Gratitude prayer II

I was first introduced to Ramanandji in 2003 by my teacher Joan Seow. Ramanandji was her teacher Nancy's teacher which made him my great-grandteacher. She brought him in for Comoshambhala teacher training and since then it's just been a journey. I would fly to Austin from LA just for his workshop and still annually, will fly to wherever he is to attend his workshops to keep learning from him. Due to the pandemic, his weekly Zoom classes has made it easier to learn from him.

Deep gratitude to the teacher and the teachings. The lineage of teachings from the ancient rishis, Krishnamacharya, Guruji (BKS Iyengar) and through Ramanandji, to him.

He was firm but always loving. Strict but kind. Methodical but yet flexible and open. We spent precious time together when he would come to Singapore for his workshops. Joan, him and I would spend all our waking hours together, eating with him, discussing with him. When i was new to the practice, they would be discussing Purusha and Pakriti and i would draw a blank. It was such an intense blank cos no matter how much i tried, i could not understand or penetrate. Cos the intellectual mind could not understand what they were saying. He would smile and say to Joan.. 'the ego huh'. I would just cry inside.... He would bring along his Swami Dayananda and Krishnamurti DVDs and we would watch them in between classes during workshops.

He would ask the class, how serious are you about yoga? Would you die to know the Truth. When i was having existential crisis about how serious i was about yoga, and truthfully told him, i'm not so serious about yoga. He would keep quiet. And only later on, I realised the wisdom in his silence, that if I was not serious, i would not fly 18 hours just to do a week long workshop and hop straight back on the plane back to work. Later years, we would just 'hang out' together in either his apartment in Bay Area or Singapore apartment he was putting up at, and there was no need to say anything. Just 'Being'. no awkward silences. No pressure of speech. These are precious times i appreciate and continue to do so. Just Being to Being, in Consciousness. I've also come to know well, his other long time students (cos we would always meet in the workshops) and grow old with them. The last Yoga and Sound workshop recently was especially poignant and i could sense the immense love the students similarly had for our Guruji.

He has taught so much of yoga asana, mulabandha work, alignment, pranayama, yoga philosophy. I would laugh at myself cos there would be an "ahah" moment, but when i flipped my notes from a few years ago, i realised he had actually said the same thing, but the mind was not receptive at that time and was not ready to perhaps understand. A sense of humour is always important, he says. His depth of yoga and understanding continues to astound me each workshop. Importantly, his openness to explore Yoga and Sound, and sharing with everyone what he had experienced to be beneficial and in the recent years, his knowledge of Cakras/Nadis/Sariras in this inner yoga journey.

On Diwali today, which means row of light in Sanskrit, I only have but immense gratitude towards my teacher who has shone the light on ignorance and really ignited my interest in yoga and this inner journey of Self Knowledge. Lucky me. Namaste 🙏

When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.

Happy Diwali to all