Podcast appearances and mentions of ananda village

We can make a real difference in the world as channels of light. This is a weekly gathering that provides a safe container for all to join together on the side of the Infinite Goodness with the sole purpose of uplifting our world. Every Tuesday night at 8(ET) on YouTube Join together with fellow Light Warriors around the globe to raise the vibration of our planet with healing light. Hosted by visual artist and Kriyaban Yogi Palehorse (Krishna Chandra Das) Teachings, techniques and affirmation inspired by Paramhansa Yogananda, Swami Kriyananda and Ananda Village.Learn More About Paramhansa Yogananda and Ananda School of Meditationhttps://www.ananda.orgPalehorse Podcast, Meditations and Online Storehttps://seekersoftheeternal.com

The is a very special podcast that kicks of the Ananda Teachers Series of episodes beginning with our guest Nayaswami Narayan from Ananda Village, CA at Crystal Clarity Publishing. Narayan is a fellow a disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda and a beloved teacher with Ananda Worldwide. At Swami Kriyananda's request, (Founder of Ananda) Narayan and his wife Dharmadevi moved to Los Angeles and became the spiritual directors of Ananda Los Angeles in 2010. Prior to that, they lived at Ananda Village in Northern California. There, Narayan helped manage the publishing arm of Ananda, called Crystal Clarity. Narayan and Dharmadevi were made Ananda ministers, Lightbearers, and Kriyacharyas by Nayaswami Jyotish. And earlier this year they were called back to the Ananda Village community where they now continue to serve through Crystal Clarity publishing.    The conversation opens in learning about the history and high-minded principles of Ananda Village which is a thriving spiritual community of over 250 residents that was established in 1969 and is rooted in the teachings of Awakened Master Paramhansa Yogananda. Narayan shares with us the essence and wisdom behind ‘The Yoga of Abundance' which is an 8-week course currently available from the Ananda School of Meditation that offers lessons on the sacred science and art of abundance. These lessons offer powerful clarity and spiritual wisdom that we can put into practice in our lives on our quest for Self-realization, while at the same time becoming money magnets with the ability to draw to ourselves what we need, when we need it, without being attached to material wealth. These teachings open us up to the beauty of life, setting us on our course to become even minded and cheerful in every situation, without fear of loss or failure. ~ Bliss to you friends!   Links ‘The Yoga of Abundance' 8wk Online Course https://tinyurl.com/5fyh7yp3   Crystal Clarity Publishing https://www.crystalclarity.com/   Ananda School of Meditation Resources: https://tinyurl.com/4wacvvrv   Palehorse Online Store • Guided Meditations • Patreon Community https://linktr.ee/palehorse108   — Chris Parks (Krishna Chandra)

Asha Nayaswami was a spiritual seeker since her early youth. While studying at Stanford University in 1969, she heard Swami Kriyananda speak for the first time. “I knew the moment he walked into the room that he possessed the consciousness I had long been seeking.”She soon became a founding member of the new community Swami was starting near Nevada City, California, called Ananda Village, based on Yogananda's dream of world brotherhood colonies for “simple living and high thinking.”Swami Kriyananda placed Asha in the role of teaching and counseling soon after her arrival. She also served as Swami's correspondence secretary and personal assistant for many years.She has served as one of the spiritual directors of Ananda Palo Alto since 1987, guiding the development of Ananda's work in the San Francisco Bay Area, including helping to launch Living Wisdom Schools and Ananda Farm, and supporting a large staff and volunteer team involved in East West Bookshop, Ananda Community, Ananda centers and meditation groups in the Bay Area, Ananda music, and a vital, lively theater arts program.Asha is a Nayaswami. In 2009, she took vows in the renunciate order that Swami Kriyananda founded. (“Naya” means “new” in Sanskrit). You will often recognize a nayaswami by the rich blue color they wear. “Blue suggests calmness, kindness, and an expansive consciousness,” writes Swami in A Renunciate Order for the New Age. This new renunciate order is very much like the ancient swami order in spirit, but is a new expression for an age of higher awareness. Its emphasis is on positive renunciation—a joyful expansion to Infinity. The vows of the new renunciate order.Asha's most recent book is Swami Kriyananda: Lightbearer, published in 2019. She is also author of Ask Asha: Heartfelt Answers to Everyday Dilemmas on the Spiritual Path; Loved and Protected: Stories of Miracles and Answered Prayers; and Swami Kriyananda As We Have Known Him, a collection of more than 200 stories by people who have been touched by his teachings and spiritual friendship.Please enjoy my conversation with Asha Nayaswami.

Recorded at Ananda Village on April 2nd, 2023 with...

Many readers will know that Ananda Village was mostly destroyed by a huge forest fire in 1976. Devi and I were new parents with an eleven-day-old infant when the flames devoured our home, our clothes, and virtually all of our possessions. In meditation this morning I was remembering that day and contemplating some of the cherished lessons I learned.

Sunday Service with Erin Vinacco at Ananda Village...

Join me and author Joseph Selbie as we talk about his new book, Break Through the Limits of the Brain were he connects the dots between the discoveries of neuroscience and the meditation-born spiritual experience, as well as offering proven and practical ways to tap into the life-changing, life-enhancing treasure house of our superconscious potential. Please donate and Help support my channel. Thank you https://www.paypal.com/donate?hosted_button_id=S9HELHULPMHTQ Joseph Selbie makes the complex and obscure, simple and clear. A founding member of the meditation-based community Ananda and dedicated meditator for over forty years, he has taught yoga and meditation throughout the United States and Europe. He lives with his wife at Ananda Village near Nevada City, California. About: Michael Philpott Michael is a Psychic Medium and has given readings to people in Canada US and the Caribbean. Michael is a Reiki Master for over 20 yrs. with clinical experience and teaches Intuitive Diagnosis for health professionals and is classically trained chef and former personal trainer and is the host of the popular podcast call The Metaphysical Mentor Show. Contact me through my social media or email me at michael@michaelphilpott.com https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5mSbeHemKiHhvBimJvWBww https://www.facebook.com/michael.philpott.3133 https://www.instagram.com/themetaphysicalguy/

Our brain forms many automatic neural circuits including those that support our breathing, heartbeat, and digestion. Here we explore how to create new neural circuits that put us in touch with the larger energetic field of infinite intelligence. Joseph Selbie, a dedicated meditator for nearly 50 years, has taught meditation and yoga throughout Europe and the United States. He is a founding member of Ananda, a meditation-based community and spiritual movement inspired by Paramahansa Yogananda. He resides with his wife at the long-standing Ananda Village near Nevada City, California. He is the author of The Yugas: Keys to Understanding, The Physics of God: How the Deepest Theories of Science Explain Religion and How the Deepest Truths of Religion Explain Science (New Page Books 2021) and Break Through the Limits of the Brain: Neuroscience, Inspiration, and Practices to Transform Your Life (New Page Books 2022)Interview Date: 7/29/2022 Tags: Joseph Selbie, brain science, neural circuits, The Gorilla Experiment, psychedelics, meditation, nonlocality, M-theory, near death experience, Max Planck, Hans-Peter Dürr, introspection, affirmations, hong-sau meditation, Spirituality, Science

Joseph Selbie, a dedicated meditator for nearly 50 years, has taught meditation and yoga throughout Europe and the United States. He is a founding member of Ananda, a meditation-based community and spiritual movement inspired by Paramahansa Yogananda. He resides with his wife at the long-standing Ananda Village near Nevada City, California. He is the author of The Yugas: Keys to Understanding, The Physics of God: How the Deepest Theories of Science Explain Religion and How the Deepest Truths of Religion Explain Science (New Page Books 2021) and Break Through the Limits of the Brain: Neuroscience, Inspiration, and Practices to Transform Your Life (New Page Books 2022)Interview Date: 7/29/2022 Tags: Joseph Selbie, brain science, the brain's filtering system, angels, multiple personality disorders, the mind, sensory input, nonlocal mind, emotional body, negative neural brain circuits, quantum field of intelligence, astral body, Meditation, Spirituality, Science

Chris (Palehorse) and Jason D'Rocha share the progress and latest vision for the growing SOTE Web3 community, along with discussions about personal takeaways from the recent conversations with special guests Robert Ryan and Luke Brown. Chris also shares insights and a reading from Paramhansa Yogananda and lessons from his teachers at Ananda Village about overcoming suffering and living without fear.

Break Through the Limits of the Brain, the new book by Joseph Puru Selbie, delves into the scientific support for the existence of a subtle, nonlocal reality that strongly suggests that we exist simultaneously in both a subtle and physical reality—and that our thoughts, life force, emotions, and memories originate nonlocally. Meditation is a central theme of the book—what it is, how to do it, why it works, its physical, mental, and emotional benefits as measured by neuroscientists, and how it rewires the brain for superconscious awareness. The book offers proven practices for bringing superconscious awareness into one's life for success, energy, health, peace of mind, and happiness. Bio Selbie makes the complex and obscure simple and clear. A dedicated meditator for over forty years, he has taught yoga and meditation throughout the US and Europe. He has also been an avid follower of the unfolding new paradigm of science—with groaning bookshelves to show for it—and he is known for creating bridges of understanding between the modern evidenced-based discoveries of science and the ancient experience-based discoveries of the mystics. His previous book, The Physics of God, with a foreword by the internationally known quantum physicist, Dr. Amit Goswami, is a concise and easy-to-understand description of the emerging new unity between science and religion. Selbie maintains several blogs, including Intersections, which explores how spirituality connects with culture and science. He has also authored, The Yugas, a factual look at India's tradition of cyclical history, and a sci/fi fantasy series, The Protectors Diaries, inspired by the abilities of mystics. Joseph Puru Selbie is a founding member of Ananda—a meditation-based community and spiritual movement inspired by Paramhansa Yogananda. He lives with his wife at Ananda Village near Nevada City, California. Website: www.JosephSelbie.com

Break Through the Limits of the Brain, the new book by Joseph Puru Selbie, delves into the scientific support for the existence of a subtle, nonlocal reality that strongly suggests that we exist simultaneously in both a subtle and physical reality—and that our thoughts, life force, emotions, and memories originate nonlocally. Meditation is a central theme of the book—what it is, how to do it, why it works, its physical, mental, and emotional benefits as measured by neuroscientists, and how it rewires the brain for superconscious awareness. The book offers proven practices for bringing superconscious awareness into one's life for success, energy, health, peace of mind, and happiness. Bio Selbie makes the complex and obscure simple and clear. A dedicated meditator for over forty years, he has taught yoga and meditation throughout the US and Europe. He has also been an avid follower of the unfolding new paradigm of science—with groaning bookshelves to show for it—and he is known for creating bridges of understanding between the modern evidenced-based discoveries of science and the ancient experience-based discoveries of the mystics. His previous book, The Physics of God, with a foreword by the internationally known quantum physicist, Dr. Amit Goswami, is a concise and easy-to-understand description of the emerging new unity between science and religion. Selbie maintains several blogs, including Intersections, which explores how spirituality connects with culture and science. He has also authored, The Yugas, a factual look at India's tradition of cyclical history, and a sci/fi fantasy series, The Protectors Diaries, inspired by the abilities of mystics. Joseph Puru Selbie is a founding member of Ananda—a meditation-based community and spiritual movement inspired by Paramhansa Yogananda. He lives with his wife at Ananda Village near Nevada City, California. Website: www.JosephSelbie.com

Chris and Jason explore additional teachings on "Uplifted Consciousness" that Chris received during his time with the teachers at Ananda Village. This episode features sacred teachings and a guided visualization that invites us to experience the divine quality of Bliss that exists within us and is always flowing to us.

