Ramesh Prathap: From IT Engineer to Ayurvedic Therapist

Leaving a comfortable lifestyle to do something far more important: helping people regain their health and discover their full potential.

Ruchira Roy
Sep 1, 2018 · 10 min read

Beginning his yoga journey in 1999 in India, Ramesh Prathap continued his practice and study as he worked towards achieving the American dream — a six figure salary, a thriving IT career, and a comfortable life on the East Coast of the USA.

Then, in 2016, he did the unthinkable. Ramesh returned to his hometown in south eastern India to establish an Ayurvedic clinic. Today, in addition to his work as an Ayurvedic therapist, he serves as a yoga trainer for both children and adults.

I spoke with Ramesh to get the full story on this drastic life change.


How did you first get into yoga?

I did my first yoga program in 1999 when I was completing my post-graduation in mechanical industrial engineering at the Regional Engineering College in the southern Indian city of Kerala. During the course my bouts of headaches in the afternoon were reduced and I found that I was able to solve puzzles better.

Kerala, India. Photo by Prasanth Chandran.

Many classmates eventually dropped out of the yoga classes and I also discovered that “life happens,” and found myself discontinuing soon after. However, the positive impression stayed with me.

In 2003, I undertook a two levels yoga program in Chennai, another southern city. Until then, I had considered yoga a purely physical form of exercise, and I felt as relaxed as I would have from any kind of work out.

Chennai, India. Photo by VtTN.

Three years later, in 2006, when I attended my first Art of Living program, I had a much deeper and more holistic experience. It was like I had watched a great film and I wanted to share about it with everybody! After the five-day program, my life took a turn towards a more spiritual and intuitive journey of which yoga became a central part.

How did you become a yoga teacher?

I kept volunteering to organize similar yoga programs and would sometimes lead yoga sessions too. While organizing these courses, I used to hear from participants about the many benefits they were getting, health wise, professionally, and personally. That inspired me.

I was also assisting on the courses where I used to get an opportunity to teach yoga. The teachers felt that I was ready to take a teachers training course. So, based on their encouragement, I got leave for three weeks and took one.

But I did not intend to teach. I actually went into the training with selfish intentions. I figured that since the regular program was bringing so much benefit and transformation inside me, then the teachers’ training would be even more beneficial. I just wanted to learn improve myself. I later realized the great benefits of teaching versus simply continuing as an individual practitioner.

Tell us about your time in the USA.

I won’t go into too much detail, but it’s safe to say that I had achieved the American dream. I had a six figure salary, a sixteen-year career as an IT engineer, and a comfortable life on the East Coast of the USA.

I continued practicing, studying, and teaching yoga on the side. Over time, I developed the idea to set up a business that benefits society and spend the rest of my life teaching and spreading the wisdom of yoga.

Tell us about your drastic career and life change.

In 2016, I returned to India and settled in the southern city of Hyderabad.

As you can imagine, my decision was met with doubt and apprehensions, especially by my friends in the IT industry. Many people fear changing jobs. But, they were completely shocked that I could leaving behind a well paid job and the luxuries of American life.

After my return, my first attempt to start the Ayurveda center didn’t go well due to a failed partnership. But, I wasn’t going to let that stop me. So, I tried again without losing his enthusiasm. Today, our Sri Sri Ayurveda Clinic offers various treatments and therapies along with yoga programs and health awareness camps.

Hyderabad, India. Photo by Nagalakshmikavuri.

What benefits have your yoga students shared with you?

The Sri Sri Yoga program that I teach regularly lasts for 2–2.5 hours a day. The experiences shared by my students have been very rewarding.

In my first course, one person had abnormally high blood sugar levels. His doctor advised him that once it’s crossed a certain threshold that it can’t be brought back down without medication. Due to this, his insurance application was rejected. After taking my five day course, they were down to a normal level. He also told me that he felt fresher and lighter.

In another instance while teaching a program in New Jersey, USA, a participant who had practiced yoga for twenty years told me that he learned more in my five day course than he had during the past twenty years because it was his first experience going beyond the physical aspects of yoga.

In another program, which had been organized especially for volunteers, the participants told me that the meditation techniques I taught them led them to go deeper than anything they had encountered before.

How has your personal yoga practice helped you get through challenging situations?

During my wife’s first delivery, I was not spiritual. I believe that it was my wrong decision that caused us to lose our first baby. During the second delivery, my wife had many more problems but I was not shaken. By then I was practicing yogic techniques properly.

Another time my spiritual mettle was tested was when I was without work for two months. I am a very active person. I was out of projects and without a job for two months. I realized how unemployed people can be impacted by tremendous stress and pressure. However, thanks to my spiritual practices and yoga I was able to sail through that stress.

What has inspired your journey thus far?

The single most important influence on my life has been my guru, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. I undertook a six-day program taught by him. On the last day, I could notice that a transformation that occurred. I felt that nothing could shake me. There was an invincible confidence that helped me continue on the path. I later took many additional programs designed by Gurudev that deepened my experience.

When I practice yoga, I feel fresh, energized, and centered. Whenever I miss the practice, I can clearly see a difference in the way I function, how I behave with people, how my body feels, and the quality of my thoughts. I’m more connected to myself when I do yoga.

I took a fifteen-day teacher training program with Krishan Verma in North Carolina, USA. It was a life-altering experience. I realized through those fifteen days, how one can become a yogi while living in modern society. Many can become teachers, but few become Yogis.

