Tantra My Way
Saturday, October 29th, 2005No one should be surprised that the song “My Way” was written by Paul Anka and Frank Sinatra instead of Sandya Patel and Huang Chin.
“I’ll did it my way” could be the epitaph of the entire U.S. experiment in “democracy.”
We Americans just don’t feel good about ourselves if we’re not reinventing everything. And let’s face it: apprenticing to others is not our forté.
The whole doin’ it my way compulsion has infected the contemporary Western approach to spirituality.
It seems that every other teacher has their own trademarked, copyrighted method, system, or “lineage.”
As students and teachers, we should be wary of this approach.
Think about how asanas, mudras, and mantras came down to us through the ages.
The postures, gestures, and sounds of Tantrik practice are revealed by Nature to realized yogis and rishis.
That’s revealed, not invented because someone thought their alternative worked better.
The elements of Tantrik practice are natural technologies: they are aspects of the fundamental modes of appearing of consciousness and energy.
You don’t make them up to get to a state of realization: they are realized when you are already in a state of great openness.
This kind of realization: of a new mantra, a new asana, or a new mudra is a direct transmission of wisdom. If every teacher on the block who puts their name and trademark on new ways of practicing were realized enough to have actually received their “system” as a transmission of natural wisdom, I think this would be a very different world indeed.
As a beginning teacher, I know I catch myself thinking about how I would teach this, or how I would teach that. I merrily start running that doin’ it my way tape loop. Luckily, I wake up from my trance before too much damage is done.
Oh yeah, I remember, masters with a much greater degree of openness than I currently enjoy have already worked out how to teach x, y, or z. DUH.
Of course, teachers have their own styles and personalities. And occasionally a new realized teacher pops out of the oven.
But the pell mell rush to invent one’s own system of asana, mudra, mantra and other practices derives mostly from that quintessential American disease: AMBITION.
Many, many American teachers of yoga and Tantra, approach their teaching as a career. This is a cultural habit, not a personal sin. We compulsively overlay concepts of professionalization, promotion, invention, and individual achievement onto our lives as students and teachers.
This is ultimately dangerous for the people who do it and the people they teach. Tantrik practice is about surrender. It is about leading a “guided life:” a life guided by Nature. It is not about accumulating skills, certificates, powers, accolades, money, orgasms, or a nice body.
If these things come, they come. If they go, they go. The problem is not the things themselves, but one’s orientation toward accumulation.
In order to really practice Tantra, you have to be willing to be challenged, scared, disturbed, messy, rejected, and even ugly. You have to work really, really hard. And you have to let go of ambition.
Even sincere teachers who nonetheless approach their practice and teaching as a career are not going to be willing, or able, to take you where you need to go. You don’t have to lose everything, but if you aren’t prepared to lose everything, you are a teacher of technique and not of spiritual View. And you shouldn’t be making anything up.
Most of us will not have a highly realized teacher. But this should not impede us.
My experience is that pretty much nothing is more important than knowing your tensions and limitations. Teachers who know their tensions and limitations are teaching from a place of authenticity. We can learn and grow tremendously through the example of such teachers.
Teachers of any degree of accomplishment who do not have an honest, working sense of their own tensions and limitations invariably impose these on their students.
No one should be blamed for anything. This is just to serve as an orientation. That the cosmos appears as teachers is its most precious capacity. I find the mere existence of a cosmic “teaching aspect” to be incredibly, and healthily, humbling. It is this teaching aspect that conveys the fundamentals of our tradition to us.
The real teachers are always and forever disciples of this capacity.
OM Shanti,
Shambhavi
P.S. Since I posted this, I’ve gotten a number of e-mails from folks thinking I am saying it’s not ok to charge for teaching. Nothing so reactionary is meant. Everyone has to eat. The ancient system of students supporting their teachers is beautiful and appropriate, in my opinion. What I was hoping to convey is that the integrity of the process of spiritual growth is paramount, and that the overlay of individualistic, careerist concepts onto spiritual teaching can limit growth. People defend their careers, but spiritual growth is about letting go of all defensiveness.
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