The Physics Of God, M-theory, Everyday Miracles & You with Joseph SelbieLivestreaming Thursday, 21 July 2022 at 7:00 AM PST/10:00 AM EST on OMTimes Magazine Facebook, OMTimes Radio & TV Facebook, or OMTimesTV YoutubeDoes God exist? Can we prove that scientifically? Is heaven a hologram? Do we have the ability to create miracles? M-Theory, and the power of your personal conviction… these are just some of the topics that Sandie will be discussing with lecturer and author Joseph Selbie, Author of The Physics of God: How the Deepest Theories of Science Explain Religion and How the Deepest Truths of Religion Explain Science this week on What is Going Om.JOSEPH (PURU) SELBIE is the author of The Physics of God a unification of science and religion, and The Yugas, a factual look at India's tradition of cyclical history. An avid follower of the unfolding new paradigms of science, he is known for creating bridges of understanding between the modern evidenced-based discoveries of science and the ancient experience-based discoveries of the mystics.A dedicated Kriya meditator for nearly 50 years, Joseph Selbie has taught yoga and meditation throughout the US and Europe helping people to understand and find their own spiritual potential—and helping them understand how the expression of their spiritual potential ushers into the world an unstoppable wave of peaceful consciousness.Joseph lives with his wife at Ananda Village, a spiritual community in Northern California. Joseph, also known as Puru, is a founding member of Ananda Sangha and has served in many leadership and teaching roles. Joseph is also the founder and CEO of Tristream, a web development, marketing and application design firm.Connect with Joseph at http://www.physicsandgod.com/#JosephPuruSelbie #ThePhysicsOfGod #SandieSedgbeer #WhatIsGoingOMVisit the What Is Going OM show page https://omtimes.com/iom/shows/what-is-going-omConnect with Sandie Sedgbeer at https://www.sedgbeer.comSubscribe to our Newsletter https://omtimes.com/subscribe-omtimes-magazine/Connect with OMTimes on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/Omtimes.Magazine/ and OMTimes Radio https://www.facebook.com/ConsciousRadiowebtv.OMTimes/Twitter: https://twitter.com/OmTimes/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/omtimes/Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/OMTimesTVLinkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/2798417/Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/omtimes/

Chris shares his spiritual and meditative retreat at the Ananda Village in Sierra Nevada, California.

Selbie makes the complex and obscure simple and clear. A dedicated meditator for over forty years, he has taught yoga and meditation throughout the US and Europe. He has also been an avid follower of the unfolding new paradigm of science—with groaning bookshelves to show for it—and he is known for creating bridges of understanding between the modern evidenced-based discoveries of science and the ancient experience-based discoveries of the mystics. Selbie has also authored, The Yugas, a factual look at India's tradition of cyclical history, and a sci/fi fantasy series, The Protectors Diaries, inspired by the abilities of mystics. Selbie is a founding member of Ananda—a meditation-based community and spiritual movement inspired by Paramhansa Yogananda. He lives with his wife at Ananda Village near Nevada City, California.

Drupada Macdonald began his spiritual search in 1981 at the age of 22, when he began studying the teachings of Paramhansa Yogananda. By the age of 23 he moved to Ananda Village in California, founded by Swami Kriyananda, based on Yogananda's teaching, and the practice of Kriya yoga. Also at this time he began his study of astrology. In 1989 he moved to the Ananda Assisi center in Italy, where he began to give astrology readings and classes. Since 1995, Drupada has been a full time astrologer, having given over 10,500 readings. His goal is to use the sacred stellar science as a guide for spiritual growth, and transformation. He now resides in Nevada City, California, and travels extensively to give classes and astrology readings. Drupada has made a deep study of both the philosophy and the calculations of Vedic astrology. He has studied the writings of prominent astrologers, with special emphasis on the writings and teachings of Sri Yukteswar, Paramhansa Yogananda, and Swami Kriyananda (author of Your Sun Sign as a Spiritual Guide). Drupada's approach to astrology centers on the potential he sees in each horoscope for personal growth and for overcoming the specific karmic patterns that are most actively present in this incarnation. He is an extraordinary Vedic astrologer, a deep soul and in this convo he connects  the fundamentals of Vedic astrology, the chakra system, and how we are all part of this divinely orchestrated Universe.   This is such a beautiful conversation that will spark your hearts especially if you have studied any type of astrology, esoteric wisdom, kriya yoga, or are just metaphysically curious.   Studies with Drupada brings clarity, hope, and insight on how best to realize one's highest potential.   CONNECT WITH JANET: http://www.janetnamaste.com JOIN THE SOUL STAR MEMBERSHIP: https://www.janetnamaste.com/soulstar IG - @janet.namaste + @rawrealtalks_ YouTube - www.youtube.com/janetnamaste Support the show: https://www.etsy.com/shop/TheNamasteLoveShoppe

In this episode we had the immense pleasure of welcoming David Eby back to our podcast to delve deeper into the incredible work that he is doing in the music community. David has an inspiring and freeing approach to music making, and shares with us how we can cultivate a state of being that allows us to truly connect to the music and our audience from a place of joy and love. This episode left us both with warm open hearts. David Bio: David Eby received his Bachelor of Music degree and Performer's Certificate from the Eastman School of Music where he studied with Paul Katz of the Cleveland Quartet. He went on to earn his Masters of Music degree from Indiana University where his principal teacher was Janos Starker. He is the founding cellist of Pink Martini and his recordings include Sympathique with Pink Martini, Mystic harp 2, Secrets of Love, Relax: Meditations for Flute and Cello, Song of the Nightingale and the Finding Happiness soundtrack for Hansa Productions.  In 2001 he became the Music Director at the Ananda Village in Northern California where he explored the realms of music, consciousness, inspiration, discovering the steps for achieving a consistently inspired performance. David is the cellist of the Bodhi trio, and performs with the Oregon Symphony and Portland Cello Project. He is on faculty at Lewis and Clark College, is a Teaching Artist for the BRAVO Youth Orchestra and is the director of the Advanced Strings at Oregon Episcopal School. He lives in Southwest Portland and teaches Workshops for the Inspired Musician. Show Notes: Princeton- Sound Journey Lewis and Clark  Bill Neill Autobiography of a Yogi Tedx Talk  David playing conceret with Speigle im Speigle  Brené Brown- Atlas of the Heart 

Selbie makes the complex and obscure simple and clear. He is known for creating bridges of understanding between the modern evidence-based discoveries of science and the ancient experience-based discoveries of the mystics. A dedicated meditator for nearly fifty years, he has taught yoga, meditation, and universal experiential spirituality throughout the US and Europe. He has also been an avid follower of the unfolding new paradigm of post-materialist science—with groaning bookshelves to show for it. Selbie has authored The Physics of God, a unification of science and religion, and The Yugas, a factual look at India's tradition of cyclical history. Selbie is a founding member of Ananda—a meditation-based community and spiritual movement inspired by Paramhansa Yogananda. He lives with his wife at Ananda Village near Nevada City, California. Books: The Yugas: Keys to Understanding Our Hidden Past, Emerging Energy Age and Enlightened Future - Today's view of history cannot account for ancient anomalies, such as the Pyramids and advanced knowledge contained in India's Vedas. But in 1894, an Indian sage gave us an explanation not only for our hidden past but for the trends of today and for our future enlightenment - the 24,000-year yuga cycle. The Physics of God: How the Deepest Theories of Science Explain Religion and How the Deepest Truths of Religion Explain Science Website: physicsandgod.com Discussion of this interview in the BatGap Community Facebook Group. Interview with Joseph Selbie on "The Physics of God". Interview recorded February 26, 2022 Video and audio below. Audio also available as a Podcast.

Selbie makes the complex and obscure simple and clear. He is known for creating bridges of understanding between the modern evidence-based discoveries of science and the ancient experience-based discoveries of the mystics. A dedicated meditator for nearly fifty years, he has taught yoga, meditation, and universal experiential spirituality throughout the US and Europe. He has also been an avid follower of the unfolding new paradigm of post-materialist science—with groaning bookshelves to show for it. Selbie has authored The Physics of God, a unification of science and religion, and The Yugas, a factual look at India's tradition of cyclical history. Selbie is a founding member of Ananda—a meditation-based community and spiritual movement inspired by Paramhansa Yogananda. He lives with his wife at Ananda Village near Nevada City, California. Books: The Physics of God: How the Deepest Theories of Science Explain Religion and How the Deepest Truths of Religion Explain Science - "The explanations of transcendent phenomena given by saints, sages, and near-death experiencers—miracles, immortality, heaven, God, and transcendent awareness—are fully congruent with scientific discoveries in the fields of relativity, quantum physics, medicine, M-theory, neuroscience, and quantum biology. The Physics of God describes the intersections of science and religion with colorful, easy-to-understand metaphors, making abstruse subjects within both science and religion easily accessible to the layman—no math, no dogma." The Yugas: Keys to Understanding Our Hidden Past, Emerging Energy Age and Enlightened Future Website: physicsandgod.com Discussion of this interview in the BatGap Community Facebook Group. Interview recorded February 26, 2022 Video and audio below. Audio also available as a Podcast.

Love and Relationships - What's going on in culture today that is making connection so challenging? Is it our approach, the status of the world, not enough time? There are no accidents, but this clip is part of a spontaneous intimate conversation between Asha Nayaswami and I before her actual interview began. It is pure gold in my view. Quite enlightening as to why dating, coupling and coming together and staying together is such a challenge at this time in history. Enjoy. Asha's actual full interview will air soon. Asha was a spiritual seeker since her early youth. While studying at Stanford University in 1969, she heard Swami Kriyananda speak for the first time. “I knew the moment he walked into the room that he possessed the consciousness I had long been seeking.” She soon became a founding member of the new community Swami was starting near Nevada City, California, called Ananda Village, based on Yogananda's dream of world brotherhood colonies for “simple living and high thinking.” Swami Kriyananda placed Asha in the role of teaching and counseling soon after her arrival. She also served as Swami's correspondence secretary and personal assistant for many years. She has served as one of the spiritual directors of Ananda Palo Alto since 1987, guiding the development of Ananda's work in the San Francisco Bay Area, including helping to launch Living Wisdom Schools and Ananda Farm, and supporting a large staff and volunteer team involved in East West Bookshop, Ananda Community, Ananda centers and meditation groups in the Bay Area, Ananda music, and a vital, lively theater arts program.

Concert at Ananda Village and with songs contribut...

