Pema Chodron is the resident teacher at Gampo Abbey, a Buddhist monastery in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. A student of the late Kagyu master Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, she received the novice ordination in 1974 and was fully ordained in 1981. Pema Chodron is the author of The Wisdom of No Escape, Start Where You Are, and When Things Fall Apart, all from Shambhala Publications. This interview was conducted in April at Gampo Abbey; photographs by Christine Alicino.

Youxe2x80x99ve described the teacher-student relationship as one based on unconditional commitments: The teacher will never give up on the student and the student will never leave the teacher, no matter what. How did you come to that understanding?

Ixe2x80x99d like to back up a bit. There are different levels of the teacher-student relationship and not everyonexe2x80x99s ready forxe2x80x94or wantsxe2x80x94an unconditional commitment. Most people read a book or hear the teachings of a specific teacher and it helps them. In fact, it can dramatically change how they work with the difficulties of their lives. They may then ask if they can become that teacherxe2x80x99s student, by which they mean asking for guidance now and then. This kind of relationship can be valuable and the student feels, quite rightly, thatxe2x80x99s all thatxe2x80x99s needed. Itxe2x80x99s rare that a student wants to enter into an unconditional commitment with a teacher because what this means is being willing to work at a very profound level on where you are holding back. So really, how many people are willing to unmask completely? Thatxe2x80x99s the basic question.

Was that your experience? That unconditional commitment came with xe2x80x9cunmaskingxe2x80x9d?

When I asked Trungpa Rinpoche if I could be his student in 1974, I was not ready to enter into an unconditional relationship. But for the first time in my life I had met a person who was not caught upxe2x80x94a person whose mind was never swept awayxe2x80x94and I realized that was also possible for me. And I was incredibly drawn to him because I saw that I couldnxe2x80x99t manipulate him.

You felt seen by him?

It wasnxe2x80x99t as personal as that. It was more like: This is a man who knows how to cut through peoplexe2x80x99s trips. And I experienced that cutting as encouraging; threatening, but refreshingly threatening.

But you still didnxe2x80x99t feel ready for an unconditional relationship with him?

That took time. Working intimately with a teacher is the same thing as learning to stop shielding ourselves from the completely uncertain nature of reality. In other words, when we work closely with a teacher, all the ways that we hold back and shut down, all the ways that we cling and grasp, all our habitual ways of limiting and solidifying our world become very clear to us, and itxe2x80x99s unnerving. At that painful point, we usually want to make the teacher wrong or make ourselves wrong or do anything that is habitual and comforting to get ground back under our feet. But when we make an unconditional commitment to hang in there, we do not run away from the pain of seeing ourselves – and this is a revolutionary thing to do and it transforms us. But how many of us are ready for this? One has to gradually develop the trust that it is ultimately liberating to let go of strongly held assumptions about reality.

Are you talking about gradually developing the trust to surrender into the unknown?

Yes. But what Ixe2x80x99m really pointing to here is developing steadfastness with yourself, steadfastness with your fears. This comes from developing clear seeing of all that arises in your heart and your mind without pushing away what you donxe2x80x99t like or getting cozy with what you find attractive, and without disassociating or acting out. So the teacher encourages you to be relaxed more and more with your own uneasy, insecure energy and to stay with yourself through highs and lows.

That implies a steadfastness with the teacher as well?

Yes, thatxe2x80x99s it. Steadfastness with one particular person translates into steadfastness with any situation that you could possibly encounter. This starts with steadfastness with yourself and in particular, steadfastness with your own emotional distress – being able to open to it, to rest in it without seeking the comfort zone of habits. Without developing this basic trust in oneself, regarding your teacher as perfect and doing whatever they request can be harmful and even dangerous to the naive student.

Do you have a different relationship with your students than your teacher had with his students?

I consider myself a spiritual friend to my students. Ixe2x80x99m not a guru. In general, I donxe2x80x99t give empowerments or perform other Vajrayana rituals and in particular, I am nowhere near as wise or daring as Trungpa Rinpoche. I can only share the spiritual understanding that I have, and itxe2x80x99s a long way from the spiritual understanding of Trungpa Rinpoche. But some things are the same. It is important, for instance, that students are open with me and donxe2x80x99t hide their neurosis and also that they donxe2x80x99t idealize me. Itxe2x80x99s important that students get to know me well so that I come off the pedestal and they see me as an ordinary person. I was always taught to see the teacher and the student as sharing a mutual journey – not as a master-servant relationship.

