After a while she said, “I really admire Tina Turner, Patti Labelle and Oprah. I figure if it’s okay for them to study Buddhism, then its okay for me, too.” I talked about the Four Noble Truths, the Eight-fold Path, reality, illusions, samsara and on and on. When I was about to leave, she thanked me and then said, “If I talked about any of this with my family, they would just say it was the devil. But I know better. I just know it’s important that I study and learn more.”

My judgment may be showing, but this kind of conservative Christian attitude is one of many that keeps us separate from one another in our world. The woman asked, “Is Buddhism a religion?” Buddhists would consider it a path, rather than a religion, as would congregants in Unity, my church, consider our faith a path, not a religion. The reason it is not a religion is that neither we nor the Buddhists have dogma and creeds you must believe. We both have very helpful and beneficial teachings that can lead one to awaken to one’s true, luminous self.

The Four Factors, which we consider here, are the very nature of an enlightened person. They constitute a genuine spiritual practice. In a genuine spiritual practice we are called upon to engage our intellect, to use wisdom, to use our minds and never to revert to narrow thinking.

The First Factor is based on authentic scripture. For our spiritual practice to be genuine, it cannot be based on air. It must have a solid, provable base. Therefore the First Factor is based on scripture, not just any discourse, but authentic scripture.

In our Judeo-Christian thought, authentic scripture is the Bible, to which I would add the Gnostic Gospels. These, along with the books of the Dead Sea Scrolls, give us a broader base view of early Christian writing. They are believed by many to offer a more accurate telling of the tales of Jesus Christ, his life and his purpose. The First Factor found in the foundation of Buddhism is the Dhammapada and the ancient sutras, said to represent the words of the Buddha, such as the Diamond Sutra or the Heart Sutra.

These sutras offer very advanced teachings that are best studied with a qualified teacher. Here is one of my favorite passages from the Heart Sutra:

The Heart Sutra is beautifully expressed in the movie Little Buddha, which my husband, David, and I have seen and enjoyed countless times. I highly recommend you watch it. Look for the short, round monk in an early scene talking with Bridget Fonda, who plays the young boy’s mother. That is Sogyal Rinpoche.

The Second Factor in our spiritual checklist are the many authentic commentaries. Using our wisdom, we decide what is an authentic commentary, because there are endless opportunities to be duped. Jesus warned against “false prophets,” and through the years I have encountered any number of them—often self-published, channeled or dogmatic books and teachers.

An authentic Buddhist commentary is Shantideva’s works, or any work by highly respected sages and saints throughout history. For me, for the past thirty years, A Course in Miracles has been an authentic commentary. The works of Unity cofounders Charles and Myrtle Fillmore, along with Ernest Holmes of Religious Science, contain authentic commentaries.

An authentic commentary stands the test of time, and the reason this is so is because it contains the absolute, changeless truth. It teaches absolute reality rather than relative or conventional reality.

The Third Factor is to study with an authentic teacher. A true teacher demonstrates passion, clarity and commitment and walks his talk. Again, I have encountered many false prophets. If you are tuned in at all, your intuition will be communicating to you to stay away from slippery teachers. Here are the warning signs: a huge ego, attracting students through a charismatic, didactic personality, often using his sexuality as a lure, a controller who has all the answers—especially yours and is quite willing to tell you what to do.

A genuine teacher encourages her students to learn to go within and discover their own inner answers. A true teacher is spiritually humble, yet she knows who she is. She gathers her wisdom from years of study and practice and meditation. She demonstrates clarity, commitment, zeal and excitement for the teachings. And most important, she is manifesting what she is teaching.

I heard Sogyal Rinpoche say that it is hard to go home and meditate for an hour when you’ve been ranting at the office all day. When you look at a teacher, ask yourself if you want to emulate him. Do I aspire to be as he is?

When I was just out of college, I met for the first time a group of young Unity ministers while doing a biofeedback demonstration at Unity Village. I inwardly recognized that they had something I did not have, and I knew I wanted whatever that indefinable something was. I wanted to emulate the luminosity that they were manifesting. Today I want to emulate His Holiness the Dalai Lama, or Thich Nhat Hanh, or Sogyal Rinpoche or Jesus Christ.

An authentic teacher teaches not just with words but through the living of his life. As has been said by a number of great beings, including Gandhi, “My life is my message.”

One message I have long taught is that everyone needs a teacher. The ego believes it has all the answers and can forgo having a teacher. The ego asks, What’s the need? The wise one knows the best guardian at the ego’s gate is an authentic teacher. Remember this, even the Dalai Lama has teachers whom he highly respects and with whom he consults.

A frequent common denominator I have witnessed with false teachers is that they dance with their sexual energy rather than commune with their inner divinity. Sexual energy can be very powerful and charismatic and alluring, but it is not of the Buddha nature, the Christ nature. Keep your eyes open, your feet on the ground and use your own inner guidance in choosing a teacher. But be mindful not to be duped.

A number of years ago I traveled to India, an arduous journey undertaken with two women friends, sisters on the path. They were going to visit their teacher, something they had done on several previous occasions. Intrigued, I went along to see if he would be my teacher, as well.

The conditions were very primitive, and we sat for hours in 110-degree heat in darshan (silently sitting and waiting for the teacher to arrive). After the fourth day of this, I realized I was not seeing an aura, that glowing color or light, emanating from this great master (for years I’ve had the ability to see auras by focusing my attention). I mentioned this to one of my friends, and she replied, “Oh, he pulls his aura in so people can’t see it.” I was not impressed.

The living conditions there were quite unsanitary. A few years later, on a subsequent trip my friends took, they returned to tell me that the compound was much improved, and the water was drinkable because the teacher was now blessing it at its source. I found out later that the fact was he had installed a water purification system. My husband, David, calls this “magical thinking.” My dear friends were blind to any flaws in their guru.

Later it became known that this teacher had some very unholy practices, including being a pedophile! Still people flock to him, being duped. We can so much want a teacher that we ignore or deny the obvious that is glaring at us.

This is what I teach:

You may be asking, How do you find a genuine spiritual teacher? An old adage is, “When the student is ready the teacher appears.” And this is true for many on the path. If that does not readily occur for you, join a sangha or a church or a meditation group and see if your teacher is there.

The Fourth Factor is knowing the truth by having our own spiritual experiences. When you reach a clear state of mind in meditation, you know it because you’ve experienced it. When you see an aura, you’ve experienced it and you own the experience. When you’ve practiced generosity and been incredibly blessed as well as blessed others, you know because you’ve experienced the increased good in your life. You meditate daily and experience greater peace, calm and clarity.

You will know the truth when you experience it for yourself in your own life.

The above is the classic order of the Four Factors. The Dalai Lama has taught that the Four Factors are often reversed for the individual in this manner:

The Buddha said, “Do not believe something to be true because many wise ones say it’s true. Do not believe something to be true because I say it’s true. Do not believe something to be true because the scriptures say it’s true. Believe something to be true because in your heart you know it’s true.”

In all your spiritual pursuits, learn to listen to your heart and trust your heart, and you will be guided as to what order of the Four Factors is best for you—classic or the reversed.