Seducing the Guru
Tuesday, June 20th, 2006The joke is, we carry on about teachers who seduce their students when nearly every student is constantly trying to seduce the teacher.
How do we seduce the teacher? In the “right” hands, any of the following forms of conduct can be used for purposes of seduction.
Displaying a lot of knowledge.
Displaying charming ignorance.
Asking interesting questions.
Waiting patiently.
Waving the banner of our courage.
Waving the banner of our anger.
Waving the banner of our sincerity.
Waving the banner of our “correct” View.
Waving the banner of our desperation.
Waving the banner of our devotion.
Waving the banner of our spiritual accomplishments.
Waving the banner of our humility.
Joking around.
Seriousness.
Listening to the teacher a certain way.
Looking at the teacher a certain way.
Dressing a certain way.
Dressing to look as if we don’t care how we dress.
Favors and service rendered to the teacher, the teacher’s family, or the teacher’s top students.
Anything we do to be number one.
Serving humbly as number two with the intent of proving we are superior to number one.
Gossiping to the teacher about other students.
Ostentatiously giving money to the teacher.
Secretly giving money to the teacher.
Flirting with the teacher.
Sex.
Challenging with criticism.
Challenging with difficult “problems.”
Challenging with the teachings of other teachers.
Ostentatiously doing spiritual practice in public gatherings where the teacher is present.
Wowing the teacher with amazing dreams.
Wowing the teacher with amazing experiences.
Wowing the teacher with amazing coincidences.
Lying to the teacher.
Rejecting the teacher, but not going away.
Leaving and coming back repeatedly.
Outrageous conduct.
Perfect conduct.
Dissolute conduct.
Anything we do to be noticed.
Anything we do to be noticed not needing to be noticed.
When we try to seduce the teacher, we make the teacher ordinary. We are asking the teacher to support our ego fixations instead of to assist us in relaxing them. This is what we do in just about every relationship. This is what we call “compatibility.” “I’ll support your ego fixations if you support mine.”
The important thing is to notice, over time, all the ways in which we are trying to seduce the teacher. Every time a seduction works, we feel a little satisfaction, but this is just ahamkara (ego, or I-ness) getting its fix. This satisfaction reinforces “I” and dualistic vision. Karmic momentum gathers strength in the direction of nonfreedom. You will always need another shot of seduction.
When you catch yourself in the act of seduction, recognize that this is just a pattern and relax. Over time, the moments of relaxing add up, and the pattern can resolve naturally.
An open, healthy relationship with our teacher may be full of romance and devotion, and may even include sex, but these will be the expression of the unimpeded wisdom of anahata chakra. Self is relating to Self in a nondual way, the way of interbeing. The qualities of this situation are spaciousness, awareness, and vitality, not ignorance, fear, neediness, and compulsion.
By relaxing in the moment of recognition, we can taste this openness through the gateway of our relationship to our teacher.
Great teachers instantly recognize our efforts to seduce them and do all sorts of discomforting things to make us more self-aware. Nobody enjoys this crash course in learning about our fixations, which is why more people are not on the direct path! But as nondual practitioners, we appreciate the grace that, in this life, we have such opportunity. And by tasting relaxation over and over again, we come to understand in an embodied way that we can work with our fixations and that they are also expressions of infinite potential. We need not feel any self-hatred or shame.
OM Shanti,
Shambhavi
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