Open Enlightenment

Building a New Tradition: Part 4

This conversation brought to my attention the vast number of questions that need to be addressed and considered when it comes to developing a community or tradition (or whatever it is), and in the video you can see the very beginnings of my articulation of how I envision this tradition taking shape (a big thank you to Vinay for facilitating this). I hope to flesh out the details (and the language) over the coming months before presenting this ‘new model’ for feedback.

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Building a New Tradition: Part 3

Relevant links:

Governance

Cohousing (also see the UK Cohousing Network)

Holacracy

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Building a New Tradition: Part 2

Relevant links:

Commune movement

The Farm

Stephen Gaskin

Guru

G.I. Gurdjieff

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Building a New Tradition: A Conversation with Vinay Gupta

A week ago I was fortunate enough to be joined in my flat by Vinay Gupta, inventor of the Hexayurt, founder of the Bucky Ghandi Design Institution, editor of The Future We Deserve, and state-failure guru, where we explored the various aspects of organisation and infrastructure necessary to develop my ideas for a new enlightenment tradition.

I video’d the conversation using my Flip HD, which has a narrow focus so you’ll have to excuse my head being partially in shot, and after ruthlessly editing down the talk I can now present the best bits in a 20 minute video.

I know what you’re thinking: without some violence, tits or CGI to hold your attention, you’re going to find it difficult to concentrate for that long. And that’s why I’ve also cut the film up into small bite size chunks, the first of which you will find below the full length film. I intend to post a new segment (of which there are 3 more) over the coming days (it might also make for a more structured conversation around the points made in each segment).

So if you’re feeling brave (or you’re particularly interested in this topic) here’s the full thing:

Building a New Tradition: A Conversation with Vinay Gupta from Alan Chapman on Vimeo.

Alternatively, here’s Part 1:

Relevant links (for part 1):

Lahiri Mahasaya

Earth ships (one example of off grid sustainable living)

Right livelihood

Note: In the video, we touch upon stepping away from a ‘corrupt economic system’. It should be emphasised that this is not a knee jerk and all too common reaction within the ‘spiritual scene’ to money in and of itself; rather, the current economic model or system is what is being called in to question and rejected wholesale. I’m all in favour of investigating initiatives such as the Totnes Pound or even a Resource Based Economy, but exploring alternatives such as these are a natural conclusion if we take a mindful approach to money, our behaviour and the consequences of our spending seriously. Check out Hokai Sobol talking about this topic over at Buddhist Geeks.

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How to experience enlightenment

How to experience enlightenment from Alan Chapman on Vimeo.

Better late than never, eh? Videos should be more frequent from now on.

My last video transformed the blog into a forum, and amongst many other terrible accusations thrown my way I was rather confusingly compared to Andrew Cohen. Let’s see where this one takes us…

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The Folk Theory of Enlightenment: An Interview with Jody Radzik

Jody Radzik is the infamous webmaster of Guruphiliac, a site that sheds light on the scams, crimes and abuses perpetrated by the mad, bad and sad hucksters and would-be gurus of the enlightenment scene. Jody recently gave a talk on the Folk Theory of Enlightenment (FToE) at the Science and Non-duality Conference 2009, details of which can be found at his new blog, Shimmering Dead End.

As a fan of his work, I was delighted when Jody agreed to the following interview, where we discuss his spiritual career, the negativity he frequently receives from telling the truth, working with Kali, and the FToE.

more »

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The Dirty Little Secret of Awakening

There is something wrong with the Dharma.

A sickness is festering, unchecked, in the shadows of the great Saints, Sages and Prophets. Its symptoms include the countless examples of psychological, physical, and sexual abuses visited upon students and devotees by gurus, the financial exploitation, corruption, fraud, murder and drug abuse perpetrated by teachers from both the East and West, the political infighting evident in every major lineage and school, the outright failure of many traditions in producing awakened practitioners, the reluctance of genuinely awakened individuals in coming forward and openly discussing enlightenment, and the casual racism, sexism, fascism and homophobia still found in ‘spiritual culture’.

Ironically, all of this is the result of an endeavour to uphold the highest standards of morality.

Gestation

It’s been just over nine months since my final awakening, and I’ve recently become aware of how easily I became infected with the sickness, and since beginning to teach, the potential for just how severe the symptoms could become.

