In life, we have so many teachers(gurus) who teach us different aspects of life. All of them are precious.
When we come to spirituality, I was once told by a friend that the one who triggers our mind on the path of spirituality and start practising is our root guru. I was also told that even you have not taken any official ceremong with a lama, if you have taken him/her in your heart as someone who aspires you to embark on the spirituality journey and practise, he/she is also your root guru.
I think here it concerns a close relationship between the disciple(you) and the guru(the one you have taken great faith in). And that the esscence of a root guru is someone you will follow his/her advice from A to Z. Having said that, it is spoken even by Lord Buddha that one should examine the qualities of the lama carefully before one takes on a close disciple/guru relationship. This also applies to a lama when he takes someone as his student, he also have to observe the mind of the potential disciple to see if he/she is the suitable recipent.
I believe when a lama takes you as a disciple, he is there for us in all future lives to guide us until we gain the ultimate enlightenment.
Dear Triesa,
You have indeed hit the nail on the head with regards to this subject matter. We do have many "teachers" in life. And yes when your Lama decides to take you on a disciple (yes I believe as much as we choose our Guru, our Guru does also in turn "choose" us) he will be the one to lead us to our ultimate goal of enlightenment.
Hence it is important to reiterate how incredibly privileged we are for those who have found our Guru. Rejoice, follow and trust in his methods as our Guru will never set us up to fail nor want us to suffer or hurt us.
