Statement: He shouldn’t make it wrong. (Beliefs. Habitual patterns. This is about the teacher that triggers a good deal of beliefs in me.)
- True?
Yes. Feels true. Can find stories saying it is true. Can find allies in the world, including skillful teachers who use another approach. (Although do I know they would agree with me? I am pretty sure they wouldn’t. My guess is that they would have more receptivity around it than I do here.) - Sure?
No. I suspect it is completely wrong, even at the level of stories. - What happens when I believe that thought?
- I tell myself that he is wrong. He is using a less-than-skillful teaching strategy. He makes our confusion wrong, which only deepens the sense of struggle and split. A much more skillful approach to release identification out of it would be to invite in a genuine appreciation for it.
- He also mixes up thoughts with beliefs, making it appear that he is talking about thoughts when what he is really talking about is beliefs.
- I compare his teachings with that of others. His approach seems clunky. It seems to come from a “should” and he tries to do it in a less than skillful way. Others, such as Adyashanti, Byron Katie, Genpo Roshi, Maezumi Roshi, Joel and Todd use an approach of appreciation to invite a release of identification. I am much more comfortable with that approach, so I tell myself it is more skillful.
- I get restless. Jittery. Wish I was somewhere else. Tell myself I don’t belong. Feel alienated from him and the other students.
- I feel I need to remind myself of what is true for me. I repeat to myself “lack of appreciation=deepening sense of identification and split, appreciation=release of drama and identification”.
- I feel I need to protect myself from his teachings. I am afraid I will be polluted by his teachings.
- He says that he teaches that way to shake people up. I think I know how he intends to shake people up, and it looks silly to me. But I am making it all up. (I tell myself that he tries to invite in a sense of separation to beliefs/habitual patterns in his students, although his approach still puts identification firmly within stories and content of awareness.)
- What do I get from holding onto that belief? I get to be right, although I suspect I am not. (Which creates another layer of drama.) I get to feel separate. I get to feel that I am taking care of myself, protecting myself, preventing myself from being polluted by his teachings.
- Who would I be without it?
- Receptive. Curious. Interested.
- In what ways does his teachings help his students? Does it shake them up, as he says he intends? I honestly don’t know. It certainly could be, at least sometimes.
- I also see that his teachings shakes me up, although in a different way. It helps me notice and inquire into these deeply held beliefs, which is good. And that may be exactly his intention. He may make our confusion wrong b/c it shakes people out of their beliefs in different ways, including how it shakes me out of my beliefs here now.
- Turnarounds.
- He should make it wrong.
- Everything in his background must tell him to do it that way.
- It may work, sometimes, in shaking people up.
- It even works for me, b/c I get to notice and inquire into my beliefs around his teaching strategy. That may even be what he intends to do, for all I know. (Acting in an obnoxious way to trigger knots in his students.)
- I shouldn’t make it wrong.
- Well, for me an approach of appreciation seems more honest and effective.
- Whenever I attach to a story as true, I put something down. And that something is really just another mental field creation, something imagined.
- I should make it wrong.
- Yes. I get to see my own beliefs around it that way. They get out in the open so I can notice them and take them to inquiry.
- He should make it wrong.