The Beginning Days at 500 West End Avenue

By Karuna Kreps I first learned of Swami Satchidananda when I was 16 and saw his striking photograph on the front page of the Village Voice. The caption read something like, “Flower children meet Swami Satchidananda at JFK Airport as he returns to New York, after...

Yoga, Medicine, and Transformation

An Interview with Dean Ornish, M.D. Integral Yoga Magazine (IYM): Please tell us about your relationship with Swami Satchidananda. Dean Ornish (DO): Let me begin by saying that I wouldn’t be alive today if it weren’t for Swami Satchidananda—because I was very close to...

Bringing the Swami to America

By Peter Max Since meeting Swami Satchidananda, the last 50 years have been the best years of my life. I’ve learned so much from Gurudev; even the way I met him was miraculous. It was 1966—a time of psychedelic experimentation among the youth and Yoga was virtually...

Truth-Consciousness-Bliss: Celebrating 50 Years of Integral Yoga

त्यं ब्रूयात्प्रियं ब्रूयान्न ब्रूयात्सत्यमप्रियम् । प्रियं च नानृतं ब्रूयादेष धर्मः सनातनः ॥ satyam brūyat_priyam brūyan_na brūyāt_satyam_apriyam priyam cha nānṛitam brūyādéṣha dharmaḥ sanātanaḥ ~Manusmriti 4:138 The above verse is from an ancient Sanskrit scripture...

Inhabiting *Both* Sides of a Paradox

By Mark Nepo It is no accident that those who survive being broken and who make a home for the terrible knowledge are, in turn, at the threshold of enlightened living. Often, in our one-sided logic, we try to theorize that suffering is a prerequisite to deep living....