WHEN THE STUDENT IS TEACHABLE, THE RIGHT TEACHER WILL APPEAR
If you decide to go on a safari in the jungle in Africa, I’m sure you will have the sensitivity to hire a guide. Otherwise, you will probably get lost, at the very least, or you will be devoured by a ferocious creature, or perhaps squeezed to death by a giant anaconda.
All kinds of things are possible when you go to the jungle and to wild places. Well, life is exactly like that, unpredictable, dangerous, exhausting, and deceiving, especially if you don’t have a guide or mentor, or a role model.
When I realized that I needed help in my early twenties, after dealing with addictions, poverty, depression, and deep pain at the core of my soul, I decided that I needed a mentor, a guide, someone to teach me all that I did not know. I realized that to cross this jungle called “life,” I needed more than a coach. I needed a SPIRITUAL GUIDE, a teacher who could help me to awaken, to see the world with different eyes in a more positive, enlightened way.
At that time, I was very much a victim, blaming the country, my family, God, etc. After searching in books, I saw that people reached the Himalayas and found a master teacher there just by hiking up those monumental mountains. Also, the books said, “When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.”
My first trip to India was magical. I fell in love with that country, but when people asked me if I had found the guru that I was looking for, my answer was that the “guru” was my trip, the people, the food, and the smelly India. No long-bearded, holy man was to be found, and so the subsequent year when I went back, I went to ashrams, to caves, to mountains, to islands, and to different schools of meditation. I encountered many holy people all around Asia with so much light. Some didn’t talk at all; they were just in silence. Some were sharing incredible wisdom during Satsangs, and some were performing healings.
In all of those places, there were many westerners and Indians worshiping the teachers, competing to find out who would be the master in giving the gift of enlightenment. All was nice, and even fun, at the time, but I needed something more, a closer relationship with someone who answered questions and saw in me what I could not see in myself.
Since then, I’ve had many teachers of different spiritual paths, and I am absolutely grateful to all of these teachers of life. One thing that I learned is that if I were not in a surrendered state with a teacher, I could not learn.
For some time, I had the privilege of meeting this yogi who had a menacing look in his eyes and who was known to yell and scream violently at a lot of people, and, in fact, who I saw being absolutely rude, and what looked angry, to many people. What I realized was that he was like that because many people went to him with big fat egos trying to teach him something or to argue with him. He was very truthful, direct, and told it like it was, and wasted no time or energy.
If you want to learn from a teacher, you must learn to surrender to him/her and submit so that you can receive wisdom, impartations, energy, light, and love.
When I went to see this yogi, I was just like the womb of a woman, ready to receive a baby, and completely submitted, for the simple reason that I knew that he knew. His eyes were filled with faith and tough love, and my eyes were filled with fear and doubt.
Yes, I read lots of books, and my ego thought that was enough to be a teacher, but I realized that if I did that, I would never get what you will never get from a book. A book is just knowledge that gets stuck in your mind. He was more than knowledge. He was the knower. His wisdom came from above and went straight to my heart.
After a while, he passed, and I had other great teachers in the new age environment, and even though I learned a lot from them, because I knew the art of submitting, I felt they were too soft and, in a way, weak with me. They were hoping that I would figure things out instead of telling me things straightforward to the core.
Eventually, I met someone who did not look like a holy teacher at all. He was not part of the new age movement. He often wore black, carried a gun, and ate a lot of meat. The first time I met him, I felt his tremendous power, but I also felt that he was not advanced enough because of his lifestyle and because of my new age belief that a teacher should look like a nice, sweet sheep.
From day one, this intriguing fellow started to press all of my buttons saying all the things that I did not want to hear about myself. To top it off, one day he said to me, “There is too much fear in your life in the area of your finances. You’ve got to give your money away!” At that moment, I thought, what a conman! What an impostor this man is! I was about to leave, but after thinking about it, he had something in his eyes that I wanted. What I saw was not human. It was the infinite, the timeless, the stillness, the truth.
Something told me, “Trust,” and so I did it! I wrote the big check! That same day, I lost the fear that had been tormenting me, and within a few weeks, I tripled what I was giving, and my spirit and mind started to change. He pushed my boundaries many times and often made me angry, but I kept surrendering. Sometimes I felt there was no separation between him and me, and I was able to receive so much light and wisdom with no words involved. Boy, he was tough, direct, and honest, a real man’s man! I was lucky that I was able to take it.
Many times he said to me, “I’ve got no time for people who come to see me, their eyes filled with fear, and even though they know that their life is not working, they keep fighting me and want to teach me.” In a way, he seemed arrogant, but so what?! He was right! He was a sheep dressed as a wolf. In fact, the more I got to know him, the more I saw his loving heart. My idea of love was to be nice, and with a phony smile all the time. With him, love became something real with so many different colors.
When I saw he was tired, I donated money for him to go to on vacation, and I always made sure that I went to see him full-handed, because when you go empty-handed, you leave empty-handed. To this day, I wish I had millions to give him, because what he gave me was priceless.
My time with him was magical. He was a true master, and most of the time, I was listening, absorbing, and sometimes watching my ego wanting to react and fight or try to defend myself. I noticed that even if, at the time, I thought I was right, just surrendering was the medicine to every problem. Eventually, meeting him was easy. I trusted him. I had no doubts anymore. I realized that for a long time, I was searching for a guide that fed my ego instead of my spirit, and he did not feed my ego for sure.
If you are studying with a teacher, and you don’t really like him or you doubt him, he is probably the one for you.
If he tells you what you don’t want to hear, he is the one for you.
If he challenges you, he is the right one for you.
If at times he makes you angry, he is the one for you.
If he pushes you into the unknown to face your fears, he is the one for you.
If he is questionable and does things “differently,” he is the one for you.
Don’t go there and teach, or think you are at the same level as s/he, especially when areas of your life are not working. There is nothing worse than spiritual ego.
If your lover or friends don’t like him/her much, or criticize him/her because s/he is different, s/he is the one for you.
Don’t play ping pong by continuing to respond, “It’s not true,” “You can’t see me,” “You don’t get it,” blah, blah, blah.
The relationship between student and teacher is deep, very intimate, and whether different or the same sex, don’t confuse it with romance. Otherwise you will miss the real juice and learn nothing.
Go there, listen to this person as if it were melodic music, and become one with them. The ultimate teaching of a true master is not in words, but in presence. It’s an energy that becomes one with yours.
My take is that “when the student is teachable, the real teacher will appear.” Being teachable is an art, the art of listening, submitting, and receiving.
Anyone can transform his/her life, but not everyone is teachable. The price is to let go of pride, to let go of fear, and to let go of knowledge. After all, pride comes before destruction, and meekness comes before honor.
Good luck on your journey in life’s jungle. The right teacher will teach you how to spread your wings so that you can take off and fly by yourself and see the snakes and ferocious animals from above with wisdom and infinite love in your heart.