=kit030ps.txt	
Kaivan KIT 30, p=PLUS additional test included in the SO
s=SURESENES KIT 31

KIT 30 - The Guru Syndrome

[ This is the Kaivan text of KIT 30, to which I will now add
passages in the SO SURESNES KIT 31 version that are not included
in the Kaivan KIT 30 version. 
I will bracket passages from the SO SURESNES KIT 31 version, and
head them:  'SOS:' 
Ny impression is that it is the Kaivan version that is the later
and fuller version ]



"To become conscious of inner contradictions, he must perforce act
out the conflict and be torn into opposite halves."
 C. G.  JUNG

"There is a pair of opposites in all things; in each there exists
the spirit of the opposite.[ SOS: ...What we are looking for is a
human spirit.""
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

" I am at the midst of my true life; I am most deeply myself." 
C. G. JUNG  

"What we are looking for is a human spirit. The personality is the
fruit on the tree of life." 
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

[ SOS:  Those in a position of authority, or whom people look up
to as an example, are called upon by the very function they assume
to nourish and nurture people with an idealized image, which is so
important for so many people in helping them to overcome their
disenchantment in the sordidness of much of our society and to
upgade their own inadequate self-image.  This is the reason why so
many, particularly young people, hae flocked around the gurus in
our day and age. ]



It has become clear to me that, because I have been emphasizing
the idyllic dimension of people and the environment while
underplaying the 'shadow,' mureeds have been lulled into a
highfaluted image of themselves and of myself which matches
neither the reality of their being nor of mine and brooks
contradictions in how they handle situations.

"The ideal is the means, but its breaking is the goal."
 PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

Here, my own idealistic temperament carries over into others, for
one thing because my ideal of the sublime mirrors an archetype and
aspiration latent and pressing as a nostalgia in those coming to
me for spiritual nourishment, and furthermore, because of the
impact that the 'guru image' has on those in contact with him/her.
Nourishing this splendid dimension is so important for so many
people in helping them to overcome their disenchantment in the
sordidness of much of our society and to overcome their inadequate
self-image. But if one fails to make the connection between this
level of reality and the existential conditions, one runs the risk
of escaping from real situations into wishful thinking, also
thinking of oneself as special, whereas everyone is special in
his/her own way.

"Great people have great faults; it is their greatness that is
their greatest fault."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

Living up to that image to nurture the need of the guru image in
people forces 

[ SOS:  all those in a leadaership position] 


me, (although I have consistently disavowed such an
auspicious status) and indeed all those in a leadership position,
into a role in which one runs the danger of neglecting to confront
one's own defects and weaknesses or inadequacies

[ SOS:  and sporting an unreal image that fosters a sense of
unreality in the pupils and fails to equip them with meeting real
life situations. ]

Because of a pupil's awe in the face of the aura of eminence of
the guru, it is sometimes difficult to unmask the justifying
faculty of the mind resorted to by a person who is looked upon as
an example. Thearguments offered often scramble the issue by
flauntingcontradictions, ascribing them for example, to 

[ SOS:  mysterious ambiguities ]


the "reconciliation of the irreconcilables" 

instead of striking a balance between clearly defined choices.
This is a typical guru syndrome which we are witnessing in our
time:  masking contradictions, instead of recognizing their
incongruity and correcting them.

"Those who try to make virtues out of their faults grope further
and further into darkness. The way to overcome error is first to
admit one's fault, and next to refrain from repeating it."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN
                                          
[ Note (sa):  Similarly, it is said in religious Judaism, that the
way to attone for a sin is:  First to admit it; next, to do
whatever one can to 'fix' (tikun ) the damage that one has caoused
by it, and then, to undertake never to do that sin again. ]

The consequence of masking contradictions is the conflict and
confusion that these ambiguities arouse in oneself and in others.
Since in the drama of real life one senses how important the image
is for people "out there", those in a leadership position fear
that, should they admit criticism, they would spoil that image.
However, by justifying oneself, one deprives oneself of the
opportunity of ever progressing. The image cannot hold long unless
matched by the reality of one's personality, so that in the end,
one's scruple to uphold one's image to help people defeats its own
end.
                  
