Kill Your Guru: The Journey from Dependency to Maturity {Reflections}

Growing pains aren't just physical – they're relational too. That moment when you realize someone doesn't need you the way they once did can be simultaneously heartbreaking and beautiful.

Ryan opens up about watching his 21-year-old son Logan transition from complete dependency to emerging independence. Where once Ryan was the source of food, wisdom, and guidance, now their relationship is evolving into something different – not less meaningful, but fundamentally transformed. This natural progression prompts an exploration of the philosophical concept "kill your guru" – not a literal instruction but a metaphor for the necessary evolution that happens when we've absorbed what our teachers have to offer and begin forging our own path.

Drawing from ancient rabbinical traditions where disciples would eventually question and wrestle with their teachers' wisdom, Ryan connects this pattern to his own role as a pastor. The true purpose of spiritual leadership isn't to create dependency but to remind everyone that they have direct access to spiritual truth without intermediaries. Like good therapists who work themselves out of a job, or mentors who equip their protégés to surpass them, the most successful guides are those who create the conditions for their students' independence. As Picasso advised: "Learn the rules as a professional so you can break them like an artist."

Whether you're experiencing this transition as a parent, mentor, or someone outgrowing a long-held dependency, there's both challenge and liberation in this evolution. Join us as we explore how to honor our guides while embracing the responsibility of forging our own way. Ready to discover what happens when hierarchies flatten and relationships transform? This conversation might give you permission to take that next step in your journey.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:16):
what is up everybody?
Welcome to our reflectionspodcast.
Hey, this is ryan and I'm inthe house today again with
olivia.
What's up, olivia?
We just realized Olivia, wethink she's mic'd up.
So I said look, you got to bequiet because you're distracting
me and you're going to be onthe podcast.
So I said don't move and don'tbreathe.
Yeah, you guys will get a goodsense of what I think is funny.

(00:41):
Go ahead and laugh as much asyou need to don't breathe, okay.
So my oldest son, logan, he justhe's about to turn, or he just
turned 21 and I'm learningsomething about him.
It's like he's 21 and he stillwill come to me for advice or
for thoughts many times afterthe fact, but it's not like it
was when he was like seven yearsold.
You know, when he's seven, he,he relied on me for almost

(01:02):
everything and even when he wasyounger than that, I mean I
would make his food or maybekatie would as well, but we
would make his food as hisparents.
We would give him advice, we'dteach him, instruct him.
We were like his main source ofknowledge and wisdom and
insight if we had anything togive.
But we were like his mentor,his spiritual guides, his
advisors.
We were like his gurus, youknow.
And it's interesting becauseI've noticed, and you're gonna,

(01:22):
many of you who are older than Iam are going to be like, yeah,
duh, that's how it works.
But now that I'm 45 and he's 21, he doesn't need me like he
once used to need me.
And it's hard because I'm likeman, I'm his dad.
I still want him to need me,but also I've realized, of
course this is a great thing.
I mean, if he still needed me,like he did when he was seven,

(01:42):
then something wouldn't be right.
If he was, you know, 21 yearsold and I'm making him his meals
and he's living in the basementand he's not leaving, you know,
of course, if he hadn'toutgrown me in some of those
ways, it would be a problem LikeI would have done.
I wouldn't have done my job,and so my job as his dad is to
pour into him, to be his guide,his mentor, so so much that at
some point he no longer needs me.

(02:03):
And as a parent, it'sheartbreaking, but it reminds me
of this old phrase that comesout of the philosophical
tradition, and the phrase goeslike this.
I love it.
The phrase is kill your guruand the idea is that at some
point in all of our lives wehave to kill our guru.
Now they don't mean literallylike to go murder your guru with

(02:24):
a gun or something like that,but at some point in all of our
lives we have these people whopour into us, who are mentors,
guides, gurus, psychologists,teachers, and the job, if it's
done correctly, is they willpour so much into us that at one
point, at one day, we mightoutgrow them.
And that's a good thing.
I think about the rabbis, therabbis in ancient Judaism.

(02:45):
They would gather disciples,little followers, the Talmudim
they'd call them.
They'd gather them aroundthemselves, but at some point
that little disciple would growup and, after ingesting all the
things he was to learn andingest, he would begin to embody
it and he would get older andhe would eventually, like the
disciples of Jesus did, he'd goout and gather his own disciples

(03:05):
and he would sort ofproliferate and sort of grow the
thing and he would outgrow therabbi.
And at some point too, youcould tell, because the rabbi
and the disciple would begin tohave argument and wrestling, and
that was a good thing.
They encouraged that youweren't supposed to always just
ingest what the rabbi said, andas the you know, without ever
questioning it, your job was toeventually, when you reached
your maturity, you'd begin toquestion the rabbi and wrestle

