It is a tradition in Integral Yoga that after daily meditation we repeat Shanti mantras, or peace prayers. These prayers are a beautiful way to end one’s formal meditation sitting and are a spiritual support in that they are affirmations of peace. The Yoga tradition...
I know so many people, that when I ask how they are doing, respond with something about how busy they are. It has become the status quo for our lives to be filled to the maximum and beyond so that we’re not really aware of how driven we are, how stressed our lives...
To know a Satguru you should know how a Satguru would be. That’s what Arjuna asked of Sri Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita: “How am I to know a person of steady wisdom (sthitaprajna)?” Arjuna then asked Sri Krishna to describe how such a person would walk, how they would...
Dean Ornish, MD was invited to give a talk at the "Life Itself" conference in June 2022. The conference was organized by CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta and Dr. Deepak Chopra. To introduce his talk, Dr. Ornish said he was going to talk less about his lifestyle medicine...
The Himalayas are indeed a crown and spread their victory flag in the sky. The Indian Ocean, in the south, acts as though it washes the feet of the emperor. In between, a thriving sun of culture has been shining for thousands of years over the waves of the Ganga and...
A questioner asks: Swamiji, what about Gurus like Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa? We read that he touched his disciple Swami Vivekananda and Vivekananda had a spiritual experience. Was Vivekananda just opening up something from within himself or did Sri Ramakrishna...
Independence implies a freedom from being controlled or unduly influenced by an outside source. Spiritual independence suggests the freedom to live in harmony with the spiritual truth at the heart of our being. It implies freedom from depending on any outside source...
Sri Gurudev Swami Satchidananda came to the West in 1966. His presence was magnetic. He attracted people from all walks of life, from diverse backgrounds and faiths, with different temperaments, interests and capacities. The unifying factor amidst all the diversity...
A few times a year anxiety sends my mind into a death spiral. I wake in the middle of the night with my stomach clenched like an angry fist. Thoughts race from zero to catastrophe and I am convinced that social interactions will only result in total alienation. By the...
The annual Guru Poornima celebration is being hosted by Satchidananda Ashram–Yogaville on July 9 – 10, 2022. The program will be both in-person (limited space, health protocols and registration required) and it will also be streamed. For in-person details and the...
One fine spring morning I stood on the deck as the sun crested the trees. Tucked into the raised beds, cabbages, and leaf lettuce glittered with dew. As if on cue a Mourning Dove landed on the topmost barn gable. I half expected a butterfly to land on my shoulder and...
A meditation teacher of mine once quoted a Burmese teacher as saying “When everything that can go is gone, what’s left is the truth.” That sentence resonated with me. I heard it maybe 20 years ago and I still reference it and repeat it a lot. And I think that’s...
In any Sanskrit mantra, one of the letters will be a sound that is considered a “seed” sound or a bija. The various bijas each have a different effect on our bodies and minds, and even on plant life. Mantra Shastra, is the science of sound. In Yoga, we have the...
Integral Yoga teacher Zac Parker leads a short meditative and relaxing experience that you can do to begin or end your day. It's also the perfect length to take a moment out of a stressful day or utilize during a work break, to drop into essence-nature and the peace...
My time on the mat began with a few sporadic classes to balance out a new fitness regime. I was in my early thirties and began noticing my high metabolism was not all I could rely on to stay healthy. Group classes motivated me to go to the gym, and I mixed up my...
The howl of a nor’easter blew against my house and rattled the windows. A rifle-like crack, roaring whoosh, and an earth-shaking thud shocked me fully awake. I assumed another tree had fallen. Finally, night gave way to grey dawn and I huddled around my coffee mug in...