Guru and the Gravity of Love

It was the final week of January 2024, we had just finished led intermediate. And this giant industrial hall becomes a soft space of love and gratitude. There are few classes that I think can challenge the human spirit the way intermediate led can. In 2010, I remember watching a small group (only two rows in the Gokulam shala) of students complete the rigorous and unrelenting rhythm of second series led by Sharath Jois. In 2024, there must be over a hundred of us, breathing through long holds, stretching to mental and emotional capacity. It's an experience that reminds me that I feel incredibly lucky to be alive, that I am so much stronger and more capable than I can possibly imagine. I feel blessed to have survived it. And I am not the only one. Sharathji doesn't get far from the podium where he sits presiding over the class's final moments, students begin to cue so they can touch his feet. This is where he will stand until we're all done thanking him. 

I am still a dozen or so people away and I am already crying. Not delicate tearful crying. I'm crying CRYING, I'm breathing crying, I've lost all command of my feelings-crying. I am overwhelmed by the experience of led, of being in Mysore after a 5-year absence. I am overcome by gratitude that I felt cared for and held in the practice and that I could get back to doing most of what I could do before pregnancy--albeit with some help. I felt the possibility of what practice and life could be like with the right support. And it moved me. 

In my experience, there are 2 main kinds of interactions with my teacher: 1) Awkward and 2) Not so Awkward. And sometimes, there could be a very thin line between the two. I wish I could tell you for sure what conditions result with a positive outcome--not that it matters now--but sometimes you get lucky and sometimes you get unlucky. Sincerity goes a long way in these moments, and I think Sharath appreciated when we understood the weight of the learning was something important for our lives. 

And it was decidedly not awkward crying in front of my teacher, after that last led intermediate, me expressing my pure gratitude for the gift of his teaching. I thanked him. I touched his feet. He looked on kindly, graciously letting me have my moment, just like he did for everyone who came before him that morning. It was not always easy to have time with him, but when it happened, it was expansive.  

When I look back at that moment, I feel so much relief that my last moment with teacher was as honest and as vulnerable as it was. I was both so sad to go but also so grateful to have been there.

In the years that I have been writing this blog, so much has been dedicated to what it means to have found my teacher, what it has meant for my yoga sadhana, or spiritual practice, how my teacher's presence has kept me an honest practitioner and how the practice has shaped me into the person who I am today. I have processed so much of my relationship with ashtanga yoga, with my teacher Sharathji, with Mysore, India and with myself in these pages. It seems unfathomable that I must now inevitably process the gravity of loss and love that I feel with my teacher's passing (last November 11, 2024). 

There was so much I wanted to write about a year ago, during that last trip to Mysore, but I was too overwhelmed by life and by also bringing my son with me for two months of practice; there was no time to write, to sit or feel or let anything settle. As I approached the end of last year, I even felt excited at the next season (which I had decided to sit out) and that maybe I would finally write about my experience between December '23-January '24. Little did I know that the end of the year would be the end of an era.

If we have learned anything, however, over these months is that Sharathji's spirit continues to preside over our practices, over Mysore, over the community he built and the teachings he helped amplify. Realizing Mysore will continue to be a pursuit for the yoga aspirant, I know it will continue to be mine. And the energy of the "guru" continues, the gravity of our Teacher, his love for this practice and his belief in each and every one of us, will continue to tug at us, pulling us into a certain orbit and leading us down the path that is meant for us.