WHAT IF THE SEARCH FOR THE INNER MASTER HIDES DISTRUST?
The analytical, philosophical, thinking and controlling mind will do anything in order to hide the fact that it cannot trust.
During the course of this first part on the subject, I want to dedicate myself to introducing the bottom-line concept that arises when we talk about disciples and/or masters. I am referring to the fact of confronting our own personality’s dominant or submissive side. There are those who give orders and others who obey. There are predators and preys. There are bosses and employees. There are politicians and citizens. There are creators and spectators. According to research, 80% of people belong in the second group. Thus it was inevitable that in the spiritual field the figure of master and disciple had been developed in order to reflect the same human nature; that, even though we are all equal before creation, we are not equal among ourselves. Given that we are getting into the master-disciple relationship, we will be also getting into the perception of superiority and inferiority or wisdom and ignorance. We will be addressing different derivations of this central subject because it is both complex and practical.
The role-playing game created by these characters can really be of benefit or detriment any person’s inner evolution process. A disciple may be stuck being a follower their whole life, or a master may be stuck being a guide their whole life, something that might be a great obstacle in their processes. Because the meaning of this role-playing game is to resolve very deep issues of the human conditioned nature.
In general, the need to be one thing or another arises, but never both things at the same time, or neither of them, nor are we expected to alter roles. It seems that parallelism or neutrality are non-admitted attitudes in a dual and extremist world. This makes me wonder: What if it were possible to be disciple and master at the same time? What if we are neither master nor disciple? So what is the purpose of having created these roles for thousands of years? Couldn’t it be that the only way to access the hidden purpose of this relationship was to become unidentified with these figures?
It is pretty much obvious and more than proven that there are people who are more connected than others, human beings that are more capable than others at getting into the art of understanding complex existential issues. So, why are we not taking advantage of their ability to save time and effort to others? If there’s someone who can indicate to me or teach me things that would take a lot of time for me to figure out by myself, why wouldn’t I use this favour this person is offering me so I can move forward faster than I could if I did it by myself? This question becomes shallow when compared to the profound purpose hidden in this stratagem.
A great learning related to trust is at stake deep beneath this master-disciple relationship. The challenge of healing or dissolving distrust. Different masteries have been based on the master-disciple relationship since forever, considering both a human phenomenon of interdependency directed at guidance, confrontation and wisdom transmission. The disciple opens up, questions, observes and obeys; the master responds, enlightens, shows, activates, confronts, awakens and transmits. This will be until the disciple is able to discover them-self and leave the relationship with the master in order to follow their own path. But most often than not the central core of this relation is left out: to heal mistrust and learn to trust.
Distrust is a choice. If it is has already been taken there’s nothing left to do. Distrust is one of the most essential and unnatural choices taken in life, it’s THE most tragic DECISION we can make. But this decision has lead millions of people from all over the world to build a life without foundation, with great cracks and structural flaws that are irreparable unless the house is destroyed and built over from scratch. There are a lot of honest people that don’t hide their distrust. They have their reasonable reasons, they live with it and that’s it. They get used to living like that and it even works well to relieve the fear and insecurity, even though it doesn’t make them happy. Still there are others that when they do some inner work or some therapy that shows them the distrust in which they live, they realize how limiting it is and since it’s not a reality they can dissolve, the only thing left to do is to try and decorate it or embellish it, as if it were a façade that needs to be fixed or the interior walls of a house. They try applying thick layers of paint, so that it doesn’t look cracked everywhere. In these cases the inner master concept plays a major role in the creation of one of the most sophisticated lies.
This is why we need to be very attentive to the possibility of deceiving ourselves through the idea of THE INNER MASTER SEARCH. Because such quest hides a very dangerous trap: the possibility of getting stuck in the belief that we can find it, or  even worse, the possibility of believing we have found it. Every day I run into more and more people that assure me they have found their inner master, but they still haven’t dissolved their choice to distrust. They still haven’t trusted anything external. Whoever believes they have found their inner master and continues to distrust, will find himself in a suicidal conflict. Every master that hides within us is suicidal and will end up leading us to the higher levels of self-deceit. And the higher we climb without real foundations, the harder and more dangerous the fall is going to be. Self-deceit will improve the belief that we are doing well, even though this isn’t real. Because that is what distrusting does:  it creates pseudo internal achievements, making you feel you have accomplished something. This is because the intention of distrust is for you to continue being the same, changing nothing, not destroying the foundations that support everything you believe yourself to be, and creating the illusory feeling of transcendence or overcoming. This may lead you to think that you don’t need anything. That you are awake or even enlightened so that you don’t re-evaluate your life. But then you reach a point, a situation, an outcome that somehow proves you that you are in an illusory cloud, and there’s nothing supporting you. You realize that what you thought were inner conquests are mere inquiries, that you are not even close to the unknown or the magnificence of mystery. This is where self-deception comes crumbling down. The time has come for you to realize that you are distrusting and therefore, you are a disciple, not a master of yourself. As long as you continue to distrust, you’ll keep needing masters.
