Those who have seen the Tamil movie "Seedan" would know how Lord Muruga came into a devotee's life as a fellow cook and finally exposed himself before disappearing in the temple grounds of Palani. I have seen the movie several times. Each time I saw the climax I cried because I could relate to the closing scene where the lord appears or gives his darshan to his devotee. If that is the movie, Jnana Jothiamma had a pleasant surprise when she came down the same temple stairs. As she rested her aching legs a young kid ran down the temple steps and stood before her. He asked her if her legs ached and drew out his Vel, tugged in his vesti, and brushed her legs with it. He ran up the stairs later laughing aloud.
We have had our fair share of similar moments when the divine came before us, many such stories shared in this blog. Lord Muruga was with us at Thiruanaika temple in Trichy. He was with us at Palani and Bhogar's samadhi. He was with us at Othimalai. Lord Muruga came to the aid of my late father when he traveled on foot to Palani from his home in Kilseval Patti in Karaikudi/Sivagangai district. A pack of wild dogs had suddenly surrounded him then. He called out to Lord Muruga to save him. A bee mysteriously buzzed by him and entered the ear of one of the dogs that then yelped in pain and had the rests of the pack scutter. He came over to Kallar ashram when my brother's family was there. A young man in his thirties hands on his hip was seen surveying the area as he stopped every few steps on his way up to the ashram. Tavayogi who was having lunch with his visitors noticed this peculiar activity. On arriving at the doorstep of the ashram, Tavayogi invited him to lunch which he turned down saying he has had it. He continued to speak some made sense and many were deemed "nonsense". But there was a certain pattern that arose in his talk that caught Tavayogi's attention. He mentioned the abodes of Lord Muruga one by one interspersed with his nonsensical talk and diversion to other matters. When Tavayogi realized it was Lord Muruga, he hushed him and entered the meditation hall. He applied the sacred ash on everyone gathered and left.
Lord Muruga was with my daughter too on several occasions at her campus grounds, taking the form of a bird. He came to endorse this later. He was with her during her 4-month student exchange program in South Korea again as these birds, keeping an eye on her. Goddess Ma came to endorse this later. When she was trying to check in her flight back to Malaysia at the Incheon airport kiosk last Wednesday after her attempt to do so online failed, a stranger with the airline came over to the kiosk and enquired if she had a problem checking in. He took her over to the airline's counter, made several calls, and solved her problem. A young airlines employee who doubled as a Grab driver was waiting at the KLIA car park after work for a possible call from arrivals at the airport. He took the call that came through from my daughter and sent her back home safely at 1am. Prior to flying back, she was attended to earlier than her time of appointment to have a PCR test at the airport. As a result, she had her test results early and could fly out on time. Similarly, I had an officer get up from his seat and attend to me during his lunch break at a government office many years back. We saw how the public came to the aid of fellow humans and animals in the recent flood that hit much of Malaysia. I believe this is how the divine comes as fellow humans and not in the form depicted in the paintings of deities.
A story is told of how a devotee who drowned in the floodwaters was angry with God for not saving him. God told him he had come in many forms but he refused to accept the help. He came as personals issuing a warning to evacuate but the devotee chose to wait believing more in his analysis of the situation and thinking it was not life-threatening. He came as a boatman but the devotee refused to board the boat to safety preferring to stay on the upper floor of his home and keep an eye on his property. He sent a helicopter but he refused to reach for the rope ladder that was let down. "So what am I to do further?", asked God of him. The poor devotee expected God to come in the form he worshipped.
These days they come as energies within devotees and perform their Lilas or plays. God's energy is in all of creation. What differentiates the holy man and the ordinary folk is the intensity of this energy. The holy man in putting into practice the means to accentuate and intensify this energy becomes a vessel filled to the brim. He is capable to transmit this energy to others too for he has excess. As for us, the energy level that is ebb, depleted, and already running low, we used up in carrying out our daily activities for our sustenance and survival. Hence we need instant and quick bites of food that replenish our energy levels. On the other hand, when the energy that is derived from the "Gods" is accentuated within us we connect with the Prapanjam and the rest of its energies. We derive their energies within. Ramalinga Adigal called this energy the effulgence or the column of light. He showed us the means to open up and reach out to this energy. The Siddhas show us the means to veep up these energy levels to become at par with theirs. What is needed is discipline and practice which we lack. We prefer handouts without working for it. It never happens. I was corrected of my previous understanding of Gnanam. I thought it was given. But Agathiyar said otherwise, that we have to work towards it and earn it. I guess I have to keep writing for my sake and the readers who follow this blog. I am learning each time a post is up just like my readers. Each happening creates an experience that gives me a lesson. This I share on these pages. This blog is not about me but the adventures of an individual seeking enlightenment on the Siddha path, by coming to it, and staying on it. But these experiences are nothing compared to the lives of the Siddhas who lived and walked the path or rather made or created the path. We are blessed that our ride in this current era is made much smoother compared with theirs. But if I believe I had lived before and shall live again then it only means that I came back again in another era to reap the benefits and privileges of this era besides continuing from where I left in the past birth. But for someone who has accomplished everything he need not come again, right? Not exactly, as I came to know. At times we come for the sake of another. The gurus too come for their disciples. Tavayogi was an old soul that came back to save us. He waited for us to take birth again and again and kept coming back for us in each birth. They want us to end this chain or cycle of birth and death and join them on their shores. Tavayogi never took credit for all the years he put in and the work he did. He always asked us to thank Agathiyar instead. He diverted all the praise and worship we had for him towards Agathiyar, never wanting to receive them. He stood in the shadows and had us deal straight with Agathiyar. All the Nayanmars too never took credit but pointed us to Lord Shiva instead. Ramalinga Adigal did not even allow his followers to address him as Swamigal. They all considered themselves as servants of God. What has happened now with modern-day gurus? The humbleness that is very characteristic of a holy man is gone with the wind. Sadly Gurus in this age behave like god, even overshadowing them on many occasions. It is no fault of theirs. We place them in that state. We are to blame.