Since beginning this blog last year, we’ve been visited by a number of individuals who are so badly infected by the sickness that their only chance of recovery – if any – is a Dharma lobotomy. I expect that what I’m going to write here is probably going to attract more of this type, and probably with further accusations of my awakening being anything but genuine or full (see how many times you can spot something that can’t possibly mean I’m enlightened). But if the Dharma is ever going to recover, someone has to bite the bullet and expose the Dirty Little Secret no one wishes to address.

Early detection

Post-awakening is just as much a learning curve as pre-awakening. For a couple of months after my awakening, I felt like I had been emptied out. I was effortlessly present, blissed out, calm and contented. I had of course experienced something similar with my peak and partial awakenings, and so I knew that this state wouldn’t last forever.

So what had permanently changed?

Although many gurus speak about the eradication of the ego or the self, I already knew pre-awakening that many genuine teachers found this model inaccurate and misleading; and my experience confirmed this. I still had an ego, a self or personality; but it did seem as if the subject/object divide had disappeared for good, and had been replaced by wholeness or completion at a fundamental level. So that must be it: I was no longer a subject!

And the sickness had slipped in by simply changing its name.

Diagnosis

We can readily identify the sickness by considering perhaps the most essential (no pun intended) concept of Buddhism: No-Self.

According to Buddhism, No-Self is one of the three characteristics evident in all phenomena, including human beings. If we observe a sensation close enough, we can see that it has no ‘essence’, despite the fact we readily assume all subjects and objects to possess such a quality.

What this has come to mean, however, is the idea that if we believe or act as though we possess a self, say by performing any actions that can be considered ‘selfish’ or ‘egotistical’, then we are acting from a place of ignorance.

Ergo, the enlightened person must be completely selfless.

In my own case, if I am no longer a subject, that means I must act as if I no longer have the concerns that a subject possesses, no? Which, for all intents and purposes, is exactly the same thing as believing I am selfless.

Furthermore, as I am awakened, I cannot possibly act with selfish, egotistical or ‘ignorant’ intent.  My motivations must always be pure then!

Now stick me in a room, surround me by devotees who also behave as if I am infallibly selfless and pure, and watch as I play out every whim unburdened by conscience (‘My devotees bitch and moan when I force them to practice for 48hrs straight/give me their inheritance for my Open Enlightenment centre/play out my sexual fantasies. Of course, they wouldn’t complain if they were awakened like me; I need to make them work harder/give me more money/perform more interesting sexual feats, more often!’).

The abusive guru and the gullible devotee is but one of the many symptoms of the Ignorant Bliss of Selflessness (IBS).

The Dirty Little Secret

The awful truth about awakening (and this has taken me a while to really understand with a degree of clarity) is that the self, ego, personality and even the subject don’t go anywhere, which means that selfish, egotistical, personal and subjective behaviour all remain. If you are greedy, angry and homophobic before awakening, chances are you’ll still be greedy, angry and homophobic afterwards.

If we define awakening as the recognition of our original nature, we can say that the awakened person is simply aware that all phenomenon is original nature; this includes all of the neuroses, issues, and prejudices that come with being a human being. This does not mean the self, ego, personality or subject are eradicated; they are simply seen as perfect, whole and complete. (Get over it.)

Or, to speak in Buddhist terms, No Self does not mean there is no self, but that the self is empty, along with everything else (including your ego, personality, issues, psychosis, facial ticks…and even emptiness itself!).

Perhaps if the concept of Empty Self replaced that of No Self we might go some way to inhibiting the spread of the Ignorant Bliss of Selflessness.

