Even Gurus have their problems.

Who hasn’t heard of a spiritual teacher brought down by their drug habit? Or misappropriation of funds? Or inappropriate relations with their disciples?

Or all three?   

We’ve already been through a Sex Scandal with our current Guru, Max. He’s in love with his stuffed bear, Emma, and shows his love by hopping on top of her and blessing her with a combination of kneading and pelvic thrusts. It’s something to behold.

We thought that was it. We thought our Guru would have a weakness in one area only. We thought that the profound teaching involved in setting boundaries with him in that one area would enlighten us forever.

Friends, we were wrong.

In addition to sex, drugs, and money, there’s another area that can snag an unsuspecting Guru.

What area is that?

In our case, the problems came not with the Guru’s consumption of food, but with his anticipation of consumption of food.

Let me explain.

The Guru gets a diet of raw food. His vet recommended it, and it’s helped clear up a bunch of the Guru’s health issues. Yay!

It took a while to get the Guru to eat the raw food, as it’s blander than the kitty crack he was eating when we first became his disciples. But now he loves his raw food. Indeed, he loves his raw food sooooo much, he can’t wait to eat it.

That’s where the anticipation part comes in.

The Guru’s regular eating schedule is breakfast and dinner. Sounds good, right? No problems there, right?

Wrong.

The dinner part wasn’t the problem. We fed the Guru before bed and everyone was happy. But breakfast?

The Guru started getting excited about breakfast at about the same time the sun was starting to think about coming up in the morning. Not actually coming up yet. Oh no. It was still dark outside. Totally dark.

And yet the Guru, knowing that the sun would be coming up in the next hour or so, decided to announce this fact in two ways. By meowing. And by walking over us in bed.

And then combining the two.

Repeatedly.

This was, needless to say, not fun. We were getting woken up every morning by a hungry Guru. A Guru who, empowered by his Guru status, felt perfectly entitled to inform us of the fact that it was breakfast time. Or close enough to breakfast time to wake us up.

Yeah.

Once again, we were forced to set boundaries with our Guru. Only this time, we didn’t know how.

We scoured articles online about how to stop your Guru from waking you up in the morning. (And we don’t mean Gurus in ashrams who wake their followers to participate in group meditation at dawn. Our Guru had no interest in group meditation at dawn. Unless it included a nice big bowl of raw food.)

We researched automatic feeders and other contraptions that would help alleviate the Guru’s yowling. Nothing was a fit. Until Melissa, in a spark of enlightenment, came up with an idea.

He’s waking us up because he wants his breakfast. But what if we don’t feed him breakfast? What if we feed him lunch instead, and take away the association between getting out of bed in the morning and getting fed?

My friends, I love my wife for many reasons, and now I had another reason to love her. Her idea was sheer genius.

We started giving the Guru lunch instead of breakfast. Immediately, being the Guru that he is, he caught on to the new routine and adjusted his expectations.

Getting out of bed in the morning became simply that: Getting out of bed in the morning. Lunch was hours later, so the Guru no longer had a reason to inform us that the sun was thinking about coming up. That was no longer his concern.

It was a miracle. And it brought tons of other benefits besides losing the early-morning wake-up calls.

Melissa was able to sleep longer. (I am a champion snoozer who was sleeping in spite of the Guru’s efforts to wake me.)

The Guru stays with us in bed in the morning, increasing our cuddle time.

The Guru no longer has to spend hours in the early morning wondering Will the food ever come I wonder will it ever??????? 

The Guru gets a nice big fat meal for dinner, as we now give him a bigger proportion of his daily allotment of food at night, allowing him to sleep soundly in the morning.

And, most important from our perspective, we have super chill mornings. No yowling. No stomping over us. No inappropriate behavior on the part of our Guru.

Once again, our Guru knew what we needed. We needed him to act out so that we would have to meditate on the best course of action and then take it. This action then resulted in a higher good for all.

Who knows? Maybe his next move will be leading us in group meditation at dawn!

Whatever the Guru has in store for us, we’re ready!

What’s your experience with early-morning Gurus? Share your comments below!