About six years ago. An ex-Buddhist monk came to stay with us for six weeks. He was from the USA and Canada and wanted to organise a Vipassana meditation retreat in Australia. I would help.
But while he was our guest, he told a stream of stories of having been rejected by others. He said he couldn't bear being judged - others had no right.
After a while, it became clear. He insisted on 5 star accommodation and food for the retreat and expected meditators to pay thousands of dollars for ten days. His goal was to raise enough money to live (luxuriously) for a year.
I did not like this. The tradition for such courses is bare bones simplicity, and the cost is whatever people can afford to donate, entirely voluntary.
When he began to push me to cough up money to support him, I balked. I explained that I was not happy about going against the tradition of voluntary generosity according to means.
He kept push, push, pushing - why was I backing out of supporting the retreat? What was going on in my head? What judgements had I formed of him? In a fit of anger, I said, "Mind your own business; what goes on in my head is none of your business." He looked shocked.
I knew that to answer the question honestly I would have to tell him that I'd formed a very negative view of his personality; I found him greedy, volatile, not very bright and profoundly ignorant. He lacked the traits required in a teacher of the Dharma. Since he'd made his position on judgements clear, I wasn't going to fill him in on all the details of why I'd come to the view that I did.
I asked him to pack up and drove him to the airport for his return to Canada.
Ari was just as grateful as me after he'd left. He was the guest from hell.
This post was edited by inky at July 8, 2020 12:52 PM MDT