Further Symptoms

With selflessness as the yard stick for awakening, it should come as no surprise that:

• Many Dharma practitioners deny and suppress their angry, greedy, lustful, attached, ignorant, anxious, weird, disturbed, restless, unhappy, sad, mad, bad and selfish emotions, thoughts and behaviours, only to have these unwanted and unloved aspects of themselves play out while the practitioner remains oblivious and ignorant to the fact, and usually within a Sangha or group of similarly deluded hypocrites, where everyone pretends they’re the most ‘enlightened’ people on the planet!
• Many awakened practitioners mistakenly believe they are not awakened because they are evidently not selfless.
• Many schools and lineages of enlightenment will not tolerate discussion of awakening for fear of being accused of displaying pride or attachment, resulting in many genuinely awakened practitioners remaining silent about the phenomenon for fear of expulsion/exclusion.
• By denying their prejudices even exist, the racism, sexism, fascism and homophobia (and even heterophobia!) of many practitioners are left unchecked and unaddressed within the ‘spiritual’ community.
• By investing in a poor model of awakening based on the ideal of selflessness, the mainstay of the Dharma community is catastrophically failing in facilitating awakening in themselves and others. The vows of many traditions and lineages have become nothing but a joke.

Treatment

Thankfully, treatment is free and available to everyone, and recovery is fast and virtually guaranteed.

The treatment is three fold:

1). Be honest with yourself and everyone else, even if you’ve invested a lot of time and energy in a certain worldview, tradition or identity that encourages the Ignorant Bliss of Selflessness. If you really care about awakening, show some integrity.

2). Now that you can consciously accept the existence of your ego and issues, you should address them. Sociopath? Have some therapy! Full of hate? Explore the nature and possible root cause of your anger! Proud? Make your competitiveness work for the cause by becoming the best awakened teacher the world has ever seen!

3).Take a sitting session for a minimum of half an hour once a day. While it is true that just before and after awakening selflessness and compassion (amongst other wonderful attributes) spontaneously arise, which positively transform the world like nothing else can, this kind of ‘perfect meditation’ passes; it is therefore down to a daily practice to foster the natural expression of openness, compassion, freedom, wholeness, peace, generosity and selflessness that demonstrates our original nature. Whether awakened or not, enlightenment must be practiced in order that we transform the world; sitting is one such method.

It should be noted that despite everything I’ve said, enlightenment does have a profound effect on a person, and it can change his or her behaviour in a very profound sense; but exactly how and to what degree appears to vary with each individual. I like to think that enlightenment doesn’t produce the perfect human being, but it does produce a better one.

Right, let’s have it

Come on then: just how unenlightened am I?

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The Last of Your Days

Jennifer Agnew profiles spiritual guru David Todd, author of The Last of Your Days and originator of its surprise-hit television franchise.

Celebrities live at a faster pace than normal people. Dave Todd certainly gives that impression, but perhaps with more reason than anyone I’ve interviewed.

He arrives ten minutes late and is finishing a call as I greet him, but turns off the phone before he zips it into his pocket. He isn’t overdressed. In fact, he seems to be striving hard to create the opposite impression: casual jeans, sweatshirt, and a very lived-in bomber jacket. His tousled hair and five o’clock shadow (it’s only 11:10 am) scream at me someone who refuses to be bothered by what doesn’t matter. Then he takes my hand in a firm, slow shake, and a pair of humorous brown eyes meet mine with a friendly and unwavering smile.

Immediately – of course – my cynical side is on alert to the possibility that this is only calculated charm, but I’m surprised to catch myself actually granting him the benefit of the doubt. A starstruck mental voice reminds me this is David Todd, the man famous for having only a year left to live, and yet here he is, giving up some of that precious time to speak with me.

I scan my notes and collect myself as we take our seats. But something tells me this could well be one of those interviews when the notes go straight out the window.

If someone told you ten months ago where you’d be today, would you have believed them?

‘No way,’ he laughs. (I’m surprised by how unrestrained his laughter sounds, almost like a small boy.) ‘There’s such incredible hunger from people seeking for meaning that responses to ideas these days can be more extreme than anyone would predict.

‘Ten months ago I was just a wannabe blogger, like a million others. Luckily the blog caught on, so a book seemed a natural progression. But the popularity of the DVDs and then the sale of the TV format admittedly took me by surprise. Until now our culture has been completely phobic of the idea of dying – of ourselves dying, that is – so I don’t think anyone would’ve guessed you could succeed at marketing death.’

And yet that’s precisely what you’ve done. Were you always obsessed with the idea of dying?

