The Crisis of Continuity of Wisdom (Rob Schmidt and Stuart Goodnick)

How do people relate to a tradition once the teacher is gone and there is no authorized leader to carry it forward? An important distinction is that a tradition is intended to serve the Work and that practitioners are not obligated to serve the formality of the tradition without deviating from a formula. An element of continuity of wisdom is willingness to embrace a degree of risk. In some communities, there’s fear of wiseacring, a Gurdjieffian term for screwing up. If we’re open to learning, mistakes are part of the path. Can balance be struck between being true to an original tradition and responding to the conditions of the world in a way that keeps the teaching alive? The idea that size matters is a Western construct. It’s not up to us if fewer people are interested in the Work; yet we can serve those with spiritual need if we are sincere and open-hearted. Some believe that the age of the teacher is over and that the teacher-student relationship is problematic if bounds of conventional propriety are crossed. But by design the teacher pushes boundaries beyond programming and comfort zone, which is not a license for self-gratification. We don’t know how the future is supposed to unfold and can cultivate a “Don’t Know” state. It’s a natural tendency to cling to the familiar, but this must be released for the path to reflect our being. We don’t know how transmission happens, but we can feel its magic. We learn by demonstration. The secret to development is to align with a higher will. We can cultivate trust and receptivity, but don’t have to be perfect to transmit what we’ve learned. Conversation among practitioners is a useful human tool on the path. Rob Schmidt and Stuart Goodnick run Tayu Meditation Center and founded Many Rivers Books and Tea in Sebastopol, CA. They invite spiritual teachers, practitioners, and authors to articulate their stories on The Mystical Positivist podcast.