Spiritual Teacher - Asha Praver is an internationally known spiritual teacher and author. She has been a spiritual seeker since she was a young girl. In 1969 at Stanford University, she heard Swami Kriyananda speak for the first time. Instantly, she recognized him as her spiritual teacher. "I knew the moment he walked into the room that he possessed the consciousness I had long been seeking."She soon became a founding member of the new community Swami was starting near Nevada City, California, called Ananda Village, based on Yogananda's dream of world brotherhood colonies for "simple living and high thinking." Swami Kriyananda placed Asha in the role of teaching and counseling soon after her arrival at Ananda. She also served as Swami's correspondence secretary and personal assistant for many years. In 1987, Asha and her husband, David, became spiritual directors of Ananda Palo Alto in California, where they continue to serve today. Asha is the author of Swami Kriyananda as We Have Known Him, a collection of more than 200 stories by people who have been touched by his teachings and spiritual friendship, often in remarkable ways. She is also author of Loved and Protected: Stories of Miracles and Answered Prayers and her latest book, Ask Asha: Heartfelt Answers to Everyday Dilemmas on the Spiritual Path (Fall, 2014)For Your Listening Pleasure for these Lockdown / Stay-At-Home COVID and Variants Times - For all the radio shows available on The 'X' Zone Broadcast Network visit - https://www.spreaker.com/user/xzoneradiotv.Our radio shows archives and programming include: A Different Perspective with Kevin Randle; Alien Cosmic Expo Lecture Series; Alien Worlds Radio Show; America's Soul Doctor with Ken Unger; Back in Control Radio Show with Dr. David Hanscom, MD; Connecting with Coincidence with Dr. Bernard Beitman, MD; Dick Tracy; Dimension X; Exploring Tomorrow Radio Show; Flash Gordon; Imagine More Success Radio Show with Syndee Hendricks and Thomas Hydes; Jet Jungle Radio Show; Journey Into Space; Know the Name with Sharon Lynn Wyeth; Lux Radio Theatre - Classic Old Time Radio; Mission Evolution with Gwilda Wiyaka; Paranormal StakeOut with Larry Lawson; Ray Bradbury - Tales Of The Bizarre; Sci Fi Radio Show; Seek Reality with Roberta Grimes; Space Patrol; Stairway to Heaven with Gwilda Wiyaka; The 'X' Zone Radio Show with Rob McConnell; Two Good To Be True with Justina Marsh and Peter Marsh; and many other!That's The ‘X' Zone Broadcast Network Shows and Archives - https://www.spreaker.com/user/xzoneradiotv

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Nayaswamis M...

Parents were disciples, earliest memory of Ananda was the music touching his heart. Fell into teenage lethargy and bad habits, rescued by Autobiography of a Yogi. At 17 moved to Ananda Village; now lives in Ananda Sacramento with wife and 3 children....

Father's profession took the family to Saudi Arabia, then France. Came to USA in high school. Never felt in tune with peers, dropped out at 17. Brother gave her Autobiography of a Yogi. At 19 moved to Ananda Village.

Youngest of 30 cousins, felt he had arrived late to the party, couldn't relate to what others thought was important. In Catholic high school learned meditation from his football coach-priest. Now helps lead Internship Program at Ananda Village...

Badri Matlock found Yogananda's Autobiography of a Yogi at a young age, and within a few years found himself visiting Ananda Village for the first time. From then on, Ananda has been his spiritual home. From chanting, sadhana, service, to how he and his...

Asha talks with Gita Matlock - born and raised in Ananda, but who traversed a successful professional career in non-profit fundraising before finding her way back to living at Ananda Village with her husband and two children. Gita and Asha talk about...

Death is inevitable. It’s also an intrinsic part of life. In Western cultures, however, death is considered a taboo topic which contributes to widespread fear and difficulty in facing it. Self-Realization offers a view of death not as an end, but as a continuation, a transition to another phase of life and potentially a higher plane of existence. In this touching interview, Nayaswami Nalini Graeber shares some of the inspiring stories of people facing their own death and the death of loved ones from her book, “Transitioning in Grace”. These stories not only exemplify how death can be a healing experience, drawing us closer to God, but they also offer hope that by engaging in a robust spiritual practice, we too can achieve such soul liberation when our time comes. Nayaswami Nalini is a founding member of Ananda Village, a lifelong meditator and disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda. Her spiritual counseling, writing and internet station, Radio Ananda provide ongoing inspiration and support to people around the globe. To purchase “Transitioning in Grace”, click hereTo see the photograph of Nayaswami Nalini with Swamis Kriyananda and Satchidananda (mentioned in the episode), click hereFor Radio Ananda, click hereFor the Ananda Live From New York! Webpage, click hereSupport the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme2/AnandaNYC)

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Nayaswamis A...

In this conversation, Asha talks with Keshava Betts who was born and raised in Ananda Village, pursued a career in acting and now serves in the Ananda Sangha. They discuss what it was like growing up in a spiritual community, in this digital age and how...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Nayaswamis K...

Me? Live in a tepee? In the early years of Ananda Village, before we had the resources to build houses, we looked to the Native American culture for solutions in creating homes.

Joining from Ananda Village in northern California, Sagar Shenvi talks us through his journey to becoming a monk in the tradition of Paramhansa Yogananda. Born and raised in India, Sagar grew up amongst Yogananda devotees. After studying engineering extensively at the post-graduate level, he renounced worldly ambition eight years ago and became a monk. On January 29, Sagar launches the course The Yoga of Jesus through ananda.org. In our discussion, he talks about Yogananda's clarifications of Jesus' teachings which set the foundation of his course. We clarify the true definition of "yoga" beyond the physical exercise with which it is often associated, relate the sleeping state to one's true spiritual nature, explore the deteriorating quality of everything (including the truth of a message) and the limitation of one's understanding based on the consciousness of the teacher, highlight the role of great saints in expressing spiritual truths in a way which is relevant to the age, appreciate the many pathways to God, and illuminate the various ways Ananda can support your spiritual growth. The Yoga of Jesus course page: https://www.onlinewithananda.org/the-yoga-teachings-of-jesus/ www.ananda.org  

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Nayaswamis P...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Nayaswamis J...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Nayaswamis J...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Erin Vinacco...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Nayaswamis A...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Nayaswamis P...

Next week Ananda will celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. We took possession of the land we now call Ananda Village on July 4, 1969.

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Nayaswamis P...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Nayaswami Pa...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Tyagis Dr. P...

In this episode, I'm really excited to speak with cellist David Eby and to dive deeper with him in a topic that we've only mentioned a few times on the show so far and that I feel is so important and can be extremely powerful in our experience as musicians!  I'm talking about pure mindfulness! We discuss the positive effects meditation and consciousness tools can have on our practice and performance.  Among many things, you will hear about the importance of adopting unprejudiced mindsets, how you can bring more flow and joy in your playing,  develop and effective automatic response mode when facing challenges in performance, and create inspired connection in your playing by accessing a higher consciousness using David's 4-step process. We expand on: Mindfulness and consciousness in our practice - how to use these powerful tools How he got to experience that state of oneness with music in his youth The transition to college and how difficult it was to keep that magic state of being while negotiating the demands and pressures of university How harsh judgment of self and others influenced him and eventually led him to a crisis The pivotal moment that led him to pursue meditation and how it changed his life and brought him back to experience pure joy and love of music again How he studied and explored different consciousness techniques and started incorporating them in concerts, reaching a state of flow in his performance How meditation and consciousness can help us reconnect with the joy and bliss in performance (and, as a result, improve our results) Different methods of meditation How training the mind to return to the breath in meditation is training our brain to focus The automatic response mode that can help us overcome challenges in performance Hush/Heart/Lift/Flow Technique for more inspired connection in performance: o   Hush: create dynamic stillness (inner and outer silence) to better hear and feel subtleties of music o   Heart: deepen intuitive perception - open chest and heart o   Lift: engage energy - creating upward moving energy o   Flow: focus with effortless pleasure     More about David: Website: http://www.davidebymusic.com/ YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/davidceby Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheInspiredMusician/   Biography Cellist, Director, Teacher and Author “Inspiration and music came into my life at age 6 when I announced to my parents that I was going to play the cello. By 16, I was drinking up inspiration from the Tanglewood and Aspen Music Festivals and sharing inspiration onstage as soloist with the Pittsburgh Symphony. I attuned my skills at the Eastman School of Music where I received the Performer's Certificate and BM under the tutelage of Paul Katz of the Cleveland Quartet. By the time I received my MM at Indiana University under the esteemed Janos Starker, my life was resonating unconditionally with the joy of music. My first position as Principal Cellist of the Evansville Philharmonic and the Owensboro Symphony Orchestras taught me about how to share this joy in the context of leadership. As the founding cellist for the musical storytelling troupe Tales & Scales, I helped inspire the imaginations of young audiences across the nation. An introduction to the West Coast awakened within me a profound yearning for the ocean and the mountains, and I arrived in Portland in 1996 to become the founding cellist for the internationally acclaimed band Pink Martini, as well as a cellist for the Portland Opera. By 2001 an inward calling had grown so strong within me that I left everything to become Music Director at the Ananda Village in Northern California, with the singular opportunity to teach and direct a remarkable group of meditators. Each week we explored more deeply the realms of music, consciousness, inspiration, discovering the steps for achieving a consistently inspired performance. We were able to duplicate extraordinary experiences of flow in performance—where time stands still and all that exists is the joy of the music. Hollywood made a dramatic entrance into my life in 2012 when I was asked to musically direct and produce the soundtrack for the film Finding Happiness featuring Elisabeth Rohm (LA Law, American Hustle). Soon thereafter, I arrived back in Portland, where I am currently teaching Workshops for the Inspired Musician, sharing what I have learned through this 18-year journey into music and inspiration. I've sought to capture my experiences of inspiration on recordings, and my discography includes Sympathique with Pink Martini, Mystic Harp 2, Secrets of Love, Relax: Meditations for Flute and Cello, and Song of the Nightingale for Crystal Clarity Publishers, and the Finding Happiness soundtrack for Hansa Productions. I currently perform with The Bodhi Trio, the Oregon Symphony, and Portland Cello Project, teach at Lewis and Clark College, direct the Advanced Strings at Oregon Episcopal School and am a Teaching Artist for the BRAVO Youth Orchestra. I live in Southwest Portland with my wife Madhavi, daughter Caitlin and our Manx cat, Maggie.   If you enjoyed the show, please leave a review on iTunes!  I truly appreciate your support! Visit www.mindoverfinger.com for information about past and future podcasts, and for more resources on mindful practice.   THANK YOU: Most sincere thank you to composer Jim Stephenson who graciously provided the show's musical theme!  Concerto #1 for Trumpet and Chamber Orchestra – Movement 2: Allegro con Brio, performed by Jeffrey Work, trumpet, and the Lake Forest Symphony, conducted by Jim Stephenson. Also a huge thank you to my producer, Bella Kelly!   MIND OVER FINGER: www.mindoverfinger.com https://www.facebook.com/mindoverfinger/ https://www.instagram.com/mindoverfinger/   Join the Mind Over Finger Tribe here!  https://www.facebook.com/groups/mindoverfingertribe/

Last week a dear friend of ours from India visited Ananda Village for the first time. What a wonderful experience it was showing her around and explaining to her the many aspects of this remarkable community.

Christmas Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Ba...

Christmas Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Ba...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Brahmachari...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village with Gita Matlock...

Sunday Service with Tyagi Atman at Ananda Village.

Sunday Service with Gita Matlock at Ananda Village...

Sunday Service with Tyagi Atman at Ananda Village,...

Evolve! Nurturing the New in Consciousness, the Arts, and Culture hosted by : Robin White Turtle Lysne, M.A., M.F.A., Ph.D. Evolve! brings you people and ideas on the cutting edge of change opening the shells of the past to move our culture into the now. We are all in great need of sustainable ideas for change. The arts and evolving consciousness are how we are bringing that change to the culture at large. This show will bring you the wise, the foolish and the heart-based to help us meet the challenges of the times we are in. This months show features author Joseph Selbie, whose new book The Physics of God shares with readers in clear language the understanding of physics and the mystics understanding of the Divine and how the two intersect. Selbie makes the complex and obscure simple and clear. A dedicated meditator for over forty years, he has taught yoga and meditation throughout the US and Europe. He has also been an avid follower of the unfolding new paradigm of science—with groaning bookshelves to show for it—and he is known for creating bridges of understanding between the modern evidenced-based discoveries of science and the ancient experience-based discoveries of the mystics. Selbie maintains several blogs, including Intersections, which explores how spirituality connects with culture and science. He has also authored, The Yugas, a factual look at India’s tradition of cyclical history, and a sci/fi fantasy series, The Protectors Diaries, inspired by the abilities of mystics. Selbie is a founding member of Ananda—a meditation-based community and spiritual movement inspired by Paramhansa Yogananda. He lives with his wife at Ananda Village near Nevada City, California.

