SANATANA DHARMA AND THE MODERN WORLD

Can One Change Gurus?

We have many teachers in the different fields of learning we may take up. We don't have only one grade school teacher, nor only one science teacher. Being exposed to a variety of teachers allows us a wider horizon of learning and we cease to identify the teaching with a person.

Yet it is possible to have a special close relationship with a particular teacher, like that of an apprentice, which we cannot have with many different teachers. We can and should have many different teachers, but we may also have a primary teacher whose teaching serves as the central focus for our practice, just as an artist or a doctor may have a primary mentor or tutor. In the spiritual life we should be connected to a greater teacher and teaching which expresses the realization of the Absolute Truth and provides a model for it. Such a Self-realized guru or Sadguru may be central to our practice, though they may not be a person who is still alive or whom we may contact intimately.

It is also important to maintain connection with the same basic tradition and approach. If we mix teachers of different traditions, and jumble different practices it can cause confusion. If we first ground ourselves in an enlightenment tradition then we can maintain a continuity of teachers and practices within it. The important thing is to be serious about our practice not merely to run after external personalities. If we lose faith in our teacher after they leave the physical plane it only indicates that we did not connect to them at a deep level.

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