It has taken some 21 years to fully understand Agathiyar and his ways. Now we understand pretty well why Agathiyar who initiates or has us start on a practice or a method, has us also bring a halt to it. In bringing me to do charity at Tavayogi's Kallar Ashram in 2005, Agathiyar had me carry on doing it solo till he brought a group of youngsters to AVM in 2013. They brought the act of doing charity to a much larger circle of volunteers. As a result, we could reach out to a larger number of recipients. Agathiyar wanted to open our eyes and hearts to the sad and pathetic state of affairs around us. He had us engage in feeding those in the Old Folks' homes and Children's homes. Later we were introduced to street feeding by another devotee spearheading their charity drive called Pothihai Tharma Chakkram. Soon we took over from a devotee who was given the task of feeding the poor by Agathiyar and had initiated feeding those poor and underprivileged who though had a roof above them found it tough to survive. At the peak of our charities, in late 2019, he has us drop the charity telling us that others would continue from where we left. He asked us to focus on our individual journey telling us that the path now could only accommodate one at a time. It was the right moment to let go, we understood later. If he had not put a stop to it we would have stagnated as in a pond. The praises heaped on us would have got into our heads.
Agathiyar told us to withdraw and go within. He had initiated the move by having us feed all, irrespective of the rich or poor, devotee or none devotee, passerby, and tourist alike. Once we got the hang of it only then did he tell us to shortlist the deserving ones as in telling us to spend wisely. Only after compassion whelmed in our hearts and tears welled in our eyes did he ask us to stop doing charity and move within.
Similarly in calling us to the path Agathiyar had us go on pilgrimages to carry out remedies for our past deeds. These included carrying out specified prayers at designated temples, giving alms to the priests, to the poor, selected people from society, and feeding the animals. He had us start home puja and conduct rituals. At the peak of it all, he had us shut the shutters to AVM and had us go inside. We were asked to carry out yogic practices. We had gained sufficient merits to counter the past karma and now had to purify the physical body to withstand and take on the challenges and changes in the internal transformation that the body and the transmutation of the very cells in itself that was in the pipeline.
Agathiyar who came as a painting and later as a statue to AVM chose to show himself now as the Prapanjam. He had me send away his statue to another devotee's home for it would not make sense to have his statue around and have us continue worship to him as a form and with a name after he has revealed himself as the very Prapanjam. As the Prapanjam he is formless and without a name for the Prapanjam is all-inclusive. He wants us to see him in all things now.
Alhough he has stopped all the activities, as of today he still wants me to blog though. If I had been writing about my travels with my gurus in physical form and whatever little I knew of Agathiyar from experience, he told me to stop writing about him and to share the experiences, that of the changes that were going on within me. There might come a day when he might ask me to call it off too, having me call it a day. The Siddhas are indeed mysterious.