A guru is one who dispels darkness. He is able to throw light on dimensions that are not yet in your experience.
Sadhguru
There was a seeker who spent decades hoping to find a convincing answer to the deeper questions of life. What’s it all about? What is our purpose? Why am I here? What should I do? If the universe was created by intelligence, why do children get cancer?
One day an experience happened that answered these questions and more. The answer and it’s delivery was somehow totally convincing and absolutely beyond doubt or reproach for this seeker. The answer led directly to a Guru, and the seeker was thoroughly certain he’d found his Guru from the first words he heard and the first time he was in the Guru’s direct presence.
And so the seeker learned all the Guru’s available teachings and meditation and yoga processes. Before a year had passed the seeker had been to India to sit at the feet of the Guru and dive as deep into meditation as was currently possible for them.
For the next 5 years the seeker lived a life of bliss and Grace and happiness. Daily practices took 2-3 hours a day. There were years of diligence and non-stop daily practices, and also a year of laziness that clearly demonstrated that the daily practices were beneficial and useful and required.
The seeker started meditation groups and did their best to spread the teachings they could. Many of the teachings were secret and forbidden from distributing. All came from the field of classical Yoga, though, and spreading the teachings of classical Yoga and Vedanta was a fruitful pursuit for years.
Then the seeker attended months of training at a school established by another Guru. Similar teachings and processes, similarly dramatic effects on one’s body, mind, spirit, emotions, and energy levels. And this new yoga school had a very different approach to distributing their teachings. There was maximum openness. the teachings were covered in widely available books. Students could easily go on to become teachers empowered to spread the full range of these powerful meditation and yoga processes.
And the seeker felt changes and growth within themselves. Energy levels were as high as ever, and the physical strength and capabilities of the body expanded rapidly. It quickly became easier to sit for meditation, despite already having 5 years of experience of yoga designed to enable comfortable sitting.
And so now we find the seeker slightly confused and surprised. They’ve considered themselves a (loose) disciple of the Guru for 5 years. But now they’ve found equally powerful tools and techniques presented in a way that facilitates teaching others.
Is the seeker switching allegiances? Abandoning their Guru? Is there even a conflict here?
The “seeker” in the story above is me. I’m writing this from my room at the Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centre in Quebec. I’ve been here for 7 weeks, with a few more weeks to go before I complete initial and advanced yoga teacher training. I find myself with a surprisingly expanded toolkit of knowledge, processes, and context with which to continue spreading the possibilities of yoga and meditation to transform our everyday mundane lives into experiences of Divine Bliss and Grace.
To do this I have to loosen up on my formerly-so-strong association with my Guru. This has been a confusing process. I know the Guru is right, and I have no criticism of him or his school or systems or processes or teachings. But in Swami Vishnudevananda‘s Sivananda school I’ve found a much more open and easily spreadable set of processes and techniques. They will definitely form a foundation of much of the work I do going forward, and will likely form a major part of my own personal daily sadhana practice.