Category Archives: Gurudevi

Bliss Is Everywhere

By Swami Samvidaananda

I went to India and met other swamis — Australian swamis!  It felt like a sweet reunion with family members I’ve never met.  There was an ease, a ready friendliness, and an enjoyment of each other’s company.  We were all there for a retreat hosted by the Aussies at our lineage home of Ganeshpuri MH, India.  

The Aussies were sweet and welcoming in general, but underlying that was something more. The swamis’ deep practice and commitment to yoga really showed.  How? It was their bliss.  My experience with them is described in a yogic text:

Lokaananda.h samaadhi-sukham. — Shiva Sutras 1.18

This yogi experiences the sweet bliss of the Self in every location and situation, and shares it with others.
[rendered by Gurudevi Nirmalananda]

This yogi is a knower of the Self.  They know their Divinity. Such a yogi experiences the sweet bliss of the Self everywhere — in every location and every situation.  

There are other names for “a Knower of the Self”: Self-Realized, Enlightened, Illumined, God-intoxicated.  When you are Enlightened, you take your illumined Self-Knowing everywhere you go.  No place or circumstance can diminish your bliss, nor can it enhance it.

Meditation doesn’t make you more blissful.  Being out in the world doesn’t make you less so.  Your experience of the bliss of the Self is steady.  

And you share it with others.  God-intoxicated beings love to share! They don’t even need to try. They vibrate with bliss everywhere they are, whomever they are with, whatever they are doing.  They radiate bliss the way the sun radiates light and heat. 

The swamis I met in India have dedicated themselves to becoming a yogi like this.  Actually, they have dedicated themselves to a yogi who is already like this.  They are on the traditional Guru-disciple path. Just like me!  Their Guru, Swami Shankarananda (called Guruji), and my Guru, Swami Nirmalananda (called Gurudevi), are Self-Realized beings. More than that, they are both Shaktipat Gurus.  A Shaktipat Guru has the capacity to awaken you to the inner knowing of your Self, an initiation called Shaktipat.

Shaktipat Gurus are extremely rare. And I was in India with two of them. Actually, three.  No, four! Another Shaktipat Guru was there at his Ashram, just outside of town.  His name is Swami Nityananda (of Magod).  And Swami Brahmananda was there as well, another Shaktipat Guru. 

One afternoon, I had the unique and delightful opportunity to spend time with them as well as several other swamis. They had all lived at the Ashram in Ganeshpuri together many years ago, studying with their Guru, Swami Muktananda. You could call them Guru-brothers and Guru-sisters.

Avengers shawarma scene (1)

For me, being in the presence of these Great Beings was like being among superheroes.  My heroes.  But for them, it seemed more like the after-credits scene I loved from one of the Avengers movies.  All the superheroes had banded together and saved the world.  End of movie — roll the credits.  Then, there’s a brief scene of all of them together around a table in a tiny restaurant, eating in companionable silence.

What happens when Shaktipat Gurus get together? They chat.  They catch up.  They drink some chai. They enjoy each other’s company.  They are present, engaged and happy.  And then, they say goodbye, and go on to their next task, equally present, engaged and happy. They certainly appreciated the opportunity to spend some time with each other.  But they are Knowers of the Self: Lokaananda.h samaadhi-sukham.  And so their bliss was not increased by being together, nor was it diminished when they said goodbye.

This constancy and steadiness doesn’t mean that an Enlightened being’s life is boring, every day the same. It’s not that they’re “beyond it,” meaning they don’t care.  The opposite is true.  Enlightened beings are some of the most active, engaged, loving, generous, caring people you’ll meet.  This is their state, and it can be yours.

I don’t mean you have to become a Shaktipat Guru.  Nor do you have to become a swami, wear orange or move to an Ashram.  I mean you can live your life, do what you do, with the people you love, and you can be more YOU.  

You can be you at your best all the time: happy, content, loving, generous.  You can be your glorious Divine Self in every location and every situation.

How? First, get Shaktipat. This sacred and ancient initiation jumpstarts your knowing of your Self like nothing else can.  Then, you have your part to do: meditate.  Svaroopa® Vidya meditation gives you the experiential knowing of your Divinity.  