‘Not at all. I was obsessed like everyone else with not thinking about it, but then I reached a spiritual crossroads. At the time I had a well-paid job, a great relationship and everything, yet I felt truth was missing, you know? I looked around and thought, “What is this? What’s it all for?”‘

A look transforms David’s face at this point. Such a penetrating, contemplative look that it reminds me of the expression on religious statues or in paintings of saints. I have to force myself to remember that this man has made more money in the past few months than I’m likely ever to earn, yet there’s still a strong sense of what I can only call inner peace radiating from him.

Soon I’m going to have to ask him about the criticisms that have been thrown in his direction, but it’s impossible to reconcile them at the moment with the intensely spiritual man who is sitting before me.

‘That’s where the idea came from,’ he continues. (I wonder if the sparkle in his eye means that somehow he senses what I’ve been thinking, and this thought disturbs me.) ‘But then I realised what a powerful exercise it would be to imagine if I were dying – actually dying – and had only a year left. Wouldn’t thinking like that reveal what was truly essential in my life and what wasn’t?’

What did you discover?

(He gives that boyish laugh again.) ‘I saw my life wasn’t anything like it ought to have been if I was actually dying. In fact, it was a total mess.’

That must have been tough…

‘”Tough” doesn’t come close. When I saw how little really mattered and how much was only clutter I began to realise I deeply needed to change. “If I have only a year,” I asked myself, “is this the woman I want to be with; is this the job I want to spend time doing; are these the friends who will give me the support I’m going to need?”‘

‘The answer in every case was, “No.”‘

He seems to catch an unintentional flicker in my expression. ‘I realise that sounds harsh,’ he says.

You’ve attracted criticism for the way you’ve treated people in your life…

He nods. ‘If you do the exercise properly you’ve got to take it all the way. When you practise spirituality you open doors that can’t be closed. Once they’ve been opened then the only way out is through.’

So living as if you were going to die completely changed your life?

‘Yes, forever. I broke up with my partner – which was very sad at the time. I reigned my job and haven’t spoken since to many of my so-called “friends”. For a time I was all alone with no income and no home, yet I still knew my life wasn’t in the shape I needed it to be in, and until it was I wouldn’t be able to say goodbye to it with integrity.’

Some of your critics have said that because you aren’t really dying the exercise is pointless and imaginary. How do you respond to that?

He nods slowly and his face fills with pity. ‘I understand where they’re coming from – or trying to – but they’re not grasping it seriously enough. This is not about occasionally thinking to yourself, “What would I do if I wasn’t going to be here next year?” You have to take it beyond thinking into action for it to become real. Okay, true, I’m not actually terminally ill, but if I choose my actions as if I were then will someone please show me the difference? There isn’t any. But there is a difference between people who think this is about imagination and those who grasp what it’s really about: action.

‘I explain this to my students over and over. Whenever they say, “But it’s not actually real” I tell them, “That’s because you’re not making it real!”‘

What tips would you give people who are trying to make it real?

‘Whatever’s not right, make it right to the maximum extent within your means. For example, if you’re not living in the kind of home you would expect to be in at the end of your life, then move to a better one. If you can’t, there’s always something you can do – from building an extension, to renovation, right down to something as basic as changing the furniture.’

Your television show and DVDs cover a wide range of ideas, such as interior design, health and fitness, and personal finance, don’t they?

‘Yes. The DVDs provide basic ideas, but of course it’s up to the student to recognise what they should change and how. It would be wrong to tell people how to go about that.’

What if they decide nothing needs changing?

He gives a wide shrug and smiles. ‘Fine. Nobody says they’ve got to. But if you’re not making the most of what you have now then you’re sleepwalking towards death. It’s hard to look death in the eye, but unless we wake up and do it we’re not making our lives the best they can be.’

The most difficult part of the interview rears its head and I’m burning to see how he deals with it. So far he hasn’t wavered; I’m still enjoying the ease he placed me in at the beginning. I check our body language: we’re both sitting in an open posture with full and friendly eye contact, and I still seem to have his full attention. Part of me hopes neither of us screws up this next bit, because it would be sad to ruin the impression so far. Nevertheless, I clear my throat and go for it…

You can’t have avoided the media debate over certain tragic individuals who, unlike those who don’t take your ideas seriously enough, have perhaps taken them too far?

‘You mean the McKenny case?’

I was thinking of Michael McKenny, among others, yes…

‘It’s always tragic when someone with a mental illness takes their own life.’