Avital has been helping hundreds of people around the world discover truth and happiness for over 13 years through yoga, healing, and dance. It is her wish to help others see the light of their soul and feel the love that already exists in this universe. That light and love can help us find inner freedom. After double majoring in Engineering and Dance at Washington University in St. Louis, she landed a job at Microsoft in 2001. Her whole life's goal was to do well in school so she could get a great job. After reaching her life goal at 22, she had to figure out what she was living for after that. So she did what many other young seeking adults do, she hit the road to travel the world with a backpack. As she practiced yoga postures in the middle of hostels or jungles, or on the most beautiful beaches of the world, people often approached her to teach them. It was a great joy to share something she loves, and to help bring inner peace to many people. The travels shifted her paradigms about life toward, what she was soon to learn, were the philosophies of yoga. Dance seemed to sparkle its way into her travels as well, as she was often invited to train with professionals. In Mexico, after her first dance of salsa ever, a local professional salsa dancer invited her to train with him for a competition in a month, convinced they would win. Two weeks into her trip in India, she was performing Bollywood at a nationally televised Miss South India pageant.  In 2004, Avital became a certified Ananda Yoga® Instructor. She settled in Santa Barbara, California, and immediately founded an outdoor yoga business, managed yoga and fitness programs at the YMCA, and became a teacher trainer. she also had some fun teaching and performing Bollywood and Salsa. Longing to share the deeper aspects of yoga postures and the spiritual path, Avital moved to Ananda Village. There she has worked as an Ananda Yoga Teacher Trainer and the Sales and Marketing Director for Crystal Clarity Publishers, Ananda's publishing company. she have been sharing yoga, healing, and spiritual dance at Ananda, around the world, and on the World Wide Web.  With a desire to work with people one-on-one, she has started offering Energy Healing and spiritual counseling through Tarot Readings. The energy healing draws from Ananda's Level 2 Healing training, Pranic Healing, and her intuition. She might be one of the only Tarot Readers who combines universal ancient wisdom derived from the Bhagavad Gita with how to live fully today! Avital recently authored and published a book - "Healing Happens: Stories of Healing Against All Odds"

Sunday Service at Ananda Village, with Nayaswami A...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village, with Nayaswamis...

Sunday Service March 11th, 2018, at Ananda Village...

Sunday Service March 11th, 2018, at Ananda Village...

Sunday Service March 4th, 2018, at Ananda Village,...

Sunday Service March 4th, 2018, at Ananda Village,...

Dana Lynne Andersen comes to us all the way for the Ananda Village in Assisi, Italy to talk about her Aliens True Story in Dreams That Can Save Your Life, Healing Art, and her upcoming book about The Power of the Creative Process in Healing Transformation.

Dana Lynne Andersen comes to us all the way for the Ananda Village in Assisi, Italy to talk about her Aliens True Story in Dreams That Can Save Your Life, Healing Art, and her upcoming book about The Power of the Creative Process in Healing Transformation.

Sunday Service at Ananda Village on February 18th,...

Sunday Service at Ananda Village on February 18th,...

LTV Welcomes Author Joseph Selbie. Joseph makes the complex and obscure simple and clear. A dedicated meditator for over forty years, he has taught yoga and meditation throughout the US and Europe. He has also been an avid follower of the unfolding new paradigm of science—with groaning bookshelves to show for it—and he is known for creating bridges of understanding between the modern evidenced-based discoveries of science and the ancient experience-based discoveries of the mystics.His latest book, The Physics of God, with a foreword by the internationally known quantum physicist, Dr. Amit Goswami, is a concise and easy to understand description of the emerging new unity science and religion.Selbie maintains several blogs, including Intersections, which explores how spirituality connects with culture and science. He has also authored, The Yugas, a factual look at India’s tradition of cyclical history, and a sci/fi fantasy series, The Protectors Diaries, inspired by the abilities of mystics.Selbie is a founding member of Ananda—a meditation-based community and spiritual movement inspired by Paramhansa Yogananda. He lives with his wife at Ananda Village near Nevada City, California.www.physicsandgod.com

Nayaswamis Jyotish and Devi are spiritual directors of Ananda Sangha Worldwide. Ananda, which means divine joy or bliss, is a spiritual organization dedicated to sharing the heart of Paramhansa Yogananda. Paramhansa Yogananda is author of one of the best-selling spiritual classics, Autobiography of a Yogi. Ananda was founded in 1968 by a direct disciple of Yoganandaji, Swami Kriyananda. Swami Kriyananda dedicated his life to sharing his Guru’s teachings and manifesting Yoganandaji’s vision of World Brotherhood Colonies, the spiritual communities of Ananda. Swami Kriyananda’s first community in Nevada City, called Ananda Village, is one of the most successful intentional communities in the world.

With warmth and wisdom, Asha helps us see how spiritual teaching can be woven into daily, ordinary life. She offers practical, real-life examples to guide us, encouragement and support for the journey of life. Her teachings are non-sectarian — sharing the truths that unite the great religions; her Sunday Services are based on texts from both the Bible and the Bhagavad Gita. Asha is a lifelong disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda and has studied for more than 40 years with Yogananda’s direct disciple, Swami Kriyananda. She has devoted her life to bringing spiritual understanding to others through teaching, counseling, and writing. Nayaswami Asha has been a spiritual seeker since she was a young girl. In 1969 at Stanford University, she heard Swami Kriyananda speak for the first time. Instantly, she recognized him as her spiritual teacher. “I knew the moment he walked into the room that he possessed the consciousness I had long been seeking.” She soon became a founding member of the new community Swami Kriyananda was starting near Nevada City, California, called Ananda Village, based on Yogananda’s dream of world brotherhood colonies for “simple living and high thinking.” Like this episode? SUBSCRIBE ON ITUNES  Click here to leave us a rating & review on iTunes Download your FREE Guided Meditation audio gift by signing up here Follow us on social media:  | Facebook | Twitter |

[Listen to Asha read this story]For many years, the only way to drive to Crystal Hermitage, Swamiji's home at Ananda Village, was over two miles of unpaved road, deeply rutted and littered with potholes. For years also, Swamiji’s only car was a big blue Chevrolet, purchased for him from a government auction of used automobiles. Two cars, exactly alike, were bought at the same time—one for Swamiji to drive, and the other to provide spare parts to keep the first one running. Each cost $75. On the door of Swamiji's car could faintly be seen the words, "U.S. Air Force," put there by one of its previous owners. Naturally, the car became known as "Air Force One,” an amusing title for this ancient vehicle.One summer, Swamiji decided it would save wear and tear on the car if he got a moped for the dirt road and used the Chevrolet only for trips outside of Ananda. Several friends warned Swamiji that dirt roads could be treacherous on a motorcycle, but Swamiji was unconcerned. When a blue moped came up for sale, Swamiji bought it.In that season, his everyday outfit was sandals, Bermuda shorts, and a sport shirt (often a bright Hawaiian print). For some weeks he cut quite a colorful figure in his flowered shirts, sitting straight upright rather than hunched over in typical motorcyclist fashion, and waving cheerfully to passersby. He appeared always serene, driving at moderate speed and calmly smiling.Then disaster struck.The dirt road includes a long, steep hill, which, on a small motorcycle, must be taken at just the right speed. Too fast, and one may lose control; too slow, and one may lose traction. Swamiji had safely negotiated the hill before now, but this day something went wrong. His speed was inadequate and the moped lost traction and began to slip. Swamiji gunned the motor, but it was too late. The moped tipped over, pinning him beneath it.The machine wasn't heavy, but the hot exhaust pipe fell right against the inside of his bare calf, burning into his skin. To get out from under it, Swamiji had to roll over on the ground, which caused the wound to become filled with dust and dirt.Fortunately, someone was driving not far behind Swamiji and was able to pick him up and take him home. The closest medical care was twenty miles away in Nevada City, and Swamiji didn't think the injury warranted the journey. He had no telephone, but somehow the word spread. Soon people began showing up at Swamiji's door with ideas of how to treat the burn. Over the course of the next several hours he received three or four different treatments. Unfortunately, none of them helped much. The wound did not get cleaned properly, and none of the ointments and salves was appropriate. After a few days the wound became infected. Only then did Swamiji consent to go into town and have it treated medically.It was a bad burn, and looked even worse: some six inches long and three inches across, inflamed and full of pus. The doctor assured Swamiji, however, that with a little care it would heal fine.The following Sunday, Swamiji was holding an afternoon satsang in his home, as he often did. He sat in his usual chair in front of the big triangle window that looked out at the river valley and the forested hills beyond. He was wearing bermuda shorts and, in accordance with the doctor's orders, had his leg propped up on a footstool before him. The wound was unbandaged to let the air reach it freely, so we all got a good view of how awful it looked. About a dozen people were present.Suddenly, a man named Ram Lila burst into the room. Ram Lila lived in San Francisco, but often visited Ananda. Before becoming a devotee he had belonged to a rough motorcycle gang called the Hell's Angels. By now he had given up most of the worst habits associated with that lifestyle, but he still looked like a "biker," and still drove a big Harley-Davidson motorcycle.Ram Lila was powerfully built—not tall but very thick, somewhat on the lines of a Sumo wrestler, though by no means obese. His biceps were bigger than the average man's thighs. The astrological bangle that is worn by many Ananda members, made to go around the arm above the elbow, was worn by Ram Lila dangling from a string around his neck. It would have taken at least two bangles to accommodate the circumference of his upper arm. He had a black beard and thick, curly hair, which hung to his shoulders. Heavy boots and a leather vest completed his "biker" outfit.He looked fierce, but his nature was that of a child. Swamiji had given him the name, "Ram Lila," which means, "God’s divine play.""I laughed when the name came to me," Swamiji said. "It was so appropriate!"Ram Lila was devoted to Swamiji in an extravagant, adoring way, like a child. He wanted Swamiji to take him on as a bodyguard. Swamiji declined because, he said, "I don't need one." Ram Lila never quite accepted that this was true, and when he was in Swamiji's company he always kept alert, "just in case."On this day, Ram Lila came straight in and threw himself at Swamiji's feet. "I should have been killed!" he said with deep feeling. "The truck came out of nowhere. BAM!" He slammed one fist into the other open hand to show the force of the impact."I wasn't wearing a helmet. I went flying over the handlebars and bounced on the road. BAM! BAM! BAM!" Again he illustrated with fist to hand. "My side, my head, my shoulders, my back: I thought, 'This is it! I'm dead!' Finally I stopped. I checked everything. Man, not even a broken bone! I walked away. I should have died, and I WALKED AWAY!" What he was describing was serious, but he told the story with such enthusiasm and drama that we were laughing with delight. Ram Lila didn't seem to mind."I'm so glad you didn't die, Ram Lila!" said Swamiji, and patted him lovingly on the head.Now that he'd told his story, Ram Lila noticed for the first time that Swamiji was injured."What happened to you?" he asked. Perhaps Swamiji did need a bodyguard after all!Swamiji didn't answer. "You tell him," he said to me."He fell off his moped," I explained. "The exhaust pipe landed on his leg and burned him."Ram Lila was so shocked he could barely speak. He stammered out a question: "W-w-when did it happen?" I told him the day and the time of the accident."O my God! O my God! O my God!" he cried. "That was just before that truck slammed into me. You did it! You saved my life! I couldn't figure out why I didn’t die. Now I know." He knelt before Swamiji and began to sob.After the accident, Swamiji never touched his moped again. A few weeks later he gave it away.

