My Baba emphasized the importance of the seated pose. He wrote, “For meditation the most important thing is asana, that your spine be kept straight, upright.” Sit up. Glide your neck and head back so they’re in line with your spine. At the crown of your head, the top of your head, is a thousand-petaled lotus…

— Gurudevi Nirmalananda

From Gurudevi’s full discourse “Sitting for Meditation“

by Gurudevi Nirmalananda

I grew up with this song. I believed in it and did my best to make it happen.

I tried to look perfect and be perfect so I would be loveable. I failed at it again and again.

Then I found how to love. Instead of looking to receive love, I loved with all my love, hoping that all I needed was love. To love without motive, love without need, unconditional love — that’s the love I wanted to give. That’s what I thought Valentine’s Day was about. 

Despite St. Valentine’s life and legend, the day in his honor is actually not about love. It’s about romance. And romance is about desire, even infatuation, with a whole lot of idealism and lust thrown in.

The problem with this is that love makes you desireless. When you experience love, you are overflowing with incredible fullness and joy. There is no space for desire in there. You only experience desire when you feel empty and needy.

Unfortunately, this describes the human condition, anava mala in Sanskrit. When you look inward, you bump into an inner block that hides your own Divine Essence. “Anava” means full of emptiness. It used to wake me up in the middle of the night with an overwhelming loneliness and despair. I’d eat ice cream.

Yoga says there is a better way. Shaktipat gives you freedom from anava mala, so now you can see all the way inward. Finding your own Self, your own Divine Essence, you are filled from within. As you turn inward again and again, your filling gets fuller until it overflows as love.

Now my experience of love is completely different. I started with looking for love from others. I grew into giving love to others, wanting them to reciprocate. Then I found Baba Muktananda, who gave me my own Self.

Now I live in that fullness and revel in the overflowing. And I see the same fullness in you, even when you don’t see your own Self. Yet your Divine light shines through, making you loveable even when you’re not perfect. 

For this Valentine’s Day, give yourself an extra meditation. Dive inward and tap into the source of love. Now let it overflow through your heart, through your eyes, through your actions and words. Do it again the next day, and the next, and the next. It’s a glorious way to live!

Parinama is the gradual transformation. It comes from the inside out, and from the outside in.  When you experience the rising of Consciousness within, you’re being transformed from the inside out.  And when you study, when you’re learning – in these discourses, in my teachings, in books, in yoga texts – you’re being transformed from the outside in.  Your progress toward enlightenment is…

—  Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

From Gurudevi’s full discourse “Close to God“

While the universe responds to what you do, what you put out — when you put out what you’ve always put out, you’ll get the response you’ve always gotten.  When you do something different, it might take a little while, but what happens is you get a different response.  This means you can actually change the world… 

—  Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

From Gurudevi’s full discourse “Proactive“

By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Something wonderful happens when you simply sit. No phone, no music, nothing to read, to say or to do.

Whether you’re under a shady tree or in a quiet indoor spot, you gradually settle into an easy motionlessness — your body becomes still.

Then your mind becomes still, like when the ripples on a lake dissolve back into the lake.

This is why people have a chaise lounge in their back yard, to stretch out and gaze at the plants, to watch the birds and butterflies. After a few minutes, you’re not seeing anything anymore. You’re settling inside. Most people fall asleep or drift in a dreamy sleep-like state. You have done this so many times.

But on the way inward, you can take the other fork in the road. Instead of settling into unconsciousness, you can delve into the bliss of Consciousness within. This is yoga’s promise, that when your mind settles, you experience your Self — called svaroopa.

Tadaa dra.s.tu.h svaruupe ‘vasthaanam — Yoga Sutras 1.3

As your mind settles, you are established in your own Divine Essence (svaroopa).

How do you get your mind to settle?  One of the easiest ways is to use your body:

Sthira-sukham aasanam. — Yoga Sutras 2.46

Asana means to sit, in easy motionlessness.

In the beginning, you may need to scratch your nose, even cough and yawn. All that will soon settle down and you will be at ease. This is even a military command, “At ease, soldiers.” It’s useful for everyone.

Everyone practices it, even unconsciously, maybe lazing in bed during snooze-alarm minutes. Not sleeping, not really awake, coasting the inner edge, it’s quite blissful. It is even more bliss-filled when you take the road less traveled…

Your body’s condition affects your mind and heart, which affect your relationships, which affect your whole life.  Yet the purpose of the poses is not merely health and happiness.  Every pose is for your spine which we work with very directly in the…

— Gurudevi Nirmalananda

From Gurudevi’s full discourse “Your Body Matters“

Would you like your mind to be like a waveless ocean – calm, infinite, pure? Simply remember your experience of the Self.  It’s a matter of taking care of how you feel.  If you want to feel differently than you’re currently feeling, use yoga to make a shift.  Using your memory to bring back the…

—  Gurudevi Nirmalananda

From Gurudevi’s full discourse “Want to Be Happy?“

Probably right now your experience of your own beingness is not fluid, is not constant.  You have moments when you know who you are.  And you have moments when you’re lost in the differences – dotted lines. But you know the way inward. And if you don’t, I’ll remind you again to honor…

—  Gurudevi Nirmalananda

From Gurudevi’s full discourse “Dotted Lines“

Baba commented on this verse, saying, “The Guru destroys the darkness in the hearts of his disciples, and fills them with the light of knowledge. The Guru is the one who dispenses Divine Power.” The Guru points you inward, takes you by the hand and walks you inward and …

— Gurudevi Nirmalananda

From Gurudevi’s full discourse “Light Incarnate“

Inner happiness is ever-arising, independent of any external circumstances. This is what yoga calls your own Self. Well, not the happiness. Your own Self is not merely happiness; it is the source of happiness within. When you’re based in your own Beingness, you live in…

— Gurudevi Nirmalananda

From Gurudevi’s full discourse “When You Grow Up“