What Are Your Spiritual KPIs
You need measurable markers of progress on the spiritual path, because if you meditate every day for six months and nothing about you has changed, you are probably doing the wrong practice.
Dandapani describes searching from the age of four or five for a teacher whose teaching was practical, and finding his guru, the first monk who could articulate the goal, the path to it and a way to know you were actually making progress. He asks what your KPIs on the spiritual path are, and describes the ten years he then spent as a celibate monk under vows in a traditional cloistered monastery in Kauai.
What this talk covers
- He met many wonderful monks and gurus who said inspiring things, but the big ideas and concepts were not practical or relevant to his life.
- His guru was the first who could articulate the goal, the path to the goal and the philosophy, so that you could tell you were making progress.
- His guru told him that if you meditate every day and six months later you are unchanged, you are probably doing the wrong practice, so most people should review their progress and do not.
- He was made to monitor and measure his spiritual unfoldment, and was given tools he could integrate into his life rather than high-minded philosophies.
- At 23 he moved to a cloistered monastery in Kauai for ten years, waking around 4am for meditation and ritual, exercising half an hour, eating three meals with no snacking, and working in one of the monastery's groups until the day ended at 9pm.
What are your KPIs on the spiritual path?Dandapani
Questions
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You measure it. His guru told him that if you meditate every day and after six months you are still the same person, you are probably doing the wrong practice. Most people never review their progress, so they never find out.
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Closed off. Guests could only visit between 9 and 12 in the morning, then the gates closed and only monks under vows lived inside. He woke around 4 to 4.15am for meditation and traditional Hindu rituals, exercised half an hour a day, ate three meals with no snacking, worked in one of the monastery's groups, and went to bed at 9pm.
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He was told growing up that money was bad and the root of all evil. His guru saw it differently, as a beautiful thing that could be spread around like fertilizer to make things grow.
Transcript
601 words · 3:09
I wanted to be a monk since I was four or five years old, and I was looking for a teacher that could teach me, and I met many wonderful monks and gurus along the way. But none of them, they all said inspiring things,
but none of it I felt was practical and relevant to my life. They talked about big ideas and big concepts, and they'd talk about the mind and use words. I couldn't wrap my head around.
It wasn't until I met my guru that I found, for the first time ever, a monk that could articulate the goal for me, the path to the goal, the spiritual goal, the philosophy,
to ensure you're actually making progress. What are your KPIs on the spiritual path? Right? Because if you don't have that, I remember him saying to me one day,
Dhanapani, if you meditate every day and after six months you're still a jic, you're probably doing the wrong practice. You're not making progress. Right? So most people don't review their progress to see if there's any change.
He made me monitor and measure my spiritual informant to know that I'm making traction down the path and share with me tools that I could integrate in my life rather than just high-minded philosophies and concepts that sound so wonderful, but in real life didn't really weren't relevant.
So you leave, how old are you? I was 23 and a half, 24. Okay. So you leave and you go move where?
To Kauai in Hawaii. Yeah. And you live in a monastery for 10 years. traditional cloistered monastery as a celibate monk under vows.
What does cloistered mean? It means it's closed off that guests could only come in to visit, like between 9 and 12 in the morning, and then the gates close, and only monks under vows live within it. So there's a lot of modern day play pretend monasteries nowadays where you can come and
go whenever you want and go for the weekend and say, oh, I lived as a monk for a weekend. Okay. But this is like the real deal. You go and take vows and you follow a traditional path that's philosophy that's over thousands
of years old. And how would a day look like? We woke up early. I usually work up around between 4 and 4.15 in the morning.
We'd have meditation in the morning with 10 rituals, traditional Hindu rituals. We'd had to exercise half an hour a day. We only had three meals a day, some breakfast, lunch, dinner, no snacking in between. And the monastery was divided into three or five groups.
So one group of monks took care of desktop publishing. We put all our content in books and online so monks had to learn, you know, Adobe InDesign and Photoshop, edit movies and Final Cut Pro and all that kind of stuff. Another group of monks took care of the endowments.
So they did all the financial stuff. My guru was… He had a beautiful relationship with money and I really loved that about him because when I was growing up, people would say to me, if you want to be spiritual, then you
shouldn't pursue money. Money is bad. Money is the root of all evil. Whereas he looked at money as a beautiful thing that we could spread around like fertilizer and make things grow. That's what he said. So the monks were divided into different groups and then our day ended at 9 o'clock at night and we went to bed.