With palms together,
Good Morning Everyone,
Waking early this morning I had an opportunity to experience the weather change from stillness to windy. Not a good day for a motorcycle ride, so I will stay home or nearby, paint perhaps, read perhaps, and practice Zazen on my cushion.
I’ve been writing about teachers lately, so perhaps it is an opportune time to write about students. How should a student relate to a teacher? What should a student do to be a student? What are the expectations of a student held by a teacher? How does one end a teacher/student relationship?
First, it is important to say from the outset that there are as many Buddhisms as there are teachers, centers, and temples. Each led by a teacher who has his or her understanding, often gained through years of practice with their teacher. So, any answer I might provide will, of necessity, be mine and my teacher’s, his teacher’s and so on. There are definite differences.
In Zen, there is a long history of teachers saying very little to their students. The expectation is that the teacher will provide a frame of practice where the student will discover their own answers to their questions. Any answer a teacher offers will be the teacher’s, not the students. To be authentic, which is one aim of our practice, one must look to oneself.
We should treat teachers with respect, but not as if they hold the answer. We should wrestle with our teachers, not necessarily directly, but rather in our heart/mind. My teacher often said and did things that sent me into orbit. How could a Zen teacher do or say such things as he so often did? This was my koan. And I chewed on it for a very long time.
I once asked another teacher to become my teacher. He asked if my teacher were dead. I said no. He refused. His point was, from his point of view, an authentic student/teacher relationship was lifelong. My desire to leave my teacher was for me to practice with. My reasons were mine and not my teacher’s. Until I got that, I mean really got that, I was a mess.
Today, too often teachers want to keep their students happy so they don’t leave the Center. So, they re-enforce what the student thinks is correct, do not challenge overmuch the student or his/her goals, and in the process do the student and the Way a great disservice.
A quick review of Buddhist magazines and advertisements for Dharma Centers suggest an effort to make themselves spas, or nearly so, kowtowing to the dollar, the self interest of potential and actual students, and making it something nearly egoistic to be a “Buddhist.” Frankly, the Buddhist magazines might as well be called “Self.” No wonder we in America are getting the reputation of being self-centered and increasingly irrelevant to the original aim of the Buddha himself, which is the extinction of self and the Bodhisattva ideal of selfless service to others.
I can therefore, understand the confusion of students who might come to our center where we have no frills and practice Zazen and the forms associated with it. Students must grapple with their underlying motives, must work to end their slavery to self, and be willing to engage in a disciplined process of self discovery leading to something quite unintended, a deep care and love for all beings.
We are an engaged Zen Order and most of us practice engaged Zen in our private lives. We might volunteer at the soup kitchen, sit in parks or at the courthouse, do hospice work, teach Zazen to children at Peace Camp or elders in retirement communities. As when I was a Child Abuse Unit supervisor who insisted my workers examined their feelings and assumptions about perpetrators, It is important for us engaged Zen practitioners to intimately know ourselves in order to be effective practitioners.
Be well.