ABC Guide to Finding Your Spiritual Teacher

In the esoteric and alternative world, there is a jungle of offerings and teachers. As a seeker, it can be challenging to navigate through all the available options. Here you’ll get tips on how to orient yourself in this often complex terrain, how to analyze your needs, and how to find a suitable spiritual teacher that fits you while avoiding the biggest pitfalls.

The article ABC Guide to Finding Your Spiritual Teacher is written from the perspective of an engineer and pragmatist. Although I have worked professionally as a spiritual teacher and guide for many years, I rarely lose the academic’s perspective on things.

We live in an era where alternative medicine, holistic thinking, and healing are more or less accepted, and where practitioners can exercise their skills without fear of persecution, torture, or being burned at the stake.

The last 30 years have seen an explosion in available offerings. Just some decades ago, it was challenging to find books about meditation, shamanism, healing, and similar topics. Today, well-stocked bookstores have shelves upon shelves of material about alternative medicine. Additionally, there’s a wealth of information available on the internet. When you Google “healing,” you get millions of results!

On one hand, it’s fantastic that we have access to such abundant information and offerings. This ensures that there’s definitely something out there that suits each one of us who has an interest in alternative practices.

A Jungle of Offerings

On the other hand, it’s easy to get lost in such a vast and complex jungle. One can become easily confused. Most topics have teachers and books that present completely different views and opinions about what’s right – and everyone claims to be conveying the truth. What should a seeker do who, for example, wants to learn more about what a chakra is? How does one separate the wheat from the chaff when it comes to offerings and teachers?

This is obviously a sensitive topic, but it’s a significant problem in the alternative industry that there’s much that’s unreliable. There are few or no control mechanisms to verify how qualified a provider is, and anyone can claim they offer the truth since it’s nearly impossible for a layperson to expose charlatans.

In recent years, several alternative associations have emerged that are government-approved. This development is very positive. Here, members must satisfy certain criteria and possess specific competencies. This means the probability of finding a suitable, legitimate offering is higher for the seeker. However, one still cannot be completely certain about the quality of what’s being offered.

It’s crucial to distinguish between two types of development. In esoteric development, one seeks to learn techniques and methods to enhance abilities such as healing, channeling, and aura reading. The offerings in this field are extensive, and there’s minimal risk in choosing an instructor.

Spiritual development refers to activities and personal growth aimed at connecting more deeply with one’s essence and soul. The market offerings here are more limited, and finding high-quality, qualified programs is more challenging. The remainder of this article primarily focuses on how to find the right spiritual teacher for your journey.

Consciousness and Self-Responsibility

Ultimately, we must bear the consequences of our choices. A key focus in my practice is helping my clients and students become more conscious of their lives and decisions. Through information and knowledge, one can expand their awareness regarding any subject. The goal is to assist you in achieving greater consciousness when selecting your spiritual teacher.

It then becomes your responsibility to take charge of your life by acting based on your expanded awareness, hopefully motivated by qualities of the heart rather than fear.

I believe in individuals’ ability to navigate the market independently. This way, you’re not dependent on others’ claims and beliefs but can make choices based on relevant awareness and knowledge using your own sound judgment.

My Personal Experience

Since 2004, I’ve been a professional teacher in shamanism, meditation, reiki, and other areas of alternative medicine and spiritual development. Throughout these years, I’ve encountered numerous students and clients across multiple countries who suffered after engaging with unethical spiritual teachers and healers. The consequences ranged from being misinformed to being brainwashed by cult leaders, leaving them unable to live normal lives anymore.

To analyze whether what you’ve learned and done in spiritual development is working, there’s one main criterion: Has my life changed positively in practical and tangible ways? Has my health improved? Have my romantic relationships and family life gotten better? Am I more satisfied at work? Do I find more meaning in life? Am I fundamentally happier on a daily basis? Has my mental and emotional well-being improved? Do I have more genuine friendships?

