I am glad Tavayogi Thangarasan Adigal came by in my life. Agathiyar had arranged it. Tavayogi who left his family at 50 to take up a life as a mendicant traveled into the far reaches of India to meditate. After his last sojourn in Sadhuragiri for some 8 years, he was instructed by Agathiyar to look up a place called Agathiyar Vanam and set up his ashram. He found the place to be the present-day Kallar. The village headman allowed him to pitch on a piece of land adjacent to the dwellings of the natives. Hence his task of feeding and tutoring their children began. Mataji Sarojini Ammaiyar who looks after the present-day ashram situated some 2kms away joined him back then at the end of the last millennium. I stood at their door in 2005 after Tavayogi invited me over during his visit to Malaysia and after Agathiyar asked me in my Nadi reading to spend a few days with him. And so my adventure in Siddhahood began. I learned much from watching him go by doing his daily things and learned many things in the brief moments and encounters with him during the many visits he made subsequently to Malaysia.
What did I learn from him? Detachment. He taught us to be detached in many ways. Not that we stayed away from society but in actively serving it we never set sights on the fruits of our labor. He himself saw himself as a tool and instrument of God and the Siddhas and stepped aside once he did his job to give us space to grow. Initiating us officially into the path that came through a calling for most of us in our Nadi readings, he did not take ownership of us. He never regarded us as his disciples or followers. He showed us to the source or Moola Guru Agathiyar and stepped back. As a result, he did not have a following though many began to follow the Siddha path after being introduced by him.
I would love to write a biography of him but I only came to know him when he was 69 and visiting Malaysia in 2005. Nevertheless, I have written much of what transpired between us in the years after that in the pages of this blog and the numerous websites and books I published online.
When many hold on to their gurus in physical form and feel lost after their demise and seek other pastures, a true guru would mold his disciple to stand on his own feet and walk the path alone regardless if he was around in the physical form or not. That was what he did for us too. It was a great favor. He gave us the tools and the means and left us to work on it even when he was around. He shines as a star in the midnight sky guiding and showing us the way even today after his demise in 2018.
With the coming of a guru, life changes drastically. It did for me. These changes began to happen subtly too. After his samadhi, Agathiyar took the reins again and led us on. It is true that once we come to the Siddhas they never desert us. But many were sent their way to fulfill their desires and responsibilities too. He kept only a few closeby and led them on through the journey that calls for one to start a lone walk now.
Agathiyar who brought us to engage in activities towards serving him and the gurus has since had us drop everything and go within with the coming of the pandemic. What perfect timing. Finding it hard to drop and adjust oneself to just sitting still and looking within using the breath as a tool, I thought that I had wasted some precious time then. Since we equate progress with activity, once all the activities stopped we thought that we had stopped progressing spiritually too. That was a misconception as Agathiyar later pointed out through Mahindren. Mahindren told me to look at it from a different perspective. He pointed out that I had learned to drop everything during those years. Spiritual growth is not about acquiring assets, merits, name, fame, position, and authority but dropping everything. Now we were taught to willingly let go a step further from previously remaining detached. How many would have let go of their hold on all these good things in life?
This reminds me of a niece who was contemplating leaving her teaching profession not because she did not love teaching but has the teachers were burdened with other administrative chores. She asked me why I had opted to leave the service early if all things were great for me. I told her that I wanted to leave as I had made a name for myself and was satisfied in giving some 36 years of myself to the service in the engineering field. I knew when to leave. Many do not and tend to overstay. That is when the graph slides and we fall from the peak. This applies to all matters in life. Check if you have overstayed and make your exit in a timely manner. While contemplating leaving I consulted Agathiyar in the Nadi. He gave the green light. Many asks me what I was doing after retirement and if I was working elsewhere. They do not understand the meaning of the word retirement. I spent the next four years beginning in 2016 doing service to Agathiyar and the unfortunate supported by a team of youngsters whom Agathiyar sent along after their Nadi readings. Agathiyar Vanam Malaysia (AVM) and its charity arm Amutha Surabhi (AS) reached the zenith during those years. But as all good things have to come to an end too, and as my wife reasoned that we were getting high on puja and charity and as Agathiyar told us that now the journey has to be made solely as the path was narrowing allowing only a single line of seekers, Agathiyar had us wind up and hang our boots.
After the pandemic made way for the lockdowns to be lifted and made way for us to move with lesser restrictions as we moved on to the endemic state, Agathiyar at AVM took to visiting the homes of his devotees. As he had previously told me never to forget to carry out his Vizha or festivities to coincide with Thaipusam and though he had refrained us from carrying out all puja unless the need arises, as it was 12 years since his arrival in 2010, a devotee couple suggested that we carry out puja for him taking a cue from the temples that conduct Kumbhabhisegam after renovation once every 12 years. As we were pondering over it, I called my nephew to ask if he realized that 12 years have passed since Agathiyar came in the form of the bronze statue to AVM. Apparently, he was at Agathiyar's temple at Agasthiyampalli when I called him. Yet I was not decided if I wanted to go ahead with any festivities holding on to Agathiyar's earlier dictate to abstain from carrying them out. The night before we finally carried it out, Varad Rajh of Swamimalai and I spoke and as I brought to his attention too that it has been 12 years since he made Agathiyar's statue and had him flown to Malaysia, he suggested that we conduct libation and puja. I knew then that all the signs were there to go ahead. During the short ritual and puja we were blessed by the presence of the Siddhas.
Since we decided to go with the flow as the Siddhas, saints, and sages have time and again told us, we look for signs and act accordingly. Rather than plan things according to our wishes, we wait for the cue and move accordingly. As Bharathi said when putting into action his wishes he only saw hurdles but when he did god's work it was all accomplished perfectly, we too await to do gods work when prompted.