His expression turns serious and I’m reassured by his instant change of mood. It suggests someone so in control that he can flick his ego on or off as easily as a light-switch. Yet the way he sneaked ‘mental illness’ into his answer makes me wonder for the first time if he’ll try to side-step the question.

Some have suggested that Michael McKenny and others like him wouldn’t have killed themselves if it weren’t for your insistence on ‘making it real’. Isn’t that a dangerous suggestion for vulnerable people?

He looks away for a second, and I wonder if I’ve finally uncovered a flaw.

‘There’s a story about the Buddha from way back,’ he says, ‘when it was common for monks to meditate in the places in India where dead bodies were left out to rot.’

His eyes glint mischievously. It’s as if he can’t resist adding: ‘I suppose the Buddha was the David Todd of his day… But anyway, this story goes that the Buddha took some novice monks to meditate in a charnel ground whilst he popped off on other business. When he got back he was horrified to find that the monks had grown so depressed meditating on death that they’d all slit their wrists.’

You’re claiming this story is relevant to the McKenny case?

‘Well, it might be, because I think it shows us two things: firstly that any spiritual practice – even a genuine one taught by a master – can be tragically misunderstood by students. Secondly, it’s a graphic depiction of what our attitude to death ought to be.’

Which is?

‘We shouldn’t surrender to death but must meet it with life. To meet dying with acceptance is no better than sleepwalking. Instead, use death to improve your life, over and over, until it’s the most successful it can be.’

I’m smiling again – and David’s smiling too, because he can see he’s won me over. I realise how his sincerity, above all else, has earned him his success.

You’ve also had negative comments from groups representing the terminally ill, and yet the contestants on your TV show always say the practice changed them for the better.

‘Yes. Because what I teach is using death for personal growth. In a deep sense, people with terminal illness are no different from contestants on my show; there’s always something anyone can do to make their lives better. Thinking about dying of course can make you depressed. If that happens, step away from the depression and change your outlook and circumstances. The person responsible for your unhappiness is you. Death is a gift from the universe; the most wonderful challenge to make your life perfect.’

David says goodbye and leaves me with another peal of boyish laughter echoing in my ears, and it’s odd but for the rest of the day I’m walking on air. Everything is fine. The thought that one day me and all I know will cease to be only makes everything even more great.

It seems that David’s system really works. Whether I’d describe him as a ‘saint’ or ‘enlightened’ is something I’d have to think about long and hard, but no doubt he has something; some kind of spiritual gift that these days is rare, but – thanks to his honesty and acumen – is now very much in demand.

To those critics who carp and cavil I’d suggest they don’t understand David until they’ve met him face to face, because his presence is equally as persuasive as his reputation. Who’d have dreamt that a culture as phobic of death as ours would grant him the exposure he’s won from it? But then again – and this is the hallmark of David’s genius – who would suppose that death itself could have such a sincere and friendly face?

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Your Ideal Teacher

A man turned up at the meditation group I lead – because occasionally someone does show, although mostly it’s only me. The advertised intention of sitting and talking about how to meditate doesn’t seem to appeal to many people. However, this guy turned up, and so we sat for forty minutes and then we talked about technique.

Two people were in the room. One of them had come to practise and learn, and the other one was supposedly in a position to teach. I asked the guy what he had experienced during the sitting and he mentioned something about his mind wandering and a pain in his leg.

I’d have been open to hearing how he’d felt when his mind wandered; or what kind of things it wandered into; or the type of pain afflicting his leg; or how the pain made him feel. Instead, I was puzzled by how he wouldn’t or couldn’t respond to my prompts. It didn’t feel that he was avoiding an answer; it felt instead as if it seemed to him that he’d said all it was possible to say.

He hasn’t been back since, so I’m left with the puzzle of how someone sits for forty minutes and notices only that his leg hurts and his concentration is poor. That isn’t much of a return on forty minutes. Casting back to how things were when I started doing this stuff myself, I think I’ve arrived at an answer: the guy assumed there was nothing more to say because what he experienced was just him.

You know how people say, ‘Is it warm in here, or is it just me?‘ [1] That’s a polite thing to say in social situation. But in meditation it’s deadly. The point of meditation is to realise how there’s never any ‘just me’.

