The Fierce Love of a Guru
Pray for the fierce love of a guru, a fire breathing, eyes blazing, śakti throwing one.
This is the most succinct way I can describe my guru, Swami Rudrananda. He was always breathing fire and his eyes were ablaze with śakti, which he was continually throwing, even without moving. His energetic fierceness expressed his relentless transmission of the power to liberate that flowed through him. It was relentless, and it was intentional.
It was impossible for Rudi to be any other way because there was nothing left of him: he was just an open channel, an agent of the śakti that moved through him. There was a wide range of dynamics with Rudi – his personality, his incessant requirement of discipline, his absolute, unconditional love for us – that was all delivered through this extraordinarily intense, embodied person. By being Rudi’s student, I learned that the very point of having a relationship with a guru is to receive the liberating power that is flowing through them, and to be freed by it.
An Age-Old Relationship
Abhinavagupta, an 11th-century Tantric master, describes the teacher-student relationship this way:
Ultimately, entering into a relationship with a teacher is the conscious choice on the part of the student to place his finite awareness in direct confrontation with the expanded consciousness of the teacher, which is the unbounded consciousness the student wishes to attain. This meeting of finite and infinite consciousness represents the very condition of vimarśa, consciousness doubling back on itself, the method of realization that abides perpetually in and as the Divine Heart.
As the student comes into the gaze of the guru his finite consciousness encounters its own Source in the person of the teacher. It releases the inner meditative current—the liberating Grace, the self-referential nature of the unbounded consciousness of Śiva. In the process the teacher binds the student to service and growth and the inner practices required—the single purpose of the binding is the attainment of freedom. The teacher acts as God’s agent, to free the student from themselves. This all happens through śaktipāta, the will of Śiva that has taken the disciple into the gaze of the guru.
This relationship is not necessarily with a living person, but with the liberating force that is called forth by God within a student to liberate that student. I have taught for fifty years and have continued to be a student that entire time. I’ve had embodied teachers, but a significant part of those years was with unembodied teachers, and there is no difference. The intense love and fierce requirement that I regularly feel from Rudi is as palpable now as it was when he was alive, sitting right in front of me.
The first Kaula Sutra, written in the 12th century, says, “There is but one guru; the illuminated rays of awakened consciousness transmitted to us through an initiatory lineage.” That sutra is another powerful way of describing the essence of Abhinavagupta’s eloquent passage.
Grace Brings Us to A Teacher
It is grace that calls forth in us the longing for the freedom that is inherent in us. By the power of God, grace sparks and powers that longing to attract to itself the energy it needs to fuel that unfolding — which is God revealing Himself within us. A person who authentically wants to know the deepest core of themselves doesn’t ask, “Do I want a teacher?” but recognizes the need for a teacher to propel and support their sādhana.
Entering into a relationship with an agent of the śakti means receiving an energy that can change us. But it’s not up to us to decide what we want to change, or when we want to change. My personal experience is that only the rarest of people can reach liberation without a guru. We will not change, as is required of us—not necessarily by that teacher, but by the very power that is trying to free us. Spiritual growth is challenging because it reveals to us every aspect of our limited perspective and activates the resistance of the ego, the part of us that adamantly believes it is separate from God and fights to maintain its identity.
There can be a lot of mental and emotional fluctuations in our sādhana, and all that is camouflage, the mirage created by the ego to defend itself against change. All that turmoil just reinforces our own limited understanding. It takes a teacher who is breathing fire, whose eyes are ablaze, and who throws śakti at you on a moment-by-moment basis to cut through this aspect of us that does not want to change. That’s why I say to pray for the fierce love of a Guru!
Our Response to the Liberating Power of the Teacher
Studentship is not like going to a smorgasbord; “Oh, I’ll have a little of that, but I don’t like that and won’t take any.” It is not enough to “have a guru,” take what we want, and ignore what challenges us. In the acceptance of a student by a teacher, traditionally there is an initiation ceremony called diksha. That initiation has a two-fold dynamic: the student is asking for grace, energy, and guidance, but also taking responsibility for hearing the feedback, doing the practices that are given, and making the changes that are recommended. That willingness to take responsibility for one’s own freedom, to be bound by the teacher to service, growth, and inner practices, is a reflection of the student’s understanding that the single purpose of that binding is the attainment of freedom.
Oddly enough, over the years I’ve learned that our own growth is one of the most significant obstacles to our spiritual growth — because we begin to project ourselves into what we think we know, rather than perpetually staying in a state of innocence that asks the questions, “What is it that I don’t know? What is it that I think I know that is absolutely in the way of truly knowing?” That openness is the environment that allows for the calling forth of the energetic and verbal feedback from the guru to inform us of the changes we need to allow happen. You’ll notice I didn’t say, “to make the changes we want to make,” because only part of us wants to change. The ego never wants to let go. The state of surrender is the only environment in which true inquiry can happen, and in which we allow ourselves to be changed.
We’re never surrendering to the person of the guru, because that teacher is simply the agent, not the agency. We are aligning ourselves with the power of Consciousness Itself that is flowing through the teacher, attempting to free us. When deciding to become engaged with a teacher, discrimination is always advisable, as there are no perfect gurus. But in choosing a teacher there is an important two-part question to consider: Is the guru self-serving or is he/she serving the God within you? Is the guru binding you to himself/herself, rather than binding you to your own freedom?
Nityananda beautifully said, “Always remain in the glance of the guru.” Always remain in the glance of the one guru, the grace of God that is available through an initiatory lineage. But understand that this glance is transmitting the liberating current from the God within you that will expose that which is limited in you, as well as awaken that which is unlimited. The purpose of our relationship with the guru is to transform our limited understanding, limited capacity, and limited willingness into unlimited understanding, unlimited willingness, and unlimited surrender.
Understand that having a teacher is only part of the equation for spiritual growth. When you find a fierce guru who loves you and has the capacity to free you, be very thoughtful about how you choose to respond.