Kausthub Desikachar - The Yoga of the Yogi - The Legacy of T. Krishnamacharya

Water drop on lotus leaf.

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Contents

Blue lily, reflection, and shadow.

Acknowledgements

Many things came together during this project. It has not been an easy task to write the story of yogacarya T Krishnamacharya. There is so much we do not know about him, and at the same time, there is so much to say about what we do know. When you are working on a project like this, you either need a lot of luck or a lot of help. In my case, I had both. At every turn, I found myself running into the people I wanted to interview for this book or stumbling across photos to bring life to its pages. Friends generously contributed rare video footage that helped me enormously in my research. The entire project turned out to be a team effort, and I am very grateful to each and every member of this amazing team.

There are several people I would like to thank individually, starting with my father and teacher, TKV Desikachar. Not only did he ignite the spark of yoga in me, he also motivated me to tackle this project. I am grateful for his teaching, which revealed to me the magnitude and depth of yoga and the revolutionary accomplishments of Krishnamacharya. His constant encouragement (and all those cups of coffee he made for me) kept me going.

I would like to offer a special thanks to Mala Srivatsan for writing the first biography of Krishnamacharya, Sri T Krishnamacharya: The Purnacarya , in 1997. This book was one of my main inspirations.

A number of people helped with this project by contributing essays, anecdotes, photos, cookies, and warm words of encouragement. They include Pattabhi Jois, BKS Iyengar, Yvonne Millerand, MV Murugappan, MM Murugappan, TV Ananthanarayanan, AV Balasubramaniam, Mala Srivatsan, U Suresh Rao, Dr. B Ramamurthy, Prasanth Iyengar, S Sridharan, Lynn Carole Milich, Steve Annandale, Karina Friej, Barbara Brian, Sharath Rangaswamy, Eddie Stern, Larry Payne, Professor William Skelton, Frans Moors, Professor Varadachari, Professor Krishnamurthy Sastrigal, Maniam Selvam, Becky Gelatt, Amy Wheeler, and George Mantoan. I would also like to thank the entire staff and teachers of Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram, especially my secretary Jayanthi Sudhakar and the publications team: Asha Tilak, Raman Pillai, Nrthya Jagannathan, Lara Abhisheikh, and Ramakrishnan.

Many others contributed stories and shared their experiences with Krishnamacharya, but for personal reasons, they asked to remain anonymous. This is why some names used in this biography have been changed, while the names of others who provided me with information were not mentioned at all. My thanks to these contributors as well.

A very special thanks goes to my friends Todd Stellfox, Chase Bossart, Masakatsu Kinoshita, Hanna Persson, and Juan Pablo Martin. They understood my immersion in this project and forgave me for not being able to give them my complete attention while they were here in Chennai.

Words are not enough to express my gratitude to Liz and Scott, who offered invaluable editorial assistance on this book. They read the book again and again, refining the language, adjusting the placement of paragraphs, and just when I needed it, inspiring me to keep going.

I also have to thank Steve Jobs for inventing the Apple Macintosh, the Google founders for developing the most amazing search engine, and Adobe for creating Photoshop, InDesign, and Acrobatall of which have been invaluable in making this project work.

This acknowledgement would not be complete without thanking my familyTKV Desikachar and Menaka Desikachar (my parents), Bhushan (my brother), Mekhala (my sister), Lakshmi (my wife), Sraddha (my daughter), and Tulsi (our dog).

Dr. Kausthub Desikachar

Krishnamacharya initiating Kausthub Desikachar at his sacred thread ceremony.

Prologue

A few months ago, I traveled to Tucson, Arizona, to teach a workshop on Yoga Therapy. A nice mix of people from around the country were gathered together that first morning of the workshop in a bright, friendly space filled with the smell of incense. There were young people and elderly people, healthy people as well as people with health concerns. As is my habit, I asked each person to introduce themselves to the group and tell us a bit about their background and the reason why they had come to this workshop.

Finally, it was the turn of an elderly lady in the front row to speak. I guessed her to be in her late eighties. She was sitting up very tall, and her eyes were clear, bright, and calm. She was smiling kindly. I was very impressed with her already, and when she began speaking, my heart melted at her words.

I am Virginia Hill, she said. I was a student of Mataji Indra Devi for many years, and I have come to meet you, the grandson of my teachers teacher.

It was a humbling moment for me. I was overwhelmed that such an elderly lady had come all the way to this workshop to meet the grandson of her teachers teacher. Such reverence for ones teacher and for the teachings is rare today. When I spoke with Virginia later, she told me how highly Mataji Indra Devi had spoken about her yoga teacher, Krishnamacharya, and this was the main reason she had come to meet me.

I was both overjoyed and terrified at the ladys words. I was overjoyed for many reasons: for being born into such a distinguished family and for being a student of yoga. Above all, I was overjoyed to meet this woman, the student of one of my grandfathers most devoted students.

And I was terrified, because at that moment I realized what an enormous responsibility I had, not just as a yoga teacher, but as a representative of two great mastersmy grandfather, Tirumalai Krishnamacharya, and my father, TKV Desikachar. But as I thought about all of this and recalled the respect Virginia had offered me and the respect she had shown for the teaching tradition, I felt more confident and comfortable.

When I was younger, I was not interested in yoga. Probably, I was going through a bit of teenage rebellion. I wanted to do something different, something no one else in my family was doing. But my familys influence on me was strong, although very subtle. They never tried to force me to take part in their work, but I always knew the door to the world of yoga was open to me, if I chose to enter. Eventually, I decided on my own to look more carefully at what my family was offering me. Before long, I was a dedicated yoga student.