If a sensation arises of heat or leg-pain or concentrating poorly, then the point is to be see that. I suspect that when I asked the guy what happened during those forty minutes, what went through his mind was something like this: ‘Well, my leg hurt and my mind wandered, but that’s just me.’

We begin practice with an unenlightened mind, which entertains this weird notion that experience is ‘transparent’. Experience arises, but the unenlightened mind looks straight through it; or it kind of looks at it, but without seeing – like that type of blindness where the eyes are working perfectly, but neurologically something is screwed.

This way of seeing is the trick we use to create a self. Instead of ‘heat is arising’ we understand ‘I am hot’; the heat is turned into the property of something and now appears to be ‘just me’.

Enlightenment is the lived realisation of how this is only a trick.

So that guy who came to the group isn’t stupid; he’s just unenlightened. My problem is how do I teach him something different?

Puppetji. Some see in him their ideal teacher, whereas others see just a bundle of colourful rags.

In most teaching situations we have the luxury of assuming there’s something to learn, someone to learn it, and someone to learn it from. In the enlightenment game, however, the object of the lesson involves realising how not one of these assumptions holds. The enlightenment game is not a typical teaching situation, like the type we’re accustomed to from school or college.

It’s said that when the student is ready the teacher will appear. But this doesn’t mean that after we’ve read some Ken Wilber a wise old turbaned geezer will show up on our doorstep. It doesn’t even mean that we need to scour the phonebook and find a turbaned geezer. This old truism is pointing instead to how students and teachers are dependently co-arising. Our education system justifies itself by designating certain individuals as teachers and paying them a salary for what they do. But cast your mind back over your life, and you’ll probably find that the people who taught you the most important lessons probably weren’t even conscious of doing so, let alone drawing a paycheque for their service.

A teacher is a teacher only in the mind of a student. There is nothing inherent in a person’s words or actions that can cause others to learn from him or her. If teachers really did exist outside of students’ minds, then teaching would be a very easy job instead of an impossible one.

It was Sigmund Freud who famously declared there were three ‘impossible’ professions: teaching, government and psychoanalysis (Freud 1937: 248). The reason they are impossible is because they seek to change people. Freud learnt the hard way that changing people is pretty much the hardest thing when he discovered how the human personality is built upon a bedrock of narcissism. The ego, by definition, cannot bear the prospect of becoming what it’s not. This obstinacy is exactly what the ego was designed for.

‘Does everyone find change difficult,’ the ego wonders, ‘or is it just me?’

But there is a way around the ego: the arrival at a lived understanding of how the ego is based upon illusion. Freud didn’t admit this ‘mystical’ possibility within his system, and even if he had the problem of the ego’s narcissism remains; he would simply have added a fourth profession to his list: the enlightenment game. Indeed, the teaching of enlightenment is perhaps the most impossible profession of all, because it involves not only teaching, but also an understanding of the human personality (‘psychoanalysis’) and the instilment of self-regulation and self-discipline into the learner (‘government’).

Sigmund Freud. Some see in him a pioneer of human psychology, whereas others see just a sexist, racist, dirty old man.

I don’t mean that we shouldn’t try to teach this stuff, or that teachers shouldn’t bend over backwards to make themselves clear and take responsibility for their teaching. But it’s important to recognise that the learning of enlightenment cannot take place within the standard model of a teaching relationship, because the teacher cannot take responsibility for the factor that ensures success: the learner’s recognition of their own lack of truth [2].

The recognition of the lack of truth is the route around the bedrock of narcissism. Without recognising the fundamental lack of truth in our perception, we’re doomed to the standard assumption of, ‘well, that’s just me.’ The bedrock of narcissism that Freud uncovered (Freud 1937: 252) is this very habit of assuming there’s a ‘me’ that cannot be seen beyond.

Perhaps one of the reasons the guy hasn’t been back to the group is that he thought I was a poor teacher, or perhaps he found my manner condescending, or something else pissed him off. In a standard teaching situation, these might indeed get in the way of success and he would be well advised to look elsewhere. In the enlightenment game, however, it’s more complicated, because it’s clear the student is making a demand on the teacher for truth, instead of focusing on the lack of truth within himself.

