So do you have to be perfect to be a meditation teacher?
Obviously the answer is no because I would definitely not be here.
But there is some nuance to that.
You also can't just be a shithead,
Right?
You have to have ethical standards,
You have to have a certain amount of experience,
And your intentions have to be aligned.
I had a friend reach out to me once and say,
Hey,
I have some questions about becoming a guide and coach for others.
And I said,
Sure,
I can help you out.
And I asked this person,
What is it that you want to coach and guide for?
Why do you want to step into this career role?
And they said,
Oh,
Because I want to live on the beach and surf and work part time.
And my response was,
Well,
That has nothing to do with helping other people grow and develop into themselves.
So that sounds a bit selfish.
Obviously,
We have our own reasons for doing things.
We have to make money,
We want to enjoy our careers,
But we also have to want to help people.
So do you have to be perfect to be a teacher?
No,
But you do want to have an open heart to a certain extent and want to actually help others grow.
Now you can cultivate that over time.
You can deepen into the energy of service and caring and helping.
It's not like that has to be full blown right when you get started.
It is a muscle that we kind of develop,
But the seed of that definitely needs to be there.
And as I mentioned earlier,
Ethical standards,
So you don't need to be perfect,
But you do need to understand certain dynamics around boundaries with students,
Around charging money in a way that's grounded and seems appropriate to you.
When it comes to guiding versus giving advice,
A good teacher doesn't program their students or tell them what they should do or need to do with their lives.
A good teacher helps students find their own answers,
Find out who they are,
And then create their own lives.
So if a teacher is out there saying,
This is who you should be,
This is what you should do,
That's always a big red flag for me.
I had a friend when I was living in the Himalayas,
And we both had the same guru for a while.
And I'll never forget it.
He was ex-special forces for a country,
I won't mention which one.
So pretty strong guy,
Very clear-minded,
Deep meditator.
And I'll never forget,
One day he said,
I'm going to go ask our guru if I can sell meditation pillows.
And I said,
What do you mean you're going to ask him?
He said,
Well,
I want to make sure it's okay with him that I have a job and make money.
And I was like,
Wow.
I was like early mid-20s,
And I was blown away that this adult male who could probably kill me with his pinky has to go ask another man if he can,
If he is allowed to make money.
And so,
And this guru was maybe playing that game with him,
Telling him what he could and couldn't do with his life.
So for me,
That's a big no-no in also being a teacher.
So do you need to be perfect?
No.
But there are kind of standards and healthy boundaries that as teachers we should abide by when we're out there teaching.
Now we grow into ourselves by teaching as teachers.
Part of the challenge and also the exciting part for me is when I teach,
I get to grow deeper into a topic as I teach it.
So you learn something once when you do it as a student and you learn it again as a teacher when you teach it.
So do you need to be perfect in that?
No,
You're growing with the students,
Which is,
I think,
Beautiful.
And you don't have to pretend you're perfect.
So if a teacher is pretending they're purely enlightened or totally perfect,
That is always another really big red flag for me.
But if you are willing to grow,
If you really have a desire to help people and share your light and your experience,
I think then don't worry about being perfect.
I would go for it and start helping everybody that you can help.
So no perfection here,
Just growth.
See you in the next one.