I often have clients who come to me as a “last” resort. Many have attended alternative courses and training in “spiritual development” for years. The first thing I ask is: What has changed practically in your life since you began your development? I’m often met with incredulous looks that speak volumes. It’s of little benefit to spend hours daily “channeling energy” if you’re not creating a better, more meaningful, and happier life!

In recent years, I’ve compiled a simple framework to constructively analyze the market offerings for seekers. Here, I’ll cover a condensed version of this. In the esoteric market, there’s a good selection of serious and highly qualified teachers across most disciplines. The art lies in finding them – and often, the best ones aren’t the loudest…

Analyze Your Needs

As a first step, it’s crucial to analyze your needs. I recommend spending ample time on this since the rest of your search will depend on a thorough needs analysis. Here’s an example of some points to consider:

• What are your needs? Do you want an introduction to techniques and methods to develop your skills, or do you desire a fundamental change in your life? In other words, are you seeking esoteric or spiritual development?
• Is your health robust enough if the teacher is based in India or Japan? A thorough needs analysis can save you considerable time, energy, frustration, and most importantly, money.
• If you’re unfamiliar with spirituality and spiritual development, it’s advisable to explore various paths such as meditation, shamanism, tantra, reiki, yoga, esoteric Hinduism, esoteric Buddhism, esoteric Taoism, Sufism, Wicca, Kabbalah, and more. What resonates with you most? Which practice do you believe could fulfill your desires and address your challenges practically within a measurable timeframe?
• What resources do you have at your disposal in terms of time, money, and energy?
• Do you have support at home for potential developmental crises? The themes that emerge may cause temporary emotional instability, requiring support from your loved ones. This is particularly relevant in spiritual development, as it focuses on freeing your heart through healing what blocks it. These blockages might include anxiety, fear, trauma, addictions, and compensatory mechanisms that developed after trauma.

Esoteric vs. Spiritual Development

In the alternative market, most offerings are marketed as “spiritual development.” I find it important to distinguish between esoteric and spiritual development concepts. This distinction will make it easier to navigate the various offerings based on your needs.

The more unclear the soup, the harder it is to determine its contents. Most offerings in the alternative world involve skill development and are therefore esoteric development.

The next step is to determine whether you need esoteric or spiritual development.

Esoteric development is ideal if you’re primarily interested in developing your abilities and talents. You’ll learn various methods and techniques such as healing, hands-on healing, channeling, reading, aura reading, ESP (extrasensory perception), mind reading, telepathy, clairvoyance, mediumship, and more.

This path is suitable if you’re a therapist looking to learn new methods to help your clients, or if you’re curious about exploring your innate abilities. Most parapsychological abilities (perception beyond our everyday senses), also known as “siddhis” in Sanskrit, are relatively straightforward to develop since these abilities already exist in a dormant state in most people.

Often, a weekend seminar combined with some practice is sufficient. However, if you wish to master more complex siddhis, such as manifesting ash in your palms or creating ectoplasm, you’ll need intensive practice over many years. To develop your abilities and talents, you’ll need an esoteric teacher who can guide you through various techniques and methods. The range of options and offerings in this field is extensive.

Once you’ve determined what you want to learn, it’s advisable to contact two or three different teachers who teach your area of interest. Ask them about the course content and what you’ll be capable of doing after completion. Also inquire about the duration and intensity of practice needed to achieve concrete objectively measurable results. My advice is to focus on practical and concrete outcomes you can expect after the course.

Escape or Presence

When facing a difficult and troubled life, it’s tempting to seek solutions that help escape from one’s current reality. Through escape, the pain may become less noticeable, but running away never solves the underlying problems. Pain medication might help neutralize the discomfort from weekly weekend migraines temporarily, but it won’t address the root cause. As dependency develops, the pain relief becomes increasingly less effective.

Here are some examples of esoteric methods that can be used/misused as escape tools: astral travel, dream journeys, guided meditations, wandering in other dimensions, meditation (several hours daily), hermit-like existence, most forms of protection against “dark energies,” enveloping oneself in violet light clouds, and similar practices.