Meditation by meditation, your inner realization that you are the Self deepens and develops.  Until one day, you’ll never not know that you are the Self.  And you will recognize that everyone and everything is another form of the same Self.  Everything is Divine, and YOU are that Divinity.  

Then you will be the yogi who experiences the sweet bliss of the Self in every location and situation, and shares it with others. This is your future, if you want it to be.

  1. Avengers shawarma scene – https://ew.com/article/2012/11/29/avengers-shawarma-scene/

Yearning to Go Further 

By Swami Shrutananda

I admit I am a Trekkie.  “Trekkie” is found in the dictionary. So, clearly, lots of people are fans of the science fiction TV program “Star Trek.”  

As the show begins, Spock (Leonard Nimoy) says, “To boldly go where no one has gone before!”  When I hear those words, there is a yearning that arises within me.  

Before yoga, my yearning was to know more, to do more, to see more, to be more.  I trekked all over the world.  I had wanderlust.  I thought seeing and knowing more about the world would take care of my yearning.  I didn’t know what I was truly yearning for until I found yoga. 

This yearning drives humankind to look outward, and even to reach out into the cosmos.  Voyager 1, a space probe launched by NASA, is now 14.6 billion miles from earth.  For what purpose?  The goal is to explore the solar system beyond the outer planets, to the outer limits of the sun’s sphere of influence, and possibly beyond.  There is this yearning to go beyond the beyond.

Ultimately, it is the yearning to experience your own infinity.  It is a yearning to know your own Self.  Everyone has this yearning, but very few act on it. It is a spiritual yearning.  

For yogis this is an inner exploration, for it is all found within you:

citi-sa.mkocaatmaa cetano’pi sa.mkucita-vi”sva-maya.h

 — Pratyabhij~nah.rdayam 4

Even while contracted, Consciousness is the essence of the individual, who embodies the entire universe

[rendered by Swami Nirmalananda]

Consciousness, the One Divine Reality, has contracted in order to be everything, including you.  Even though Consciousness is contracted, the whole of consciousness is found inside your own body.  

The ancient sages did explore “where no man had gone before.”  But they looked inward.  They sat in meditation and deepened within. What did they find?  They found the whole universe within their own body.  

From seeing the whole universe within, they came to understand the solar system and the galaxy.  And they even understood that space was expanding.  Into what?  The yogis would say it is expanding into the Self.  All of this is described in the ancient yoga texts.  Their knowledge came from exploring inward.

In meditation I had the experience of the universe being within me while I was being in the universe.  I saw planets, the stars and the space between the planets and the stars.  Not only was the universe outside me, but the universe was within me as well.  Moreover, I was more than the universe.

Baba Muktananda said, “The inner universe is much greater than the outer universe; it is so vast that the entire outer cosmos can be kept in just one comer of it.”  Right now, astrophysicists estimate that there are two trillion galaxies, and their estimate just keeps increasing.  But, as Baba Muktananda says, the two trillion galaxies can be kept in just one corner of your inner universe.   Wow!  There is so much more to explore within.

My mind cannot even fathom that.  That is because your mind can only take you so far.  To go beyond your mind and explore the innermost realms of your own being, you must meditate.  The vehicle you use to explore inward is mantra.  By repeating mantra, you place yourself in the mantra mobile  —  your rocket ship. 

Yet, if you want your rocket ship to take off for your inner exploration, you must fill your tank with special fuel — Guru’s Grace.  You cannot get there on your own.  Receiving Shaktipat from a Shaktipat Guru ignites your inner energy and it climbs your spine.  Now you are being propelled beyond the beyond into the inner infinity of your own Self.  

Wonder after wonder of yogic realizations will unfold.  Now you are exploring what you have yearned for all your life — to know and to experience your own greatness, your own Self.  This is the gift of the Guru.  This is why I have a Guru: Swami Nirmalananda Saraswati. 

A Full-Hearted Life

By Swami Satrupananda

You want to live your life with an open heart. You want everything you do to warm your heart. 

You want your heart to overflow and to share that with others. This can be your physical and emotional heart, but it is only truly satisfying if it is the heart of your being. 

