The “Presence of the Living Teacher”
and the Emanation of Energy
by Samuel Ben-Or Avital
The Master-Teacher emanates a certain quality of presence, whether the student is aware of this energy or not. This awareness can be experienced as a genuine energetic frequency, and is very balanced and accelerated.
The Teacher serves as a tuning fork, a “conscious sending-station,” and has a definite influential vibration on all that is in their environment and in their immediate proximity. The student or anyone orbiting around in his or her presence is like a “receiving-station,” a l’écoute, always at the state of listening, ready to receive that “presence” energy and its communication.
This experience is available at every moment now, and in full range of the human benevolent presence of the Master-Teacher.
This is a very important key to understand the phenomenon of the Master-Teacher encounter. This exchange between the Teacher-giver and the Student-receiver, happens in everyday relations, flowing harmoniously by the simple presence of the Teacher in teaching situations: meditating, talking, walking, sharing food, explaining great concepts of life with simple words, or by simply being silent and communicating without words, sensing the ordinary reality as an extraordinary experience. It is like sensing a merging with the universe, a union with all that is, a sense that “one is one and not two.”
This giving-receiving energy functions on many levels, and it is like a circle of flow of practical wisdom, both silently, and with other means of communication. A teacher is also one who knows how to receive, and a student is also one who knows how to give.
This exchange of energy is based on no conditions and no reward basis. It is, and there is no ”because” between the beings. This is a very subtle form of relationship that is built with care, kindness and love, and a purposeful and conscious direction.
This energy is always in relation to anyone who is consciously aware of this “Presence.” By simply spending a valuable time in the presence of the Master, as the source of knowing and being, one experiences a sense of balance and spontaneously expands one’s awareness. One learns many subtle aspects of knowledge by osmosis.
This experience is known as “Transmission,” a state where the Master-Teacher pours the “knowledge,” “light of understanding” to the physical proximity, the student, as the vessel awakes and is ready to receive, practice and embody that “knowledge.”
This Transmission is also like a 1000-volt light bulb pouring more light into a 100-volt light bulb. The awareness and readiness of the 100-volt to receive from the 1000-volt bulb without being shattered to pieces requires a very definite state of being. It is a certain attitude of “conscious innocence,’’* in order to be able to receive more “light” gradually without breaking to pieces. One must stay whole, expanding both the moment and making the space for more light, until they will be able to contain the 1000-volt degree of light, gradually.
So, meeting with the Master-Teacher is a momentous occasion to embrace, experience, and expand. It is a time to use the “teaching situation,” to evolve in one’s honest efforts, to use one’s learning ability to move another step in the ladder of being and becoming. Doing so is activating the restoration of oneself and “others.”
MORE ABOUT TEACHERS AND STUDENTS
Here are some nuggets of practical wisdom to ponder and practice.
THREE WAYS OF LEARNING
When my grandfather and I sat on a small smooth rock in his yard, after stamping the grapes rhythmically with my bare young feet, learning how to make wine, he told me that there are three basic ways of living and learning:
1. . The first priority and purpose of life is to live to learn, absorbing like a sponge, sharpening and using your intelligence to learn as much as you can, with increased curiosity.
2. The second priority and purpose of life is living your learning, mastering the practicality of your learning.
3. The third priority and purpose of life is to tell a passionate story of your experience, so others can also learn and benefit from your brief existence on this earth.
Over the years, I reflected on this profound wisdom many times. I adapted these three processes of learning to most of my activities. (See the “What is BodySpeak™? Article about the three phases of learning I use in my workshops and seminars).
TEACHER/ TRICKSTER
True teachers not only live the truth, they love the truth that they live, modestly living it on many levels. But in fact, that truth, for the students, is a lie until they investigate it for themselves. So the teacher plays out his or her own role — being simple, stupid, outrageous, a trickster, whatever, luring the students on, sometimes satisfying their expectations, sometimes frustrating them, always testing, measuring, so that the students will measure their own something-ness.
Even false teachers, with their half-truths, can unwittingly aid in the quest if the students learn to relax and not force the issue – if they learn that in all their struggles what they are looking for is already looking for them.
STUDENT-TEACHER- MENTOR RELATIONSHIP
Both teacher and student know. One remembers, and one has forgotten.
When they get together, they remind one another.
From “The BodySpeak™ Manual”
MORE THAN WHAT YOU THINK
It is said by our revered sages:
“The more you think about teachers, the less you may learn”.
One must learn how to learn. Your focus must be on LEARNING, not the teacher, or the book, or this or that. One can learn from everything. Life is our great teacher, if we learn HOW TO READ IT. So do not think of yourself when learning, focus on that which you learn and practice.
