Almost exactly a year ago (in 2004) I wrote a paper entitled “Being a Spiritual Teacher”. Writing that paper was a major step in accepting that this was something that I could be in my life. The paper set out some of my reservations and ways in which I proposed to address them – primarily by establishing a ‘learning system’ based on others challenging and confronting me. After writing the paper my energy ‘took off’. In fact within a few months I was displaying all the signs of a kundalini release, which was largely confirmed by my effect on others and by having a direct experience. This reinforced my view that it was correct to allow myself to explore this path of development. This paper describes the main things I have learned and understood over the past year.
One of the difficulties I experienced when writing the “Spiritual Teacher” paper was elucidating exactly what it was that I am teaching. I was not part of any particular lineage, nor did I wish to join one. Therefore I did not have any guidance on how to take up the role, nor any support from peers or a teacher of my own. Over the last year it has become clear that the main reason for this is that most spiritual teachers are teachers of the renunciate path, the path of personal enlightenment or liberation. In contrast I wish to be a teacher of the householder path – a path that does not require or expect people to be unattached or celibate.
A key part of the householder path is to be actively involved in affairs at many levels. The point is to integrate one’s spirituality and spiritual understanding into all one’s activities – not to hold it as something separate. One of the key ways in which I wish to teach about this is by providing a role model for others. This means that I continue to be involved with making money (running a business), furthering intellectual ideas (writing papers and books), engaging with politics, being a responsible member of my family and enjoying life in all its facets. A consequence of this is that my “spiritual teacher” activities have to fit in with a full and rounded life. I do integrate my spirituality into all the activities in my life – but what I noticed was missing was direct engagement with the Divine – with people having direct experiences and kundalini releases and so on. So I want my activities as a spiritual teacher to provide this direct contact – and to fit with all the other aspects of my life.
One way that this has unfolded over the last year is that I have become re-engaged with running Enlightenment Intensives. I have scheduled running two three day and one fourteen day Intensive over the next year or so. I am excited about this and already have many ideas about how to do this differently – and I hope more effectively – than before.
The other way is that there is a group of six people who have asked me to be involved with their lives as a spiritual teacher. All are married, have taken a number of Intensives, are all trained (or in training) to Master Intensives and are all engaged in running Intensives. They all have a strong commitment to developing personal awareness and serving Truth or the Divine in their lives. They are all aged between 33 and 45. They all have young children, in some cases very young. They are all clearly ‘householders’. And in practice I have been in the role of a spiritual teacher with these people for between 4 and 10 years – but that role was not clearly acknowledged by me. Most of the learning I have been through in the last year is as a result of my interactions and relationships with these six people.
The Householder Path
“The curse of clever men is to be ruled by fools – if they do not engage with politics”. This is a crude paraphrasing of something uttered by a Greek philosopher. It affected me a lot when I heard it because it was so obvious and ran counter to the scornful image regularly presented of politicians. Over time I came to see that this principle applied to many things. My current version is something like “it is the curse of spiritual people to be governed, led, taught and commercialised by those ignorant of spirit – if they do not engage with government, culture, thinking and commerce”. This is the basis of my advocacy of a householder path. It seems to me that it is critical that the affairs of the world have as many aware and spiritually inclined people involved with them as possible. This must include the worlds of government, media, academia and business. It is also consistent with my perspective that spirituality is not something that is separate from the world, it is not “other worldly” but rooted in the reality of everyday experience. This seems to me to be an essential principle of Enlightenment Intensives, certainly how I facilitate them.
The householder path is often presented in contrast to the ‘renunciate path’. Renunciates are aiming for a state of personal liberation or full enlightenment and in order to achieve this they have to renounce the world – in particular eschew attachments to money, success, relationships and possessions. Almost everyone who describes themselves as a ‘spiritual teacher’ advocates practices that are consistent with the renunciate path, and as such they do not encourage their students to engage with the worlds of politics, business or academia. This is an important component of what I refer to as “the baggage” associated with the phrase “spiritual teacher”.
Clearly the renunciate path suits and appeals to certain people. But if it were the only way in which spiritual development were practised then we would fall into the trap I described earlier – of all the spiritual people excluded from the affairs of the world. So I see the householder and renunciate paths as complementary and both as necessary. The first to bring spirit into our secular world, the other to deepen our collective understanding and appreciation of spirit by ‘perfected’ examples.