By assuming that a teacher must fulfil certain criteria or behaviours, the student is trying to satisfy his or her own narcissistic desires in a projected form. Think about it: if the ego is an illusion then that’s true now, already. If we suppose that something has to be fulfilled before we can see this, we are merely adding a new desire to our experience.

There’s nothing wrong with this in a standard teaching situation. The aim of the enlightenment game, however, is to make our demands the object of enquiry, not to allow them to form the basis of our motivation.

Of course, institutions that teach enlightenment have recognised this problem and have devised different models of teaching for circumventing it.

In the east we have the guru system. The guru looks superficially like a standard teacher idealised to an absurd degree. Sadly, many students fall into the trap of regarding their guru as precisely this – their ideal teacher. (And so, unfortunately, do many gurus.) However, by surrendering our will, judgement and probably a hefty proportion of our income to the guru, the authentic goal of this system is to confront us with our own narcissistic demands, because once we have genuinely allowed the guru complete dominance over our lives, we’re left staring those demands right in the face.

The western approach to the problem is more radical. The western occult tradition throws out altogether the standard model of the teacher and urges upon us a bizarre array of daimons, Holy Guardian Angels, invisible colleges and ascended masters. Although communication with ‘imaginary’ beings is greeted with scorn by most people, it’s a model that has much to recommend it, when practised correctly. It’s a major milestone in magical practice, the first time we receive from a non-human intelligence a message that completely contradicts our conscious assumptions and as a result leads us toward new understanding.

The western model, by advocating surrender to a teacher who doesn’t even exist (in the human sense), can steer us quickly around the ‘it’s just me’ of ordinary perception into a stark confrontation with the radical otherness of our own experience, far more quickly than the guru method. The reason is that it demonstrates more graphically our lack of truth, because there’s nothing like a chat with a discarnate being for forcing us to concentrate and interrogate very closely indeed our experience, motives and demands. In contrast, dependence on the idea that a human person can grant us what we desire will tend to work in the opposite direction. Yet it must be noted that neither of these models guarantees against the mispractice of projecting our narcissistic demands onto the other, whether that other is human or astral [3].

Some people assume that anyone who claims to have played out the enlightenment game is therefore obliged to teach, or automatically assumes the position of a teacher, and that this obliges them to say certain kinds of things or act in particular ways or adopt certain models of teaching.

To this I’d respond with a big smile and a loud and hearty ‘Fuck off!’

I’m a teacher of enlightenment to the degree that anyone regards me as such. If anyone decides to do this, but then discovers that what I write seems condescending, negative or spurious, then I hope they’ll confront the doubt and the need for self-affirmation that underlies their projection. I’m not arguing that I don’t manifest those qualities, but no one will get enlightened by trying to fix my faults rather than examining the experience provoked in themselves by those faults.

Someone might take my advice to recognise their lack of truth as a boastful claim that I possess a truth that they don’t. I remember reading Daniel Ingram for the first time, and feeling sick with envy and resentment for weeks on end at the access to truth that he (the lucky, arrogant, smug bastard) evidently had. But sitting with that unbearable envy and resentment, and using it to explore my relationship with my own lack of truth taught me more than I could ever have imagined.

The experience of the lack of truth is enlightenment. When our lack of truth is fully realised there is no longer any ground to experience, and then a whole new order of truth is able to enter our being, risen from falsity.

When the student is ready, anyone and anything is a teacher. One day, I hope that players of the enlightenment game will do away altogether with the notion of teachers, and we’ll wake up to a new aeon in which everyone is recognised as a messiah.

Notes

[1] This expression has at least two meanings. Firstly it can mean, ‘Am I the only one who is hot?’ But secondly it can mean, ‘Is it only due to my peculiarities that I come to possess this sensation of heat?’ It’s the second meaning that I’m focusing on here. The first meaning concerns the sensations, but the second is focused on the self that is supposedly feeling them or generating them.

[2] In a standard teaching relationship it is the transfer of a skill or body of knowledge which is the factor that ensures success, and a good teacher should most definitely be willing to accept responsibility for this!

[3] For example ‘prayer’, when understood as the practice of making petitions to God, is a depressingly common example of this error.

