Motive is pretty much everything where spiritual practice is concerned. As my acupuncturist says, “We’re neurotic right up to a nanosecond before enlightenment.”

I might not use the word “neurotic,” or “enlightenment” for that matter, but it’s a cute saying, and all-too-true.

My brother asks more questions about my spiritual practice than any sister has a right to expect. And his kids like to hear “Auntie Lalla” tell stories about yogis who walk through walls and appear in two places at the same time. I’m a crazy aunt.

My brother once observed about me: “ You can’t just meditate, you have to be a Swami or something.”

And a teacher friend of mine said of all Americans: “No one here wants to be just another bead on the mala. Everyone wants to be the Guru bead.”

Ambition. I’m talking about Ambition.

A few months ago, I took a break from teaching. The reasons are many, but one of the main reasons is that I need to learn how to be content with being an ordinary bead on the mala.

One of my favorite Gurus, Rudi, remarked that the point of Tantra is to lead an extraordinary life. I don’t dispute this. Not at all.

But you can’t climb the ladder to extraordinariness. The extraordinary is not the outcome of successful ambition. The extraordinary promised by Tantric sadhana is not a career goal.

It also does not require masses of people, institutions, and media attention to support or validate it.

The extraordinary is the spontaneous play of this life, experienced in all of its fullness. Opening to the extraordinary ordinariness of each moment brings contentment and equanimity. The ambition to lead an extraordinary life and be rewarded for it brings anxiety, disquiet, insecurity, and dis-ease.

Ambition contaminates spiritual practice and prevents us from fully participating in life. The bottom line is: If we don’t dump ambition, we will not get the full fruit of our sadhana, and neither will those around us.

I have a sincere desire for freedom, for liberation, for Reality. This desire is the only aspect of experience in which I have 100% confidence. And it’s enough. But ambition will keep me from realizing this desire, I have no doubt. Ambition must go.

This doesn’t mean I will laze around like a bowl of soggy risotto for my remaining years. I will likely teach, as it seems to be my dharma. I will write. I’ll eat sushi and drink sake. Hopefully, I’ll laugh and play. But if I manage to divest myself of ambition, I will do these things as the Gita says, without attachment to the outcome and with a bhava or orientation of true self-sacrifice.

The Gita says that everything a yogi does is yajna or self-sacrifice exemplified by the offering mantra “Svaha.” “I surrender my small self, to the larger Self, the world Self.” This is a description of the life quality of a real yogi or yogini. Yajna is real yoga.

Americans have the ambition samskara bad. It’s hard for us to really, really, really get it that life is not one long individualistic effort leading upwards and onwards to personal-professional security. It’s hard for us not to self-identify with our so-called achievements. If we have one job, we’ve got our eye on another job. If we aren’t looking too publicly successful, we suffer horribly. If someone else knows more, makes more money, or attracts more attention, we cringe into ourselves, attempt to hurt the other person, or puff ourselves up extravagantly in order to get the better of our fellow human being. We are almost always competing in some way, either subtle or gross.

As I read recently: Do you think Siva cares what anyone thinks of him?

So, if you care, as I still do, you are suffering from ambition.

Ambition takes an enormous amount of energy to maintain. Enormous. Overtly ambitious people may look like they are doing a lot on behalf of their fellows. They put out big energy, big shakti. But only a small percentage of that energy really reaches and nourishes the people around them.

We all have known someone who can’t figure out why the people around them feel stepped on, neglected, or undernourished. “But I do so much for you.”

And nearly all of us have put out a lot of energy under the guise of “helping” others when what we are really doing is feeding our self image.

The energy we put out to feed our ambition, our self-image, is not just lost to those around us, it is also lost to us. We may feel temporarily, even for years, pumped up by the amphetamine of our achievements and the recognition they bring. But eventually, exhaustion will take its toll.

Ambition creates energy starvation all around. It is the death knell of authentic spiritual practice.

Most of us are neither totally sincere nor totally insincere. We’re a mix of ambition and a true desire to realize freedom and help others to do the same. This is our given condition; it is the energy we have to work with on our path. It’s not easy energy to work with, either.

Lately, I have found respite in three activities:

Just doing my job.
Just doing my sadhana.
Just taking care of my health.

The “just” is paramount. When I act simply and efficiently in these areas without fearful future planning, or widening my net of attention, I can feel the ambition energy drain dwindling. Contentment, or at least greater peacefulness begins to set in. The whole “problem” of what to do, how to do it, and what rewards “it” will bring, subsides. Life and energy reappear.

Since I have been practicing the “just” sadhana, friends have started complaining. I’m not participating as much as I used to, they say. But I think I am finally learning to participate for real.

OM Shanti,
Shambhavi

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