The main sticking point for the future of Vajrayana Buddhism, imo. Good discussion, especially from Pema Khandro Rinpoche (a white woman lama who teaches in Berkeley, CA). 
@VincentHornhttps://www.lionsroar.com/guru-model/
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Pema Khandro Rinpoche points out that there *is no* The Guru Model. (That’s a caricature born of late-70s hysteria.) Teacher-student interactions in Vajrayana are highly varied, and often quite individualized. It’s rarely if ever a “model” in the sense of a formalized system.
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Replying to @Meaningness
In general, I think what people have in mind with “the guru model” is some sort of centralized hub and spoke schema, where students connect to the guru in a vertical relationship supported by a centralizing hierarchy.pic.twitter.com/FLcBiP5y4y
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Replying to @VincentHorn
Ah… then “it’s not the shape, it’s the specific power dynamics” seems the right diagnosis (or a significant part of one).
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Replying to @Meaningness @VincentHorn
OTOH it seems that the rejection of “The Guru Model” is often a blanket rejection of any asymmetrical relationship. It’s usually contrasted with “The Spiritual Friend Model,” which sounds nice because friendship is a symmetrical relationship. But that model doesn’t exist either…
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Replying to @Meaningness @VincentHorn
This is where I personally get stuck when trying to imagine a future Vajrayana. As long as those simplistic alternatives are the only available conceptions of teachers, it’s impossible.
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Replying to @Meaningness
I’ve experienced profound transmission experiences with close teachers, and have entered into insanely deep relationships with students. I see this reflected in my cohort of peers also, though it isn’t talked about openly much...
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Replying to @VincentHorn
Yes, it seems delicate. But if there’s a way of talking about it openly, that might be of great value.
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Replying to @Meaningness
How does one convey the profound dropping off of individuality that occurred, for ex, after an exchange in which I shared a dream with an older female teacher that involved anal sex? This shocked the people who were there witnessing it at the time, all of them teachers!
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Replying to @VincentHorn
That’s really funny, partly because I had very similar experiences with my first serious Buddhist teacher (also an older woman). She later told me she thought I was testing her, to see if she was unflappable, which she was. I wasn’t, though; I already trusted her for that.
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(and, come to think of it, since I was tweeting about her, someone told me they thought I was testing Pema Khandro Rinpoche in that way too, and I also wasn’t, I was just being me and trusting that she was not going to freak about it)
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Replying to @Meaningness @VincentHorn
maybe this is actually a central point, that if the student trusts the teacher’s capacity, it makes it easy for the teacher to respond accurately, outside of social convention
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Replying to @Meaningness
Yeah, I think so. And as
@EmilyHorn points out all the time, "trust is earned." I can see why it's difficult, or maybe even impossible, to formalize and institutionalize the conditions that lead to this kind of deep trust & confidence.0 replies 0 retweets 1 like
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