HOW THE ADVENTURE BEGAN..

ARUN PERUN JOTHI ARUN PERUN JOTHI THANIPERUN KARUNAI
ARUN PERUN JOTHI
May the dazzling light of grace be with you!

Hello Friends!

My name is Maria and I am happy to open this blog to share this beautiful experience surrounded by devotees of the Saint Vallalar Ramalinga.

Typing from Vallalar’s Ashram at the feet of Arunachala the holy hill at Thiruvannamalai in Tamil Nadu ,one of the five main Shaivite holy places in South India.


It is said that when you reach Arunachala it is not you who chose this encounter with this powerful Mountain but Shiva himself to allow you to discover the true Atman inside your self.

And after being here for a couple of months attending different Satsangs of interesting teachers , mainly westerns and mainly practicing my meditation in Ramanasramam , just 2 weeks before my flight going back to Mexico I come across a beautiful picture of Vallalar at a friends house.


Something happened to my heart when I saw this picture. I remembered my meditation teacher in Mexico explaining with so much respect the value of the message of this Saint.

“He became an embodiment of light! He transcended matter! He left this plane with his body and melted into light! He proved it is possible to conquer total awareness of your soul until it looses the idea of having a human form and penetrates into the highest teachings a human being can conceive: Becoming BODY & SOUL ONE WITH THE SUPREME!!.”

So my friend Greg was a very close friend of the Swamis, he played cricket with them, had travelled with them, and kept a close friendship with them.
So he explained to me the main teaching of Swami Ramalinga is JivaKaruniam which means compassion. So this Swamis don’t only meditate, they feed everyday more than 200 sadhus and give yoga and meditation lectures! I was so excited to meet them!

That same night he took me to have dinner with Guruji and his devotees.

I was greeted by so many beautiful pure smiles I was shocked.
And I thought.. how it is possible? I have been in India for 4 months and haven’t tried to find truth in relationships with Indian people? This people are so beautiful !

My friend Greg explained my interest and Guruji immediately opened his heart and said many times:

ARUT PERUN JOTHI ARUT PERUN JOTHI ARUT PERUN JOTHI
THANIPERUN KARUNAI ARUTPERUNJOTHI

Guruji speaks little English so Sadhu Janagi Raman Swami did all the translation.

-“Why are you attracted to Saint Vallalar Ramalinga?” Guruji asked
-“Because I'm interested in understanding truth and if it is possible that the SELF can be a body of light wit the supreme” Something like this I answered.
-“You are blessed !” Guruji replied. “Its not common for a human being to trust its own power to become an embodiment of light!”

To be honest there are so many things I don’t understand about myself, what energy brought me from Mexico to India ? why I have this luminous auspicious callings in my heart ?
But I DO know my desire to BE with God, my desire to find truth and I was sitting in this room smiling at this people feeling trust and warmthness and I felt for the first time that I would stay with this people for a long time.

With a sad smile I explained my Airplane was leaving in one week and that I was very interested in going to Vadalur the town were Swami Ramalinga became liberated before I went back home.

Immediately the Swamis began to make arrangements to take me to Vadalur.

Also this night I met Vimala a 20 year old beautiful girl wanting to learn yoga and Guruji said that just this morning he was telling her she needed a yoga teacher and that it was my duty to teach her some asanas before I left.

The next morning I didn’t have only one student I had three students.
One was my student Vimala. Another was a quiet women wearing a white Sari taking notes on the back.
And wearing a bright orange chudither was SantaMa MAtaji a beautiful women in her mid thirties with shiny brown big eyes and a an elegance difficult to describe.
The dark color of her skin made her holy eyes look like two bright stars.
The first thing I felt when I saw her was: “Im standing infront of a Saint” Her presence is very powerful and soothing.

So my yoga class started and I was getting nervous. It felt too strange to be from Mexico and teach yoga to two Indians! SantaMa calm presence made me shiver.

So I asked the ladies to do Suryanamaskar by themselves so I could compare their practice from my learning from the Rishikesh teachers.

ShantaMa closed her eyes placed her hand in her heart and started singing:

ARUT PERUN JOTHI ARUT PERUN JOTHI THANIPERUN KARUNAI ARUTPERUNJOTHI

As she began Sun Salutation my eyes froze into her moves and the rest of the room vanished.
Her arms caressed the sky, caressed the ground so softly , with a soothing power I cannot describe.

It was as if her God was in the air and she was calmly dancing with him, the space became so silent, my heart started to burn.

It was not that only it was amazingly good yoga , it was HOLY yoga, full of love, and this was the first time in my life I saw it.

Her eyes were mainly closed , her breath was soft and long and there was no sound, not a single sound as if she was weightless.

In that moment I knew my plane ticket had to be cancelled.

How is it possible that us foreigners learn yoga to be fit? To be in peace?
I could feel how powerful it is to understand that yoga is an act of love to the creator, to the body, an intent to become one with the Supreme.

For this women SantaMa and all the Vallalar devotees the Supreme God is Jothi this vibrant light that Saint Vallalar Ramalinga pointed.
The challenge is to search for it in the middle of your eyes,until one day you see it burning and you have found your true SELF. The rest of the work is done by Grace and by an spontaneous act of compassion that begins to flourish into your arms.

As SantaMa did her sun salutation I could see her eyes, even if they were closed ...they were frozen into an inner space that was guiding her to move with such grace, such love, such devotion!

waaa!! what else to say..this was the beggining of an adventure that I will be sharing with you! I feel blessed and happy and thankful to be able to try to put in words such blessings being revealed to my heart

Jothi Jul Jothi Jul Jothi!