We must remember that the whole purpose of the practice is to destroy arrogance. When we submit to the Guru, it is not to lose our freedom; is to gain full freedom. Through the practice of Dharma and Enlightenment, we gain full freedom. It is not just about getting money, long life or protection from obstacles. We gain complete freedom: we gain control of where we go, what we do, our rebirth, and how we benefit. We get the full benefit.
If, in our next rebirth, we want to have money, we will be born in money. We will be born where we want to be born. We get full control. That is why we submit to the Guru. It is like submitting to school, training, our teachers, our parents, our counselors, our psychiatrists and doctors.
We all submit, we are always submitting! We submit to our doctors to invade our bodies. We only have one body: if you’re wrong, we’re done! We submit to our beautician. One wrong hit and some of the muscles in our face will never move again! We submit to our teachers, we submit to our wives and husbands, we submit to our children. Some of us even submit to our dogs and cats; Our lives are controlled by them! We can’t go anywhere or do anything because we are completely controlled by our pets. We put ourselves in those situations, whether we do it deliberately or not. We are always submitting to others. It is nothing new to present. Only now, it’s a person who helps us on the highest and ultimate level.
Devotion and submission to our Guru is the beginning of our independence: from our ego, from samsara and from our inflicted emotions. It may seem that we have imprisoned ourselves, but if he is a true Guru, the moment we submit to him, believe, trust, let go and do what he says, it is the first step towards total freedom. The Guru will drive us, assign us tasks and design a job for us that will help us achieve the six paramitas, bodhichitta and compassion, which are the necessary prerequisites for the higher practices that give us total freedom.
When you sacrifice yourself, submit yourself and do things for the Guru that you would not normally do, you accumulate merit. Psychologically, you open up because this person will challenge you to be better. If we look at the people who are close to the Guru, we will see that no matter how bad they are, they get better or get some benefit, physical, monetary or emotional, most of the time. We will also see people who are outspoken, getting better and better, year after year, when they are close to the Guru.
The moment you submit to your Guru, you immediately gain your first day of independence. The day you meet a real Guru is the day you begin to separate yourself from him, to make yourself independent of him.
Real gurus don’t get sticky with us. They make us more and more independent. His goal is to make us a Buddha, not to have companions around him. You may think that you were working with your Guru last year, doing this and that with him, and wonder why you are not this year. You think, “Poor me, poor me. I did so much for you, but you won’t let me do anything this year anymore. It’s so unfair. It’s so bad.” This shows that the student does not know the purpose of a Guru-disciple relationship.
Do you think the Guru has to be sticky with you? Do you think that the Guru does not like you or that he has rejected you when he changes jobs or responsibilities? Maybe the initial methods weren’t working, so he does something else to help you. Maybe you have already done and mastered a task, so he can give you something else to help you develop your mind. Sometimes a Guru will let you be sticky, sometimes the Guru will make you not sticky – it is your level that the Guru is looking at.
People do not understand devotion to the Guru. They think it’s slavery. They think it is an indoctrination or a loss of freedom but it is absolutely the opposite. When I connected with my teachers, I gained freedom. Look what I’m doing now. Guru devotion was and is my main practice. When I had obstacles and problems, because I had so much faith in my Guru, my Dharma Protector in Gaden told me in an audience with him, “Don’t recite any mantra, recite your Guru’s mantra and you will be fine.” So I did; I recited my Guru’s mantra 100,000 times and my illness was cured. I didn’t need to bid.
If you think this is slavery or induction, or the imposition of another culture, you are dead wrong. I will not be diplomatic about it. I will be diplomatic with everything else and give concessions because I know we are all trying, but not in the case of Guru devotion. There are no concessions. That’s the hole in the road. Without an instructor, without a teacher, without someone to guide you and without your cooperation with this person, what benefit can you get?
If you’re studying with a music teacher but you’re always late, you forget your sheet music, you don’t do your homework, you don’t practice, you break your guitar, you don’t take the strings off, you forget your appointment, you’re rude to your teacher, you pick your nose in front of from him, you don’t listen to the instructions, how is he going to teach you to play the guitar? And that’s just for playing the guitar! Imagine how much more alert we must be if we want to learn how to attain Enlightenment.
Even with normal teachers who teach us writing and arithmetic, we have to be respectful because arithmetic and writing will benefit us. But we want benefit that will help us in many lives. If we have an instructor for that, our Guru, and we cannot be respectful or submissive, or even trust or try, how will we get that benefit?