What challenges do you see the yoga world facing today?

Children and teens have often no knowledge of authentic yoga, and so they just react to stereotypes. Our education system encourages them to spend time studying or playing sports, but doesn’t give them a way to relieve stress or get to know themselves better. Their parents usually can’t help either because they haven’t been exposed to authentic yoga.

In Indian schools, the administration get worried when non-Hindu students start taking an interest in it. They are more worried about those students’ parents than educating them about the benefits of yoga.

Often, neither the parents nor the teachers realize the value of yoga and its universal nature. They fail to see that when children practice yoga, they will be able to focus, memorize, and assimilate more easily. They will be saving lot of hours and won’t need to go through so much effort. They will be much better equipped to achieve their goals if they practice yoga.

Young people in their twenties are more interested. However, they have various responsibilities and are trying to start their careers. They feel under pressure and many experience disillusionment. They need a way to de-stress.

That said, I feel excited and hopeful to see many young people taking up teaching yoga as a career. It is a tremendous change. We are moving towards a positive state in the path of yoga.

People Need To Be Taught The Essence of Yoga

Even, within the practicing community, Prathap observes there are problems that need to be addressed. Lot of people today have taken up yoga for superficial benefits when it has so much more to offer. It is the preface to knowing one’s highest self.

“One major thing I noticed is, many institutions are limiting their teaching to physical postures. I feel if they do not have enough understanding, they can learn from some other sources and extend the teaching to wisdom. It will add more beauty to the practice.”

Prathap also addresses the hot issue of practical plagiarism which can cause harm to the practitioner and swear them off Yoga if not looked into. “Today everything is online. Some are copying from there and teaching them as their own techniques, which is not right. One of the principles of Yogic life is Asteya- non stealing. When a teacher is not following, I don’t think the teacher will be able to give such a profound experience to their students.”

Yoga is Serious?

It is hard to miss the joy and lightness of being in Prathap while he is practicing the postures or even when he is not. He takes this lightness into his programs as well, especially while teaching kids.

“Sometimes yoga is taught in a serious manner where as some fun can be added. We need to make it more interesting. We need to find the distinction between seriousness and sincerity, especially while teaching kids.”

Prathap points out that people who are teaching Yoga without proper training make the students lose out on the truest and deepest meaning of Yoga or experiencing that state of Yoga, which is the real essence of it.

“They learn from here and there and go out to teach. Without proper training, we cannot give that profound experience to participants. If they have that, they will continue on path. If they are teaching in bits and pieces and leaving it as just another form of exercise, then they are doing injustice to yoga. So I think, only trained teachers should teach Yoga,” Prathap says.

Healing People And Taking Yoga To Everyone

A Yoga trainer for both children and adults, Prathap has taught yoga in orphanages, government schools where kids do not have many opportunities to learn Yoga otherwise. In some courses, people got healed from body pains, aches and ailments like diabetes. Some participants got curious about yoga. Prathap was able to get people to have some deeper experience of yoga, apart from enabling them to hold postures steadily, comfortably and meditatively. “I was able to guide and encourage many of them to become yoga teachers and I was able to counsel them to stick to the path of yoga. Otherwise they were about to go off the path.”

Prathap envisions dedicating his life to taking the wisdom and lessons of Yoga as a way of life to every corner of the world. “I would like to share it with masses especially in rural areas. I keep getting this vision that I would be teaching yoga to thousands and thousands of people there.”

He sums up the contribution that Yoga and Yogic practice has had in every step of his life. “As a student, I was able to maintain my freshness, was able to solve puzzles in life and otherwise. While working in IT, I started performing better at my work place.” He integrated Yoga into his life seamlessly, and Yoga did not fail him. For example, while working in the U.S, during lunch, Prathap’s colleagues would spend their lunch hour gossiping, while Prathap would practice Yoga Nidra, or Yogic sleep which is a restful meditative technique, that would help him stay fresh for next few hours. This would save him endless cups of coffee and the embarrassment of nodding off in front of his computer screen.

Want To Stay Fresh For 22 Hours?

“Yesterday I woke up at 4.30 AM and did my Sadhna (spiritual practice) for 90 minutes which helped me keep fresh till the evening and again before dinner I did some practices which helped me keep kicking for another 4 hours. It is amazing for myself to see that I can be fresh for 22 hours! Now I will be going at bed after finishing this interview at 2 AM and now I am still pretty alive!”

Prathap gives a glimpse of his humility and respect for his art, as the interview draws to a close, “I am so grateful for this knowledge of Yoga, for all the Masters who have walked this planet who have kept this knowledge alive and my own Master Sri Sri Ravi Shankar through whom I got all these wonderful techniques.”

“Whatever I want to achieve I have to do it now. Whatever I am passionate about, I have to do it now!” says Ramesh Prathap with a sincere sense of urgency, as we wrap up the conversation.


To learn more about kk and his Ayurvedic practice, please visit Facebook.com/ssacgachibowli.

Ruchira Roy

Written by

I like to observe. A pacifist who loves to create,entertain, meditate and tell stories!! anti-small talk. NYU journalism grad and ACJ alum.

Welcome to a place where words matter. On Medium, smart voices and original ideas take center stage - with no ads in sight. Watch
Follow all the topics you care about, and we’ll deliver the best stories for you to your homepage and inbox. Explore
Get unlimited access to the best stories on Medium — and support writers while you’re at it. Just $5/month. Upgrade