This is the age of social media where we raise our kids and also the kundalini watching videos and learning from books and the net. Gone are the days when we had our grandparents staying with us or vice versa to pass on their wisdom and knowledge. Similarly for lack of genuine gurus, the false and unbaked have mushroomed overnight to fill their places. Everybody wants to have a say or voice an opinion in social gatherings these days. Everybody is a doctor now too dishing out advice whether it is called for or not. But who shall take ownership of any disaster that arises from our advice? The world around us is filled with so much information for it is the age of information too. It is for us to vet through and relate the signs to our personal experiences before following further. All this information cannot possibly replace a guru or mentor as who do we seek if things go wrong? A guru or mentor too has to be available at all times and be around when we need him. A guru has to be accessible at all times. He cannot possibly initiate a student and leave for the Himalayas for where or who would the student turn to in times of confusion or danger arising from the advice or practices? Similarly, the student should not receive initiation from visiting gurus or masters or those passing by for the same reasons.
Though I "happen" to land at the doorstep of my very first guru Supramania Swami not knowing that he was to be my guru until I left his humble cottage in a small village some eight kilometers away from the town of Tiruvannamalai towards my hotel in town, I figured later that he was the guru that Agathiyar had hinted I shall meet in my very first Nadi reading read months earlier. There was no formal initiation during the five hours I spent with him though he spoke about his five gurus and revealed my life without looking into the horoscopes or charts. Today I understand pretty well the nature and how he could reveal my life then. He connected with the Prapanjam and tapped into the future. Today Agathiyar tells me to connect with the Prapanjam too, for all knowledge is available in it he says. A wonderful relationship and bond were created that day in 2003 that is still intact even after Supramania Swami left his mortal frame in 2006. Meanwhile, Agathiyar sent a guru to our shores in 2005 whom I recognized from a leaflet that I had received from the Nadi reader and kept with me since 2002. Yet another wonderful relationship blossomed between a guru and a student. Upon initiating me and my wife and others into the path of the Siddhas, I followed behind him to his ashram in Kallar upon his invitation and Agathiyar's command in the Nadi. Tavayogi did not pass on techniques or bookish knowledge but instead led me on an adventure that I had never dreamed of till then. If Agathiyar had me leave my daily regime of family and work to take my maiden flight to India on the pretext of carrying out parikaram or atonement for my wrong deeds through carrying out rituals and pilgrimages of temples in 2003, he had Tavayogi take me to his abodes and sacred places exposing me to an entirely new facet of life that of the Siddhas. It was only after two years of apprenticeship that Tavayogi passed on, in the words of Agathiyar, a treasure in the form of asanas and pranayama techniques to follow. Tavayogi saw himself only as a tool in the hands of the Siddhas and never proclaimed himself a guru. He had doused off the fire and flame that began to arise in me the day he stepped into my home after I invited him for the first time. He gave me a thrashing for looking up to him as a guru. Instead, he showed me to Agathiyar and asked me to hold on to him. Indeed in the times and days when I had to endure bodily pains, Agathiyar was there for me dishing out advice and remedies through his Nadi. Agathiyar and the other Siddhas guided me with diet and further practices. Tavayogi stepped aside leaving the Siddhas to attend to me. These were all only possible by connecting with them through rituals, worship, and puja. The bridge was laid for the Siddhas to travel into our homes and lives through worship of the Siddhas. Today even after the passing of both my gurus the Siddhas look after our affairs. Imagine if I had held on to Tavayogi's physical form and adored and worshipped him, I would have been lost after his demise as many find themselves in this predicament after the death of their gurus.