But you do enter into formal teacher-student relationships?

The first time someone asked me to be their teacher, I didnxe2x80x99t know what it meant. I kept saying no, then after two years I said, xe2x80x9cOkay, but if wexe2x80x99re going to do this, you have to do what I ask you to do.xe2x80x9d That was a big mistake and I would never say that to anyone now. Because now I realize that you just enter into the relationship, as I did with my teacher, and it evolves to that place of trust and love – or it doesnxe2x80x99t. Itxe2x80x99s not something that you can demand.

Why did you ask that student for total obedience?

Because I know that when youxe2x80x99re willing and able to trust the teacher, thatxe2x80x99s your first experience of steadfastness; it was my first experience with not getting swept away by judgments and opinions. See, the idea here is that entering into an unconditional relationship with one person is a training for staying open to the paradoxical nature of reality. How do you get to the point where you can open to this world as it is, with all of its violence and beauty and meanness and moments of courage? When you enter into an unconditional relationship, you experience both like and dislike, approval and disapproval; you experience profound horror and heartbreaking love. And then you get to discover if your heart and mind are big enough to contain the complete picture – and not just the part that you approve of. If you can develop the capability to remain steadfast in one unconditional relationship, you can remain steadfast with the suffering and joyfulness of life.

And the key is the experience of trusting another person?

Itxe2x80x99s more than that. The teacher serves as a mirror but also encourages your ability to trust in yourself. You begin to trust in your basic goodness instead of identifying with your neurosis. Therexe2x80x99s a shift of allegiance. Then the obstacles begin to seem temporary, and whatxe2x80x99s permanent is the wisdom. To the degree that you become intimate with your neurosis – not acting-out and not repressing – to that degree you discover your wisdom. In Vajrayana Buddhism they actually say, xe2x80x9cThe more neurosis, the more wisdom.xe2x80x9d

They talk about transforming confusion into wisdom. That doesnxe2x80x99t mean getting rid of confusion: Itxe2x80x99s alchemy – the gold is in there. The relationship with the teacher helps you stay in the middle of the fire.

How is the role of the teacher and the role of devotion to the guru different in Vajrayana than in other forms of Buddhism?

In Vajrayana youxe2x80x99re moving in the direction of realizing that the whole world is your teacher. Youxe2x80x99re encouraged to have a passionate involvement with life – with love, illness, death, disappointment. There is no emotion or activity that is off limits as a source of wisdom. For this reason, this path demands a lot of discipline, and it also requires guidance. In the absence of a narrow and restrictive set of rules, you need someone to show you where youxe2x80x99re behaving in a way that is indulgent or repressive or too reactive. And you need someone that you will listen to. In Vajrayana, the guru shakes things up a lot, which prepares you for the fact that so does life. So in real life – what do you do when things fall apart?

Do you function like that for your students?

I donxe2x80x99t deliberately set about to create those moments when the student feels the rug being pulled out. In the lineage stories, the gurus purposely did that. For instance, Marpa tested Milarepa by making him build towers and then, with no xe2x80x9crationalxe2x80x9d reason, told him to pull them down again. So youxe2x80x99re asking about students working with me? Might they suffer because they donxe2x80x99t have that?

Or, are you somehow providing that?

In a limited number of relationships, when we work closely and the student is brave enough, that kind of cutting through of old habits and limited ways of seeing does happen. But, curiously, it seems to have to do more with their own courage than anything that I do.

In guru yoga the instructions are to see the guru as a Buddha, not as an ordinary person. But you say that you want students to realize that you are ordinary.

Well, not only the teacher, but everyone is Buddha. Buddha means awake. Itxe2x80x99s important to know that we are all capable of being awake. What I was left with from Trungpa Rinpoche was this: that between the teacher and the student there can be a meeting of minds, a mutual communication. The job of the teacher is to help the student experience that their mind and the mind of the teacher are the same. The teacher realizes that the student doesnxe2x80x99t understand that, doesn't believe it, and doesn't trust it. The relationship needs to be intimate enough so that the teacher can work with exactly where the student is limiting themselves. Sometimes someone needs love and sometimes harshness. But whatever the teacher does is always about helping you to see layer after layer of defense mechanisms and self-deceptions that block your innate wisdom. You have tremendous devotion because without your teacher you would never have discovered this confidence in your own wisdom. But you donxe2x80x99t think of the teacher as being up there while youxe2x80x99re down here. Thatxe2x80x99s an important point.

