I recently received an email from a longtime reader and friend with some questions about another spiritual teacher and his teachings. I’ll leave the details and the teacher’s identity aside for now, as they really aren’t relevant, but I want to address her main question publicly as it provides a great intro to something of value for you and your journey.
Her question was: “Do you know what he is talking about?”
Have we not all stumbled upon a teaching or two that left us scratching our heads? At times, we can even sense a real vitality, a real aliveness in the teacher or teaching that gives us a sense we might be served by paying attention. But try as we might, we just can’t figure out what the hell the teacher is talking about.
So, with that in mind, I visited this other teacher’s website, curious what had my friend so stumped. I must confess, I didn’t last 2 minutes, as the first article I started reading was dense, wordy, convoluted and long. Very long. And for me, too long.
Let’s start with the obvious. As I told my friend, there are many great teachers out there. If a teaching really resonates with you, if the teaching grabs you and you connect with it, then by all means, dive in. But if the teacher or teaching leaves you at a loss, or does nothing for you, then move on as there are plenty of others to choose from. On the surface, it really is that simple.
That said, however, while I’m not in the business of knocking other teachers and teachings, I think I can safely say, from my experience, that teachings such as the one I looked at are, to some extent, less helpful than others. Why? Because the very complexity of the teaching, the very depth and sophistication of what is presented is, for most people, a definite hinderance to awakening.
Teachings that are complex and “deep”, while appealing to the mind, while having a semblance of depth that must be valuable for one who wants to get to the bottom of things, are more often than not just food for the mind. They have lots to offer a hungry mind, but in the end, they really aren’t useful to what is actually waking up in awakening.
A good teaching, as I have experienced in my own journey, is a teaching that cuts to the heart of the matter and stays there. Quite often, it is a teaching that is simple, direct, and, in hindsight, ridiculously obvious. A good teaching is one that speaks to that which you truly are, that which will in fact awaken when awakening occurs. Not the mind, but the very truth of your being. That’s what awakens, and that is what is being spoken to in a good teaching.
That is not to say that a good teacher won’t use lots of words to convey a simple teaching. Ramana Maharshi said many, many things to a wide variety of people. There are books and books filled with transcripts of his dialogues. While it would seem to a casual observer than Ramana had a wide ranging, deep, teaching, it doesn’t take much time spent with his words to realize his teaching was incredibly simple:
“Find out what you are.”
That’s it in a nutshell. That’s Ramana’s teaching. “Find out who you are.” Over and over, like a broken record, Ramana would point people back to this one simple teaching. And other teachers that we revere, the ones who really seem to have lit the world on fire, had a teaching that is the utmost of simplicity.
Nisargadatta Maharaj’s guru told him, “You are the Supreme Reality. Now go find that out for yourself.” Wham! That’s it, that’s what Nisargadatta had to work with. Beautiful, simple, sublime. And Nisargadatta’s teaching reflects that simplicity.
A good teacher will often say much more than Nisargadatta’s teacher. Just as I’m writing several hundred words to answer this one question, a good teacher will address a questioner in whatever way is needed. Ramana would talk about mantras, meditation and various spiritual practices with his followers. He met each one where they were. But in the end, back would come Ramana: “And can you find the one who has that problem? Who is it that wants to know the answer? Who is asking this question? Who are you?”
If you run across a complex teaching that resonates for you, that’s fine. You may have something very valuable to learn from it. I studied A Course in Miracles for a number of years, and most would agree that The Course can be quite complicated (or at least convoluted). Yet, The Course was a necessary part of my journey. I used to be quite the intellectual snob, so I guess I simply needed something that would appeal to that facet of my persona. But in the end, I found I had to jettison the complexity in favor of incredible simplicity, and thus The Course left my journey.
And in case someone might read the above and assume that I’m just some ignorant hillbilly from Missouri who needs lots of one syllable words, please understand that, if truth be told, I have one of those minds that most people would love to have. It got me through an Ivy League college with high honors back in the day, and being “the smart guy” has always been my defining characteristic. But it has done me virtually no good when it comes to waking up. It comes in handy at times, to be sure, for many worldly things, but in the spiritual realm, I am quite certain it’s power and sophistication has been a hindrance all along the way. So while I have the capacity to understand any teaching intellectually, there really is no value in doing so. I’m hoping you will see that an intellectual understanding is not an advantage in the spiritual realm.
In the final analysis, the Truth is very, very simple. It cannot be expressed in words, but the closest we can get are with statements like “It’s all one” or “Thou art God.” These simple statements, inquired into by a spiritual seeker, can have tremendous value, much in the same way as Zen koans. A simple phrase that drives one beyond the mental workings and into Silence.
Feeding the mind is not going to get you very far in the end, so why not quit feeding it? You will eventually, either in this lifetime or another. But at some point, the mind becomes less and less of a concern for you, and the simple light of Truth becomes all that is known.