(Swami Daasyananda at Kailash, Satchidananda Ashram–Yogaville, Virginia.)
On the blessed morning that marked the beginning of the Guru Poornima celebration at Satchidananda Ashram–Yogaville, July 25th, 2026, our beloved brother and senior monastic, Swami Daasyanandaji, peacefully left the body.
The timing of his departure seemed deeply fitting. Throughout his life, Swami Daasyananda’s devotion to Swami Satchidananda (Sri Gurudev) was steady and profound. In his final days, that devotion seemed to shine with particular clarity. He spoke of Gurudev often, resting inwardly in the guidance and grace of the Guru to whose teachings he had dedicated his life.
Those who were with him felt that he was completely prepared—peaceful, balanced, and free from attachment to the body. His passing was not marked by fear or struggle, but by a quiet readiness to release the physical form and rest in the Truth he had contemplated so deeply: the formless, infinite, and eternal Awareness.
Swami Daasyananda was born in Virginia and always regarded himself, with affection and humility, as a country boy. He loved the natural world and felt at home in its simplicity. He enjoyed camping, especially near quiet lakes away from crowded summer destinations, and spent many hours exploring the countryside. Earlier in life, he was also an enthusiastic cave explorer. On one occasion, a sudden storm caused water to rush into a cave he was exploring, placing him in serious danger. Yet his attraction to wildlife and hidden places remained part of his lifelong kinship with nature.
He also loved the traditional music of rural America. Country music, particularly the old-time music of the mountains, spoke to something deep within him. He taught himself to play both the fiddle and the dulcimer, becoming quite accomplished over the years. He attended workshops to deepen his knowledge and took great delight in the music, traditions, and simple fellowship surrounding it. These interests revealed an earthy and engaging side of a man whose inner life was increasingly absorbed in the highest philosophical truths.
Swami Daasyananda became involved with Integral Yoga in the early 1970s. He first received pre-sannyas diksha (initiation) from Sri Gurudev and was given the name Brother Bhargava Chaitanya. Bhargava traditionally means “a descendant of the sage Bhrigu,” while also carrying the luminous associations of bharga—radiance, brilliance, and divine splendor. Chaitanya means Consciousness.
(Swami Daasyananda, 2nd from left, with Sri Gurudev and his sannyas sisters & brothers.)
Later, upon receiving sannyas diksha from Sri Gurudev, he was given the name Swami Daasyananda—“the bliss of devoted service,” or “one who finds bliss in serving the Divine.” Taken together, the names given to him by Gurudev beautifully encompassed two complementary currents of his life: his growing absorption in the radiance of Pure Consciousness and his humble, steadfast dedication to selfless service.
Meditation had already been important to him for many years, including during his college days, and it was one of the primary forces that drew him to Yoga. When he met Sri Swami Satchidananda, he felt that he had found an extraordinary spiritual teacher—one who could guide him more deeply along the path of meditation and Self-knowledge.
His bond with Sri Gurudev became the foundation of his spiritual life. Beneath Swami Daasyananda’s practical manner, quiet humor, and country ways was a heart filled with devotion. His love for Gurudev was not merely sentimental. It expressed itself through decades of discipline, service, meditation, study, and dedication to the teachings he had received. He trusted Gurudev’s guidance and sought to embody it fully.
Swami Daasyananda served for a number of years at the Integral Yoga Institute in Denver, Colorado and the Integral Yoga Natural Food Store in Santa Cruz, California prior to moving, in September 1979, to the newly developing Virginia Ashram with some of the first families who were helping to establish the Ashram. He was the first sannyasi to make his home at the Virginia Ashram, and he would remain a devoted presence there for nearly five decades.
Much of his service was offered through the maintenance department. As the Ashram’s lead plumber, he carried out countless repairs, installations, and practical projects over the years. Plumbing was not simply an occupation to him; it was Karma Yoga. He understood that maintaining water systems, repairing what was broken, and responding to the everyday needs of the community could all be expressions of spiritual service.
He was also a gifted dowser. Using instruments he often fashioned himself, he helped locate promising sites for wells both at the Ashram and for many residents of the surrounding Yogaville community. People came to trust his sensitivity and skill. In a rural community where access to dependable well water is essential, this was no small contribution. In this distinctive way, too, he combined his closeness to the natural world with a desire to serve others.
(Swami Daasyananda and the Ashram M&R team. L-R: Swami Daasyananda, Rev. Siva Moore, Jayan Johnson, Sri Ram Eyth, Rev. Devaja Cicolella Wandering Turtle.)
Those who knew him remember his warm and sometimes playful manner. He often greeted men as “laddie” and women as “lassie,” an affectionate expression that reflected his friendliness and old-fashioned country charm. He enjoyed conversation, laughter, music, and friendships. Yet as the years passed, he became increasingly inward and solitary. This was not because he had withdrawn from others out of dislike or indifference. Rather, his mind and heart were becoming more fully attuned to another dimension of life. As several friends observed, he seemed increasingly to live on the wavelength of what he called “Formless Awareness, Infinite and Eternal.”
