YogiWrites

A humorous yet profound account of my journey to Isha Ashram, where chance encounters with three strangers during Mahashivratri led to unexpected friendships and deeper self-discovery. From pandemic-era train travels to all-night spiritual marathons, here’s how a simple pilgrimage became a life-changing adventure.

The Restless Beginning: When Couches Become Prisons

The year 2020 had turned us all into professional couch potatoes. As the world slowly reopened, I found myself with an inexplicable urge to push every boundary I’d built around my comfort zone. Isha Ashram kept calling—not just for spiritual reasons, but because I needed to remember what it felt like to be fully alive.

December 5, 2020: The date I first boarded that train to Coimbatore, when train stations still echoed like abandoned cathedrals and half-empty bogies felt like ghost towns. Yet somehow, online reservations remained perpetually “Waitlisted.” Classic Indian Railways—making the impossible possible since forever.

By 2021, I’d become such a regular that the train staff started recognizing me. “Isha wala!” they’d call out, slipping me insider tips about which vendors actually sold edible food. In a world where pantry service had vanished with normalcy, these small kindnesses meant everything.

The 1:40 AM Gamble: Mahashivratri 2021

Nothing good ever starts at 1:40 AM, but Mahashivratri 2021 was about to prove me wrong.

Standing on Pune station platform at that ungodly hour, I realized I was part of a migration. Young faces, old souls, backpacks stuffed with enthusiasm—all heading toward the same magnetic pull. About 80% of our train was Isha-bound, turning the journey into an unofficial pilgrimage express.

Being 6’2″ means train berths and I have a complicated relationship. So I claimed a side aisle seat, accepting that my already-questionable four-hour sleep routine was about to get worse. Around me, excitement bubbled like a college fest, but I chose the observer’s corner. Sometimes the best conversations happen in silence.

I was still clean-shaven then, hair cropped short, but my dhoti had become a statement. Comfortable, dignified, and built to last—unlike those fast-fashion disasters that disintegrate after two washes. The fabric moved with me as the train swayed through the night, and I felt strangely at peace.

The real story begins not on the train, but on that packed bus from Coimbatore to Isha—a 40-kilometer journey that somehow takes an hour and a half when you factor in the stops, the crowds, and the sheer determination required to stay upright.

I was standing with my bag wedged between my legs, gripping the seat backs for dear life as the bus lurched from Gandhi Nagar toward Poondi. That’s when I noticed him beside me—a twenty-something guy who looked like he was carrying invisible weight.

“First time?” he asked quietly as the bus swayed.

“Third,” I replied. “You?”

“Second. Still looking for… something.”

That was Bhavook. But unlike the torrential conversation I’d expected from someone seeking answers, he was surprisingly reserved. He mentioned he’d lost his father recently, but when I offered condolences, he quickly changed the subject. It was clear he was running from his grief rather than processing it—using the spiritual seeking as an escape route rather than a healing path.

“I just need to find the right teacher,” he kept saying. “Someone who can show me how to… move forward.”

By the time we reached the ashram, I realized Bhavook wasn’t looking for answers about his loss. He was looking for a way to forget it entirely.

Meeting Sanjhna and Rishab: When Worlds Collide

Bhavook stayed by my side through the ashram experience, but his approach was different from what I’d expected. Instead of diving deep into his pain, he seemed to be shopping for solutions. At Dhyanalinga, he kept asking about techniques. At the Devi temple, he wanted to know about specific practices. He was building a spiritual toolkit, hoping one of the tools would fix what felt broken.

“My dad always said I overthink everything,” he mentioned once, then immediately deflected: “But Sadhguru has this whole thing about transcending the mind, right?”

The couple from the train—Sanjhna and Rishab—remained mysteriously distant during this first visit. I’d catch glimpses of them around the ashram, always watching, always listening, but never approaching. They seemed to be conducting some kind of extended reconnaissance mission, cataloguing everything but revealing nothing about themselves.

It wasn’t until months later, during my next visit to Bangalore, that they finally made their move.

The Isha Immersion: Where Coffee Becomes Communion

The ashram hit you like a wave of possibility. First, Adiyogi—that magnificent statue that made you feel simultaneously insignificant and infinite. Then Dhyanalinga, where silence had weight and presence. Finally, Devi, where the feminine divine seemed to whisper secrets only your soul could understand.

