Gary Peterson - November 12, 2024
Week 1 – Oct. 29, 2024
The emphasis for this first week was on Section 1.3 of the text, which entails advice concerning finding and establishing a relationship with the teacher or lama.
Translated in today’s terms and Western culture, this is often seen as advice to:
- find someone whose teaching style fits your learning style, and
- avoid teacher/student exploitation
Today, in seeking deeper truths, we in the West often must deal with teachers from different cultures, who have different mother tongues, and even are on different continents. The teacher is seen as a guide, someone experienced in the ways of the journey.
Remembering that this is a text from the 13th century, one’s relationship with a teacher was very different. It was likely someone from the same village or area, who spoke the same language and shared a common cultural background. A spiritual seeker usually sought refuge in a sangha. One probably lived in the same household or community with the teacher. Such an arrangement made it possible to observe and imitate, as well as interact with the teacher throughout the day. While some teaching was instructional, most was likely done through example. Good teachers were ‘skilled participants in the life of the world as it flows,’ not detached mind-stream analysts. The A-Tri text often speaks of “gift-waves” of influence that the lama provides. In terms of modern psychology and neuroscience, this empowerment/influence may involve ‘mirroring‘ or mirror neurons. Living near or with the lama likely made such interactions routinely possible. (Can Zoom meetings be changed to make this more likely?)
Another perspective that is overlooked is that Tibet/Nepal in the 13th century had a worldview deeply entrenched in what we now call animism. According to AI Overview:
Animism is a worldview that holds that all things in the world have a spiritual essence and are animated, or have agency and free will. It’s a relational perspective that views the world as an interconnected web of being, where humans are not separate from other living things or inanimate objects.
This entails a value system that sees the world as sacred and interconnected, quite different from today’s West. One of the more interesting aspects of McGilchrist’s hemisphere hypothesis is that our two brain hemispheres have different value systems. Our right brain hemisphere values the Holy, Nature, beauty, goodness, and truth. Our left brain hemisphere values power, control, manipulating and making use of the world, as well as seeking pleasure. McGilchrist states that our values determine how we see and what we see, both in ourselves and in the world. If in seeking enlightenment we are trying to change our ‘base of operations’ to our right brain hemisphere, we should acknowledge that we are choosing a teacher who will not only instruct us in training the mind, but will also be working with us to change our core values. That adds a seriousness to the relationship requiring trust, admiration, respect and diligence.
In his books, McGilchrist posits that Eastern cultures emphasize the a right brain perspective on the world. It appears that typical 13th century Tibetans utilized their brains quite differently than we Westerns do today. This is something that our teachers likely know all too well.
Thanks Gary! Yes, so true that we in the west don’t often readily understand the meaning of teacher as the text identifies it-a Dharma teacher or Lama is that one who points out the truth of our own nature—this is not necessarily through explicit instruction, but more often through subtler forms of pointing out. This resonance forms the heart connection which engenders the trust admiration respect and diligence that are required on the path.