These methods can, of course, also be used for constructive development. Any method aimed at disconnecting us from living and feeling our daily life in a practical and concrete way is considered an escape method. This means that most methods can be misused if one chooses to do so. The benchmark is always whether the method provides practical and sustainable results in your daily life.

If the goal is to become pain-free without medication, escaping from the problem won’t help. Here, it’s beneficial to call a spade a spade while observing your problems in the present moment. This allows you to take practical action to begin solving the issue. In many cases, a fundamental lifestyle change is necessary.

Spiritual Development

If you wish to get closer to your essence and soul, you need to pursue a path of genuine spiritual development. Our soul is our essence that reincarnates again and again (seen from a linear perspective). It can provide answers about who we truly are, what our real needs are, what can make us fundamentally happy and joyful, and what gives life meaning.

A spiritual development path is ideal for those seeking deeper meaning in life. Spiritual development focuses on personal growth, healing of issues and problems that prevent you from living a healthy, happy, and meaningful life. Spiritual enlightenment and self-realization are the ultimate goals. Additionally, you learn esoteric methods and techniques to help with the above tasks, though these are viewed merely as tools.

Here are some examples of paths that can offer spiritual development: meditation (in its true sense focusing on mental stillness – not guided meditations and dream journeys), shamanism, tantra, yoga, Zen, esoteric Hinduism, esoteric Buddhism, esoteric Taoism, Sufism, Wicca, and more.

What characterizes most genuine spiritual development paths is that you need to engage in long-term education with your teacher. True spiritual development cannot be achieved by merely attending occasional weekend seminars.

If this is what you desire, you need a qualified spiritual teacher who can guide you toward spiritual enlightenment (see the articles on Spiritual Enlightenment).

A spiritual teacher is there to help expand your consciousness. What you think you want to learn is only the beginning steps.

How to Analyze a Potential Spiritual Teacher?

You can use these three criteria to analyze a spiritual teacher:

• Does the teacher focus on making you dependent or independent?

• Is the teacher rhetorically manipulative, or do they express themselves in language you understand?

• Does the teacher operate from fear-based or heart-based motivation?

• Does the teacher use statements like: I have all the answers, I know everything, I’m the only one with the solution, and you’re stupid if you don’t follow me, you don’t need to learn from or listen to anyone else but me, I’m enlightened and therefore don’t need to learn anything more, I’m perfect without flaws, all you need to do is stay close to me, then everything will work out?

My advice is to stay far away from those who use fear and/or are manipulative in their marketing and teaching. Fear encompasses all forms of fear-orientation, jealousy, envy, greed, hatred, egocentrism, xenophobia, intolerance, non-acceptance of others, competition anxiety, fear of other belief systems, and so on.

The more fear-oriented a teacher is, the further they are from their soul and spiritual enlightenment/self-realization. Therefore, such a teacher is unsuitable to help others get closer to their essence and soul, which is the main goal of all genuine spiritual development.

A good spiritual teacher will always respect your free will and won’t try to “retain” you if you wish to go in a different direction. They have no need to be elevated as an icon or guru where you’re not allowed to freely express your critical opinions.

Six Concrete Tips

Determining a teacher’s competence is much more challenging since most seekers lack the expertise, experience, or knowledge to evaluate proficiency in an unfamiliar field. I recommend doing the following:

1. Review the teacher’s books and publications. Does the teacher communicate in clear, understandable language that provides practical knowledge you can apply in your daily life, or do they write in vague, esoteric terms that offer little concrete value?

2. Conduct online research. What does the teacher say about themselves, and what do others say about them? Remember that the internet is a platform where anyone can publish anything.

3. If possible, attend a lecture or seminar conducted by the teacher. Ask questions about things you don’t understand. How does the teacher respond to your questions? Are they supportive and willing to explain until you understand, or do they come across as arrogant, rhetorical, and dismissive? This reveals much about how the teacher interacts with their students. How’s your chemistry with the teacher? Does their teaching style suit you?