But in some of the texts about guru devotion, the word used is xe2x80x9cworshipxe2x80x9d – the student is instructed to worship the teacher.

Ixe2x80x99ve never been encouraged by my teachers to worship anyone. Therexe2x80x99s too much hope and fear in that kind of setup. In my opinion, it would definitely not be helpful to advise students that they should worship a guru or that they should feel wrong if they question or find fault with a guru. If Ixe2x80x99d been given that advice, I wouldnxe2x80x99t have lasted very long. One has to be encouraged to use onexe2x80x99s critical intelligence and to express onexe2x80x99s concerns without fear. Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche used to say, xe2x80x9cQuestion authority.xe2x80x9d Just like those bumper stickers. But youxe2x80x99re still left with an important question: What is it that encourages a person to hang in there so that the minute the teacher does something that you donxe2x80x99t like you donxe2x80x99t say, xe2x80x9cIxe2x80x99m outta herexe2x80x9d? We Westerners have a strong habitual tendency to idealize our authority figures. We romanticize them. For Western students what needs to be communicated is that the mind of the teacher and student meet, not by the student making the teacher all pure or all evil, but in the ambiguity between those two, in the capacity to sustain uncertainty. Otherwise, in the name of true devotion youxe2x80x99ll get a kind of worship that inevitably flips into vast disillusionment because sooner or later the teacher does something that the student canxe2x80x99t handle. Wexe2x80x99ve seen many cases where that happens. What has to be emphasized is that students donxe2x80x99t accept anything without questioning. This is a standard Buddhist teaching: Donxe2x80x99t accept anything before you test it and test it and test it. And one should be encouraged to move as close as one can get to the teacher so that if there is any hypocrisy or deception one will see it.

And what if you do see hypocrisy?

You can stay or you can leave. But the most important point is how you handle your mind. There have been cases when teachers, both Western and Asian, have caused harm. But for the most part, what wexe2x80x99re talking about are students who bolt the first time a teacher doesnxe2x80x99t meet their preconception of what a teacher should be. You donxe2x80x99t like their political views, or the fact that they eat meat or drink wine . . . youxe2x80x99re out of there because you donxe2x80x99t like a change in the dharma centerxe2x80x99s policy or you feel unappreciated or neglected. What Ixe2x80x99ve seen is that often a student hangs in there for four or five years in a kind of honeymoon period where they endow the relationship with all their longings to be loved and to be in the ideal, non-messy relationship. Then, inevitably, because of the closeness to the teacher, they get provoked – something provokes them – and all their core, unresolved emotional issues come up. They feel betrayed, disillusioned and a lot of other habitual feelings, and then they leave the scene. Ixe2x80x99m talking here about situations where the ordinary messiness of daily life becomes unavoidable and not of situations where there is severe abuse of power.

And in cases of severe abuse of power?

The challenge is to be able to say that something is wrong and still not demonize that teacher. To me, the main point is still how you are handling your mind. Once you start demonizing, your heart and mind get very small. Fixation in any form causes suffering. That fixation could take the form of xe2x80x9cThe guru is perfect and can never do anything wrong,xe2x80x9d or it can take the form of xe2x80x9cThe guru is a charlatan and can do no good.xe2x80x9d Both are expressions of freezing the mind. You know, we all love to talk about big mind, vast mind, spaciousness. But can we abide in the spaciousness that is presented to us when things fall apart? Or when the bottom falls out? Every time you hit your thumb with a hammer, the mind stops – and then the mind jumps in to build its case. Sometimes you have to leave a teacher, and that is very painful. But if you can stay with the pain instead of justifying or condemning, then that teacher has taught you well. It may sound corny, but I think that love is where itxe2x80x99s at. Not romantic or possessive love, but this unconditionally steadfast relationship with ourselves and with other people – thatxe2x80x99s what Ixe2x80x99m talking about. If a teacher never gives up on a student, thatxe2x80x99s what I mean by love. And if a student also never gives up on the teacher, then in that situation of complete openness there can be a meeting of minds. But if either the teacher or the student have fixed ideas of what they are going to achieve, or how to deal with each other, or who they think the other one is, then communication gets blocked.

