Finding A Spiritual Teacher - Study Buddhism

There’s no point in complaining; it’s the reality of our situation. The challenge is to make the best of that, and that’s why we need to recognize and accept the different levels of teachers for ourselves as we progress along our spiritual journey. Most of us don’t have the opportunity to be able to devote all our time to Buddhist practice. We have families to support and we need to make a living, etc. We need to be realistic about that.

If we have a realistic attitude, it helps us not to become disappointed when, let’s say, our local teacher is not quite the quality of His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Consider that even if we were able to be with His Holiness all the time and receive private teachings from him, it would be at such an advanced level, and perhaps so much over our heads, that we wouldn’t be able to really relate to him and take the best advantage of his guidance.

I remember when I first went to India, back in 1969, I had already completed the course work for my doctorate at Harvard, and had already studied the various Asian languages, including Tibetan and Sanskrit. However, Buddhism was taught basically as a science, a dead subject. At that time, we only learned how to read Tibetan; the professor lacked a clear idea of how the language was pronounced. It was only in India that I first was able to study spoken Tibetan and basic Dharma with qualified teachers.

When I first met the great teachers – His Holiness and His Holiness’s teachers – my perception of them was they were like horses galloping very, very quickly. I felt that I couldn’t possibly get on any of those horses. They were speaking too quickly in a language I couldn’t really understand; and what they were talking about was much too fast and advanced. But I had the strong aspiration to be able to ride those horses and to train to get up to that level when I could actually understand them and take advantage of the ride on such incredible thoroughbreds.

If we’re on a merry-go-round, we don’t need a thoroughbred horse; a wooden horse will do to go around. In that way, we work first with our local teachers. Obviously, the relation with that teacher needs to be respectful and so on; still, it’s not quite the same as a relation with the greatest masters that we might meet only a couple of times in our life. Perhaps, our local Dharma teachers might not be as inspiring for us; but nevertheless, we can learn a great deal from them. They can help us to train.

What is important about meeting the great masters of our time, even if we don’t meet them very often, is having someone that really inspires us. They don’t have to be with us all the time, because as I said, they might be galloping so fast that we couldn’t even keep up with them.

The other really important point that needs to be emphasized is that the relation with the spiritual teacher is not like the relationship with somebody in the army. It isn’t a “Yes, sir” and then we obey no matter what. We need to have examined the teacher very well. We need to do this before actually committing and entrusting ourselves to be guided by that person, even if it’s from a distance. Beforehand, we can of course go to their teachings, lectures and so on; but, that’s very different from the attitude of actually making that commitment.