[ Footnote (sa) kit030s__1 ]



"It is no use trying to prove what you are not. If you begin at
the end, you will end at the beginning."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

Anybody volunteering to embody the archetype representing people's
higher self will have to choose between artfully concealing one's
shadow, and when discovered, stand on one's high horse, justifying
it hypocritically, or alternatively, by putting oneself on the
line, be open to be exposed to scrutiny and criticism by all.

[ Foonote (sa) kit030s__reputation ]

Should one have the honesty and courage to confront one's
shortcomings, one will, in addition, better understand people's
problems through seeing oneself in others and others in oneself,
thus affording real help to those who also need to transmute their
shadow. Clearly, how could one expect to help another if one has
not experienced their problems oneself and dealt with them
constructively?

"You discover your own faults in the faults of others."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

By justifying oneself, one blunts one's ability to earmark one's
defects.

"All impulses originate in the divine impulse but get limited and
distorted in man."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

The human personality acts as a lens distorting the divine
impulse. 

[ SOS:  Our pristine nature gets distoreted in our personality. ]

For example, wrath facing injustice gets distorted as
hatred, or mastery as an ego trip; love as possessiveness or
nobility as vanity; compassion as indulgence, condoning, or truth
as callousness; cautious responsibility as fear or timorousness.
If one is not extremely scrupulous about being honest to oneself,
one tends to fail to recognize this distortion and firmly believes
that one is acting under the higher impulse.

Our personality acts as a lens, distorting our divine inheritance,
as in the picture of Dorian Gray. 

However, this distortion can be
redressed by confronting it with its archetype, just like light
distorted by a concave lens can be reconstituted to its original
pattern by a convex lens. Caruso's voice distorted by the
recording machines can be restored to its original beauty just as
if we were able to reverse the arrow of time. Even so, our divine
nature, suffering from defilement like a distorted exemplar of a
perfect archetype, can be reinstated in its pristine glory.

This requires one to match a divine quality latent in divine
inheritance with its distortion in our personality without
slipping into a guilt complex or a state of despondent self-
denigration. The role played by the ideal becomes evident when one
realizes that one cannot compensate for the distortion we have
inflicted upon our divine inheritance without referring back to
the divine model. Conversely, the ideal can only be known in and
by means of its exemplification which is perforce distorted.

It is only if one is able to recognize one's inadequacies as a
distortion of that very ideal to which one pays lip-service that
this ideal can operate in transmuting the 'shadow,' thereby
realizing the divine legacy in our being so that it may become a
reality in our personality. 

To know what one's defects are, all
one needs is to recognize one's qualities and earmark the
distortions of those qualities in one's personality. It is this
very distortion of a quality that stands as an obstacle to
developing that very quality. Should one fail to admit and
confront the defect, that very defect will, by the synchronistic
interplay in our relationships with people, call a situation in
which we are placed before the choice either of applying the
defective idiosyncrasy in handling the situation, or the divine
quality of which the former was a distortion.

PIR-O-MURSHID was very aware of the hazards of the transference
syndrome and warned people about role playing.

"Every soul has its own way of life; if you wish to follow
another's way, you must borrow his eyes to see."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

A further disadvantage of the guru image strikes clearly:  if
mureeds or representatives think of me as the image they have
projected upon me rather than the real person, they run the risk
of going wrong if they assume that my advice is absolute.

"Do not take the example of another as an excuse for your
wrongdoing. One should take oneself to task instead of putting
one's fault upon another. Overlook the greatest fault of another,
but do not partake of it in the smallest degree."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

Much as I make it clear that neither I or the representatives are
entitled to give advice to mureeds as to what to do, some still
try to read, in the inflections of my voice, how I feel about a
situation. Failing this, they think that, assuming I must have
higher guidance, that they need to try to capture this guidance,
whereas they run the risk of wishful thinking!

Representatives, particularly, and those active in spreading the
message tend to model themselves upon my own life pattern which is
practically 99% dedicated to service at the cost of my private
life. In this instance, genetic traces of my atavistic ancestry of
sannyasins and dervishes and my own temperament that prioritizes
service above anything else sets a challenge that people tend to
emulate. Here once more, the guru transference image acts
adversely, though I warn people not to consider me as a guru or
even as an example. People get burnt out, while I go on striding
ahead apparently unscathed. This accounts for many representatives
handing in their resignations because of being increasingly aware
of the stress incurred by accumulating the responsibility of
service with the need of matching up their job and the care of
their families.