When you show up full-hearted, it is about putting your whole self into it. Your body, mind, heart and more all show up — open and ready to give. This is how you want to live. Then even washing the dishes is fulfilling. It’s not about the task. It’s not even about your heart. It’s about your wholeness. 

While you want to live from your wholeness, it can be challenging. You might have been hurt in the past, so you protect your heart. Your body might have aches and pains, so you’ve numbed out parts of your body. And there may be some dark corners of your mind where your scariest thoughts lurk. To protect yourself, you don’t go there. While you are protecting yourself from these pains, the result is that you don’t have your wholeness. 

Yoga reverses this process. The yoga poses and breathing practices open up your body and breath, making you more embodied. You breathe deeper, have less pain and have a more capable body. Meditation and chanting open up your mind and heart. You have clarity, decisiveness and the ability to follow through with your decisions. 

As your heart opens up, you are able to feel more love and to love more. And there are more dimensions of your wholeness that yoga opens up for you. One of yoga’s maps lists 36 dimensions of your own being.

The purpose of the yoga practices is for you to rediscover your multi-dimensionality and the wholeness of who you truly are. Then you can bring your wholeness into every moment of your life. To get to yoga’s promise, simply do the practices that are recommended. It’s like anything in life — you follow the instructions to get the promised outcome. 

Patanjali, a yogic sage, gives us guidance on our yoga practice:

Sa tu deergha-kaala nairantarya-satkaaraasevito drdha-bhoomih

Practice becomes firmly established by being continued for a long time without interruption and with devotion.

Yoga Sutras 1.13

Like everything in life, you work at something for a long time and without interruption to make progress. The same is true and necessary when you are opening up to your inner wholeness. You do practices every day. Every day you re-open again what has closed down as well as open up new dimensionality. 

Bit by bit, you open up more and more of who you truly are. The incremental changes delightfully creep up on you. Then something happens in your life, and you realize that you have changed. There is more of you here now.

Pain is a great motivator to do the yoga practices. It is painful to be closed down to the multi-dimensionality of your inner wholeness. This includes physical pain as well as mental and emotional pain. Pain can motivate you to begin your yoga practices. And pain can motivate you to continue your yoga practices for a long time and without interruption. 

And Patanjali tells us that devotion is also needed. You need to put your heart into your practice. This comes naturally as you love the practices, or love how you feel after doing the practices. But it is also about actively putting your heart into your practices. Then your yoga practices take on a new vibrancy as you put your heart into them. 

I loved how the practices made me feel from the very beginning. This, along with pain, was a great motivator to consistently attend weekly yoga classes. Over time, this grew into a home practice and then a consistent daily home practice. 

And, now, I do the practices because I love them. I also love how they make me feel. And I do the practices because of my devotion to those who shared them with me.

My Guru, Gurudevi Nirmalananda, shares the teachings and practices with me. As a Shaktipat Guru, she fuels the practices with Grace, the power that reveals to you your inner wholeness. I do the practices out of devotion to Gurudevi, to the Grace. I feel there is no better expression for my gratitude and love than doing the practices.

So, do the yoga practices because you love to do them or because you love how they make you feel. The more yoga practices you do, the more you know and you be your wholeness. Then you bring the whole of you into your life. This includes your heart and so much more. 

Then you have not merely a full-hearted life but, more importantly, the wholeness of your being. You have a “full-You” life. What a glorious way to live!

Why a 2024 Calendar-Journal?

By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

I bring this book to you because I’ve been inspired by others.  I have seen many yogis sharing online about quotes they’ve read and memes they’ve seen.  Inspiration for how to live your life comes from so many sources. So, I thought a yogi could share about how to live as a yogi.

I was surprised to find out that I am quotable.  When I was President of Yoga Alliance, I was interviewed by journalists from many different publications. One of them told me, “Every line you say is so quotable.”  I was delighted to find that my message comes through so clearly.

Now I realize it is like sutras – short pithy sayings with layers and layers of meaning.  A way to capture your mind and heart so the Truth contained in them will echo inside for you.

I know where that clarity comes from, which is why I live in endless gratitude to my Baba.  And I recognize that, having been given such a gift, it is my dharma to share.