Swami Asha has been a spiritual seeker since she was a young girl. In 1969 at Stanford University, she heard Swami Kriyananda speak for the first time. Instantly, she recognized him as her spiritual teacher. “I knew the moment he walked into the room that he possessed the consciousness I had long been seeking.” She soon became a founding member of the new community Swami was starting near Nevada City, California, called Ananda Village, based on Yogananda's dream of world brotherhood colonies for “simple living and high thinking.” Swami Kriyananda placed Asha in the role of teaching and counseling soon after her arrival at Ananda. She also served as Swami's correspondence secretary and personal assistant for many years. She has served as one of the spiritual directors of Ananda Palo Alto since 1987. Asha is author of Swami Kriyananda As We Have Known Him, a collection of more than 200 stories by people who have been touched by his teachings and spiritual friendship, often in remarkable ways. She is also author of Ask Asha: Heartfelt Answers to Everyday Dilemmas on the Spiritual Path, andLoved and Protected: Stories of Miracles and Answered Prayers.

[Listen to Asha read this story](Told by Carolyn Denslow Riffle)It was always hard for me to be on this planet. Awareness of my own imperfections, and how those imperfections hurt others, caused me to suffer intensely. I had been diagnosed as clinically depressed. It was a cyclical thing and sometimes I had to take prescription drugs for it. Because of the depression, I’ve had some pretty serious problems in my life. I always felt I wasn’t okay, that somehow I needed to justify my existence. Before I came to Ananda for the first time, I worked for a nonprofit organization, where I thought I could really do some good in the world. The job became my purpose for being on Earth. But then one of my depressions hit. It affected the way I worked and I got laid off. Eventually I got over the depression and off the drugs they'd given me to cure it, but I felt like I’d lost everything. I was into yoga, and had been meditating on and off for years, so I decided to take the Yoga Teacher Training Course at Ananda Village. I didn’t know much about it, but a friend had taken the course and said it was great. So I registered and sent in my money.After that, I stumbled onto a website that described Swami Kriyananda as a terrible person. I was shocked and scared. My yoga teacher had also recommended the course, so I asked her, “What about all these stories?”She had never met Swamiji, and didn’t know any more about him than I did, but she offered this reassurance: “Don’t worry, he lives in Italy now.”* * *Soon after I arrived at Ananda, I bought Yogananda’s book, Scientific Healing Affirmations, with his picture on the cover. I put it on my nightstand where I saw it every morning and evening. I was intrigued, and wanted a better picture of him. So one afternoon, about two weeks into the program, I decided to walk over to the boutique at Crystal Hermitage and get one.I got lost, and eventually bumped into two people I’d never met before. Although I didn’t know it at the time, one of them was Swami Kriyananda, who had just returned from Italy. He directed me to the Hermitage and I got my picture.On my way back, just outside the Hermitage gate, I ran into him again. By now I had figured out who he was. This time, he asked me a few questions. “Where are you from? Are you enjoying Ananda?” That sort of thing. He was very kind and very gentle. Not at all like the man described on the website.Then he asked, “Have you ever meditated in the Crystal Hermitage chapel?” I told him, "No, I haven’t."“I think you should,” Swamiji replied.I said something noncommittal and started to walk away from the Hermitage. “I really think you should meditate now,” Swamiji said. His voice was light and there was twinkle in his eye, as if to say, “It is just a suggestion; you decide.” So, to be polite, I turned around and went back to the chapel. There was no one else in there. I sat down to meditate. After about ten minutes, I suddenly felt a finger touching my heart, inside my body. It was palpable and I knew it was Yogananda. At the same time, I was lifted into the light, and flooded with the knowledge that it is okay to be on this planet. It didn’t come to me in words, it was just the feeling that I don’t have to justify my existence, I don’t have to work for the organization that fired me, I don’t have to do anything. I can just be who I am and that is enough.In that moment, a cloud lifted from my life and it has never come back. The cycle of heavy depression ended. It was gone. * * *Easter was a few days later, and Swamiji gave the service. He was so inspiring it threw me for a loop! I couldn’t reconcile all the stuff I had read on the internet with Swamiji as I was experiencing him.One thing he said really impressed me. He referred to the enormous debt Ananda had accumulated defending itself against the SRF lawsuit, which was still threatening Ananda’s future.“In the long run, though,” Swamiji said, “it is not all that important whether or not Ananda survives. What is important is how we handle ourselves through whatever tests God sends us.”There was so much integrity in the way he said it. He was talking about his life’s work, and he was ready to let it go rather than give up dharma.I thought to myself, “I can’t know what happened in the past. I have to go by my own experience. I trust this man standing in front of me and I am willing to accept him as my teacher.”Soon after, I became a disciple of Yogananda, and eventually moved to Seattle and joined the Ananda community there. When Swamiji came to visit, I told him about the healing I had received from Master in the chapel. “If you hadn’t suggested it,” I said, “I would never have gone into the chapel to meditate. I was already walking away when I saw you.”“I remember,” Swamiji replied. “I didn’t know what it was, but I felt something in you.”I shudder to think what my life would be like now if I hadn’t listened to him. “Thank you, Swamiji,” I said to him. “You were a perfect instrument of Master. It was pure grace.”

[Listen to Asha read this story](Told by an Ananda devotee)From childhood I carried a deep sadness. Even as a little girl, I knew it came from a past life in which I had experienced the traumatic death of a beloved spouse. It was a kind of “post traumatic stress syndrome” that spanned more than one incarnation. Sometimes, when I was a child, the grief was more than I could bear and I would weep uncontrollably. As I grew older, and especially after I got onto the spiritual path, I made progress in resolving it, but much grief remained. I didn’t know what else to do except pray, and accept that the grief might be with me for the rest of my life. I could feel the karma as a knot of energy lodged in my spine just behind my heart. One evening, after I had been living at Ananda Village for many years, I went with my husband to a community musical event. The concert was a birthday gift for Swamiji. As part of the program, a group played selections from his album Secrets of Love. The music uplifted me and at the same time made me aware of my inner grief. I didn’t want any unhappiness to mar the evening for Swamiji, so I prayed to Divine Mother, “Please don’t let my sadness touch his joy.”During the intermission, Swamiji came to where my husband and I were sitting with a group of friends. He stood between us, with one hand on my husband’s shoulder, and the other hand on my spine. His fingers were right where the karma was lodged. I felt a tremendous pressure from his hand and enormous energy going into me. Swamiji didn’t make a point of what he was doing; the whole time he chatted casually with the others. He didn’t, however, speak to me, but let me receive his energy in silence.A few minutes later, Swamiji took his hand away. The knot of energy was gone, and with it the sadness I had known all my life. Every once in a while since then, a shadow of it has crossed my consciousness, just enough to make me continuously grateful to Swamiji for taking that karma away.