It seems to me that there are a number of key principles involved in pursuing a householder path. They have emerged in my own life over the last twenty years or so when I have sought to integrate what I have experienced spiritually with my everyday life. In no particular order they are:
- The continuous development of self-awareness using every situation as an opportunity for self-inspection and learning. I have found several tools invaluable for this. One is the criticalness exercise (whatever I am critical of in another indicates something I have not yet accepted about myself). Another is daily meditation – where issues and misbehaviour on my part arise and require attention. In all this work the key is being open to being wrong.
- Aiming to live by my own inner standards of honesty, non-violence, integrity, loyalty – and care for other people and the environment. None of these standards are absolute, they are always context dependent and the situations I find most difficult to resolve are where they are in conflict. A common problem is being honest whilst not injuring others. It is also clear to me that unless I trust myself to behave well (i.e. by my own inner standards) then I will hold myself back. I will restrain my energy and abilities for fear of misbehaving – so my development is critically dependent upon my ability to live by my inner standards.
- Becoming more myself, by which I mean the whole self, as disclosed through both direct experiences and self-awareness. At an absolute level we are all God, or Divine Love or whatever you wish to call it. At a human level we are also characters with particular personal histories (that cannot be erased), gifts, abilities and vulnerabilities. For me the whole self is the unique combination of the absolute and the relative; of becoming one’s self sufficiently to fulfil the potential of one’s gifts and abilities.
- Continual deepening of one’s intimate relationship. It is one thing to be open with strangers on an Intensive, a lot more difficult to be as open with the person who knows you best – who sees your glory and your faults and lives with you. A deep personal relationship is a spiritual path of its own since it requires a continual process of serving the other, being open to self and the other and being willing to share one’s deepest sense of self. The trick is to spot ways in which you collude with your partner and be willing to face ‘the raw untarnished truth’ about oneself.
- Contributing to the well-being and development of self, family, social group, culture and the world. This involves actively exploring difficult issues – such as abortion or the use of violence against tyrants. It also means standing up for principles that are part of one’s own inner standards and not just accepting social norms. It also means devoting time and resources to the development of others, passing on what has been learned and being an example to one’s peers.
- Developing ways of accessing sources of wisdom. It seems to me that people who are inspired, or who gain profound insights or who are very creative are not generating these consciously – they are contacting a source from which they receive their wisdom, creativity or inspiration. Some people find this in religion, others in shamanism, others in times alone or in deep contemplation. It seems to me that it is an important part of being a householder to actively develop one’s ability to contact ‘the source’ so as to gain deeper understanding of what is occurring and have more to contribute.
This list is not meant to be exhaustive. So it is work in progress, but it is clear that whilst the principles have much in common with the principles of renunciate paths, there are also important differences.
Pleasure, drugs and sex
So far my exposition of the householder path will not have raised too many issues with people who regard themselves as following a spiritual path of some kind. However, I now want to broach areas of life that seem to me to be unreasonably excluded by even eclectic and liberal spiritual seekers – sex, drugs and pleasure. This is another area to be regarded as ‘work in progress’, but there are some principles that seem to be fairly clear already.
The first is that pleasure is as much a part of the human condition as suffering. Why has no one challenged the Buddhist claim that “life is suffering”? I do not keep a detailed record of time spent experiencing these extremes of human experience, but my guess is that in my own life the balance is roughly equal. So life is also pleasure! Why should spiritual paths be so concerned with excluding pleasure and overcoming suffering? There is enormous pleasure involved in sharing love with others, with raising children, with marvelling at the world in which we live, eating delicious fresh food and experiencing new sensations. It is also true that all of these can also be the cause of suffering and emotional or physical upset. But this does not make them any less part of life. And it seems to me that part of fulfilling my potential as a human being is to enjoy the pleasure and experience (and learn from) the pain.
One of the major sources of pleasure for many people is sex. I do understand that if one is seeking to have direct experiences of the absolute then conserving sexual energy is helpful. But it seems to me a serious error to suppress sexual desire and pleasure. I do not regard it as accidental that many ‘spiritual teachers’ of the renunciate path run into serious trouble (usually by having sex with their students) because they are attempting to deny or suppress their sexuality. I am seeking a more inclusive approach to sexuality that channels the sexual energy into intimate relationship. Indeed it has been my experience that the more open I become with my wife the greater the flow of love between us and the better the sexual exchanges between us. This process has continued unabated for the last 25 years and I see no reason for it to cease.