So I come to you daily, if you allow.  In this book, with daily quotes, which we will be using in my daily Meditation Club as well.  Let’s bring more light into the world, together.

Peek into Living Mysticism

See how Gurudevi’s new Calendar Journal helps you celebrate the special days in the year, beginning with Valentine’s Day. Let her teachings seep into your day and fuel your yoga.

February 14 — Valentine’s Day

Since yoga makes you more “you,” you become more loving and more loveable.

February 15

Your love becomes pure and powerful only when you discover the perfection, wholeness and fullness of your Self.

February 16

The infinity of your own svaroopa is made of love — and more.

February 17

Your heart doesn’t need filling. It already encompasses the ocean: the ocean of your own immortality.

Who Raises You Up?

By Swami Shrutananda

I was mesmerized when I heard the song You Raise Me Up, sung by Peter Hollens. Being so full of gratitude, love and devotion, it got me contemplating: whom do I have gratitude for?  

Who has raised me up?  The composer, Rolf Loveland, states everyone raises one another up.  Josh Groban, who wrote the lyrics, says God raises him up.  This is Grace.  

I have found that Grace has been there throughout my whole life.  Perhaps yours, too.  Not everything has been easy, but I have gotten help along the way.  As I listened to this song, I thought of my family, my teachers, co-workers, friends and God.  They all supported me and raised me up to more than I thought I could be.   

Then I found a spiritual master, a yoga Guru, Swami Nirmalananda Saraswati (aka Gurudevi).  She showed me that I am so much more.  More than others think I can be.  But more importantly — so much more than I think I can be.  

This is the specialty of the Svaroopa® Sciences. They raise you up physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.  You get it all!

You can’t pull yourself up to such a state by your own bootstraps.  You need a Guru.   A Guru is an agent of Grace.  The importance of the Guru is that they raise you up to what they got from their Guru. 

From their Guru, they got the knowing of their own Divine Greatness within, the one Self being everyone and everything. So a Guru is someone who can guide you, inspire you and push you when needed.  

For me the Grace of the Guru is described in this verse from “You Raise Me Up”: 

When I am down and, oh my soul, so weary

When troubles come, and my heart burdened be

Then, I am still and wait here in the silence

Until You come and sit with me.

Soul level is the deepest level of your individual existence, reincarnating from lifetime to lifetime.  It empowers you to bring your sense of separation and pain with you, along with all your karma. Your soul needs a way to access the Ultimate Reality — your own Self — that you feel separate from. 

To end that sense of separation, meditation is a primary practice.  You sit in an easy upright position and wait in silence. But being left alone with your mind and all its thoughts can be a little daunting.  In SvaroopaÒ Vidya meditation you are given the mantra of this lineage to repeat.  This sacred phrase settles you inward deeper than your mind.  Your meditations are deep and easy.

How does the mantra work?  The mantra is the portable Guru.  When repeating mantra, you are calling the Grace of this lineage to you.  With each repetition you are invoking their presence and their blessings.  They support you as you undertake your inner exploration of your own Divine Greatness. 

One morning during meditation, I suddenly felt like I was being lifted up right off my meditation seat.  I was reminded of this meditation experience by the song’s second verse:

You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains

You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas.

I am strong, when I am on your shoulders

You raise me up to more than I can be.

In that meditation experience, I saw and felt the force that was beneath me. It was Bhagavan Nityananda, a Great Being of this lineage.   I was being lifted up on his shoulders.  Surges of bliss were coursing through my body.  Angels were singing his chant, Jaya Jaya Arati.  We chant this at the Ashram to honor Bhagavan Nityananda every morning.  I was ecstatic. 

From that experience, I know I am riding on the shoulders of the great spiritual giants of this lineage.  This is Grace.  The Gurus raise you up to more than you think you can be.  

Once you know your own Divine Greatness, you can stand on mountains.  Not only stand on mountains but know you are the mountains, the skies, the oceans and more.  You will come to know you are that One Divine Reality that has become everything and is being everything and more. 

You have equanimity of mind because you are anchored in the depths of your own Divine Greatness.  When based in your own Divine Greatness, you can walk on stormy seas.  

