First, you don’t have to have a guru, and most Buddhists wouldn’t even in Tibetan Buddhism, pretty sure. And, nobody can tell you that they are your guru. Well they can try to say so but you don’t need to listen. Because it’s got to come from your side. And you can’t make it happen. Maybe you want some famous or very impressive teacher to be your guru but if you haven’t got the right connection, it will never happen.

And the guru can’t ever tell you to do something that goes against the teachings of the Buddha. Can’t ask you to do something unkind, uncompassionate, something that harms others, something that causes you to do something against basic morality, can’t tell you to steal, kill, lie maliciously etc, or to do something that’s harmful sexually. If asked to do something like that, if you can’t see how it accords with the dharma, just don’t do it. If you get the chance to talk it over with your teacher you can explain how you can’t reconcile what you’ve been asked to do with the dharma and ask for clarification (probably you’ve misunderstood what was asked of you).

Of course your guru may ask you to do things that are puzzling, that are scary in various ways, that maybe make you feel embarrassed, or disgusted even, none of those are against the dharma.

I think the main function of the guru really is to be someone other than yourself. When stuck in a rut, the guru may ask you to do something you’d never do. And the main thing is, if your guru asks you to do something, then it’s like, it takes you out of that space where everything you do is something that somehow you yourself set in motion. It’s next to impossible anyway to understand non self, to get this perspective of somehow seeing that this “I” that you are so sure is there, isn’t really there in the sense you thought it was. Nothing to be got rid of, it’s just not as you thought. Trying to get rid of the thought of I or the impression of having an I etc will just make it even stronger, the “I” that managed to get rid of “I” can become a big deal, such a big deal you have no chance of any realization of non self unless you lighten up a bit.

So the guru there can give you space, by being someone other than “me”. A space in which you may possibly realize something or see some truth.

The only reason for the guru is to help you to see the truth for yourself, whatever truth there is to be seen, the thing you are missing and need to see.

Doesn’t have to be a human. You can get this inspiration from an animal, bird, things that are not particularly intelligent, even from a flower or a stream or a stone. But a human teacher can help - main thing is the guru is not fooled by all the things you do to try to hide and confuse. It’s much easier to pretend to yourself that you’ve found some kind of a realization from a flower or a tree. Not so easy to fool yourself when it’s another human being.

So that’s the idea behind it. But you can’t make this connection happen. And - there’s no hurry for it either. Like, if you are on the path that means you need a guru, you don’t need anyone to tell you, you’ll be urgent to find a guru. But if you are on a slower path, but more steady, well you don’t need a guru. And most people don’t need a guru as a Buddhist. Much like in Christianity most people don’t become priests or ministers, not quite the same but in Tibetan Buddhism, you’d only take on a guru if you are really really into the teachings, and you probably have a long term connection with this person, you evaluate each other for some years beforehand. Typically. Can happen very quickly in some of the stories, in the case of the Indian mahasiddhas sometimes they only met their guru once, short encounter, short teaching, and they then followed what they had been asked to do in a devoted way for years.

Some fun stories there, lots of stories where the student gets it wrong, but also, sometimes the student follows the guru’s instruction very sincerely, realizes the path, becomes enlightened, meets their guru who they thank, and their guru, whose instruction they have been following for all these years, then asks them what the teaching was because they forgot they even gave it. And then the whole thing swings the other way, the former student becomes the guru of their former teacher telling him or her the teachings that they’d been given so many years ago and then come to realize, which their guru as it turned out had never practiced sincerely himself or herself and had forgotten about.

That shows, that the guru is not like an absolute thing. You can’t say that “so and so is a realized teacher, they have deep realization and will lead you all the way”. It depends on your connection. With the right connection, anyone can give you a teaching that can lead you all the way, or even something inanimate can do that like a flower or a stone. It’s like a blessing from enlightenment, that somehow you get a glimpse of truth in that moment that then becomes a key to the path to you.