Would you say, then, that the practice is learning to love the guru in this open-ended way?

Yes, and wexe2x80x99re not used to this kind of love. To love and be loved unconditionally is what we all want to receive, and what we all have difficulty giving. And then add into the equation that the teacher-student relationship is not exclusive. Thatxe2x80x99s really not what wexe2x80x99re generally looking for. So, as students we usually enter into the relationship with our habitual, neurotic relationship patterns. If we have jealousy issues, if we have abandonment issues, those will come up with a teacher. On the other hand, if we persevere and experience our emotional difficulties as path, then the relationship evolves. In my case, when I saw Rinpoche not giving up on other people I began to trust that he would not give up on me. So the experience of seeing that the teacher can love so many people and wish to dissolve the suffering of so many people can help the student develop more love and trust for both themselves and the teacher.

Something happened along those lines once that had a profound effect on me. One time when Trungpa Rinpoche was in retreat, one of his longtime students was there with him. The student was having emotional difficulties and causing a lot of problems for everyone. So the other students began wishing that this man, letxe2x80x99s call him Joe, would go away, and they told Rinpoche about all the problems with this manxe2x80x99s aggressive behavior. But Rinpoche just seemed to ignore their complaints. At one point, though, Rinpoche walked into the room just as Joe had lashed out viciously at a woman and slapped her. Then Rinpoche did something that was very atypical. He said to Joe, xe2x80x9cOut! I want you out now!xe2x80x9d Joe was completely devastated and could not believe it. He said, xe2x80x9cBut Rinpoche . . .xe2x80x9d And Rinpoche just said, xe2x80x9cOut, I donxe2x80x99t want to see your face again,xe2x80x9d and he left the room. After Joe left, Rinpoche came into the living room and all the other students gathered around him and said, xe2x80x9cWexe2x80x99re so glad you got rid of Joe. He did this yesterday and that the day before and this morning . . . Thank you for sending him away.xe2x80x9d Then Rinpoche drew himself up and said very firmly: xe2x80x9cI think you do not understand that Joe and I are the best of friends.xe2x80x9d So thatxe2x80x99s the kind of love Ixe2x80x99m talking about. I felt like Trungpa Rinpoche would step in front of a train if it would get through to you.

But how did Joe feel?

At that moment the rug got pulled out and Ixe2x80x99m sure it hurt a lot. But later, Joe said that Rinpochexe2x80x99s throwing him out saved his life.

I wonder if this classic teacher/student relationship that youxe2x80x99re describing is being diluted as Western teachers incorporate their cultural beliefs into the dharma.

This kind of question comes up whenever the dharma goes to a new land. The teachers from the new country naturally draw from their own culture. So itxe2x80x99s always an experimental time in that way. And there are Asian teachers now who naturally fear that the dharma could be corrupted. I think that creates a good balance. The more they fear corruption, the more that causes Western teachers to make sure that they arenxe2x80x99t corrupting. If someone you respect says, xe2x80x9cI think that youxe2x80x99re going astray,xe2x80x9d you have three choices: You can become defensive; you can buy it hook, line and sinker; or – the middle way – you can just let it process you. That middle way is the one I would suggest. Just let it process you. Therexe2x80x99s no problem with being questioned and challenged. Yet there is no other way but to experiment. Buddhism is going to look different in the West. If the essence were lost, that would be a tragedy. But keeping the essence doesnxe2x80x99t mean not changing anything.

What kind of challenge do you find in being a teacher of Buddhism as it comes to a new culture? Being a teacher is a constant training. Training to be sane. To be genuine. To be honest. And to not hide behind some title. I feel that I am at the kindergarten level with this. But it is joyful to pass the dharma on. Generations of teachers have dedicated their lives to realizing these teachings and to passing them on, and that lineage of wisdom could be lost, so itxe2x80x99s wondrous that the teachings can take root in a new land and be digested by Western people. Thatxe2x80x99s what Trungpa Rinpoche said again and again: xe2x80x9cYou people are the ones. Ixe2x80x99m going to die. If you donxe2x80x99t understand what Ixe2x80x99m saying and pass it on, then nothing will grow and the dharma in the West will not survive.xe2x80x9d