WHO IS A GURU?

I will be 67 years old this year. My completely white hair is now growing black hair. As this is pretty obvious, Agathiyar asks me how else he shall make others realize the transformation that is taking place within me. The five senses, sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch, are enhanced. The sights are clear, bright, and colorful. I can hear beyond the wall, the hum of my neighbor's refrigerator. I can pick up smells that are oblivious to others. Food is heavenly these days, sinking right into the very cells the moment I place it in my mouth. The sense of touch is possible even without touching another. The aura in another is felt, often bringing joy within.

Adi Sankara is quoted to have said that, “Only through God’s grace may we obtain the three rarest gifts: Human birth; the longing for liberation; and discipleship to an illumined teacher.” The creative Kundalini force, energy, and power in man, who is considered the rarest of gifts, after bringing about the creation of the zygote, embryo, fetus, keeping the child cosy and warm in the mother's womb, went into hibernation in the Muladhara, continuously feeding the toddler who grows up to be a teen and adult with continuous energy. Sadly, creation that is originally one of beauty and power has been subdued in our eyes by layers of coverings. The soul that masterminds our birth and that was exiled into hiding too after the Ego in us dethroned it and sent it into the far reaches of the heart's chamber longs for liberation. This JeevAtma longs for its other half and source, the ParamAtma. This longing for liberation leads one to the guru, or, as Adi Sankara says, an illumined teacher.

Indeed, as Isaikavi Ramanan Aiya says, everyone we meet is a guru. So too have I learned from many others, beginning with my parents, siblings, relatives, and later friends in the neighborhood, school, and workplace. The books became my guru, too, as they carried others' experiences that became mine, too. One such book, "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Paramahansa Yogananda, opened my mind and world to the existence beyond our home altar and temples, and introduced me to the concept of living gurus in physical form. Then, when I knocked on the door to the Nadi reader, I came to know of an existence that was entirely new to me - the Siddhas. Following the Siddhas, I knocked on the doors of institutions that profess the Siddha teachings. I came to know those who favored and walked a similar path. Soon, Agathiyar sent me knocking on the door of Supramania Swami of Tiruvannamalai to learn what it is to be a good student of a guru. Later, Agathiyar sent Tavayogi to Malaysia, where I knocked on his door. He showed me Agathiyar. Walking with Agathiyar, he brought down the Gods, and showed me the Prapanjam, showed me my Atma or soul, and showed me Sivam. This is what the gurus do. Taking the hand of all upagurus and gurus as mentioned earlier, we come to learn. Later, when going within, taking the hand of our Atma or soul, we begin to unlearn. We then take in the ever-blissful teachings that Prapanjam has to offer to us. Soon, we shall meet up with Sivam, the source from which we came.