References

Freud, Sigmund (1937). Analysis Terminable and Interminable. In: The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud. Volume 23. Translated by James Strachey. London: Hogarth Press, 1968.

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The #1 Secret to Achieving Enlightenment Here and Now, in This Lifetime

Authoritarian gurus will try and take it from you; enlightenment doubters and cynics will try to undermine it.

When we choose to ignore the advice of a guide or teacher we dishonour it; when we fail to believe in ourselves and each other we lose it.

The number one secret to enlightenment is not a technique, a special mantra or a bizarre diet. It’s much more human than that.

The number one secret to achieving enlightenment here and now in this lifetime – as I have done and many, many others walking this planet right now have done – is integrity.

Is that all?

Perhaps you were hoping for something along the lines of a pseudo-mystical notion of interconnectedness and an instruction in positive thinking, but then there’s no accounting for taste.

We can all exercise integrity; I just think many people don’t know how. So here it is:

Integrity means that we are honest with ourselves and each other, on the basis that we are all capable, trustworthy and good.

No, honestly.

Do you really believe there is such a thing as enlightenment? Integrity means you consider on what basis you do or do not believe such a phenomenon exists. Who or what is your source for what you believe enlightenment is?

If you doubt such a phenomenon exists, be honest with yourself: do you have an accurate and believable description of what enlightenment is, and do you really have sufficient grounds for believing it isn’t real?

If you believe enlightenment exists, be honest with yourself: on what grounds is the description of enlightenment you believe in accurate and believable? What are your grounds for accepting the reality of such a description?

It takes integrity to understand that just because you have read a few New Age paperbacks you are not qualified to identify the ‘Big Special Event’ you have just experienced as enlightenment; or that reading a few philosophy texts qualifies you to dismiss all ‘Big Special Events’ as nothing but overactive imagination, delirium, insanity, or lies.

We show a lack of integrity when we doubt ourselves, others and the countless millennia old spiritual traditions for claiming that not only does enlightenment exist, but that anyone can experience it should they be willing to investigate the field of spirituality, identify the good teachers from the bad, discover and apply the good maps and models of the territory leading up to and beyond enlightenment, practice a time tested daily meditation for life, and find others – especially those with more experience under their belts – with whom to learn with and from.

Integrity means that you would form your expectations of enlightenment on the teachings of people – both alive and dead – who have displayed integrity themselves. A teacher displays integrity when she is honest about what she does and does not understand, what she has and has not experienced, how someone can experience what she has experienced and openly encourages the discussion of doubts, confusion and difficulties that a student might be facing.

A student exercises integrity when he reports experiences that he thinks might be significant to the teacher, but openly accepts what advice or opinion his teacher gives. It takes courage to admit the inescapable truth that we make mistakes about a lot of things a lot of the time. It’s not a sign of weakness to be helped or guided by others.

It shows a spectacular lack of integrity when a teacher refuses to discuss enlightenment or anything else that a student might encounter, refuses to address or is unable to welcome doubts, confusion or difficulties raised by a student, or instructs a student to perform any action that brings harm – whether mental, emotional, physical or financial – to himself or anyone else.

It shows a lack of integrity when a student is unwilling to address or welcome any doubts, fears or concerns over his teacher’s conduct as a result of it harming himself or others.

Ultimately, if we want to experience enlightenment then we must be true to what we think may have happened, both internally as our practice progresses and externally as we observe our behaviour and the actions of our teachers. Internally, this means not being afraid to try and accurately assess our experience in the light of the many models we have for describing what type of ‘Big Special Event’ might have occurred, but also admitting the limit to which our experience and knowledge can help in such an assessment. Externally, this means not being afraid to openly discuss any doubts or difficulties we might be having with our teachers, or to admit where our own behaviour is falling short of our practice.

Entertaining fantasy about enlightenment or absolute doubt in the reality of spiritual experience are both symptoms of a lost belief in the inherent virtue of humanity. Integrity is faith in ourselves and each other, and without it we are lost.

I have every faith that we are capable, despite what authoritarian gurus might preach, or the arguments made by those patronising teachers who refuse to talk about enlightenment on the grounds that we will only harm ourselves with such knowledge.

If you can exercise integrity when it comes to spirituality, then you don’t have very far to go.

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