Brad Warner blog on why he can't be your teacher

I tried to post this about 10 minutes ago and nothing happened. Anyway, I really like the middle part here where he talks about wanting to escape to some "beautiful zen place." It felt embarrassingly familiar.

http://www.hardcorezen.blogspot.com/2012/01/can-you-be-my-teacher.html

I liked it a lot.
Here is my take:
He is telling the people who write or email him asking him to be their teacher -- no. And then he tells them why he can't. That pretty, direct, honest, and original to him. Just him. He is letting us know who he is and that is interesting and it's fun to read because what he says is unexpected and divergent.

I suspect, and I could be wrong about this, is that what he is saying is that if you just out of the blue, as a stranger, ask Brad Warner to be your teacher -- it won't happen. But, maybe, if you happened to sit with him for a while and he and you got to know each other and developed some real, one-on-one, in person relationship, then, maybe, he would become your teacher. Then, at that point it could be long distance if needed.

Or, maybe he just doesn't want to be a teacher.

So he is giving is own, personal view on his attitude about teaching and about students, which means, for him, it has to be very intimate and serious and he just doesn't think he could do that by email, online, by phone, etc. .

And, I think he probably has a lot of experience in person and online with people having idealistic/romantic/wrong views on what being a "zen student" will bring a person. He was there once himself and can recognize it in others. I think it is a great teaching to point out that zen offers no escape from real life.

Like he's being a little too direct and mean just for effect, to make the blog more provocative?

I don’t particularly enjoy Brad Warner’s writings all that much. I think it’s because when he writes about things he doesn’t like, he doesn’t just say, “I don’t like this or that.” Instead, he seems to put a lot of energy in to making whatever it is he doesn’t like look like something SO STUPID and ridiculous. It’s one thing to affirm or deny, and another to put people down – whether subtlety or blatantly - for going about things in ways you don’t like.

Like Chris, I think Brad’s communication could be more skillful. It’s not that I think Buddhist-types are supposed to be nicey-nice, but the other extreme isn’t useful either, and sometimes Brad gets dangerously close to that line – and may even cross it more often than I’d like to see.

Well, he's enacting a very clear boundary around his teaching activity and rather than trying to actively sell himself or attract people, he's defining the boundary (in this post, and maybe in general) by being slightly offensive rather than attractive. I kind of respect that.

It seems like every teacher, intentionally or not, has a sorting effect on potential students via their "outer" persona, and Brad is no different; but his persona, and so who it sorts, is unique. Maybe it works well for him (i.e., maybe it works out well for his one-on-one teaching).

I think so too, Chris. Not everyone who behaves like an asshole is doing so as some sort of compassionate skillful means. That myth is pretty much built into the Zen tradition; a fact that is clearly articulated in Stuart Lachs' work.

Sometimes what looks like a badass zen master is really just a punk-ass brat in black robes, just as what sometimes looks like crazy wisdom is just plain old crazy.

Could be guys! I sure don't know I agree that the enlightened asshole thing is nuanced though, and can be a handy screen for real abuse. I don't see Brad this way at all, but what do I know?

Well, I don't know much about Brad besides the few blog posts of his that people have linked to, and whatever vague notion I had of him prior to those few concrete encounters. So whatever I could say about him would be about these few works I have actually seen. I have no basis to make an over-all judgment on the fellow, and if anything I wrote was construed as such then I apologize.

Commenting only on what I have seen of his work, I mostly like it. I often have found his obnoxiousness humorous, and could see the word "schtick" applied to that in a merely descriptive way. I can think of a few things that seemed like very clear examples of Brad's samsaric patterns, but those mainly seemed self-important rather than mean, per se.

I'll read the post again because my perception (of its tone at least) differed greatly from what you guys wrote. I don't remember thinking "this is mean" or "what an asshole" at all; I often ignore tone in favor of content. But you guys probably have much more experience with Brad than I have, so I'm interested in your opinions. What did you see as "mean" in the post? Or Brad's work in general? (I am assuming you both would use this word to describe what you perceive in his behavior?) Maybe after I read it again I will have a different opinion!

Jake
Ive read all his books and most of the blogs and listened to talks and watched videos and somehow he has always seemed ... nice. I dont always agree with him though.
Chris and Jackson's reaction made me wonder if i was insensitive.

Maybe. I even kind of identify with him. Or at least with the character he creates.

Mike, Jake--

I have a strange, old-lady tolerant fondness for BW: I often think he's trying a bit too hard to be 'edgy.' At his bookstore talks [he's been through my town a couple of times] he's unfailingly kind, helpful, amusing, and self-deprecating. He's completely NOT either a smarmy Marin-County spiritual type, all Metta-this and Namaste-that, V R ALL 1. And he's completely not some loud, tattooed, up-in-your-face rude punk. I imagine he's a favorite uncle.

And I get that the way he writes sometimes presents a different, more cocksure, less tolerant persona-- and that plenty of folks are not gonna like it. That said, he's posted some of the cutest kitty youtube clips on facebook, lately.

Mike, Kate:

I share your impression! Chris and Jackson, I had a similar moment to Mike's in wondering upon reading your reactions if I was just an insensitive jerk for not noticing what an insensitive jerk Brad was

Kate, "self-deprecating": yes. That's my take on Brad's "attitude"; I've always felt he was playing up his own samsaric tendencies for a knowing chuckle. Mike, he's always seemed "nice" to me too. But I grew up in a family with a lot of sarcastic wit being thrown around, more often than not in a self-deprecatory way in which we play up our own limits as a way of sort of saying "yes, I know I can be like x y z and i know you all know too".

Yeah, I have to say Brad's style is not my style, and he seems to enjoy pushing buttons. I find deliberate button pushing either amusing or tedious (depending on my mood). But it is damn refreshing sometimes when people talk about dharma and practice without feeling obliged to put on that far more prevalent performance: "Now we are going to talk about very serious, important things, so I am going to be very, very precise in my speech and use my Dharma Voice, and you are to sit there and nod sagely as you listen, because this is deep wisdom, and we must all behave like popes at a funeral."

If there's one thing I'm not good at, it's behaving like a pope at a funeral

A bit of Mr. Bean in Church is probably appropriate at this juncture:

Funny how some little vague disquiet keeps tugging at me, even after I've said something apparently definitive.

I was thinking about Chris' and Jackson's finding BW 'rude'-- and maybe I see what it is. I don't think it is this post about his inability to be 'our' teacher. I think it is that he has been repeatedly [and wittily] snarky in denying what we might call 'the enlightenment project.' He's really the epitome of the antithesis of 'pragmatic dharma.' Now, there are times when I find this line of expression a refreshing corrective to some of the more out-there obsessions of PD. [see, for instance, this-- via Hokai--

]

AND I recognize that it is hardly the 'whole truth', or even the most useful truth. Without the inspiration of having recognized moments of enlightenment in ourselves or others, any practice is just a kind of rote repetition, like brushing your teeth-- yes, it has good consequences, but it hardly engages the highest human potential. And it is more than a little strange that after having written so clearly and ecstatically of his own such experience, BW is so heavy-handed in his subsequent denial. That, I think is a worthwhile conversation; and, unfortunately, it is one that Brad seems completely averse-- at least for now-- to having.

So, yeah, Brad's 100% correct in saying he 'can't be our teacher' in that mode; and he is 100% incorrect in implying that no one can, and that only a fool would hope it was possible.

I guess it's up to us!

God I love that cartoon.