JayneBond

Seeking a Spiritual Teacher- KNOW THYSELF
Jayne Bond 2010

When I was younger I was hungry to learn information about the Path and after reading many books I found myself at a point of no return. The books I had read had started to become repetitive and other than old sources that only hinted at varying philosophies of magick and alchemy, I couldn't find anything tangible in the way of new information so I decided it was time to find a teacher. Now being young and naive to the ways of the world, and idealistically believing that everyone who was a spiritual teacher was filled with integrity I innocently began apprenticing to all sorts of various practitioners. I soon found out that I was a fool to think this way, that there were tons of people who were egomaniacs, charlatans and just plain scam artists that might have some sort of psychic talent but really didn't have true wisdom when it came to learning magick. But it did expose me to a lot of experiences I wouldn't trade in for simply reading. Finally I met what I would call a bonafide magickal practitioner who didn't consider herself a teacher as much as somebody who shared what they had learned, a Wise Woman. I actually met her at another teacher's workshop and we hit it right off. She is an elder Native American woman who gave me some great information regarding finding a proper spiritual teacher that you might find useful in your pursuits along these lines.

To give background a human soul is comprised of four aspects which you can think of like a gemstone with four facets. One of the facets is the intellectual, another the emotional, there is also the physical and of course spiritual sides. Each of us come into our life with the goal of balancing these four aspects so that our soul crystal can "resonate" with a higher vibrational mode and become enlightened. In fact we come back lifetime after lifetime dealing with life's lessons trying to do so. A soul who has finished this balancing act of the four aspects is considered a "completed soul". If you think of the crystal metaphor when we balance these four aspect the resonation causes our soul to change it's vibrational (energy) pattern so that we have an inner light- enlightenment.

Grandmother TwoMoons
"A teacher is a person who has balanced these four aspects and then can disseminate this information to others in a balanced way. When you balance your four aspects your ego takes a back seat to your higher purpose, your oversoul, your spirit wisdom. The problem with (my teacher at the time) is that she decided to bestow upon herself the title of teacher before she was actually balanced. This is why she behaves in this manner and attacks those who she is threatened by because you are showing her a mirror that she is not ready for, that of integrity in purpose, and so she tries to throw you off balance too, attacking your weakest facet, your physicality. You know as well as I do that your physical shield is very strong in some ways but weak when it comes to making correct decisions regarding sharing energy. Those women who are sensitives are drawn to your strong male shield and your higher energy center- that is natural. She is upset that she cannot push your buttons like she does to the other apprentices, that your strength of spirit prevents you from allowing yourself to be engaged in negativity. So she attacks this weak facet in the hopes that it will keep you off-balanced and dedicated to her. Many so-called teachers who are imbalanced rely on these tools of pushing buttons or manipulating their students through their physical or emotional aspects to keep them cowtowing to them, to keep their own ego satisfied. This is true of many people of this age group (the hippy generation) who have taken to this work, and originally had good intentions. But they allowed capitalism fueled by ego inspired ideals, to interfere and therefore instead of doing the true work necessary to balance out their facets first, they jumped right to teacher to make a buck. This is the problem with the New Age, Wiccan and all of the other various pagan magick apprenticeships that have grown out of the later 20th century, they are hollow shells, they have no substance to back them up, they are just smoke and mirrors to prostitute spiritualism to make themselves money. When you seek an alternative spiritual teacher, no matter what the religious shell is enticing to you it is important to separate out the wheat from the chaff, do not think that everyone out there simply because they wrote a book, or profess to be a high priestess of a mighty coven, or have hundreds of followers are true teachers. The Wise Woman teacher is not easy to find, she does not pretend to be omnipotent and she should never try to manipulate her or tell you that her way of magick is the true path to power. There are many paths to power and the most important is the one that you find within, that is why you must KNOW THYSELF before you ever begin the journey to power."