We should never forget that distrust is what makes a disciple, yet trust makes a master. The relationship between both of them is the reconciliation between trust and distrust. What goes on in this relation is the topic that has filled countless libraries containing stories, tales and anecdotes telling the essential struggle of these two possibilities to face life: to trust or distrust.
We have been taught to distrust ever since we were children. This is why it is extremely difficult to remove that cornerstone upon which our life projects have been created. Distrust weakens and divides us, leaving us fit to be manipulated. If there’s no conscious collapse or demolition of what we have built upon distrust, whatever we try to do on top of that foundation will be weak and inconsistent. Every master aims for the dissolution of distrust with great precision as it is the nucleus that holds together all conditioning. But in order to do so, we need to remove every brick that has been put on top of it, until that cornerstone is left totally uncovered.
The spiritual, therapeutical, philosophical, mystic and shamanic community that gathers millions of people from all over the world who are on the quest of personal growth and inner development is full of distrusting people that hide this very well. What I am reporting here is the self-deception stage that one easily reaches after skipping steps in the inner evolution process. Skipping the step of dissolving distrust leads us to a dead-end, a spiral that makes us spin around trying to prove something we haven’t achieved. Realizing this means going backwards to figure out where we have deceived ourselves so we can continue from a real set point in our process.
For many people it is so hard to acknowledge that they are still distrusting. So much so that they need to argue, demand, criticize and complain in order to channel such an enormous frustration, and to explain the reason why they are escaping. From there on, all sorts of preventive measures are taken to give them a security they don’t possess, such as defining escapism as a call from a place of feeling. This is where the expression “I feel like I must continue my path” comes from. Transforming the flight impulse into a call from the heart is so easy anyone can do it, and just by using some magic words they create a belief. People who avoid confronting situations’ favourite phrase is “I will follow my heart”, especially when the time has come for them to observe their distrust. They don’t want to continue being in a place that’s going to confront them with their own distrust. That’s why they use this cliché and suspicious phrase. In order to escape what they weren’t able to overcome and to continue believing they are doing the right thing.
If you are facing a situation that confronts you, puts pressure on you, makes you uncomfortable or doesn’t leave you much room to escape, you may consider giving up, because you are facing the mastery of life. If you surrender to this situation, you may save yourself a lot of years of inner work and a lot of money in courses and experiences. You will be cornering yourself, acknowledging you are a disciple of life.
We are facing a time in which the figure of master and disciple has transformed, even though deep down they are still the same. When life puts you in a corner, pay very close attention because you are in front of the greatest master. The time has come for you to trust.
Alberto José Varela
The next topics that will be addressed in part two and three of THE INNER MASTER FALLACY:
THE LIMITATION HIDDEN BY THE SEARCH FORÂ INDEPENDENCE.
THE FAKE EMPOWERMENT STRATEGY.
TO NEED A TEACHER IS TO NEED A FATHER THAT ACCEPTS US AND DISCIPLINES US.
DIFFERENCES BETWEENÂ THEÂ INNER MASTER AND INNER MASTERY.
“YOUR” INNER MASTER IS YOUR EVOLUTION’S WORST ENEMY.
THE POWER STRUGGLE BETWEEN THE INTERNAL AND THE EXTERNAL.
PACHAMAMA IS THE MOTHER AND GREAT SPIRIT IS THE FATHER.
THE EXTINCTION OF DISCIPLES AND THE PROLIFERATION OF MASTERS.
THE GREAT DISPUTE BETWEEN OBEYING AND DISOBEYING.
THE FEAT OF SPIRITUALIZING THE EGO AND THE CHALLENGEÂ OFÂ DETHRONINGÂ IT.