Yet, there is more.  This is a mystical tradition. In this tradition the Guru is a Shaktipat Guru who gives Shaktipat initiation.  Gurudevi is such a Guru.  Shaktipat initiation awakens your Kundalini, the Divine Energy within you.  

This empowers you to attain the highest goal of human life — knowing your own Divine Greatness, your own Self. This is Grace. When awakened by the Guru, Kundalini climbs your spine from tail to top. She is the mystical force that is the energy of your own Self-Realization, as described in the Sanskrit text, Shree Guru Gita: 

You should perceive your joyous Self

Through the gift of Guru’s grace.

This is the Guru’s proven path

Where Self-Knowing shines from within

— Sri Guru Gita verse 110 (1)

It is the gift of Guru’s Grace that raises me up to the knowing of my own Divine Greatness. You can receive this gift as well.  Meet my Guru online or in person.  She wants you to know your own Divine Greatness, your own Self.

(1) Rendered by Swami Nirmalananda Saraswati 

Live a Yogic Life!

By Amanda (Purna) Schmidt

Plan your yoga-year with our “Living Mysticism 2024 Calendar Journal.” The title is a wonderful promise for the year ahead.

Each day has its own dedicated page with a quote from Gurudevi. In these pages, you will find space for organizing your day. In addition, blank space leaves room for journaling and other creative expressions.

Keep this compact book with you on the go. It will help you bring yoga’s teachings into daily life. Stay inspired all year to live a yogic life.

Living Mysticism

Take a sneak peek at how the year begins in our new 2024 Calendar Journal.  Let Gurudevi’s teachings seep into your day and fuel your yoga.

January 1 – New Year’s Day

Your creative capacity is your ability to bring new into existence as well as to bring them into full fruition.

January 2 

Yoga says you have the creative power of consciousness intact within you.

January 3 

You are Shiva and you have all of Shiva’s powers intact within you.

January 4

Practice your practice in order to reach your goal — independent, unending bliss and Beingness.

January 5

By doing a little yoga every day, you can actually feel good every day.

Bittersweet Chocolate

By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Bittersweet chocolate is the best.  The sage Narada agrees, describing the yearning for God as the most painful and most blissful of the 11 types of Divine Love.  

Today, I honor my Guru on the anniversary of his departure from this earthly plane.  It is a day of great grief and a day of great gratitude – both of which are based in Divine love.

Grief is when you feel you’ve lost something important to you.  Yet the fact that it was important means you are grateful for what it gave.  Thus, grief is the flip side of gratitude.

Wonderfully, this gives you a pathway out of grief — simply express your gratitude.  When you put words to all you’ve received from that source, you are filled up inside and there’s no room left for grief.

I was in Spain when Baba left.  At the pivotal time in India, it was sunset where I was, on private retreat in a small town overlooking the Mediterranean.  That sunset lasted longer than any I’ve ever seen, with colors ranging from golden orange into deep purple.  

As I sat and watched it, Baba spoke to me inside.  For a long time.  Mostly it was wordless communion, but sometimes a few words would come – deeply loving while giving me direction for my life.

He was my sunset.  He was my sunrise.  He was the sun that lit up my whole world, even my inner universe.  Or I thought he was.  As long as he was in his body, I could see only Baba.  He took up the radar screen of my mind in an ecstatic and glorious way.  It was a whole lot better than anything else I’d had on my radar.

It was only after he was gone (seemingly gone) that I could look past my mind and discover what he had given me.  He gave me my own Self, the vast profundity and inner reality of Beingness being me.  But frankly, I’d rather look at him than look at me.

That’s bhakti yoga, the science of Divine Love.  Tukaram, a poet saint of India said it this way, “Please, please, dear God.  Keep me just a little separate from you, so there’s still a ‘me’ to love you.”  Yes, I love to love Baba.  Which is why I indulge myself in sweet moments of Divine Grief – so I can feel the love, the longing, the yearning, while I know I am the One who was He.

There is only One Reality, the ultimate, ever-existent, present-right-here-and now Beingness.  Called by many names, our tradition honors the One by the name Shiva, meaning the Auspicious One who plants his auspiciousness in all.