[Listen to Asha read this story]A married man had an affair with an unmarried woman. At the time, they both lived at Ananda Village. His name: Danny; hers: Annemarie Bertolucci.When Swamiji heard about the affair, he urged them to end it, and supported Danny when he made the decision to go back to his wife and daughter. Annemarie refused to accept Danny’s decision as final. She made it clear to Swamiji that she was determined that Danny should leave his wife and marry her. “I would make a good mother to his little girl,” she insisted. The child was not developmentally normal and needed special care.“I will not let you stay here and destroy that family,” Swamiji told her firmly. Later, Swamiji said, “I didn’t hesitate. I knew intuitively, however, that, in thwarting her desires and abiding by dharma, I would be faced with a difficult test.” To Annemarie he said, “You must move to another Ananda community.” She pleaded to be allowed to stay, but Swamiji was unyielding. “You must live as far away from him as possible. That will make it easier to break the attachment.” He suggested she go to Ananda Italy, or, as a second choice, to Ananda Seattle. She rejected both in favor of Ananda Palo Alto, where she had lived before. Swamiji did not dispute her choice.“She appeared to cooperate,” Swamiji said afterwards, “but underneath I could see she was seething with rage. Not at Danny, but at me. She was certain that if I hadn’t intervened, she could have gotten him back. She once told Danny, ‘I always get what I want.’” * * *It was no surprise when, a few months later, she left Ananda altogether. Her dispute with Ananda became her entrée into SRF. She visited SRF headquarters in Los Angeles, was given lunch by Daya Mata, and met with several other members of the SRF Board of Directors. Even longtime SRF members rarely get to see Daya Mata. For a newcomer to be received so royally was, indeed, exceptional. Soon after, she filed a lawsuit against Danny, Swamiji, and Ananda. She claimed, among other things, that she had been brainwashed, coerced, and sexually harassed. At the time, the lawsuit said, she may have thought the relationship with Danny was consensual. Now, she alleged, nothing she had done, in the abusive atmosphere of Ananda, had been of her own free will. When Swamiji heard about the lawsuit, he said simply, “This is not about Danny. It is SRF trying to destroy me.”The SRF lawsuit took twelve years to resolve. By 1994, however, when the Bertolucci lawsuit began, SRF had already lost 95% of their case. The next eight years were mostly repeated attempts on their part to get the judge’s rulings reversed. SRF took its appeals all the way up to the United States Supreme Court, which refused to hear the case.In 1994, SRF still had one possible way, apart from reversal on appeal, to retrieve what it had lost. It was a legal concept called “tarnishment.” If SRF could prove that Swamiji and Ananda were morally corrupt, and that any association in the mind of the public between SRF and Ananda would “tarnish” SRF’s reputation, then the judge could impose restrictions on Ananda that would diminish that association.Even though the court had dissolved SRF’s copyrights, trademarks, and publicity rights to Master’s name and teachings, through “tarnishment” they might have those exclusive rights restored. Swamiji had told us to be ready for just such an attack from SRF. * * *Most of us referred to “Lawsuits” in the plural—meaning Bertolucci and SRF. They were legally separate, filed in different courts—SRF’s in federal court in Sacramento, Bertolucci’s in state court near Palo Alto. Swamiji, however, never referred to them in the plural. To him, it was just “The Lawsuit,” since it was obvious to him that SRF was behind them both.Just as Swamiji had predicted, SRF soon filed a motion in federal court, describing the Bertolucci lawsuit, and asking for relief on the basis of “tarnishment.” We countered with the charge that SRF had “unclean hands.” “SRF can’t be permitted to both create a scandal and then benefit from that scandal,” our attorney argued. He had considerable evidence to back this up, starting with the way Bertolucci had been received at SRF headquarters just weeks before she filed the lawsuit.He went on to list other convincing facts. Bertolucci’s attorney was a prominent member of SRF. (Later he became the lead attorney in SRF’s federal case as well.) A major SRF donor had been fraudulently passed off as a paralegal so as to be able to attend Swamiji’s deposition in the Bertolucci case. Swamiji had never met the man, but when he saw him sitting there Swamiji said to our attorney, “That man is an SRF member. What is he doing here?” Bertolucci’s attorney insisted that he was a paralegal. It was impossible at the moment to disprove his claim. Not long after the deposition, SRF transferred to that donor a large and valuable property for the sum of $1. The donor was already a client of Bertolucci’s attorney and our assumption is that he was the conduit through which SRF financed the Bertolucci case. On the basis of this and other evidence, we demanded the right to question Daya Mata about SRF’s involvement in the Bertolucci lawsuit. SRF waged a fierce battle to prevent us from questioning her. Their efforts to do so did not, in the end, help their cause. “Your very reluctance to allow her to be questioned tells me you have something to hide,” the judge said when he ordered Daya to submit to a deposition. “It is not right for fellow disciples to be fighting each other in court,” Swamiji had written to Daya more than once since the SRF lawsuit began. He urged her to accept his invitation to meet together and find a way to settle the case. Always she had refused.Now, faced with the prospect of having to answer questions about SRF’s involvement in the Bertolucci lawsuit, Daya contacted Swamiji and for the first time appeared eager to settle.* * *At the settlement conference, however, as a condition for even beginning the discussion, Daya demanded that we give up the right to take her deposition. Naively, we agreed. Settlement negotiations dragged on for months. SRF expected us to cede back to them all the exclusive rights to Master and his teachings that the court had taken away. They negotiated as if it were they who had won, not we. By the time it became clear that settlement was impossible, the window of opportunity to take Daya’s deposition had closed and could not be reopened. Later, we were forced to conclude that Daya had initiated the whole settlement process for the sole purpose of escaping the deposition.SRF did, however, withdraw its “tarnishment” claim. The Bertolucci lawsuit proved to be exactly what Swamiji expected: a vicious personal attack on him. The linchpin of Bertolucci’s case was the “coercive, cult-like atmosphere of Ananda.” Without that, it was just an affair between two consenting adults. An abusive cult cannot exist without an abusive cult leader. Danny soon became an “also-ran,” almost incidental to Bertolucci’s case—at times even a sympathetic character, because he, too, was presented as a “victim” of the “abusive cult leader.”* * *Swamiji and Ananda were not the first spiritual group or spiritual leader to be sued by Bertolucci’s attorneys. By the time they got to us, they had perfected a method for destroying reputations and winning huge out-of-court settlements.The first step in their system was to write the lawsuit and supporting declarations to be as lurid and shocking as possible, with an eye to how they would play in the media. The second step was to court the media like an ardent suitor. Accusations in a lawsuit are exempt from the laws that usually govern libel. No matter how false they may later turn out to be, the accusations can be repeated and reprinted in all forms of media without fear of retribution. Scandal sells newspapers. The same day the lawsuit was filed in court, it was also released to the media. From then on, Bertolucci’s attorneys argued the case in the press as much as they did in the courtroom. The lawsuit was so extreme as to be almost a parody of itself. It read as if the lawyers kept a boiler-plate, anti-cult lawsuit in a file drawer and just pulled it out as needed. Perhaps it is not so far from the truth to say that they simply inserted the names “Ananda” and “Swami Kriyananda” whenever a specific reference was needed. Human nature tends to think, “Where there is smoke there is fire.” Or, between two conflicting points of view, “The truth must lie somewhere in the middle.” Few people are discerning enough to know when they are being taken in by a daring ploy that Hitler called the “Big Lie.” This is something so outside of reality as to have no foundation in truth at all. With this understanding of human nature, and by skillful use of the media, the reputation of a spiritual leader can be destroyed by accusation alone.Nothing in the lawsuit reflected Ananda or Swamiji as we know them to be. It was the “Big Lie.”At Ananda, women are in charge of half the departments. Still, in the lawsuit, the community was described as an environment “hostile to women” in which they are “second-class citizens,” forced into drudgery, mere sexual playthings for “the Swami” and his male minions.Swamiji was described as a ruthless dictator, indifferent to the welfare of anyone but himself, obsessed with power, pleasure, and money, who routinely took advantage of vulnerable young women. According to the lawsuit, Ananda was nothing but a “sham religious organization” set up primarily to keep “the Swami’s harem stocked.”When she filed the lawsuit, Bertolucci did not accuse Swamiji of abusing her. She alleged only that he was responsible for creating the atmosphere in which abuse could occur. To bolster that claim, the lawsuit included declarations from a few women, former residents of Ananda, now all affiliated with SRF, who claimed that in the past they had been subjected to coercive sexual advances from Swamiji.The most recent was alleged to have occurred thirteen years before the suit was filed in 1994, the most distant was twenty-eight years earlier. None of these women were plaintiffs in the lawsuit, but these declarations proved to be the core of the campaign to destroy Swamiji’s reputation.The third step in the method used by Bertolucci’s attorneys in their attack on spiritual groups and their leaders, is, gradually, over the course of a lawsuit to uncover more and more abuse, and thus draw into the lawsuit an ever-increasing number of plaintiffs. Eventually, the sheer magnitude of the case against the “cult” and its leader forces them to pay whatever is needed to avoid a trial and the risk of an even greater loss of money and reputation.Four years passed from the time the Bertolucci lawsuit was filed until the trial ended. During that time, Bertolucci’s attorneys sent letters, made phone calls, held public meetings, and at one point even dropped leaflets from an airplane onto Ananda Village, all in an effort to uncover further abuse and draw more clients for their case. These efforts were entirely unsuccessful. There was no abuse to uncover. The only ones who spoke against Swamiji at the end of the case were the same ones who were there at the beginning: a few SRF-affiliated women.* * *Dozens of Ananda women did come forth, however, to testify and file declarations on behalf of Swamiji. “Women have an instinct for these things,” one woman wrote. “They can sense when a man has sexual intentions. I have worked closely with Swamiji for more than two decades. He has been a guest in my home. I have been a guest in his. I have traveled with him. I have worked alone with him late into the night. Not once, in hundreds of hours of close association, have I felt from him, or observed in his interactions with other women, even the slightest expression of sexual interest. Not even an appreciative glance or a remark with sexual overtones. Nothing. Sometimes I think he doesn’t even notice the gender of those around him.”Another woman said, “To speak of Swamiji as ‘coercive’ is like saying the sun rises in the west. The truth is, when you are with him, you have to be careful not to express preferences that might interfere not merely with his convenience, but with his real needs. He is nothing less than heroic in his willingness to sacrifice his own well-being for the sake of others.”“I’ve been discussing Ananda personnel issues with Swamiji since the community was founded twenty-five years ago,” a woman wrote. “I don’t even want to think about how many meetings I’ve attended. I can’t recall a single instance in which a decision was made on the basis of gender. That kind of bias just doesn’t happen at Ananda.”* * *In the “discovery” phase of the lawsuit, Swamiji was subjected to eighty hours of deposition. Bertolucci’s attorneys videotaped the entire proceeding. Each day, in an attempt to unnerve Swamiji, the camera was moved a little closer to his face. Bertolucci’s attorney was deliberately lewd and insulting in the hope of embarrassing Swamiji or, better still, enraging him and capturing it all on video.Less than a year earlier, Swamiji had had open-heart surgery. His physician, Dr. Peter Van Houten, was present for the deposition to monitor Swamiji’s condition and call a break in the proceedings whenever he felt Swamiji needed a rest.“Bertolucci’s attorney knew about the surgery,” Dr. Peter said later. “Still, he was completely unconcerned about Swamiji’s well-being. I think he could have pushed Swamiji to the point of a heart attack if I hadn’t been there to prevent it. Even when Swamiji asked to be excused to go to the bathroom, the attorney would say, ‘Just one more question.’ Then he would go on with the deposition as if the request had never been made. If Swamiji reminded him of the need for a break, the attorney would say again, “Just one more,” until Swamiji would simply get up and leave anyway, with the attorney calling out questions even as Swamiji walked out the door.”Later, Swamiji said, “I am so accustomed to microphones and cameras. It meant nothing to me to have the video even inches from my face. As for the attorney’s attempt to bully and insult me, I saw no reason why his rudeness should affect my inner peace.”Hour after hour, Swamiji calmly answered all the questions they put to him. During that time, in conversation with a few close friends, Swamiji shared some of his personal history that he had never talked about before.“At my first meeting with Master,” Swamiji said to us, “he asked me, ‘Of the three major delusions – sex, wine, and money – which ones attract you?’ Wine and money have never been issues for me. I had no wish to get married, but I did experience sexual desires and I told him so. He made no comment.“At the end of the interview, Master initiated me as a disciple and also as a monk. I took that for his answer and resolved to do my best. It was a struggle. Once I said to him, ‘I would commit suicide rather than fall into temptation.’“’Why speak of suicide?’ Master replied. ‘This is not deep in you. Keep on trying your best. You will overcome it.’“On another occasion I asked him to whom I might go for counseling on this issue after he was gone. I was astonished when he replied, ‘Speak of it to no one.’“‘Not even Rajarsi?’ I asked.“’No,’ Master replied firmly. ‘No one. You have a great work to do and no one must know.’”* * *Swamiji was twenty-two years old when he became a monk. For the first fourteen years, he lived within the protected environment of the SRF monastery. When he was expelled from SRF in 1962, he found himself suddenly, at the age of thirty-six, all on his own.Most monks and nuns who, for whatever reason, find themselves suddenly no longer in the monastery, have usually gotten married shortly thereafter. Swamiji was determined to remain a monk, even without a monastery to support him. In India, a solitary swami is a common sight and people relating to him understand his position. In America, there is no such tradition. Many women still considered him “fair game.” Some even found him more attractive because of his commitment to be a monk.Swamiji maintains a certain detachment from his own feelings. That detachment, however, does not diminish the depth and sensitivity of those feelings. Only a few, even of his closest friends, have been able to appreciate how deeply he has been hurt by the way SRF has treated him. All these years he has not had the company of even one fellow monk. Instead, he has been vilified and relentlessly persecuted by fellow disciples, some of whom were, at one time, his closest friends. It was only natural that Swamiji would long, as most people do, for a small haven of emotional intimacy as a bulwark against so much hurt and betrayal, especially when that comfort was freely offered.“When I took my vows as a monk, and then a few years later, as a swami,” he later wrote, “it was not a declaration, ‘I am free!’ Rather, it was an affirmation, ‘I will do my utmost to become completely free in this life.’”Swamiji struggled valiantly against a lingering desire for human love and intimacy. Mostly he succeeded. A few times he did not. Always it was consensual. It is not in Swamiji’s nature to impose his will on anyone. Mentally, however, he himself never gave his full consent, but acted always in obedience to Swami Sri Yukteswar’s advice quoted in Autobiography of a Yogi: “Even when the flesh is weak, the mind should be constantly resistant.”“A slip is not a fall,” Swamiji often says to encourage a person to cling to his aspirations even if, for a time, he fails to live up to them. Master said, “A saint is a sinner who never gave up.”When Swamiji started the community a few years after he was expelled from SRF, he had no choice but to mix freely with both men and women. If he had remained aloofly protective of his monastic vocation, Ananda would have failed.“I made the decision to risk even my own salvation,” Swamiji said, “in order to do the work Master had given me to do.”Later he wrote, “I could see no alternative but to go on, hoping for the best, clinging with faith to Master’s power, believing that he would take me eventually out of delusion. To me personally, the risk was agonizing. Meanwhile, I never pretended to myself or to anyone else that it was not a delusion, or that it might be in some way justifiable. I always saw, and spoke of it, as a fault. At last, as it happened, I discovered that Master’s blessings had been with me always.”* * *During the time of the depositions, in that conversation with his close friends, Swamiji went on to say, “Bertolucci’s lawyers tried to make it seem like sex was something I reveled in. That is not true. It was always something from which I wanted to be freed. “There was no point, though, in running away from it or doing all those other extreme things people do in an effort to kill the impulse within them. Quite simply, I’d tried that and had found it didn’t work. I realized I just had to live through it, maintaining as much mental detachment as I could.“To maintain detachment in this way is a form of Tantra yoga. Many people think Tantra is about enjoying your desires. That is entirely wrong. The teaching of Tantra is to withdraw the feelings, by an act of will, from sensory enjoyment, not to indulge them. “The follower of Tantra trains himself to keep the thought, ‘Even in the midst of enjoyment, I myself am not the enjoyer.’ The goal of this practice is eventual inner freedom. By maintaining mental detachment even while experiencing apparent ‘fulfillment,’ one gradually comes to see that desire itself is a delusion. “Tantra can be dangerous, however, and the masters do not recommend it. I would not have chosen even this one practice for myself if my situation had not forced it upon me.“It complicated things for me that Master had told me not to talk about it. Of course I would follow his guidance, there was no question about that. If he hadn’t guided me that way, however, I would have talked about it easily. I have done my best and I am proud of the life I have lived. Sexual desire is, after self-preservation, the most powerful instinct there is. It is nothing to be ashamed of.”* * *Bertolucci’s lawyers offered to settle, but Swamiji refused even to consider it. “It would,” he said, “be tantamount to admitting an untruth – a whole series of untruths, in fact.”The Bertolucci trial turned out to be a travesty of justice. The judge was biased against us from the start. He told Bertolucci’s attorneys what arguments to make and what motions to file so he could rule in their favor. He put Ananda’s spiritual practices on trial. He issued a ruling that prohibited us from offering any defense against the fulcrum issue in the case: the allegation that Swamiji was a “sexual predator.”When it came time for the women who had filed declarations against Swamiji to testify against him, they knew in advance that we’d been prohibited from cross-examining them. They could perjure themselves without fear of exposure. Some of their testimony contradicted what they had said in their own declarations and depositions, but there was no way we could bring even this fact to the attention of the jury.The jury was never informed about the prohibition imposed on us by the judge. They observed, without any explanation, that we offered no defense. They drew the obvious conclusion that we had no defense to offer, and considered the issue proved. * * *The attorney we worked with from the beginning to the end of the SRF lawsuit is a brilliant lawyer, an honorable man, and has become a dear friend. But he is not a litigator. So we had to hire another attorney to work with him for the trial. Swamiji was in Europe when this litigator was hired. He was a well-known defense attorney, who, we found out later, specialized in defending guilty criminals. His contribution to justice was to be sure that the criminals, although guilty, received a fair trial. When Swamiji came back to California a month or two later, they met for the first time. The litigator had apparently decided he needed to make it clear from the start who was the boss. He treated Swamiji as if he were a guilty criminal who needed to be bullied into telling the truth. Afterwards, Swamiji said, “He is the wrong attorney for us.” It wasn’t personal. It was just obvious to Swamiji that such a man could never tune in to him or to Ananda and therefore would have no idea how to defend us.Swamiji’s remark was met by a hailstorm of reasons why we had to keep working with that lawyer.“We’ve paid him a big retainer.”“He’s done a lot of work already to prepare for the trial.”“He has a reputation for winning.”“We don’t have time to bring someone else up to speed.”Again Swamiji stated emphatically, “He is the wrong attorney for us.” When the hailstorm began again, Swamiji made no further effort to persuade us.* * *Throughout all life’s challenges, Swamiji’s first thought has always been, not, “How to win?” or “How to succeed?” but, “How to maintain the right spiritual attitude required by the highest principles of dharma.”Even in a matter of such importance, if we were not receptive, it was contrary to dharma for Swamiji to impose his will on us. “I knew this attorney would be a disaster for us in exactly the way he proved to be,” Swamiji said later. “When I couldn’t get you to listen, however, I accepted it as God’s will.” The irony is that the man was hired to defend Swamiji against the charge, among others, of being a dictator. Even though the consequences for Swamiji personally were enormous, he let us go forward as we preferred and let God to determine the outcome.So we went to trial represented by an attorney who didn’t believe in our cause, who believed still less in Swamiji, who never understood the case, and who refused all our helpful suggestions. As a result, insofar as he was allowed to present a defense at all—given the judge’s prohibition—his defense was so weak that in many ways it strengthened the case against us. We continued to affirm victory right up to the end, but it was no surprise when the jury ruled in favor of Bertolucci. Afterward, we consulted with several attorneys about filing an appeal. “Even without considering all the other improprieties in the way the judge conducted the case,” one attorney assured us, “the prohibition against your presenting a defense to the key issues is enough in itself to guarantee that the verdict would be overturned on appeal. That verdict has the shelf-life of an apple.”To our dismay, however, we found out that even if one wins an appeal, all he gets is the right to a new trial, sometimes even in front of the same judge. The first trial had lasted three months, cost us hundreds of thousands of dollars, and for the entire time, thanks to Bertolucci’s attorneys, and our own lawyer’s refusal even to let us talk to the press, we were raked over the coals by the media. No thank you, we decided. We’d had quite enough of this so-called “justice.” “Where there is dharma there is victory.” What does it matter how we are judged in the courts of man? All that matters is how we stand in the eyes of God.Even in the worst hours of the trial, Swamiji said later, “I felt inwardly free. My constant prayer was, ‘Divine Mother, they can take everything away from me, but they can never take away from me my only treasure: my love for You.”Bertolucci’s attorneys very nearly succeeded in taking from Swamiji the copyrights to all his books and music, the fruit of a lifetime of work. Only by putting Ananda for a time under the protection of the bankruptcy court were we able to prevent that from happening. In the end, the trial proved to be a great blessing for Swamiji. “Since then,” Swamiji said, “I have not felt the faintest stirring of attraction toward human love.” * * *It seems an inescapable conclusion that those women who helped Swamiji in achieving his ultimate victory also reaped for themselves, in time, some of the good karma of that victory.Speaking to a group of friends, all of whom happened to be married couples, Swamiji said, “I don’t mean to hurt your feelings, but Master told me something that I didn’t understand at the time, but I do understand now. He was speaking of the attraction between the sexes. ‘Once you have overcome that desire’ Master said, ‘you will see it is the greatest delusion.’” Persecution has been the lot of many great souls throughout history. St. Teresa of Avila was called before the Inquisition. St. John of the Cross was cast into prison. One of John’s persecutors was even there at his deathbed interviewing the nuns who nursed him in the hope of finding evidence of misconduct to use against the saint. In his Christmas message to the community the year of the Bertolucci trial, Swamiji wrote, “We have so much to be grateful for. I wouldn’t trade anything God has given us this year for some imaginary ‘better deal.’ Spiritual growth comes as much through divine tests as through overt blessings – so much so that I’m inclined to say, ‘What tests?’ “What we want from life is to grow closer to God. Nothing else – absolutely nothing else – matters. Speaking for myself, and I think for all of you, my love for Him is deeper than ever. So also is my faith.”