4. Examine the results achieved by the teacher’s students. In my view, this is the ultimate factor in evaluating a teacher. Search online for student testimonials, or if you attend a seminar, speak with students directly. It’s wise to talk with them when the teacher isn’t present. Ask how their lives have practically improved during their time of study. Be wary of vague statements like “Yes, I feel so much better.” Your task is to look beyond such dreamy language by asking direct questions about concrete life changes in areas like health, relationships, career, friendships, happiness, perspectives, and similar aspects. By thoroughly interviewing perhaps three to five students, you’ll gain a solid foundation for assessing the teacher’s competence and whether they align with your goals. However, if you’re dealing with a cult-like organization, questioning students may not be helpful as they’re likely to be indoctrinated. More on this in the next section.

5. Observe how the teacher and their senior students receive you. The students’ reaction to you as a newcomer (whether welcoming or dismissive) reveals much about how the teacher interacts with others.

6. All that glitters is not gold! Celebrity status doesn’t necessarily indicate a teacher’s quality. A teacher’s media appearances, magazine features, published articles (like this one), TV appearances, or authored books don’t automatically guarantee their competence.

Cults – A Dangerous Pitfall

Religious cults are a phenomenon familiar to most people. In the esoteric and alternative market, numerous cults also exist. Determining what constitutes a cult can be challenging, as most present a polished, glossy image to the outside world.

Defining a cult can be complex – there are as many definitions of cults as there are experts studying them. Dag Hareide, who has worked with children and young people in cults for many years, has presented a 10-point checklist for identifying cults. If a group or congregation satisfies multiple points on this list, there’s reason for caution.

Dag Hareide’s Cult Checklist

1. The cult possesses the truth.

2. The cult leader holds the power.

3. The cult maintains strong and simple enemy images.

4. Members undergo identity changes upon joining.

5. The cult exercises social control.

6. The cult maintains an internal enemy.

7. The ends justify the means.

8. The cult develops its own language that becomes a closed universe.

9. Knowledge within the cult is hierarchical and esoteric (secret/hidden).

10. Leaving the cult is met with sanctions.

The consequences of being drawn into a manipulative and destructive cult can be severe and, in the worst cases, can destroy a person’s life. I have personally experienced the emotional impact of being ostracized from a cult. When I was young, my father chose to leave a well-known religious cult in Norway, facing all the repercussions that decision entailed.

In my practice as a spiritual teacher, I have encountered numerous individuals who have emerged from esoteric cults. The problems they face range from mild persecution anxiety, depression, and damage to their energy system to severe physical and emotional issues that prevent them from living a normal life.

Consequences

Finding a competent spiritual teacher is of utmost importance in the quest for a better and more meaningful life. Based on my professional experience, here are practical examples of consequences that can occur when being taught by an unsuitable spiritual teacher:

1. You learn little that can be practically applied to your daily life, resulting in wasted time, resources, and money.

2. You may be imprinted with ideas and philosophies that don’t align with reality, leading to misunderstandings.

3. You won’t develop spiritually or move closer to your essence and soul.

4. You cannot unlock your potential and therefore cannot share your unique gifts with others.

5. It becomes more difficult to follow your own spiritual life path.

6. It becomes harder to realize your spiritual learning tasks and the reasons for your current incarnation.

7. Your fears may intensify, and paranoia levels can increase. Especially if you have a teacher who emphasizes the need for protection from evil spirits, negative energies, and other such influences.

8. You might become isolated from family, friends, and social circles. Anyone outside the teacher’s group is viewed as inferior, harmful, or irrelevant.

9. Creating a fundamentally happy and meaningful life becomes more challenging.

10. In worst-case scenarios: You become ill (mentally and/or physically).

Your Choice

Through this article, I hope you have gained some valuable insights to aid in your pursuit of better health, happiness, joy, and a more meaningful life.

Navigating the esoteric landscape isn’t simple – but it’s definitely achievable if you remain vigilant and discerning! Since we are all blessed with the gift of free will, we can make the choices we desire – and ultimately, we alone must live with the consequences of those decisions.

Wishing you the very best on your journey to finding the right spiritual teacher.