Finally, I do not agree that all use of intoxicants or illegal drugs is unhelpful or bad. Indeed my own experience has been quite the opposite. I have used various illegal drugs (principally cannabis and psilocybin) therapeutically for the last 25 years and gained great benefit from so doing. Before extolling the positive effects of drugs I want to also acknowledge that relatively few people use these drugs constructively. I do not advocate using drugs to avoid pain or upset, nor to just ‘get out of it’. The drugs which I regard as potentially beneficial are cannabis, psilocybin, LSD, ayahausca and ecstasy – all of which enhance awareness rather than suppress it. I think it is fine to experience and enjoy the heightened awareness of one’s senses, to marvel at the love and deep connections with others and to experience oneself in such different ways. But for me the main benefit of using these drugs is their contributions to personal awareness, personal growth, insight and spiritual experiences.
Part of what I want to teach is this creative, constructive and therapeutic use of drugs. It seems to me too important a tool to be ignored. And at the moment there is very little information available to people who wish to explore these aspects of drug use – which accounts for why most drug users are simply using them recreationally (and having amazing times doing so). The main principles that have emerged from my own practice are:
- the determinants of what happens using these drugs are one’s intention and the setting one has created.
- it is critical to be in contact with others and to communicate what is occurring. This both avoids ‘bad trips’ and also helps to ground experiences in the present and make them more accessible afterwards
- whatever is discovered or understood under the influence of drugs needs to be checked when sober. Frequently the significance of insights made under drugs will be exaggerated.
- it is important to take all drugs in moderation and to allow the body significant periods of recovery – otherwise the physical effects can be unhelpful.
I am aware that rejecting the established spiritual attitudes towards pleasure, sex and drugs is taking a great risk. Perhaps many wiser people have previously explored these aspects of life and concluded that they are, on balance, unhelpful to spiritual development. But I have not heard anyone explain anything along these lines.
Over the last 18 months I have explored the use of ecstasy (E) as a therapeutic drug, both for myself and with some of the students. The results have been striking. My own exploration showed me several aspects of myself that I had not engaged with fully before. One was the effect I have on others – something I was completely blind to previously. Another was that other people really love me – another enormous blind spot. Indeed breaking through this blind spot was instrumental in the direct experience of myself I had recently.
It is clear to me that ecstasy is a very powerful agent for both opening people’s hearts and getting them to tell the truth – and be open to receiving truth from others. As such a shared ecstasy experience can transform a relationship – and not just temporarily. The drug also makes it easy to forget one’s personal and sexual boundaries – which can be problematic.
Traps Failings and Lessons
It is interesting to me that when I set out to write this paper the main purpose, as I conceived it, was to set out clearly the traps and failings that I had fallen into over the last year and the lessons I had drawn from them. Here I am close to the bottom of page 5 and I have only just started on the core topic. And I also noticed that I used every distraction available before starting to write this section.
To be fair there is a real difficulty in writing this section. I am quite happy to disclose my own shortcomings and failures and to seek support and advice from others in dealing with them (well quite happy maybe an over-estimation). However if I were to describe the traps I have fallen into in detail it would also disclose material about the students with whom I have been working – and that does not sit comfortably with me. So I have resolved to try to write this in such a way that I do not embarrass any of the other people involved in the drama – and I will also seek their agreement before circulating this document outside the group involved.
When I reflected on the issues involved they fell into two broad areas. One was a number of my own trips and failings that have been caught up in my role and activities as a teacher. The other is a more general issue about the nature of the teacher-student relationship and the degree to which this can be combined with friendship. I want to start with the second issue because I think it will also illuminate ways in which I have engaged with students.
- Students or friends?
The only people I have as students are people with whom I feel a strong heart connection. There is a ready openness between us, we clearly like each other and respect each other. We like enjoying ourselves together, sharing growth work together and discussing difficult issues. In short we are good friends. However, all these people are significantly younger than me, they all met me when I was mastering an Intensive on which they were participants and they all regard me, to some degree, as a teacher with knowledge and experience that they wish to access. So when we get together we are likely to discuss any aspect of our individual lives, including our close relationships, our meditation, what we are dealing with in our growth work and so on. We may also use drugs together – with the intention of exploring ourselves and our relationships further – and having a good time together. In this mode we are relating very much as peers, as friends. Yet there is also the student-teacher relationship operating – and in this relationship we are not equal, in either experience, wisdom or stature. The situation is compounded by the fact that one of the things I require of them, as my students, is that they are prepared to confront and challenge me – to keep me on track (I also have a peer group with whom I do not have any teaching relationship of whom I ask the same). So the relationship between me and these students is quite complex – and may be untenable. It may be that I am not facing up to a fundamental conflict between friendship and the teacher-student relationship.