The dip in Suryakund was like baptism by shock therapy. The water was cold enough to wake up cells you didn’t know you had, and somehow, that felt exactly right.

Hunger eventually drove us to Peppervine, the ashram’s restaurant that doesn’t just serve food—it serves experiences. The coffee was liquid enlightenment, the tea a meditation in a cup. The secret? The ashram’s cows live like royalty, fed organic food and roaming free. Basically, they had a better life balance than most Silicon Valley executives.

Over that first meal, the dynamics became clearer. Bhavook was the seeker-in-denial, desperately trying to find a guru who could help him transcend his grief rather than process it. He’d ask me endless questions about spiritual practices, always looking for the shortcut to enlightenment that would make the pain disappear.

“Do you think if I do enough inner engineering programs, I’ll stop missing him?” he asked once, then immediately caught himself. “I mean, stop being stuck in the past.”

The couple from the train maintained their distance, but I could sense their presence throughout our conversations. They were like spiritual anthropologists, studying our interactions from afar, building some kind of comprehensive understanding of what drew people to places like this.

It was only much later that I understood what they’d been doing during that first visit—they were learning to speak our language.

The 12-Hour Marathon: Dancing with 2 Lakh Souls

Mahashivratri night was chaos orchestrated by the cosmos.

The energy was electric from 6 PM onward, with at least 2 lakh people creating a human constellation around the main area. Seating was first-come, first-served, which meant people had been strategically positioning themselves like chess pieces since afternoon.

The main attraction was watching Sadhguru—this old man who moved like he contained multitudes. Every step was deliberate, every gesture purposeful. When he danced, 2 lakh people held their breath. When he spoke, the silence was so complete you could hear your own heartbeat.

Bhavook stayed by my side through the entire 12-hour experience, but his engagement was different from what I’d imagined. Instead of breaking down or opening up, he seemed to be taking mental notes, trying to decode the formula for transcendence.

“Look how peaceful everyone looks,” he’d whisper, studying faces in the crowd. “There’s got to be a technique for that, right?”

During the most intense moments, when others were lost in devotion or tears, Bhavook was analyzing. He wasn’t avoiding his grief exactly, but he was definitely trying to engineer his way around it rather than through it.

The mysterious couple remained in their observation mode throughout the night. I’d catch glimpses of them in the crowd, always positioned where they could see the maximum number of interactions, always watching, always learning. They were like spies gathering intelligence for some future mission.

It was only during my later visits that I realized what they’d been preparing for.

Around midnight, some locals decided they’d reached their spiritual quota and headed home. The rest of us settled in for the long haul, watching Sadhguru lead kriyas that turned the entire gathering into a single, breathing organism.

The temperature dropped as dawn approached. Those who had danced earlier were grateful for their sweat-warmed bodies, while the rest of us huddled near lights and fires. Rishab had somehow procured an extra shawl, but I noticed he’d charged three people ₹50 each to share it—entrepreneurial even in the cold.

Bhavook spent the coldest hours writing frantically—not in panic this time, but in a kind of flowing communion with something beyond himself. Sanjhna kept us all loosely connected, though I realized her “checking in” often involved getting people to tag her location on social media.

By dawn, we were exhausted, exhilarated, and somehow fundamentally changed.

The Morning After: When Everything Shifts

The sun rose on four different people than it had set on.

The Bangalore Connection: When Masks Come Off

It was during my next visit, this time to Bangalore for another program, that Sanjhna and Rishab finally revealed themselves. They approached me at a café near the venue with the confidence of people who’d been planning this conversation for months.

“We remember you from the Isha trip,” Sanjhna said, settling into the chair across from me. “You had that interesting dynamic with your friend—the one who was looking for a guru.”

“Bhavook,” I said, surprised they’d remembered.

“Right, Bhavook. We’ve been thinking a lot about that interaction,” Rishab added. “About what draws people to these experiences.”

That’s when they opened up about their real mission. They were indeed the Mumbai rebels I’d suspected—fresh out of 12th standard, refusing their parents’ pressure to pursue engineering or medicine. But instead of just rejecting conventional careers, they’d identified what they saw as the next big opportunity.

“Spiritual wellness is exploding,” Sanjhna explained, pulling out her phone to show me analytics. “But most of it is either too traditional or too Western. There’s a gap for something authentic but accessible.”

“We spent months studying places like Isha,” Rishab continued. “Understanding what works, what doesn’t, what people are really seeking versus what they think they want.”

