{"id":3596,"date":"2017-08-25T08:04:28","date_gmt":"2017-08-25T14:04:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/?p=3596"},"modified":"2022-01-25T20:11:11","modified_gmt":"2022-01-26T02:11:11","slug":"modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html","title":{"rendered":"A Modest Proposal: Facilitator, Teacher, Adept"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"20953761_759546937585892_3911715206195147910_n\"<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Unlike in 1984 when\u00a0the above photo was taken at the end of a practice period (Katagiri Roshi is up front and center, I\u2019m in the back on the right), meditation and mindfulness are booming and widely available. You can pick up basic meditation skills not only at dharma<\/a> centers representing dozens\u00a0of different lineages but also at yoga studios, community centers, and churches (usually of the progressive variety) from coast to coast. No need to shave your head and wear black. Even Target has been in on it for years, selling yoga mats and meditation cushions.<\/p>\n

Case in point: Of the twenty-seven people in the above photo, only one, Katagiri Roshi, was a meditation teacher in 1984. At least eleven (that I know of) have since become meditation teachers, seven with Soto Zen dharma transmissions. See James Myoun Ford Roshi\u2019s recent post for more on the graduation issue in Zen: \u201cOf the Raw and the Cooked: A Zen Teacher Reflects on Dharma Transmission and Spiritual Practice<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

So\u00a0like Keizan said,<\/p>\n

A splendid blossom\u00a0issues forth from the old plum tree<\/em>
\nThorns come forth at the same time<\/em><\/p>\n

In other words, with success, problems arise. The problem I\u2019d like to address in this post is how we use the word \u201cteacher\u201d to refer to folks with a wide range of training and experience. That fits with the American proclivity for leveling, often a wholesome thing, but in this case, I suggest, it is resulting in a tangle of confusion and misinformation.<\/p>\n

The range of training and experience for meditation teachers<\/h4>\n

The most basic certification for a yoga teacher is 200 hours. Iyengar Yoga teachers, though, do a whole lot more. A person can become a Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction<\/a> (MBSR) teacher for their 8-week course after an a eight-day training (Correction: I didn\u2019t have this right in an earlier version). On the other hand, according to a recent survey, the average teacher in the Soto Zen Buddhist<\/a> Association has been training for about twenty-five years. One of the minimum qualifications for membership in the American Zen Teachers Association is about 300 days of intensive retreat.<\/p>\n

However, don\u2019t get me wrong, there is also a lot a variation in the Zen world and an urgent need for quality control. At the top end, one woman recently became a fully authorized Zen teacher after twenty-five years of monastic training, fifty or so practice periods, and about 2,000 days of sesshin. Some people become teachers with little retreat time (less than one-hundred days of intensive retreat) and some have over a thousand days. I\u2019m aware of one person who presents as a Zen teacher who has not done a single day of sesshin. Some have worked through extensive k\u014dan curriculum and some have not. Some have studied the Zen buddhadharma, including the likes of D\u014dgen, and some have not. Some teachers have verified awakening experiences and some (i.e., almost all) do not.<\/p>\n

All of these people are referred to by some or themselves as meditation teachers.<\/p>\n

Depending on what you\u2019re looking for in a teacher, that might be fine. If you want a little relaxation and centering, or to learn a well-established program like MBSR, a teacher with 200-hours and\/or an eight-day training might be fine. If you\u2019re looking to wake up from a \u201clife story comprised of a series of complaints,\u201d as a student recently put it, and dive deeply into this issue of birth and death, it is not.<\/p>\n

Seems to me that most of the people with little training that present themselves as meditation teachers have positive intentions, but perhaps don\u2019t appreciate the subtlety of the buddhadharma, are unaware of the possibilities for training and realization, and may\u00a0not have met a true teacher. In addition, we have this huge cultural undercurrent encouraging us to be impatient with processes that take time and a tendency to be very creative with our bios. There\u2019s also a particularly American form of arrogance that leads us to assert in a heartbeat, \u201cOh, I get that,\u201d even when it\u2019s taken our predecessors decades of practice.<\/p>\n

And there are a few who present themselves as meditation teachers that are frauds.<\/p>\n

Eskimos really do have 50\u00a0words for \u201csnow\u201d<\/h4>\n

Check it out.<\/a><\/p>\n

We don\u2019t have nearly that number in english for \u201cteacher,\u201d but we do have some: coach, trainer, guide, educator<\/span>,\u00a0tutor<\/span>,\u00a0instructor<\/span>,\u00a0master<\/span>,\u00a0mistress, mentor, guru, counselor (those from an online search).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Some of these don\u2019t resonate, of course, like \u201cmistress,\u201d and it\u2019d be impractical to have 50 grades of teachers, but we could have a few.<\/p>\n

So I\u2019d like to keep it simple and offer a modest proposal:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Meditation facilitator: people that don\u2019t have a lot of training but that can skillfully facilitate a beginner\u2019s meditation<\/li>\n
  2. Meditation teacher: people that have a moderate amount of training and experience and point people to more advanced skills, while sharing the possibilities and dharma purposes for meditation practice<\/li>\n
  3. Meditation adept: people that have a heck-of-a-lot of training and deep experience and can help people wake up and live with it<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    I suspect that \u201cMeditation adept\u201d might stick in your craw. Adepts, after all, are supposed to be humble and self-effacing. And yet that humility might be adding to the problem and not really serving people.<\/p>\n