There are two issues that have arisen in my relations with these people that illustrate the way in which this combination of friend and student gets extremely messy. The first arises when one of these people has overt, or worse unacknowledged, negative feelings towards me. I think I detect the negativity in an “off” confrontation of me – but of course I am then in the trap of finding some basis for deflecting or ignoring challenge or criticism. So, I have tended to allow my perception of negativity to pass and to look seriously at the challenge or criticism. However, in so doing I realise I am not fulfilling my role as a teacher. I am caught in the horns of a dilemma that has its roots in this ambiguous relationship.
The second issue is more clearly to do with my own ‘stuff’ but it is also excited by the ambiguous relationship. I love to serve people. I am very generous with my time, affection, money and so on. I find it easy to give and much harder to receive. In the context of these student-friends I find that I have a lot more time and money than they do: I am comparatively rich and am retired. So, in terms of time and money exchanges between us there is an imbalance; I give a lot more than I receive. In a traditional student teacher relationship there is a balance achieved by the students serving the teacher in some way – but this seems a lot more difficult to organise when the people involved are also friends. This issue of over-generosity, is one that has appeared in other areas of my life, so I know it is something I have to address – and that here it is made more complex by the ambiguous nature of my relationships with these people
- Love, sex and affection
Aha, now you see what I have been avoiding! The blunt facts are that shortly after my 60th birthday last year I was at a number of parties with some of my students and I became deeply emotionally involved with a young woman. We each loved each other, were each turned onto each other and engaged in a specialness trip together. We did not cross any sexual boundaries, but we have both recognised that we felt that in the intensity of our contact and our intentions we were disrespectful of our marriage partners. This happened for me at a time when Eva was in Australia, so I was lonely and more vulnerable than usual. It was also when my kundalini energy was running strongly, which made me more attractive and also heightened my emotional and sexual energy. At the parties I, this woman and the other people present were also taking ecstasy.
Having written that so simply, it is obvious that I was really stupid to have gone to those parties. Although I had come to terms with being 60 I was still hankering after youth – and I was entranced by finding a very attractive young woman finding me sexually attractive and giving me a great deal of attention and affection – that is part of what got me to go there. I have always enjoyed flirting with attractive women and had found ways of using my ability to contact people to make it even more enjoyable. I fell into a fairly classic teacher-student trap – the only thing that I can say in defence is that I did not engage in any sexual activity with the woman. I did respect that boundary, even though I was intoxicated with a drug that trashes sexual boundaries, even though my kundalini was running, even though I was having this divine contact with a beautiful young woman who fancied the pants off me. It was important because I cannot imagine a greater temptation – and I did not succumb to it. So I trust myself more than previously. But there are darker aspects to the story. But before enlarging on this I want to make something else clear.
I have been extremely critical of male teachers who seduce their female (or male for that matter) students. I had presumed that they had simply succumbed to a temptation, largely as a result of trying to suppress their sexual desires. This is true to a degree – but it is also likely that there was another ingredient involved that I had previously ignored or underestimated – namely kundalini. I have read and understood that kundalini energy is directly related to sexual energy and that when people have their kundalini released, even to a mild degree, then their sexual desire is increased. But I had not actually experienced the intensity before. This time I did. And to have that powerful amplification in a situation where the other person is loving you profoundly and providing extremely deep contact is truly amazing. It is very very beautiful – and I now understand why it is such a common problem. I also know that my kundalini release was comparatively mild, I can only imagine how much more intense it could become.
Back to the dark stuff. There were actually three ways in which I was caught by my own ‘stuff’. The first is that as an ageing man I wanted to prove to myself that I was still a potent and attractive man. I didn’t just want to flirt, I wanted to know that if I chose to, I could have sex with this young woman. This was my intention that did not respect either of our marriages.
The second is that I have a deep craving for love and affection that I usually hide behind a super-man and very giving nature. This craving comes from a childhood that was seriously bereft of love and affection. The ecstasy trip opened this craving to my awareness – and at the same time I was having it satisfied by physical contact and emotional closeness with this woman. It was also at a time when my wife was literally on the other side of the world – and prior to her departure our relationship had been strained. I was not aware, before this episode, just how powerfully I craved affection and love. It is the main issue I have been working on since.