They’d been watching me because I represented their target demographic—someone who kept returning, who brought friends, who seemed to get something real from the experience. I was their case study.

“We want to create something similar but more… democratic,” Sanjhna said. “Less hierarchical, more collaborative. More honest about the business side.”

The Morning After: When Everything Shifts

Dawn broke over our exhausted group, and Bhavook was already planning his next spiritual expedition. If anything, the all-nighter had reinforced his belief that there was a technique out there that could solve his grief.

“I’m thinking of doing the advanced programs,” he said, his voice hoarse from the long night. “Maybe even volunteer here for a few months. Total immersion, you know?”

He’d filled a notebook not with emotional processing, but with practical observations—which practices seemed most effective, which teachers resonated, which experiences produced the most noticeable shifts in other participants.

Meanwhile, during that later Bangalore encounter, Sanjhna was showing me their social media strategy. “We started documenting our own journey,” she explained. “Not just the highlight reel, but the real questions, the doubts, the business side of spirituality.”

“People are hungry for honesty,” Rishab added. “Everyone knows these places need money to operate, but no one talks about it. We’re being transparent about building something sustainable.”

And me? I sat there fascinated by how the same spiritual experiences could lead to such different conclusions—Bhavook’s quest for transcendence through technique, the couple’s vision of democratized enlightenment, and my own growing questions about what any of us were really seeking.

The Ripple Effect: How Strangers Become Soul Friends

What started as a chance encounter on a train became something none of us expected—a study in how the same spiritual experience could transform, inspire, and yes, be commodified all at once.

We exchanged contacts, but our post-Isha paths revealed just how differently that night had affected us. Our group chat became a fascinating tension between Bhavook sharing genuine insights from his grief work, me chronicling the deeper questions, and Sanjhna and Rishab constantly posting about their new “spiritual wellness consultancy.”

Bhavook started a grief support group in his city, realizing that his questions about loss and meaning weren’t weaknesses to overcome but bridges to help others navigate their own dark waters. His father’s death had taught him that some of life’s most important work happens in the space between questions and answers.

Sanjhna and Rishab launched “Authentic Awakening”—a Mumbai-based startup offering “curated spiritual experiences for the modern seeker.” Their Instagram had 50K followers within six months. They’d rebelled against their parents’ conventional career expectations, only to create their own version of traditional entrepreneurship, just with better lighting and Sanskrit hashtags.

The Journey Continues: More Questions Than Answers

As I made my way back to Pune, tired but somehow more awake than I’d been in months, I carried more than just memories. I carried new questions, better questions, the kind that don’t demand immediate answers but invite you to live into them.

The journey to Isha had been about pushing boundaries—of comfort, routine, and the small box I’d built around my identity. But meeting Bhavook, Sanjhna, and Rishab showed me something unexpected: that the same transformative experience could lead to radically different conclusions.

Bhavook found healing in embracing the questions. Sanjhna and Rishab found opportunity in packaging the answers. And me? I found fascination in witnessing how spiritual seeking and spiritual selling could coexist in the same moment, the same space, even the same heart.

Maybe that’s the most human thing of all—our ability to encounter the sacred and immediately wonder both “How can this change me?” and “How can this serve me?” Sometimes those questions lead to the same place. Sometimes they don’t.

Sometimes the best trips are the ones that refuse to end, that keep unfolding long after you’ve returned home. This was one of those trips.

Practical Wisdom for Fellow Travelers

Getting There: Direct buses from Coimbatore to Isha now cost ₹49 (keep exact change—conductors are still figuring out the whole change-giving thing). Book trains well in advance, especially during festivals.

What to Pack: Layers for temperature changes, comfortable shoes for walking, and an open mind for everything else. That hoodie I forgot? Pack it. Trust me.

Where to Stay: The ashram has various accommodation options, but book early during major events. The energy is worth any inconvenience.

What to Expect: Crowds during festivals, incredible food at Peppervine, and experiences that will follow you home whether you invite them or not.

Final Reflection

The title promised a story about how I met three people, but really, it’s about how we all met versions of ourselves we didn’t know existed. In the end, that’s what the best journeys do—they don’t just take you somewhere new; they reveal the new that was always within you.

Would I do it again? In a heartbeat. But next time, I’m definitely bringing that hoodie. And maybe an extra notebook, just in case.