We learn much from the documentary "Samadhi - The Pathless Path". The child is said to have "a mirror mind, a beginner's mind without memory or a past, open and transparent mind". They make every moment anew. Hence we see them not getting tired or bored of repeating the same words or actions as they truly live in the present. Each moment is new to them. I see this in my grandaughters. They rush to us each time as if seeing us for the very first time. They would start pointing to the known and established daily routines. But they are happy with the familiar. If we have 1001 things to do these children's lives only revolve around us. All they know is us. So do not push them away. They might look for love and attention somewhere else. If only we could be like them. But as we carry too much junk with us it taints our lives making it miserable. When we start comparing ourselves with others our life seems miserable. If we were to be empty as a child life would be more manageable. We shall need to defrag less often. So the idea here is to shed this baggage. Going within is a way. But it is truly difficult to go within. Why can't we be still, both in body and mind? Stillness leads to Samadhi. Samadhi is when your calendar is empty. You have nothing else that needs to be done. Samadhi is you sitting alone gazing initially at the wall and later gazing at your thoughts and eventually getting lost. The idea is to switch our focus, as Buddha says to focus on a single thought among the thousands, to divert our attention from the thousands of thoughts to the single breath. Observe the coolness of the breath, the sweetness of it, and the calm that enters and envelopes us as we rid the breath. Even as I write these posts I am engaged sitting alone, observing and sharing what is being observed, and felt this very moment. I am blessed to have all the time to sit by myself and contemplate. Many just can't find the time. Others even if they have time, prefer to fill it up with other activities in the company of others never giving priority to being alone. Then again, one who might be seen sitting alone cannot be taken as meditating for his thoughts might be aggressively engaged elsewhere. "Whenever the mind moves unconsciously it's due to some unsatisfactoriness." True. It only means there is something that we think we need to do. It only settles when we drop all our plans and doings. Sitting alone having to do nothing further is what we need to do for now. If this is prolonged it becomes Samadhi. Nothing to do, no partying, no Satsang, no gathering, no external journeys, travels, and pilgrimages, no rituals and external worship, no ground to cover, no book to read, no movie to watch, no helping another, no teaching and guiding another.
"The you that you think you are is a process, a constant movement of ego's thoughts, a collection of pattern and preferences that has to die. The pathological pattern of you has to end for samadhi to be realized. No technique for realizing awareness, no process that can be learned, no formula that can be practiced. It is the dropping of all formulas, knowing, and all doing all egoic agenda. It is rather "received in an instant, in a flash."
In paying attention to the word and doing something taught we get stuck with it for life. Then it becomes automated. Rather than being aware of what's happening in the now, we either are engaged in work with the mind and thoughts elsewhere or we are so engrossed in perfecting the techniques and the method that we fail to see the change arise within and the feeling that envelopes us. "We end up tasting the menu and not the meal." The word and the doing are only to bring us within to a state of awareness. Once we are at the door we need to let go of it and step inside the doorway. Agathiyar says in prolonging the vibration that arises one shall know him. "The illusion of separation has to fall away. In actuality, we were never separate. Be still and know."
What is that that becomes still? If "Your heart is beating, cells are moving inside, food digesting, brain producing brain waves, blood is pumping, energy is moving", so how can we be still? Stillness is to realize the primordial consciousness or Paramatma. Agathiyar and Ramalinga Adigal brought us as far as to show us the means to realize the prapanjam or primordial awareness, the completeness or paripuranam. That is why they want us to pursue the efforts. What is at the beginning deemed as an effort to gather ourselves and our thoughts to sit alone, concentrate, and focus soon becomes effortless sitting and looking within.
After "Freeing samskaras, dismantling the thoughts, humbling one's self-structure, to realize samadhi one surrenders to the source longing for union." True it seems so. Instead of us longing for him he longs to take us with him just as the father longs for the child. I remember vividly Tavayogi awaiting my arrival at the doorstep to his ashram. In fact, he had sent his emissaries looking out for me in Tiruvannamalai and sending out others to wait at the junction to the old ashram for my arrival from morning. I only arrived late afternoon after visiting Supramania Swami. He too rushed out to greet me as I arrived at his kudil some days earlier. This is the humbleness we saw in our gurus, who we would really love to emulate.
What needs to be done prior to going within? "External pursuits must seem hollow and meaningless. Burn up patterns, preferences, and conditioning. One can't make awakening happen using the conditioned mind, it happens seemingly by accident, but by practicing it makes us accident-prone." Such lovely words. In other words, although it seems to happen by accident, all our previous efforts, and practices, and failures shall one fine day bring us to settle into Samadhi.
Though I would very much like to do these, it is during these moments when I take my sit to just sit in silence that the subject for the blog and all the words, phrases, and sentences come to me. I immediately have to take note of it otherwise it just drifts away. I have to capture them immediately. Later I develop the essay looking for references to what is said. So for now I guess I have to wait around at the doorway and take notes.