The third trip involved was my desire to be special. I have always known that I have wanted to be the best, to stand out, to succeed and so on – but I had not previously seen the depth of my desire to be special. And this trip was fed in several ways by my relationship with this woman. I have recognised this and know that I have to give it serious attention, but have not yet done so.
Of course at one level declaring to other people that I am a “spiritual teacher” is itself a giant special trip – it can feed my ego in many different ways and make me appear better than others. In other areas of my life this sort of trip has arisen because I have not accepted some positive quality or ability about myself – and I already know ways in which this was operating here. For example I have not really owned, to myself, that I am a sexually attractive and potent man – even though many women have told me so. Had I accepted this fact then I would not have need to prove to myself that I was still potent – and would not have succumbed as much as I did to the sexual game between us. I suspect that the other aspects of the ‘special’ trip will have a similar resolution – but that is work yet to be done.
The intensity of my relationship with this woman student decreased quite quickly and largely disappeared when she went on holiday for a month over Christmas. We are still in the process of picking up the pieces and re-establishing some sort of more normal relationship. When Eva returned from her trip to Australia she took one look at the situation and made it absolutely clear that she wanted me to herself. As a result of sorting it out together we became very much closer – and the gap that had opened between us before she went to Australia was healed. Indeed we were both surprised at how much closer Eva and I became, how much more love there has been between us since then – and how all aspects of our relationship have improved. We did not think we could be any more open or closer together – but we are. Also the relationship between the woman and her husband became much deeper and more loving as a result. So the outcome has been OK.
I have deliberately written this account to emphasise the trips and traps into which I fell and I do not wish to duck anything or try to justify my behaviour. However my account is lopsided in that it says very little about the woman involved and her husband, who is also one of the students. Her husband was at the parties involved and both she and I told him what was happening. He was willing to allow us to explore the relationship and to trust us both to not cross any boundaries, a trust not easily given but one that turned out to be justified.
There was one particular aspect of this episode that caused me serious concern for a long time. The main way in which I work with these students is by facing, together, whatever is in the way of us making deeper contact together. However, it is now clear that this approach can easily fall into difficulties of emotional intensity, falling in love and sexual attraction. So in order for me to be able to help others be more aware of themselves through contact with me, I have to clean up my act further so that the contact from my side is based on Divine Love, not lust or emotional longings. So it was inevitable that I would fall into this trap and have to face my unresolved stuff. And I suspect that this process is not at an end. In all areas of my personal growth the obvious stuff is surfaced quite quickly and over time the material involved becomes more subtle. My interim conclusion is that in undertaking this work with students I need to do so in a more formal setting so that I can spot issues on my side.
Conclusions
I have deliberately written this account from a very personal point of view and have minimised what I disclosed about, or attributed to, other people involved. However, this does not mean that they were not completely involved both helping me, dealing with their own stuff and generally trying to understand all that was happening. I have been very grateful to all the students for their contributions in these ways.
Eva has been more than amazing. I am deeply sorry that I caused her any suffering and have apologised to her for that. I have also made it clear to her, and everyone else, that at no time was our relationship threatened in any way. Nevertheless having the person you love having a profound emotional loving relationship with someone else is difficult, especially if the other one is young and pretty and you are facing your own stuff about getting old. Eva also spotted many of the trips that were running, both mine and other people’s. Her wisdom was a major reason why things did not get any messier. And in the process she ‘came out of hiding’. For a few years she has been holding back from being involved with other people’s development and making a contribution – that is now over.
At the time of writing the “Being a Spiritual Teacher” paper I visited my wise-man and sought his advice. His main comment was “Oh goody. Now the fireworks can begin!” With hindsight I can now understand what he meant. By setting out to explore a new role it was inevitable that I would make mistakes and hence discover new things about myself and relationships, other people and how to engage spiritually. It has been a year of intense learning. It feels as if my personal development process has been accelerated about tenfold. I welcome this.
Also, because I am aiming to be a different kind of spiritual teacher, I have no role models or structures to use. So it was, and remains, inevitable that I would learn by making mistakes. I am sure that this will continue and trust that the love, openness, trust and honesty between all those involved will ensure that any suffering is minimised. This all feels completely consistent with my previous engagement with Enlightenment Intensives. There I discovered that being the Master was the most intense growth experience of all those involved. Here I find that being the spiritual teacher is again the most intense growth path. This is because by seeking to clean up my contact and relationship with six different people I am having my trips and failings exposed at a very fast rate.
June 2005
Next.
A Master's Path 