Just kidding. Yes, the photo was a big red flag. Also their dharma just didn’t make sense and they were like “it may take a lifetime to understand this one thing”. Later I realized that most Buddhists teach kind of the opposite of that.
Now I’m in a direct democratic zen group that explicitly has no master. The founder has some natural authority because he learned it in Japan but no one cares about his strict rules. Which is the best of both worlds: you have rules for those who seek guidance but you can just ignore them with no consequences.
That’s the second one, the one I’m in now.
Just kidding. Yes, the photo was a big red flag. Also their dharma just didn’t make sense and they were like “it may take a lifetime to understand this one thing”. Later I realized that most Buddhists teach kind of the opposite of that.
Now I’m in a direct democratic zen group that explicitly has no master. The founder has some natural authority because he learned it in Japan but no one cares about his strict rules. Which is the best of both worlds: you have rules for those who seek guidance but you can just ignore them with no consequences.
Nice. I always found it easiest to follow the authority of people who don’t care about their authority, if that makes sense
That’s interesting! Never heard of this sort of group