[Listen to Asha read this story]It was Swamiji’s idea to incorporate Ananda Village as a California city. As a municipality, we would have control over our own land use, planning, and zoning. This would get us out from under the county approval process, which had proved to be cumbersome, expensive, and gave our neighbors too much influence over internal community affairs. Many of our neighbors had come to the area to drop out of society. It was almost a principle with them to oppose all organized groups and strong leaders. Many objected, also on principle, to the population density and some of the land use inherent in having a community. We were not indifferent to their needs, but most of their opposition was not based on anything we had done, or planned to do, but on the fear of what we might do if they did not keep a close watch on us. In fact, the community is quite self-contained. Most of what happens within the borders of Ananda has no actual impact on those who live nearby. Filing for incorporation was like filing a declaration of independence. Even if we didn’t succeed, we felt it was time to stand up to our neighbors and at least bring the controversy out into the open.Incorporation proved to be a long and complicated process. After a year and a half of hard work, it culminated in a series of public hearings, then a vote by a seven-member council called LAFCO, the Local Agency Formation Committee. Each hearing drew more people, went on longer, and was more contentious than the one before. Before the public hearings started, the members of LAFCO seemed to favor our application. We didn’t look like a city, we looked like a farm, but we met the legal requirements for a municipality, and that was all that mattered. LAFCO was forbidden by law to decide our application on the basis of religion. Even to discuss religion in relation to the incorporation, or to let the subject come into a public hearing, was a violation of our rights. The fact that “Ananda City” would be both a spiritual community and a municipality was like a shadow lurking in the background that could never be brought into the light of day. The LAFCO members visited the community, met Swamiji, and also met many of the residents. They liked what they saw and for a time it looked like our effort would succeed. The opposition of our neighbors, however, was our undoing. They were determined, well organized, and came out in droves for the public hearings. We were largely unsuccessful in getting anyone outside of Ananda to speak in favor of incorporation. Gradually the LAFCO members began to side with what appeared to be the majority view: to deny our application. At the end of the final hearing—which lasted seven hours and was attended by 800 people—only one LAFCO member voted in favor of our application. In that hearing, though, and in several leading up to it, LAFCO allowed extensive testimony from our neighbors about Ananda’s religion and how it would affect the municipality. We protested repeatedly, but to no avail.* * *The incorporation effort attracted statewide media attention. After LAFCO voted down the application, I and another Ananda spokesperson vowed in front of the TV cameras to get the decision reversed on appeal, because testimony about religion had been allowed in.Later, another television crew came to the Village to interview Swamiji. I met them at the community and rode in their car the three miles up the dirt road to Swamiji’s house. The entire time they plied me with questions about what we planned to do now. I was emphatic that this was just a temporary setback. Our rights had been violated. The process was compromised. This is America. We have not yet begun to fight.In previous incarnations, no doubt I have been part of more than one revolution, probably including the American Revolution, so this kind of rhetoric comes naturally to me. When we arrived at Swamiji’s house, he said to the television crew, “I don’t know how much time you were planning to give me, but if you let me have a full five minutes to read a statement I have prepared, I have a special scoop for you.”I turned to a friend who was there when we arrived and asked him, “What is Swamiji talking about?”My friend paled, then said, “You don’t know?” He refused to say anything more. The filming was just about to start and I couldn’t ask Swamiji myself. A few minutes later, in front of the camera, Swamiji started reading the first page of his prepared statement. Immediately I saw that he was speaking of the project in the past tense. That was the scoop. It was over. We weren’t going on.According to the law, Swamiji explained, LAFCO had acted improperly when they let religion come into the debate. But the fact is religion is the central question. Separation of church and state is one of America’s most cherished principles. Even if “Ananda City” conducted itself in an honorable way—which we have every reason to believe it would, Swamiji hastened to add—to allow Ananda to incorporate would set a bad precedent. LAFCO made the right decisionThe moment Swamiji finished speaking the crew turned the camera on me. I had to improvise on the spot all the reasons why I agreed completely with what Swamiji had just said. Of course, I was contradicting everything I had said off-camera just a few minutes earlier, but these crews interview a lot of politicians and it didn’t seem to bother them.I then took the television crew back to the community, talking all the way about the wisdom of the Founding Fathers and how much we support the basic premises of American life. As soon as they left, I made a beeline back to Swamiji’s house.“Why didn’t you tell me what you were going to do?” I asked him. I described the scene in the car, how I gave the crew one story on the way over and another story on the way back. “Fortunately, I think fast on my feet.” By this point, we were both laughing. The situation was so ludicrous.“I’m sorry, Asha,” Swamiji said. “It was a surprise to me, too. When I sat to meditate this morning it just came to me that it was not right for us to go on. It was already too late to reach you.” There were almost no phones at Ananda in those days. Swamiji didn’t have a phone, and neither did I. “Why didn’t that revelation come to me?” I asked Swamiji. “I’m the one who has been working on the project all this time.”“Probably because you didn’t ask,” he said.“No,” I said honestly, “I didn’t. I just went on as if the guidance for today would be the same as the guidance for yesterday. A serious oversight on my part.”“Yes,” Swamiji said. “It is not wise to presume. You have to be open, and continuously ask Master, ‘What do you want me to do?’”“I only want to do God’s will,” I said to Swamiji, entirely reconciled now to what had happened. “I threw myself into this project because you asked me to do it and I felt it was right. If you feel it is God’s will that we stop, that’s fine with me.” Then I added, “I don’t mind losing. I have to admit, however, that our neighbors have been so unkind, in fact at times so downright nasty, that I don’t like the idea that they have won.”“It is not a matter of likes and dislikes,” Swamiji said. “It doesn’t matter if we lose face, or even if people think we were foolish for having tried in the first place, or for having vowed to go on and then pulling back so suddenly. The only thing that matters is truth.”“Ahh…. Yes,” I said with a smile, “Where there is dharma there is victory.” Then jokingly I added, “Dharma has served us well so far. No point in changing horses in midstream!”“Even though we didn’t become a city,” Swamiji said, “I think in the long run our neighbors will respect us more for standing up to them. That’s how they operate and we have to show them we are not pushovers. We can also play their game.”After that, our neighbors still spoke against most of our proposals, but some of them had been so appalled by things that had been said in the heat of the moment at public hearings that they resolved not to let emotion take over like that again. Swamiji paused for a moment during our talk, then went on. “Working on this has also been good for you,” he said. “At the beginning, when you spoke in public, you were inclined to tell your listeners what they wanted to hear, rather than tuning in to what needed to be said. Having to stand up to all that opposition at the public hearings has lessened this tendency in you. Now you will be a better minister. That’s the main reason I asked you to do it.”* * *Because the incorporation had been such a public event, Swamiji wanted to inform the whole county of Ananda’s decision and the reasoning behind. What he’d written was too long to be printed as a “Letter to the Editor,” so Swamiji bought advertising space in the local paper and printed the following statement:April 16, 1982 A representative group of us at Ananda met yesterday and decided to go to court over the decision of the Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCO) to deny our petition to be granted incorporation status as a municipality. Next week this matter would be taken to the entire community for discussion and final decision. Our legal counsel feels we have a good chance of winning. The issue, from our own point of view, is clear-cut: We want the freedom to develop, according to law and to the broader interests of Nevada County, but without the restrictions of bureaucratic red tape, and without the all-too-frequent, basically emotional opposition of our neighbors. Our (to us) perfectly reasonable wish has aroused unprecedented, and unprecedentedly emotional, opposition. Ananda has been vilified; my own character publicly slandered. I have repeatedly expressed my desire to work for harmony, and for the general good of all, including the good of our neighbors as much as our own. The press, instead of quoting these statements, has tried to fan the controversy by quoting people who would make me out to be another Hitler, or Jim Jones. For myself, I am interested in the truth. Lies, whether public or private, are still lies and simply don’t claim my respect. I have consistently affirmed that only two arguments could persuade me not to proceed with our efforts to incorporate: One, that incorporation would not give us the one thing we want from it: greater freedom; and two, that incorporation would actually (as opposed to theoretically) hurt our neighbors. During the LAFCO hearings, no one in the opposition addressed these two issues in such a way as to convince me of the justice of their cause. Rather, they expressed fears which, our legal counsel assured us, were groundless. They said we might, if incorporated, annex their property. Legal counsel told us they would have plenty of recourse in the event of our wanting to, a thing we would never be interested in doing anyway. They said that as a religious community we would be in conflict with the church-state separation guaranteed by the United States constitution. But the legal decision from Sacramento on this issue was that to deny us on these grounds would be to deny our rights as U.S. citizens. County counsel advised the LAFCO members to reject testimony against our bid on these grounds as invalid. Part of our suit against the county would certainly be based on the evident fact that religion was in fact admitted as a major part of the testimony, and could not but have influenced the final decision against us. I have always said that truth is my guide—not opinion; not likes or dislikes; but truth. I am not interested in winning, or in saving face. In the present issue, I am only interested in the rights and wrongs of it. I feel that within the limited context of what Ananda’s needs are, and of our contribution, past and future, to Nevada County we were right. However, last evening, after the meeting at which we decided to appeal, I sat down and read reports on this issue in the national press. As a result I have come to appreciate the problem in the broader context of America as a whole. And I have come to feel that the church-state issue, despite the official pronouncement on the matter from Sacramento, is at the heart of the matter. At stake is not the question of whether I would abuse my power as leader of this religious community. I have never done so. Nor is the issue whether I might do so. I think those who know me are quite certain that I would not. The real issue, however, is whether I could abuse this power. And there we have to say, There are no guarantees that human nature will not express any of its hidden potentials, whether for good or for evil. Our constitution was written with a clear eye to history, and to the evils that have occurred in the past when any group of people whose interests drew them together for one reason allowed those interests to dictate their decisions in other matters. One of the saddest periods in the history of Christianity was, in my opinion, when Christian teachings became widely enough accepted to become mixed up with national policy. If, for example, Minneapolis were to become a wholly Christian city, and St. Paul (its sister city) a wholly Jewish one, to the extent that their definition as legal entities became rooted in their respective religious beliefs, I can see the possibility of persecution, perhaps decades down the road. As long as Ananda was a local issue, our bid for corporate status revolved around land use, self-government, etc. I believe strongly, moreover, and said so at the last LAFCO hearing, that what Ananda stands for in a sociological sense—namely, cooperative effort at a time when our nation is becoming all-too-fragmented—needs to be encouraged, not discouraged. This very fragmentation, however, that I see taking place on a national level might also be strengthened if religious groups like ours were permitted the status of legal entities. I foresee a time of great stress for this country, when groups will be pitted against one another in an ideological struggle. At such a time, I feel, religion will need to speak out on religious, not political, grounds if it is to be effective for the truth.In the broader context of America’s history and future directions, I think the LAFCO decision not to grant us corporate status was a wise one. This does not mean I think we were wrong, for what we wanted was valid. This does not mean I think LAFCO’s reasons were necessarily right. But it does mean I think there were higher forces at work here, and that the truths that our neighbors intuited were valid, and a valid reason for concern. I shall make my recommendation to our Ananda community that we drop the issue. Sincerely,Swami Kriyananda(J. Donald Walters)

