Good Evening Ed,
I liked Robert Adams’ book. But the materials you are presenting online seem to go much deeper.
I was particularly interested in Robert’s view (paraphrasing) that the best teachers don’t have a big following.
I have an opportunity to go to a satsang with a teacher who has an international following. It will be attended by dozens of people. And it will end up costing a fair amount of time and money.
In your view, are these types of satsang worthwhile?
It seems that you gained a great deal from satsang with Robert. But it also seems that you got a number of relatively unproductive detours.
How do you tell if a satsang/teacher will be a help or a hindrance?
Thank you in advance for any comment you care to provide…
Best,
Ron
RESPONSE:
You can't tell ahead of time.
But if there is a big cost involved, know it is worthless.
The great ones do not charge. People are free to give what they will, but it is not a precondition.
The spiritual model is not the same as the business model. With the spiritual model, God takes care of you. With the business model you sell as service and get recompensed for the service.
Unfortunately, in the West most of the spiritual teachers have adopted the business model, selling books, Satsang, ebooks, workshops, intensives, lessons, talks, and personal interviews or teachings. Their ads are all over their sites.
On the other hand, the student must realize they have an obligation to take care of the teacher. Indeed, Robert used to say that is the agreement between student and teacher: the teacher takes care of your spiritual life and the student takes care of the teacher's physical life. Unless the student feels that obligation and just partakes of the teachings one way, being spoon fed, that student has learned nothing, and remains just a hungry mouth.
If people come to me with humility and ask to guide them, I do it willingly, freely. If they come with arrogance, or want only to know about concepts or words rather than self-realization, I have nothing for them.
Personally, I feel I owe everything to Robert and Grace.
Realizing the Manifest Self--the Life Force permeating our humanity--and the Unmanifest source from which it arises.
bullshit - "Robert used to say that is the agreement between student and teacher: the teacher takes care of your spiritual life and the student takes care of the teacher's physical life."
ReplyDelete--Jason
Jason is mad because he only wanted to learn about concepts in Buddhism and Advaita, as well as the "new" concepts in Jean Dunn's Prior to Consciousness. I refused, stating that learning one set of new concepts, explained in terms of his old concepts that he understands, does absolutely nothing towards acquiring spiritual understanding. Spirituality is going beyond mind and concepts altogether. As long as he insisted on learning concepts only, and refused to make the transition to self-inquiry, there was nothing I could do for him.
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