Is Your Yoga Teacher Insane?

–DhammapadaWhen I found out one of my favorite yoga teachers goes to a shrink, I figured it must be one helluva shrink. After all, I find great clarity in this yoga teacher’s class. So I got the name and number of this Dr. Schein and showed up for a session.

“So David, what brings you here today?” he asked.

“Well I feel so nervous about the impact of the economy on my financial well-being. That and I have a strange fetish with gerbils,” I quietly answered

“Who doesn’t!” he shot back.

“Oh good, so I’m not alone. It’s just that I find them so cute and squiggly,” I added

“Oh I was referring to the economy, not the gerbils. And let me tell you, I’ve gotten some great advice from my shrink about this subject,” Dr Schein continued.

“Wait a second, you have a shrink?”

And a few weeks later I booked an appointment with the shrink to the shrink. And after 6 months, I discovered the shrink to the shrink to the shrink to the shrink to the shrink to the shrink. All rivers seem to lead to one ocean, one guy who seems to be at the top of the chain of shrinks, a Dr. Abramowitz-Weinstein.

It took me 2 months but I finally got an appointment feeling absolutely confident that Dr. A&W, as they call him, would be nothing short of a friggin guru.

A measly man, 5 foot 2 with bifocals and a toupee, Dr. A&W greeted me.

“Velcome,” he said in a German accent.

It didn’t take long before he led me outside, down a path, through the forest, around a pond, under a tunnel, over a mountain, across a graveyard, and through a labyrinth. And there in the middle of the labyrinth on a golden table was a big chocolate truffle.

“Zis is the answer,” he said.

I hesitated but ate the special chocolate and felt amazing. I wandered through the woods and returned to Dr. A&W week after week. Each time I would eat another special chocolate and feel more ecstatic joy frolicking amongst the trees.

Finally, after thousands of dollars of doctor’s bills and a strange problem with itching, I had the special chocolates investigated and realized they were coated in oxycontin. I turned Dr. A&W into the police who also discovered he ran a huge pot farm, yoga studio operated by midget hookers, and counterfeit Christian Louboutin shoe factory.

I was devastated. Horrified. Flabbergasted. Oh my God. To think all those shoes I’d bought from him were fake?!

*****

At that moment I realized the Source does not exist in the form of a human being. Yes there are gurus who are close to pure channels of the Source energy. Wayne Dyer calls them “Sorcerers.” But for most of us, it’s not likely we will come in contact with these gurus unless we’re able to journey to India.  So the most realistic and financially healthy option is to chart your own path to the Source energy.

Source energy is rich with wisdom and revitilizing power that is yet to be filtered by the mental kaleidoscope. Think natural spring water. Think organic food. Think pure healing energy.  Without a daily moment of mental freedom, we essentially spend the day wallowing in the pollution of old habits and smoggy consciousness. Think Tijuana tap water. Think McDonald’s filet o’ fish. Think the nastiness in the crevice of an American Airlines seat.

Carlos Castaneda said, “The task of sorcerers was to face infinity and they plunged into it daily as a fisherman plunges into the sea.” Each and every day, we must find the place from which to take the plunge. The plunge need not be from the ridge of the Himalayas. It can be from the ridge of a fine glass of Cabernet or (if you don’t drink), from the miniature craters of chocolate coating a Vosges red-fire tortilla chip (see below).   Who doesn’t feel like jumping from all that binds her to the world!

There’s nothing wrong with a trip to a Shrink many of whom are brilliant. But there should be a balance. By taking too much of a another’s advice whether it’s your crazy red-headed yoga teacher or Dr. Abramowitz-Weinstein, you risk ingesting the runoff of their influences, flaws, and fears.  But worse, you risk drowning out one of the most untapped human resources: intuiton. As Herman Hesse said, “All I ever wanted was to live from the promptings of my true self, why was that so difficult?”