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Master teachers are found not only on lonely mountaintops or in ashrams of the East. Our teachers may take the form of friends and adversaries— of clouds, animals, wind, and water. Moment to moment, our teachers reveal all we need to know. The question is, are we paying attention? When the student is ready, the teacher appears everywhere.

Q: I have read many books and attended more workshops than I can count. But I need a personal teacher to guide me. Don’t people need a teacher, guru, or guide to complete the journey?

A: Practicing in isolation can breed illusions; we come to know ourselves best in relationship with others. And while we can learn much from books, a personal teacher can tailor guidance to our individual temperament and needs. Buddhism and other traditions recommend the trinity of a teacher, a teaching, and a community of practitioners as the ideal learning environment. But it’s a minefield out there: Even genuine teachers are sometimes corrupted by the adulation of their devotees. So be wary and wise; keep your eyes as wide open as your heart. Teachers need to earn their students’ trust over time. Avoid any who demand complete devotion from the beginning. Pay attention less to what teachers say than to what they do. And notice: Do their students live a life to which you aspire? Are they kind, compassionate, balanced, healthy, honest, open, respectful? Do they show a sense of humor? If not, look elsewhere.

Your teachers are numberless— the offered welcome and agony inflicted; every event and every circumstance is your teacher. —Bauls verse

Our approach to teachers often corresponds to three stages of life: childhood, adolescence, or adulthood. Children seek a parent to guide and protect them, and make good followers (and some teachers are happy to play parent). Adolescents reject authority and have a skeptical view of most teachers. Adults apply intelligent discernment, and learn what they can, where they can, whether from fools or sages, friends or adversaries, animals, infants, or elders. We also learn through experience and circumstance, hardship and insight. Consider this story:

Zembu, a young samurai, had an affair with the wife of his superior. When discovered, he slew the nobleman in self-defense, then fled to a distant province. Unable to find employment, he became a thief, until one morning, in a flash of understanding, Zembu saw what he had made of his life. To atone for the harm he had done, he resolved to accomplish some good deed as a sincere act of repentance. Soon after, while walking on a dangerous road over a cliff that had caused the death of many persons, he decided to cut a tunnel through the mountain. Begging food to sustain himself during the day, Zembu dug each night. Thirty years later, when the tunnel was two-thousand feet long and within a few months of completion, Zembu was confronted by Katsuo, a young samurai who had come to kill him to avenge the death of his father, the nobleman whom Zembu had slain years before.

Pay attention to your enemies, for they are the first to reveal your mistakes. —Antisthenes

Facing Katsuo’s sword, Zembu said, “I will gladly give you my life if you will only allow me to complete my work.” So Katsuo awaited impatiently as several months passed and Zembu kept digging. Seeing that Zembu was nearing the end, and tired of doing nothing, Katsuo began to help Zembu dig. As they worked side by side, Katsuo came to admire the older man’s strong will and character. Finally the tunnel was finished; travelers could now pass safely.

We are all teachers; the question is not whether we will teach, but what. —Anonymous

Zembu turned to the young swordsman. “My work is done. You may cut off my head,” he said. Tears flowed from Katsuo’s eyes as he asked, “How can I cut off my own teacher’s head?”

According to an ancient proverb, “We have no friends; we have no enemies; we only have teachers.” Find wisdom in whatever form it appears.

Q: I’m twenty-two years old and seeking meaning in life. I was thinking of going to India in a year or two, for a few months. But I have a two-year-old son. I’m struggling to decide what is right and honorable. I want to learn all I can, but my son needs me. What would you advise?

A: Whether we travel on a pilgrimage or on vacation, exotic travel can be broadening and stimulating. But in today’s global village, the East holds no monopoly on wisdom. My travels revealed that there’s no place like home—because universal truths reveal themselves everywhere in daily life.

I view parenthood as a sacred responsibility and supreme teaching. Raising your child will demand and develop more capacities than sitting in a cave meditating, or stretching and breathing at an ashram. (I know because I’ve done them all.) The spiritual secrets are available here, in our own country, state, town, home, and heart. You are likely to find that the journeys you take through childhood with your son are as enriching as any you might make by boat or plane.

There is one Light but many lamps. —Proverb

And as you open the doors of perception, you will find your teachers not only in human form, but in the world of nature, in children and strangers, and in unexpected circumstance. For example, retired physician A. J. Cronin moved to a small farming community in Scotland to write his first novel. For many months he filled tablets of handwritten text, finally sending it to a typist in London. When the typed manuscript was returned, he gave it a fresh read and was shocked at his mediocre writing. Disgusted with his work, he walked out into a drizzling rain, abandoned his manuscript, throwing it into an ash pile, and wandered into the heath. There he met an old farmer, digging a drainage ditch in a boggy field. The farmer inquired about Cronin’s writing, and learned of the manuscript’s fate. The farmer paused a few moments, then said, “My father dug drainage ditches in this bog all his days but never made a pasture. I’ve done the same and not succeeded yet. But pasture or not, I know what my father knew—that if you only dig long enough, a pasture can be made.” Cronin walked back to the house, picked the manuscript out of the ashes, and dried it out in the oven. Then he want back to work, rewriting until it satisfied him. His book, Hatter’s Castle, was the first in a string of successful novels—all because of a teacher he found in a bog.

Everything in this world has a hidden meaning. . . . People, animals, trees, stars are all hieroglyphics. . . . We think they are really only people, animals, trees, stars. It is only years later. . . that some of us understand. —Nikos Kazantzakis

Our children, worth far more than any manuscript, grow so quickly. And the world will still be waiting when your son is old enough to travel with you, or to follow his own path as you pursue yours. So ask yourself what you want to look back on in the years to come—that you left home to find yourself or that you put your child first for the few years he was given into your care? You will find no higher calling, greater blessing, finer teacher, or more spiritual journey than the process of raising your child.

Personal Applications

Many of us believe that when we graduate from high school, college, or graduate school, our education is finished. But our true schooling has only begun as we shift from word lessons to world lessons. Throughout our lives, we meet (but don’t always recognize) an array of teachers, if we have the eyes to see, and the ears to listen.

In the Buddhist tradition, practitioners remind themselves that the Buddha is everywhere, and in everyone; they treat all beings with respect. Similarly, many Christians see Jesus, or a divine spark of God, shining within all beings; the same is true for many religions. Remembering this, we can find wise teachers where we once found only the ordinary. And, we can find a Buddha, a Jesus, a source of infinite wisdom inside ourselves as well. We have only to ask, and listen, and trust.

 List three or more people, situations, or experiences that have served as teachers for you.

 Next to each one, jot down in a few words what you learned.