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live in a real conscious community - one where people live in harmony, collaboration, compassion, cooperation, pace and love? that's what skeptical reporter Juliet set out to investigate. On assignment from her editor at Profiles Magazine, this urban chic cynic is plopped in the middle of a modern day Utopia - and she finds what she never expected to discover - True Happiness. However, the fascinating thing about the charming, satisfyng and enlightening file, Finding Happiness, is that is is only partly fiction! It is filmed at the Ananda Village in teh SierrA Nevada Foorhills of northern California - one fo the world's first and foremost conscious communities - and at Ananda Europa (Italy) and Ananda India. The people who Juliet discovers there are real lpeople talking about their real life experience in genuine, unscripted interviews. Ananada was founded nearly 50 years ago by the late Swami Kriyananda, who lived with Paramhansa Yogananda (Autobiography of a Yogi), and assumed teh lead role in developing the maser's dream of "world brotherhood communities, based on the principle that simple living and high thinking lead to greatest happiness and inner fulfillment." If you've ever wondered what it would be lilke to return to a more harmonious and peaceful way of life amongst like-minded people, Finding Happiness will give you a glimpse of that tantalizing future. This is a sweet, uplifting, inspirational story that fills the soul.

Swami Asha has been a spiritual seeker since she was a young girl. In 1969 at Stanford University, she heard Swami Kriyananda speak for the first time. Instantly, she recognized him as her spiritual teacher. “I knew the moment he walked into the room that he possessed the consciousness I had long been seeking.”She soon became a founding member of the new community Swami was starting near Nevada City, California, called Ananda Village, based on Yogananda’s dream of world brotherhood colonies for “simple living and high thinking.”Swami Kriyananda placed Asha in the role of teaching and counseling soon after her arrival at Ananda. She also served as Swami's correspondence secretary and personal assistant for many years. In 1987, Swami Asha and her husband, Swami David, became spiritual directors of Ananda Palo Alto in California, where they continue to serve today. Swami Asha is author of Swami Kriyananda as We Have Known Him, a collection of more than 200 stories by people who have been touched by his teachings and spiritual friendship, often in remarkable ways. She is also author of Loved and Protected: Stories of Miracles and Answered Prayers.With warmth and wisdom, Asha helps us see how spiritual teaching can be woven into daily, ordinary life. She offers practical, real-life examples to guide us, encouragement, and support for the journey of life. Her teachings are non-sectarian — sharing the truths that unite the great religions; her Sunday Services are based on texts from both the Bible and the Bhagavad Gita. “Good company is essential on the spiritual path. Whether your energy will move inward toward God, or outward toward the world, is determined, to a large extent, by the company you keep.” —Paramhansa Yogananda http://www.nayaswamiasha.org  

"Finding Happiness"...A Film...A Vision...A True Story Skeptical Reporter Discovers the Truth Behind What It's Like to Live in a Conscious Community.  Part Fiction, Part Documentary, a Real Inside Look at an unusual spiritual community Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live in a real conscious community where people live in harmony, collaboration, compassion, cooperation, peace and love? That's what skeptical reporter Juliet (Elizabeth Rohm of American Hustle, Miss Congeniality 2) set out to investigate. On assignment from her editor at Profiles Magazine, this urban chic cynic is plopped in the middle of a modern day Utopia--and she finds what she never expected to discover--True Happiness. The fascinating thing about the charming, satisfying and enlightening film, Finding Happiness, is that it is only partly fiction! It is filmed at the Ananda Village in the Sierra Nevada Foothills of northern California. The people who Juliet discovers  there are real people talking about their real life experience in genuine, unscripted interviews. David Eby began his musical studies at 6, and made his public debut as cellist with the Pittsburgh Symphony at 16. He attended the Eastman School of Music where he received the Performer's Certificate and B.M. He is featured in the film, FINDING HAPPINESS as the tour guide for the visiting journalist. He produced, composed, arranged, and recorded the soundtrack for FINDING HAPPINESS. For more information, visit: www.FindingHappinessMovie.com

Shivani Lucki, executive producer of Finding Happiness, an exciting new docu-drama film starring Elisabeth Rohm (American Hustle, Miss Congeniality 2, Law & Order) who plays a New York journalist sent on assignment to the Ananda Village in Northern California. Ananda was founded by Swami Kriyananda who was a direct disciple of Yogananda during the last few years of Yogananda's life.  

With Swami Kriyananda

With Swami Kriyananda

“What were Yogananda’s views on education for children?” Swami Kriyananda talks about Yogananda’s interest in education and how the non-sectarian principles he taught have been implemented at Ananda Village.

“What were Yogananda’s views on education for children?” Swami Kriyananda talks about Yogananda’s interest in education and how the non-sectarian principles he taught have been implemented at Ananda Village.

“What were Yogananda’s views on education for children?” Swami Kriyananda talks about Yogananda’s interest in education and how the non-sectarian principles he taught have been implemented at Ananda Village.

“What were Yogananda’s views on education for children?” Swami Kriyananda talks about Yogananda’s interest in education and how the non-sectarian principles he taught have been implemented at Ananda Village.

40 years after he first arrived at Ananda Village, Nitai discusses what brought him onto the spiritual path and how his journey has helped him find his “larger Self.”

40 years after he first arrived at Ananda Village, Nitai discusses what brought him onto the spiritual path and how his journey has helped him find his “larger Self.”