Jnana Yoga—the path of Self-knowledge—became the central spiritual passion of his life. He read, studied, reflected, and continually educated himself in its teachings. He loved philosophical discussion, but his interest was never merely intellectual. He wanted to know the Truth directly. For him, the teachings of Jnana Yoga pointed to the Reality discovered when the mind becomes still and the false identification with the body and personality falls away.
In the late 1990s, after years of deep meditation, Swami Daasyananda had an experience of what he described as pure Awareness. He went to Sri Gurudev and told him what had occurred. Gurudev reportedly responded, “Yes, that’s it. Go there.”
Those few words became a guiding instruction for the rest of his life. From then on, Swami Daasyananda sought, as much as possible, to abide in that pure Awareness—not as a passing experience, but as the ever-present Reality underlying every experience. To him, it was beautiful beyond description.
His home at the Ashram reflected this inner orientation. The walls were covered with handwritten notes proclaiming the glory of the Supreme Self and reminding him of our true nature. These were not decorations. They were instruments of practice—constant calls to awaken from identification with the changing body and mind and to remain established in the unchanging Reality.
About a decade ago, Swami Daasyananda began leading a Jnana Yoga study group for members of the community who shared his sincere interest in the path. He devoted great care to this responsibility. He prepared lesson plans for every gathering and invested significant time and thought in the material he offered. He wanted the group to remain small enough for participants to engage deeply, ask questions, and truly explore the teachings together. Although he sometimes felt concerned that limiting its size might prevent others from joining, his intention was to preserve the depth and seriousness of the study.
He did not wish to offer Jnana Yoga as a set of abstract ideas. He wanted those who came to the group to enter into genuine inquiry—to look beyond the surface of life, to question the assumed identity of the separate person, and to recognize the Self that is never born and never dies. He believed deeply in meditation as an essential means of preparing the mind for this recognition, and his own meditation practice became increasingly intense over the final two decades of his life.
In recent years, as the body became less able to support activity, Swami Daasyananda spoke openly of no longer needing it. His words did not come from despondency, but from spiritual detachment. He had spent decades examining the distinction between the body and the Self. When his physical condition declined and he entered hospice care, he appeared ready to live that understanding fully.
Even then, his humor remained. He continued to joke, talk, and laugh with those around him. There was an ease about his final days that deeply touched his friends. On the Thursday before his passing, Ashram residents and community members gathered in Guru Bhavan to offer 108 repetitions of the Maha Mrityunjaya Mantra, praying for an easeful transition. Surrounded inwardly and outwardly by the love of the sangha and the grace of Sri Gurudev, Swami Daasyananda peacefully departed during Brahmamuhurta.
(With his beloved Guru at an Ashram construction site, where Daasyananda offered his practical skills in maintenance, plumbing, and dowsing, early 1990s).
His transition seemed to embody the teachings to which he had devoted his life. He was calm, prepared, and unattached, resting not in fear of what might come, but in the conviction that he was never the body. Those close to him felt that he left consciously and illumined—ready for the apparent boundaries of the individual form to dissolve into and as Pure Infinite Awareness.
Swami Daasyananda leaves behind a legacy that is at once humble and profound: pipes repaired and wells discovered; music played and friendships cherished; lessons carefully prepared; decades of meditation; handwritten reminders of the Supreme Self; and a life quietly offered at the feet of his Guru.
He showed that the deepest spiritual life need not be separate from ordinary work. The same hands that repaired plumbing could hold the fiddle, fashion a dowsing rod, prepare a lesson on the Self, and fold in reverence before the Guru. The country boy, the craftsman, the musician, the Karma Yogi, the contemplative, and the Jnani were not separate identities, but different expressions of one sincere and dedicated life.
We will miss his physical presence, his warmth, his humor, and the distinctive way he moved through the world. Yet the Truth he loved reminds us that what is real in him has not gone anywhere.
As we remember Swami Daasyanandaji with love, we offer our deepest gratitude to all those who cared for him so tenderly during his final days, including Swami Dayananda, Rev. Bhagavan Metro, and Mitra Metro, as well as the hospice professionals’ compassionate support. We also extend our heartfelt thanks to Swami Karunananda, Rev. Dhyani Simonini, Revs. Bhagavan & Bhavani Metro, Swami Dayananda, Rev. Bharati Gardino, and Lakshmi Fradianni, whose loving memories, personal stories, and reflections helped us portray more fully the many dimensions of his life.
May Swami Daasyananda’s life inspire us to serve faithfully, meditate deeply, seek the Truth wholeheartedly, and remember what he so often affirmed:
Formless Awareness.
Infinite and Eternal.
Beautiful.
Om Shanti Shanti Shanti