In as much as I am fully aware of this issue in my life, my choice
is involved. Assuredly I am becoming increasingly sensitive to the
need for balance here, yet I must follow my conscience.

"The way you choose is the way for you."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

Pir-o-Murshid saw the need for people to give some satisfaction to
their personal emotions. In the foregoing, the wisdom of Pir-o-
Murshid comes through with clear evidence:

"Balance is the keynote of spiritual attainment. A virtue carried
too far may become a sin. The fulfillment of life is by being
human."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

Had CHRIST not already warned: 
"Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to
God."       

[ Note (sa): as I recall PVK noting in alecture, when Jesus made
that remark, he held up a coin with the image of Caesar on it. 
The implication being, since it is written that man in made in the
image -- b_Tsalem -- of G_d, that one must consecrate one's divine
image to the Sacred ]

Pir-o-Murshid gave space to people's need for love, for
recognition, for self-esteem, for fulfillment in achievement, for
security while equally giving satisfaction to the need for
ecstasy, for freedom, for glorification, for the discovery of the
divine in one, for sacredness:

"He who can live up to this ideal is the king of life. Devotion is
proved by sacrifice."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

I have to shatter your image of me so that I may make my ideal a
reality and you will have to shatter it also, and what is more,
any replication of that image in you, especially if a
representative or coordinator in The Sufi Order. Since we are so
inextricably intermeshed I will have to recognize myself in both
your ideal and your idiosyncrasies, as you may recognize yourself
in my ideal and in my failures without the screen of your image of
me or my image of you confusing the issue.

May our ideals resonate like the multiple projections of mirrors
placed face to face, cross-pollinating each other, while we strive
in our interconnectedness to make these ideals a reality in our
lives so that restored to their pristine splendor, our ideals may
fertilize our personalities.
    
==================================================================

COMMENTS FROM THE PEANUT GALLERY:  

[ That is, Comments by sa ]

[ and I (sa) recall many nice sunny afternoons, sitting out in the
bleachers at Fenway Park, eating roast peanuts and maybe drinking
a beer ]     

----------------------------------------------------------------

[ Footnote (sa) kit030s__1 ]

[ Note (sa):  I would add that one should not refrain from noting
the weaknesses nor editting out embarassing utterances of a great
leader, for those give those of us who are struggling to accept
and forgive our own humanity, not to mention mortality, a deeper
and much more useful model of his greatness. 

And that is my aphorism (ca. 1988), a play if not parody on Pirke
Avot:  "He who gives less heed to the tora of women than to the
torah of men, will in the end inherit Gehinnon."
What I want to say is:  a woman knows that to be tameh is not to
have lost, even temporarily, one's spirituality.  But most men
secretly don't, and so furtively try to mask it all. 

The most common example of tameh is a sexual charge or discharge,
including menstruation and childbirth. 
Recognizing the accompanying sense of shame or uncleanliness, not
to mention simple hygiene, the Bible said:  wash it water, wait
till evening, and then forget about it.

PVK recalls that whenever one of the children did wrong, HIK would
assign them a punishment, though quite an unpainful one, and
surely never a degrading one -- eg, to run around the garden a
number of times. ] 


"Those who try to make virtues out of their faults grope further
and further into darkness. The way to overcome error is first to
admit one's fault, and next to refrain from repeating it."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN
                                          
[ Note (sa):  Similarly, it is said in religious Judaism, that the
way to attone for a sin is:  First to admit it; next, to do
whatever one can to 'fix' (tikun ) the damage that one has caoused
by it, and then, to undertake never to do that sin again. ]

[ Foonote (sa) kit030s__reputation ]
[ Note (sa):  Cf. HIK, Collected Sayings, 357: "Either take good
care of your reputation, or do not care for it at all."
Personally, sometimes appearing to be what some might deem not
impeccably elegant, I had fondly supposed that HIK would allow the
latter alternative, as a sort of 'way of the dervish' I suppose. 
But considering some of his other remarks on reputation in
Collected Sayings, now I ain't sure of that. ]

