situation still exists then, as Awakeness, sit.

Examine it. Ask if it is Real. Ask if it is True. Ask WHO is having the issue. It is always the ego/character – not You.

Vigilance, Constant-Awake-Vigilance is the way forward.