While the other way around, without that connection, you could encounter a fully enlightened Buddha, and it means nothing to you, such as the first person that met Shakyamuni Buddha after he became enlightened

“Then, bhikkhus, when I had stayed at Uruvelā as long as I chose, I set out to wander by stages to Benares. Between Gayā and the Place of Enlightenment the Ājīvaka Upaka saw me on the road and said: ‘Friend, your faculties are clear, the colour of your skin is pure and bright. Under whom have you gone forth, friend? Who is your teacher? Whose Dhamma do you [171] profess?’ I replied to the Ājīvaka Upaka in stanzas:

‘I am one who has transcended all, a knower of all,
Unsullied among all things, renouncing all,
By craving’s ceasing freed. Having known this all
For myself, to whom should I point as teacher?

I have no teacher, and one like me
Exists nowhere in all the world
With all its gods, because I have
No person for my counterpart.

I am the Accomplished One in the world,
I am the Teacher Supreme.
I alone am a Fully Enlightened One
Whose fires are quenched and extinguished.

I go now to the city of Kāsi
To set in motion the Wheel of Dhamma.
In a world that has become blind
I go to beat the drum of the Deathless.’

‘By your claims, friend, you ought to be the Universal Victor.’

‘The victors are those like me
Who have won to destruction of taints.
I have vanquished all evil states,
Therefore, Upaka, I am a victor.’

“When this was said, the Ājīvaka Upaka said: ‘May it be so, friend.’ Shaking his head, he took a bypath and departed.

The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha - Selections

There, you couldn’t really say that Upaka met the Buddha. He met the historical person of the Buddha, but not really the Buddha, didn’t encounter an enlightened being because he didn’t have the right connection.

So also this guru student connection is a natural thing. Many of Buddha’s disciples, according to the sutras, realized the truth very quickly, sometimes they didn’t even need to hear the Buddha speak, sometimes it was enough for a friend or passer by to summarize the essence of the Buddha’s teachings in a single sentence, and the truth arose in their mind / heart.

Anyway - so as I understand it that’s the main purpose of a guru in Tibetan Buddhims. But you don’t have to have a guru. I’ve been a Buddhist in the Tibetan Nyingmapa tradition for 35 years now and I don’t have a guru :).

It just depends and you shouldn’t feel that somehow you are inadequate if you don’t have a guru. It’s just so sad. A sort of peer pressure amongst some Western Buddhists to find yourself a guru, and they either find someone that they fantasize about endlessly is their guru, or they don’t find someone and then they feel inadequate for the rest of their life. That’s like feeling inadequate because you are not a bishop, or something, when there is no reason at all why you would want to be a bishop. Just depends on your path and connections. Maybe you are a particle physicist or a gardener, be a good particle physicist or gardener :).

But there are different kinds of guru. What I’m talking about here is the “root guru” I think it’s called. In a broader sense, the guru is anyone that brings you the message of the path, enlightenment, introduces you to basic ethics, compassion, loving kindness. Helps to give rise to a search for the truth. Anything like that. They are performing the same role as the guru, inspiration that is not you, and that is connecting you to the path and to truth. In that sense most people do have gurus, and normally many of them. They often say conflicting things, but if you connect to the essence of what they are doing, the way they are helping you along the path to seeing truth for yourself, then that itself also helps you to wake up.

And if you really connect to the essence of the dharma, you are never without teachers. The whole of the world is your teacher. Always, all experiences are teaching, leading you along the path, things that are difficult, things that are easy, pleasant, unpleasant, it’s all the teaching of the Buddha, or the path to truth or whatever you want to call it. Which is another reason why you don’t really need to search for your guru. Because your guru is right there before you all the time. But sometimes for some people you find that for a while it is good to have a particular human being that all this otherness and the wisdom of just being other than you focuses down to one person. You can’t make that happen, you don’t need it to happen, but it may happen to some people, and it’s great for them when it does happen, though also awkward, embarrassing, makes them as if their most tenderest parts are exposed to view (in a good way) - that’s the Tibetan Buddhist idea of a guru as I’ve had it explained to me. Hopefully this gives some idea, I’m sure it’s clumsy, talking about things I don’t really understand but have had explained to me vividly.