This teaching/learning situation environment can be manifested and offered to you by a guide, a genuine teacher, someone WHO KNOWS HOW TO KNOW, and one who has a natural wisdom to impart. This is by one who is willing to transmit knowledge to you, when you are “ready.” That is when you know HOW to be a receptive vessel, willing to learn how to shape new ways and new forms for your life and yourself. That shaping new forms for your life is done by yourself and with yourself.
But if you think you “know,” you don’t need a teacher. (Remember that the most abused and misunderstood word in any language is “knowing.”) With that attitude of “Been there, done that,” one will never find an authentic teacher.
In a time in history that most negativities are defined as positive, it is a creative effort to search for a living authentic teacher. The fake teachers know very well how to introduce you to their teachings with “laughter,” “kindness” and “happiness.” They present a life of eternal happiness, and that is half of the problem. That is why when you come to real life and you have problems, it creates confusion.
It is a search for one who can guide you back to your essential, authentic and spiritual self, in a healthy and sane way. I consider that as a spiritual effort – that is, if you know what you really want to learn. And that requires one to first unlearn what you learned. That is a good introduction to rediscover your sane being in a perplexed and confused generation.
Finally, not everyone is interested in finding an authentic living teacher. For this, one needs to be accomplished in three things:
- Understanding one thing from the other.
- Having some knowledge in a few languages.
- One needs to have developed and experienced understanding through intuition (However, false intuition can appear, in the form of ego or toxic thoughts. And that is why it is difficult to distinguish.)
These are important, because these teachers are primarily unknown and not heavily advertised. However, there have been great sages in the kabbalistic tradition in the past, whose work is documented in a code, and built into that code is how to practice and apply the teachings.
Many of us pass by authentic teachers and we don’t notice them. Just as we breathe, but most don’t know that the breath can heal.
Various new age traditions contain negative memes, that are obstacles to learning. And, with our innocent search, sometimes we don’t notice them. But they appear authentic, while containing half-truths. (See the article, The Spiritual Ratatouille in the book “From Ecstasy to Lunch”).
We need the ability to acknowledge the sanity in the midst of madness and act accordingly. This is also why it is so important to learn how to learn, by unlearning what you think you know.
Some people do not know how to be a student. They are mostly lazy and pretentious and their attitude of learning is superficial and just a way to pass the time. Learning must be playful and deep at the same time. Learning from someone who knows is really rare, unless you prepared yourself enough to be able to be called a student, and to attract the “teacher” you deserve.
Bon courage to you who is the caring true seeker of authentic wisdom.
And remember
כָּל־הַנְּחָלִים הֹלְכִים אֶל־הַיָּם וְהַיָּם אֵינֶנּוּ מָלֵא אֶל־מְקוֹם שֶׁהַנְּחָלִים
Ecclesiastes 1. 7
הֹלְכִים שָׁם הֵם שָׁבִים לָלָכֶת: קהלת פרק א. ז.
“All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full;
to the place from where the rivers come,
there they return again”
Here are some more nuggets of practical wisdom to ponder and practice:
Provide yourself with a teacher; be quit of doubt; and accustom not yourself to give tithes by a conjectural estimate.
Rabban Gamliel – Sayings of the Fathers 1.16
He who learns in order to teach, Heaven will grant him the opportunity to both learn and to teach. But he who learns in order to practice, Heaven will grant him the opportunity to learn and to teach, to observe and to practice.
Rabbi Yishmael – Sayings of the Fathers 4.6
Make a regular period for your study; Say little and do much; And receive every human being with a cheerful countenance.
Shammai – Sayings of the Fathers 1.15
Ben Zoma said: Who is Wise? The one who learns from everyone; As it is said, “From all my teachers I have gotten understanding”
Pirkei Avot 4.1
And this last one, can begin to convey to you the gentle urgency of becoming a good student of life to explore the “mysteries” of yourself, become the “mystery,”and learn the art of BEING and BECOMING.
THE DAY IS SHORT, and THE WORK IS GREAT.
THE WORKERS ARE LAZY, and THE REWARD IS MUCH.
AND THE MASTER IS URGENT.!
Rabbi Tarfon – Sayings of the Fathers 2.20
* Addendum to the article “Finding Your True Living Master Teacher” by Samuel Ben-Or Avital.
** See the “Conscious Innocence” definition in the “Defintuitions” in The BodySpeak™ Manual.
Samuel Ben-Or Avital, in one of his first teaching situations in a 1972 workshop in Boulder, Colorado, USA