(03:27):
harder.
And that was how you showed therabbi that you were involved
and engaged and that you werereaching your own level of
spiritual maturity.
And that was what they weresupposed to do.
And it reminds me of my own job.
I'm a pastor, I'm an ordainedminister, pastor, and in many
ways what I do is I get up on aSunday morning and there are
many times and many, you knowmany Sunday mornings where folks
will look to me as though I'mlike the spiritual guide or

(03:49):
mentor or guru in the room andlike, hey, tell us all the
answers and I get it.
It's kind of the box that we'veinherited and I did go to
school for this stuff.
But my job really, ultimately,as the pastor, is to remind
everybody in the room hey, youdon't need my permission to go
on your own faith journey, youdon't, and you don't need me to

(04:09):
sort of talk to God, you don'tneed me at all.
And so my job as the pastor isto remind them that they don't
need a pastor, that at somepoint I hope they outgrow their
dependency on me.
Now, listen, I hope we can stillhave this, because what happens
is me and Logan will still havea relationship together my
oldest son, logan.
We'll still hang out, we'll seeeach other, we'll banter, but

(04:30):
he won't need me the way he onceused to need me and he'll be
able to be a part of the morecollaborative more, more, you
know, be more like a flat sortof structure, not really any
kind of hierarchy any longer,and he'll be like like my, like
a friend, and you know I'llalways be his dad and I am, you
know, 20 something years on,that more than he is, and so I
might always have some things tooffer because I'm just a bit
ahead of him on the journey.

(04:50):
But the relationship changesand so, same as it is with
people here at Central, I hope,we always gather and we share
relationship and fellowship andkoinonia and we share each
other's burdens and we pray foreach other.
But the dynamic of me being theguru I hope at some point they
realize that they don't reallyneed me for that any longer and
that they have just as muchaccess to God as I do and that

(05:11):
they don't need my permission todo anything.
Really it's like a psychologistwhen you go to therapy, a good
therapist eventually will workhimself or herself out of a job.
You don't go to therapy foreverIf you did.
There's something not rightabout that, whether it's some
kind of codependency or I don'tknow what's going on there.
But, like, the job of thetherapist is to help you acquire
the skills and the mindset andthe patterns and habits to be

(05:33):
able to do your life on your ownwithout that therapist.
It's the job is to workthemselves out of a job.
And I think about a lot of.
You know, I figured I think itwas Picasso once said.
He said like this.
He said hey, learn the rules asa professional so that you can
then break them like an artist.
And so maybe you're like acreative person and you like.
When you first start out, youstart taking, you start sampling

(05:54):
from other people, and that'stotally fine.
We all do this Authors, pastors, musicians.
You start to borrow from otherpeople because you're just
beginning, you don't really havelike a whole collective of
things yet, and so you borrowwisdom or insights or tracks or
whatever from other people.
But then at some point youbegin to outgrow needing to do
that and you start to make yourown path in your own way, and
you have your own vision forwhat you want to create and you

(06:15):
contribute in a brand new andtotally different way, and I
love that.
So, yeah, that's what I want tosay.
I want to say to you today hey,some of you might need to hear
this morning or this afternoonor whatever time of day it is
when you're hearing this youneed to kill your guru, and
again, you have to kill themliterally, and it doesn't mean
you have to stop being theirfriend or stop going to church
or stop taking advice from youryou know, your therapist.

(06:37):
By no means.
It just means that at somepoint you have to begin to let
go of this dependency on thatperson, and that's part of your
own maturity.
You begin to question andwrestle and begin to realize, oh
, I don't need that permissionany longer, I can forge my own
way, and you'll know when thattime comes, just like Logan does
and I could sense it as his.
Now my job too, as the teacher,as the guru, as the dad, is to

(06:58):
help him understand that and,when the timing is right, and to
walk him through that, but asyou, as a follower, as a
disciple, you'll begin to know,you'll have this sense like I'm
sort of outgrowing this, Notthat you're better than this,
not that you don't need it anylonger, but, like you, just sort
of maybe it's time for you tomake your own path in your own
way.
And so today I'm giving youpermission to do that and to

(07:18):
outgrow some of those thingsyou've been holding onto for so
long and to take them off thepedestal and define and forge
your own way and begin tocollaborate and partner where
there used to be hierarchy andto be a sort of a you know again
sort of this sort of flattenthe structure and to kill your
gurus.
All right, love you guys, peace.
Hey, if you enjoy this show,I'd love to have you share it
with some friends.
And don't forget, you arealways welcome to join us in

(07:40):
person at Central in Elk Riverat 830, which is our liturgical
gathering, or at 10 o'clock, ourmodern gathering, or you can
check us out online atclcelkriverorg.
Peace.