The Guru Who Refused to Help

The first time I participated in a debate, it was a total disaster. You would think of stage fright, anxiety, or simply blanking out as the usual suspects that led to the catastrophe. All of that was there, but the mayhem started long before the actual day of the competition. It started, as it always would, with literal begging.

This was middle school. Most of my competitors would have their scripts locked and loaded on day one after the announcement, drafted by their parents, older siblings, or someone they could rely on. And rightly so, since the competition rules didn’t mandate solo authorship or forbid outside research. We only had a few days to prepare. The majority spent them in rote learning.

I remember calling my grandfather, my Nanu, one of the greatest writers our country has seen, and literally begging him to help me with the draft. He would not even give me a single suggestion. He strictly forbade my parents from intervening. Helping me himself was out of the question. No one would help me. I didn’t have an older sibling either. What followed were days of helplessness. I would write things and strike them out. Countless pages written and discarded. I’d keep going at it, calling him, crying, imploring him to help. He would not be moved. I remember the pencil I used as a child. It was used less for writing and more for striking things out.

I would call him, and he would say only one thing. “You should certainly do it by yourself. You are the most capable person to do this. You can do it better than I can.” Strangely, his words, probably meant to instil confidence in me, only left me frustrated. More pages down the drain and relentless crying the day before. Nanu would say, “Even if you can’t write anything, or don’t remember what you decided to speak, just go on the stage, you will know what to say.” He made me believe I could speak better spontaneously than by memorising a manuscript.

Competition days were generally very overwhelming for me. I would be stunned by my competitors’ profound arguments and abstruse vocabulary. Their arguments carried a weight and a precision that didn’t belong to children of that age. I felt that my writing paled in comparison. I never won.

Something shifted with time, though. Without realising it, I got better at improvising. I’d cite my opponents by name, turn their own arguments against them, and dissect their specific phrases before I dived into my rebuttal. Yet my juvenile vocabulary was still no match for the ghostwritten scripts.

My first win came when my school started organising impromptu essay-writing competitions. Everyone else was used to relying on crutches, while I was used to relying on my mind to create. I still remember that day. There was crying that day as well, but of a different kind. My Nanu was so proud of me. He might deny it, but I’m pretty sure he cried too, on the other side of the call.

He has always been there, one call away, refusing me everything except himself. Thanks to my Guru, who built the conditions for Aparokṣa Jñāna in me long before I knew the word, I got a taste of the Gurukul in my own home. I looked within when I created instead of looking outside. I never got to have training wheels. I had fallen way too many times before it was time to ride solo. And once I did, I was unstoppable. I won not only in school but at college level and in inter-zonal competitions at university. It was all because of my Guru, who refused to help me.

This essay sits at the intersection of Education & Learning and Creativity & Expression.