I was thinking recently about the way we always seem to want things to be authentic. That isn’t so much of a bad thing, a least in so far as it can act as a guarantee of quality, but can it be a problem?
I see it more in religious thought, but not only there. Something is labelled as not an “authentic” teaching, usually with the intimation of inferiority. I don’t entirely see the point of this as most religious or spiritual teachings tend to have a lot of ideas in common, therefore in that context, the argument that something is not authentic doesn’t seem to hold much water.
As a more concrete example, I like to do BodyPump classes, which are by a company called Les Mills. Now these incorporate various techniques, for example: squats, bicep curls, tricep kickbacks, etc. But you can’t call those “authentic” BodyPump moves, those exercises have been around for a lot longer than BodyPump.
What matters more is whether what we’re being taught is safe and effective, or to borrow a term from the Buddha ’skillful’.
Leave a Reply