The Man Who has Practiced One Kick 10,000 Times

Vedic chanting was my father’s passion, a discipline he took very seriously and one he overcame obstacles to attain.While studying for his masters, he approached one of the staff members he knew had Vedic chanting knowledge, asking to learn from him.

While the man appreciated his enthusiasm, he could not teach him unless he had obtained the upanayanam, or sacred thread, a prerequisite for Vedic education.

At 24 years old he gave his parents an ultimatum: Perform my upanayanam (traditionally performed by parents) or I will perform it myself. Wanting to avoid social embarrassment, his father performed it and my dad began his classes.

This required waking up at 4:00 am for a chanting session, prior to a 5:00 AM bus to his job. He learned alongside 9 and 10 year olds, which he recounted as a humbling experience. His teacher, Putta Narasimha Shastry was a well- respected Vedic scholar had a very particular philosophy regarding chanting that relates to the picture above.

Bruce Lee once said, “I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who had practiced one kick 10,000 times” My father’s teacher also wouldn’t teach his students further chants until they displayed complete mastery of the ones they were learning. It’s an attitude my father took forward with him when teaching students of his own in the USA. Myself being one of his first!

It’s also an attitude that has filtered potential students that wanted to learn as much as they could in a short amount of time. But like his teacher and Mr. Lee, mastery over a small amount was far more valuable than the inverse. Furthermore, my dad was never looking for a large student count to put up on a sign, a la McDonalds.

It’s why as a kid I would sometimes call him “The Bruce Lee of Chanting.”

Teju Prasad