Graphic of Vintage poster by Victor Arjuna Zurbel, late 1960s.
As we celebrate sixty years of Integral Yoga, we also look back to the spiritual streams that helped shape the path Swami Satchidananda brought to the West.
In 1949, Swami Satchidananda met his Guru, Sri Swami Sivananda of Rishikesh, and received Sannyas initiation from him. Swami Sivananda taught what he called the “Yoga of Synthesis”—an approach to spiritual life that brought together the major paths of Yoga rather than treating them as separate or competing ways.
At the heart of this approach was an understanding of the human being as a whole. As Swami Sivananda explains in the teaching that follows, “will, feeling and thought are not distinct and separate,” and therefore neither are work, devotion, and knowledge. Each has its place in spiritual development, and each supports the others. For Swami Sivananda, their integration leads toward what he called “integral development”—a harmonious unfolding of the whole person directed toward Self-realization.
This vision became an important stream in Swami Satchidananda’s own spiritual formation. In time, the integration of the different branches of Yoga would find its own expression in the Integral Yoga he taught as a complete path to realization.
In 2026, as we celebrate Integral Yoga’s 60th-anniversary year, Swami Sivanandaji’s words offer a glimpse into one of the important sources from which that complete path emerged.
The Yoga Of Synthesis By Sri Swami Sivananda
Some maintain that the practice of Karma Yoga alone is the only means for salvation. Some others hold that devotion to the Lord is the only way to release. Some believe that the path of wisdom is the sole way to attain the final beatitude. There are still others who hold that all the three paths are equally efficacious to bring about perfection and freedom.
Man is a strange, complex mixture of will, feeling and thought. He wills to possess the objects of his desires. He has emotion and so he feels. He has reason and so he thinks and ratiocinates. In some, the emotional element may preponderate, while in some others, the rational element may dominate. Just as will, feeling and thought are not distinct and separate, so also work, devotion and knowledge are not exclusive of one another.
The Yoga of Synthesis is the most suitable and potent form of Sadhana. In the mind there are three defects, viz., Mala or impurity, Vikshepa or tossing and Avarana or veil. The impurity should be removed by the practice of Karma Yoga. The tossing should be removed by worship or Upasana. The veil should be torn down by the practice of Jnana Yoga. Then only is Self-realisation possible. If you want to see your face clearly in a mirror, you must remove the dirt in the mirror, keep it steady and remove the covering also. You can see your face clearly in the bottom of the lake only if the turbidity is removed, if the water that is agitated by the wind is rendered still, and if the moss that is lying on the surface is removed. So too is the case with Self-realisation.
The Yoga of Synthesis alone will bring about integral development. The Yoga of Synthesis alone will develop the head, heart and hand and lead one to perfection. To become harmoniously balanced in all directions is the ideal of religion. This can be achieved by the practice of the Yoga of Synthesis.
To behold the one Universal Self in all beings is Jnana, wisdom; to love this Self is Bhakti, devotion; and to serve this Self is Karma, action. When the Jnana-Yogin attains wisdom, he is endowed with devotion and selfless activity. Karma Yoga is for him a spontaneous expression of his spiritual nature, as he sees the one Self in all. When the devotee attains perfection in devotion, he is possessed of wisdom and activity. For him also, Karma Yoga is a spontaneous expression of his divine nature, as he beholds the one Lord everywhere. The Karma-Yogin attains wisdom and devotion when his actions are wholly selfless. The three paths are in fact one in which the three different temperaments emphasise one or the other of its inseparable constituents. Yoga supplies the method by which the Self can be seen, loved and served.