    A qualifier: I\u2019m not\u00a0quantifying these categories so as to prevent my head from exploding and so that they might be used more widely than in any one system \u2013 an important thing, in my view, to help consumers of meditation know what kind of training their teacher has.<\/p>\n

    A ground-swell of immediate implementation<\/h4>\n

    I\u2019m not quite dumb enough to think that this will catch on widely, but having seen a problem, I offer this as one solution \u2013 a solution from which thorns would grow.<\/p>\n

    By the way, I\u2019ve turned off the comment section here \u2013 \u201cDisqus\u201d was a bit much for me \u2013 but you can find me on Facebook and join the conversation about this topic there.<\/p>\n

    _____________________________<\/p>\n

    \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Unlike in 1984 when\u00a0the above photo was taken at the end of a practice period (Katagiri Roshi is up front and center, I\u2019m in the back on the right), meditation and mindfulness are booming and widely available. You can pick up basic meditation skills not only at dharma centers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":3595,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nA Modest Proposal: Facilitator, Teacher, Adept<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"            Unlike in 1984 when\u00a0the above photo was taken at the end of a practice period (Katagiri Roshi is up front and\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Modest Proposal: Facilitator, Teacher, Adept\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"            Unlike in 1984 when\u00a0the above photo was taken at the end of a practice period (Katagiri Roshi is up front and\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Wild Fox Zen\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dosho.port\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-08-25T14:04:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-01-26T02:11:11+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/88\/2017\/08\/20953761_759546937585892_3911715206195147910_n.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"640\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"450\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dosho Port\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dosho Port\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html\",\"name\":\"A Modest Proposal: Facilitator, Teacher, Adept\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2017-08-25T14:04:28+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-01-26T02:11:11+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/#\/schema\/person\/45224391b7690e99673782337bd0eabd\"},\"description\":\"            Unlike in 1984 when\u00a0the above photo was taken at the end of a practice period (Katagiri Roshi is up front and\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"A Modest Proposal: Facilitator, Teacher, Adept\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/\",\"name\":\"Wild Fox Zen\",\"description\":\"Living the Dream\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/#\/schema\/person\/45224391b7690e99673782337bd0eabd\",\"name\":\"Dosho Port\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7b9712e98924dea6c08d55890403352f?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7b9712e98924dea6c08d55890403352f?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Dosho Port\"},\"description\":\"Dosho Port began practicing Zen in 1977 and now co-teachers with his wife, Tetsugan Zummach, with the Vine of Obstacles Zen. Dosho received dharma transmission from Dainin Katagiri Roshi and inka shomei from James Myoun Ford Roshi in the Harada-Yasutani lineage. He is the author of \\\"Keep Me In Your Heart Awhile: The Haunting Zen of Dainin Katagiri,\\\" \\\"The Record of Empty Hall: One Hundred Classic Koans,\\\" and \\\"Going Through the Mystery's One Hundred Questions.\\\"\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.vineobstacleszen.com\/\",\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dosho.port\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/author\/doshoport\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"A Modest Proposal: Facilitator, Teacher, Adept","description":"            Unlike in 1984 when\u00a0the above photo was taken at the end of a practice period (Katagiri Roshi is up front and","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"A Modest Proposal: Facilitator, Teacher, Adept","og_description":"            Unlike in 1984 when\u00a0the above photo was taken at the end of a practice period (Katagiri Roshi is up front and","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html","og_site_name":"Wild Fox Zen","article_author":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dosho.port","article_published_time":"2017-08-25T14:04:28+00:00","article_modified_time":"2022-01-26T02:11:11+00:00","og_image":[{"width":640,"height":450,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/88\/2017\/08\/20953761_759546937585892_3911715206195147910_n.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Dosho Port","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Dosho Port","Est. reading time":"5 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html","name":"A Modest Proposal: Facilitator, Teacher, Adept","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/#website"},"datePublished":"2017-08-25T14:04:28+00:00","dateModified":"2022-01-26T02:11:11+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/#\/schema\/person\/45224391b7690e99673782337bd0eabd"},"description":"            Unlike in 1984 when\u00a0the above photo was taken at the end of a practice period (Katagiri Roshi is up front and","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2017\/08\/modest-proposal-facilitator-teacher-master.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"A Modest Proposal: Facilitator, Teacher, Adept"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/","name":"Wild Fox Zen","description":"Living the Dream","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/#\/schema\/person\/45224391b7690e99673782337bd0eabd","name":"Dosho Port","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7b9712e98924dea6c08d55890403352f?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7b9712e98924dea6c08d55890403352f?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Dosho Port"},"description":"Dosho Port began practicing Zen in 1977 and now co-teachers with his wife, Tetsugan Zummach, with the Vine of Obstacles Zen. Dosho received dharma transmission from Dainin Katagiri Roshi and inka shomei from James Myoun Ford Roshi in the Harada-Yasutani lineage. He is the author of \"Keep Me In Your Heart Awhile: The Haunting Zen of Dainin Katagiri,\" \"The Record of Empty Hall: One Hundred Classic Koans,\" and \"Going Through the Mystery's One Hundred Questions.\"","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.vineobstacleszen.com\/","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dosho.port"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/author\/doshoport"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/182"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3596"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3596\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3595"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}