Zen Students: Don’t Give Up Your Power

Yvonne Rand once told me about a conversation she had with Lama Govinda, a German-born guy who was one of the first dharma teachers of Western descent. He retired and lived out his last years at Green Gulch, I believe. It must have been in about 1983 and the Baker scandal was rocking San Francisco Zen Center.

“The problem,” the lama told her, “is that you Americans are all too eager to give up responsibility for your circle of protection. Don’t do it, even to your teachers.”

The old lama here seems to be embracing a teacher-student model where the student is an adult. That’s my view too.

Students choose to enter into a relationship with a teacher, choose to undertake the practice, and then may choose to move on at some point.

I remember checking out a therapist while Katagiri Roshi was still alive and in our first meeting he said, “Katagiri depends on you.”

That was a shocker.

The ideal is expressed by Dogen, “We attain the way together.” And also the following that he borrowed from the Lotus Sutra: “Only Buddha to Buddha.”

In many dharma circles, however, traditional power is still prevalent. From the perspective of traditional power, students are like children and the power of the teacher is absolute.

Think feudalism with the teacher like the lord and the student like the serf. Or the Leave it to Beaver family of the 50’s with the teacher as the father, Ward Cleaver, and the student as Wally or even Beaver. Or the Pat Robertson world with men as the head of the household and women as perpetual subordinates.

One sign that you might be in that kind of relationship is if you find yourself going to the Zen Center, or taking a certain position, or doing a certain practice and doing so for the teacher. Beware. What other needs of the teacher (parent) might you be trying to meet?

Any wonder that we get into big trouble?

Usually, though, it’s more complex. Many systems have various kinds of power functioning and it can get really confusing and kinda icky feeling. Sometimes there is a big gap between what’s said and what’s practiced.

I’m not suggesting that a teacher doesn’t have power. Of course, we do. And so do students, probably more than most students know most of the time. In my view, to really sit in the student seat, it is essential to feel and act as a profoundly empowered being, a sovereign.

“Psychologically, a person who does not feel and act empowered may experience a sense of low self-esteem, learned helplessness, and external rather than internal locus of control,” says an article on empowerment and strengths (“The Languages of Empowerment and Strengths in Clinical Social Work: A Constructivist Perspective” by Greene, Lee, and Hoffpauir).

How could a person in such a position sit Buddha to Buddha?

In my view, power is a multifaceted and complex thing. Age, experience, profession, emotional savvy, and wealth are just a few of the things that influence power in any relationship.

One hold-over from traditional power that is often infused with a community’s power structure comes up in how the possibility of sexual relationships between teachers and students are regarded. Click here for the perspective of Diane Musho Hamilton.

It seems to be the prevailing view that students cannot have a consensual sexual relationship with their teacher because the teacher has more power. Real and free consent is then not possible.

Now there are many good reasons for teachers and students not to have sexual relationships, let me be clear about that. One of the most important being how sex changes a relationship and the dharma focus is then difficult to maintain.

It is important for the teacher to encourage the student to maintain a circle of protection and if the student’s dharma interests are front and center in the teacher-student relationship, then a sexual relationship will almost always be ruled out.

And when it’s not precluded, then the interest of the community to be free from the turbulence created by a teacher and student entering a sexual relationship would need to be considered and would almost certainly rule out the relationship – especially these days.

Sometimes a student will develop a crush on the teacher when it is really the dharma that they’re wild about. This is an important part of a student’s process and the teacher needs to be consistently clear about being unavailable for a sexual relationship.

However, to suggest that a student lacks the ability to form consent is dangerous and part of the problem in the American Zen scene. It places the teacher in a power-over position that can make the relationship more about the teacher than the student and then, strangely, make a sexual relationship between teacher and student more likely, not less. Further, it disrespects students, usually women students in this case, by depriving them of personal agency.

Moreover, there’s an internal contradiction in this view that is also disempowering in the cognitive dissonance it creates. If a student lacks the personal agency to enter into a sexual relationship (including freely choosing not to have a sexual relationship), then they would also lack the agency to enter into the teacher-student relationship. They would lack the agency to give money to the Zen Center, to take on a volunteer position, to attend sesshin, etc. They would also lack the agency to move on.

A student without personal agency would be unable to take responsibility for their circle of protection. The door handle to their inner life would be outside and depend on the teacher’s good graces and all-knowing benevolence.

What a bad idea.