But it’s not like planting a seed in earth, with the seed being different from the earth.  Instead, Shiva plants himself in you by being you.  Shiva is being you while being me, while being all and beyond all.  Oh, Shiva!

So when I look for Baba, I find him inside. I love to look at his photos, but it is always he who is looking through my eyes.  I masquerade as a bhakta, lost in love of the Divine, while being the One who is being both the lover and the beloved.  There’s no better way to live, always lost in Divine Love, yet knowing that it is me loving me – even when I am loving you.

bittersweet chocolate bits

Jai Muktananda!  Hail to Muktananda!  As he said about himself, I also proclaim to the world – I don’t care what anyone says about my Baba.  He gave me everything.  

And he sends me to share it with you. Does anyone want some bittersweet chocolate?  We can laugh and cry together.  It’s a glorious way to live!

Yoga: The Fountain of Youth

By Swami Shrutananda

You always look better at the end of a meditation program or yoga class.  That’s because, when you arrive, often you don’t look so good. Perhaps your skin is ashen and dry.  Or your face, your neck and shoulders are crooked – even your gait.  You may look anxious and worried, the outside showing what you feel like inside.

All this makes the light in your eyes dull and your face wrinkled.  Instead of skipping though life, you may be limping along.

I watch people come in for yoga classes and meditation programs. They limp in. They skip out. It’s completely reliable. 

— Gurudevi Nirmalananda, Changing Your Future, Teachings Article, April 2023

In the 16th century, explorers looked for the Fountain of Youth to feel young and more alive again.  Yoga is the Fountain of Youth.  I love watching you during your yoga class or meditation program.  When it ends you look younger.   Your spine has lift.  Your face softens as your wrinkles melt away.  You have color in your face.  More light shines through your eyes.  You look radiant and you feel full of life.

I went through this too.  Before yoga, I was getting physical therapy for a neck & shoulder injury.  Unfortunately, it was not taking care of my pain. Then I started yoga.  My spine lifted and lengthened.  My pain lessened as my shoulders, neck and head moved back in line with my spine.  As I did more yoga, I felt better and better. 

Then Gurudevi taught me to meditate. I felt even better.  The pain in my neck completely went away.  My body was more fluid, and my mind was sharper and clearer.  I had more energy. I felt younger and more alive.   

How does this work?  Yoga and meditation ignite your own healing power.  Through these practices, the energy that was trapped by your spinal tensions begins to flow.  This energy is yoga’s fountain of youth.  When this energy is flowing through your spine, you get younger.  Simply look in the mirror.  This energy enlivens your body, your mind, your heart, and your life. 

Where does this energy come from?  Your own Self.  From your yoga practice you deepen more and more into the source of youth – your own Self, your own Divine Essence.  This is the mystery and the majesty of yoga.  As you deepen within, your own mystical energy flows stronger and stronger through your spine.  Along with being enlivened and youthened, you have access to deeper, richer and more profound experiences of your own Beingness.

You feel younger when you are more your Self. This is because your own essence that is arising is ever young.  It is the eternal.  Yet your body does have a limited life span.  Tick, tick, tick.  It means that the time is now!  Do more yoga and to deepen into your own Self while your body and mind can respond.

In a Teacher Training program, a middle-aged student was frustrated with another student who often distracted the group with her antics.  At one point the frustrated student said, “You are younger.  I am older.  I have less time left to deepen into these teachings.”  The younger yogi got it.  

Unfortunately, the frustrated teacher had less time than she thought.  A few years later she was diagnosed with cancer and died.  How much time do you have left?  Nobody knows.  How do you want to spend your time?

The poet Bhartrihari warns:

I thought I was enjoying sense pleasures;

I did not realize they were enjoying me.

I thought I was spending time;

I did not realize it was spending me.

   — Bhartrihari Vairaagya Shataka, verse 7

The reality is you always find time for what you really want to do.  If you want to feel better, you can make time for it.  It means that you miss out on another opportunity.  You can’t do everything.  Are you choosing to get old – or young?  Are you choosing to be peace-filled – or anxiety filled?  What you choose determines what you will get.  It is a personal choice.  To be young and vitally alive, as well as to deepen into the eternality of your own Beingness, do more yoga.