Spiritual Friend

I pray for your blessing my guru, great and completely worthy spiritual friend. I pray that you will cause love, compassion and bodhicitta to arise in my mind. —Prayer from The Great Path of Awakening, said multiple times a day for years, walking down the hall at work, in the john, waiting in line, really everywhere. Then one day I realized it had come true.

Mila
I grew up privileged, but like most children of privilege, I had no awareness of our wealth and status—that is until it was all taken away. When my father died, instead of inheriting our house and farm, my mother and I were pushed out as my Auntie and Uncle took over what was rightfully ours. My mother seethed with resentment, and well, you know the story, she sent me to learn the Dark Arts so I could cast revenge upon our usurpers.

I had the power and discipline to quickly master sorcery, and in short order, conjured a spell that decimated our old house and crushed to death dozens of our relatives and neighbors. My revenge, of course, solved nothing. Instead, it only fueled the villagers to retaliate upon me. So then fearing for my life, my mother sent me to learn yet another dark spell. I dutifully complied, and soon let loose a hailstorm that destroyed the village’s harvest. This time, however, I saw how the cycle of revenge and retaliation is endless, and that there would never be a time when all the parties involved felt avenged and satisfied. I realized the futility of my spells, and more chillingly, saw that I would incarnate in the darkest of hell worlds, worlds that matched the vibration of my dark and vengeful deeds. Fear oozed through my being, and I knew the only way out of my current and future hells was to find a teacher, a spiritual friend who could purify my karma.

So I struck out in search of a teacher, my teacher, the one who could save me from my dark past. And while it was sweet to meet him, it was very difficult to endure what he put me through. He could see the hell I was destined for and understood that the pain I’d experience dissolving my bad karma would be nothing compared to the pain of those hell worlds. So he proceeded to put me through many trials to purify my karma. At times I was desperate and even considered suicide, but I’m grateful he pushed me through it all. On the other side of his tasks (rebuilding yet another tower), there was freedom from my past. And from there it was only up. I went on to lose all identity, and help countless others do the same. It’s hard to be a spiritual friend, to do for a student what is best for them rather than what seems outwardly nice (we have regular friends for that!), so I’m truly grateful to my guru for being my spiritual friend. Praise to my guru. Gratitude to my guru. Thank you, my spiritual friend.

Nikita
Bob: “I work, let’s say, for the government. We’ve decided to give you another chance.”
Nikita: “What do I do?”
Bob: “Learn. Learn to read, walk, talk, smile and even fight. Learn to do everything.”
Nikita: “What for?”
Bob: “To serve your country.”
…
Nikita: “What if I don’t make it?”
Bob: “You’ll make it.”

Idiot. I’m such an idiot. We’d just ordered room service and were rolling around on the bed, completely giddy with being in Venice on a romantic getaway, when the call came. It was a mission—my instruction to locate the rifle in the bathroom and wait for the signal. I should have known. How did I not know? Why did I once again think that Bob would treat me like a friend. That is not the nature of our relationship, nor will it ever be. So yeah, just an idiot that I thought he simply gave us a romantic trip to Venice because he was fond of me.

The first time I made this mistake was when he took me to dinner on my twenty-third birthday. I was so excited, my first foray into the normal world since I began training. He gave me a birthday present and I hugged it with glee. I thought he was recognizing how hard I’d been working, and silently showing me that he loved me. But instead of a present, it was a gun. It was a mission. He told me to assassinate the man sitting behind us and escape through the window in the men’s restroom. I remember crumpling for a moment at the sight of the gun—my illusion of a glamorous dinner date with this handsome man crushed, and my feelings hurt that we weren’t out together because he simply wanted to be with me. But I quickly rallied and did the job—that was the quality Bob had always seen in me, more than I ever saw in myself. That’s not to say I didn’t feel tricked (“Bob, the window was walled up!” “Of course it was.”), but I understand now I was being tested. I did the job then, just like I did in Venice.

I don’t know why I keep wanting to think of Bob as my friend. It’s a mistake to do this and has caused me to have an unnecessarily emotional response to the tasks he’s given me. It would be easier if I would simply recognize he’s my spiritual friend, because from that place, it’s easy to do what I’m assigned. Bob saved me, literally, and I am forever grateful. 

When I met him, I was fucked up bad. Completely zoned out. Addicted. No awareness except wanting it, needing it, looking for the next fix. I killed a police officer the night we broke into the pharmacy, and only Bob saw a seed of potential in my cold-blooded ruthlessness. The rest of the agency didn’t think I deserved another look, to them I was just a cop killer. But he saw me, the real me, and knew my strength could be redirected to the light. And, whew, I’m grateful he saw what he did and was patient with me, because I was so unaware and so ungrateful in those days. He was providing me a way out of hell, and I couldn’t even see it. It didn’t take me long to fall in love with him, but it took me years to really understand what he did for me.

So, yeah, I’ve been a slow learner. I remember telling my boyfriend Marco that he was the only one who ever helped me. Isn’t that funny? Bob was bailing me out of my shit karma! He helped me in a way Marco could never even dream of. (Not to bust on Marco—he was beautiful and helped buffer me while I was going through some tough trials, but he was clueless about the true story going on between Bob and me.) And, of course, Bob loved me, much more than Marco or any other person. It just wasn’t a human kind of love, it was bigger. It was the love of a spiritual friend.

And the missions finally paid off. After my last one, I was free to go. Even though the mission was a disaster (they had to send in a cleaner), the karmic debt was paid. It was never about the success of the mission, just like it was never about Milarepa building the tower correctly. But I suppose you can’t know that at the time. If you didn’t try to build the tower correctly, you’d never be purified of the debt. And now, because of my spiritual friend, I’m free of my old identities—slacker, rebel, junkie, assassin, agent—and can go higher into the light. The prayer worked.