Author Archives: Swami Nirmalananda

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About Swami Nirmalananda

Swami Nirmalananda is a teacher of the highest integrity since 1976. In 2009 she was honored with initiation into the ancient order of Saraswati monks. Now wearing the traditional orange, she has openly dedicated her life to serving others. Usually called Gurudevi, she makes the highest teachings easily accessible, guiding seekers to the knowledge and experience of their own Divine Essence.

Yoga for Upper Back Pain

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By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

You’re hiding your heart.  When your upper back rounds over, it crunches your neck and can cause a lot of pain.  It’s all because you’re hiding your heart – not only from others, but also from yourself.  When what you really want is for your heart to be open.  Open and safe, that is.

If you are currently living in circumstances that require you to hide your heart, I support you in necessary self-protection.  But if those circumstances were in the past, it’s time to begin unraveling the spinal tensions that you installed when needed.  Are they needed now?

While yoga poses and breathing practices do help, it is the deeper inner experience that makes the biggest difference.  When you use poses and yogic breathing as the ancient system recommends, they dissolve deep physical tensions as well as mental-emotional reactivity.  As these dissolve, your deeper essence is revealed, called svaroopa in Sanskrit, meaning your own capital-S Self.

Svaroopa is your own Divine Essence, the source of all healing, creativity, love and joy.  As you settle inward, the past dissolves and you become aware of being aware. Your own Self knows your own Self.  In this inner Knowingness, your body begins a cosmic reset, dissolving the old patterns that don’t serve you anymore.

Now your heart is full, filled from the inner source. From that fullness, you have a new level of clarity about your life and your own being.  From that inner fullness, you have something worth sharing.  Now you’re ready for your heart to show, for all you really ever wanted to do was to share from your essence.  Yoga empowers you to live this way.

Yoga of the Heart
Therapeutic Yoga

Yoga of the Heart with Gurudevi 

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Online Beginning September 14

Gurudevi Nirmalananda walks you through the inner exploration of your own heart to its core.  This experience, plus the wisdom of the sages, empowers your ability to bring it into your life and relationships in the way you always wanted.

This online course gives you both the experience of your heart and the understanding of your experience.  Together, they mature into profound wisdom, in which you can base your life.

Gurudevi’s teachings are like seeds that go deep.  The roots grow, the buds come on, and then the flowers bloom.. — Loretta F.

Yoga of the Heart

Wonderful Am I!

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By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

When you know your own Self, jubilation bursts forth.  Glory and glee.  Gladness arises from within.  You can raise your arms to the sky and shout out loud, as Janaka did:

“Aho aham!  Wonderful am I!  I adore myself!” 

— Ashtavakra Samhita 2.11

He repeats this jubilant cry in verse 12, again in verse 13 and once more in verse 14, each time describing more about his expanded inner state.  It’s almost like the Sanskrit words explode off the page.

This is a significant upgrade from the way you usually feel.  The upgrade is what yoga is all about. First yoga makes you feel better: physically, mentally and emotionally.  Then it opens up a new dimension of inner experience, bliss arising from Source.  The bliss of Consciousness fills you completely, shining into every corner, illumining every shadow.

Freed from your needs, fears and memories, you are set in motion to shine your light into the world in whatever way will best serve others.  Best of all, you see the light shining in them, even when they cannot see it themselves.  This is enlightenment.  It is your destiny — if you so choose.

King Janaka was a seeker.  He yearned for Self-Realization.  He often invited forest sages in for conclaves, listening to them expound through day and night, though he had not yet attained his great desire.  When the young sage Ashtavakra arrived for one of these gatherings, King Janaka was not impressed.  Ashtavakra‘s body was bent (vakra) in eight (ashta) places.  He was a cripple.

Like most people, the king equated beauty and strength with higher Consciousness.  Plus Ashtavakra was only twelve years old.  But once he began expounding with the other sages, Janaka realized that this was the Guru he’d been waiting for.  Ashtavakra gave Janaka what he had been seeking, all at once, in a Divine moment while Janaka was dismounting from his horse.  I call it a giant leap into Consciousness.

The Ashtavakra Samhita is a dialogue between these two great beings.  Ashtavakra gives teachings, then Janaka describes them as his own personal experience, that he is:

Eternal, ever existent reality
Being God, being all
Having a body, not bound by the body
All-pervasive
All-knowing, absolute creative power, source of all
Possessing nothing, yet owning and being all.

When you know your own Self, jubilation bursts forth.  Glory and glee.  Gladness arises from within.  All you need is a Guru who can get you beyond the theory to the experience.  That’s what I got from my Guru – a giant leap into Consciousness.

This is why I call my new Telecourse, “Leaps & Bounds.”  It’s about the light of Consciousness shining forth from within, burning away all your limitations, and showing you the same light shining in all.  It’s a whole new way to see yourself!

Leaps & Bounds

Where Are You Going?

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By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

While I was growing up, the adults around me often asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I always wanted to know, “What are my options?” They never suggested that I could get enlightened. I would like for you to know that this is one of your options, too.

The good news is that you don’t have to give up your other options while you’re working on enlightenment. You can have a home and family as well as your work and pastimes. Your actions are not what keep you from being enlightened. It’s what you think that holds you back.

Yet your actions do change as you begin to manage your mind more effectively. They become more uplifting and more altruistic. This is because anything you do is preceded by thoughts. The sages warned us about this around 3,000 years ago:

Whatever one thinks, that one does.

Tat vaachaa vadati, tat karmanaa karoti.

— Taittiriya Aranyaka 1.23.1

Where is your mind taking you? If you want different results than you’ve been getting, simply steer your mind differently. It’s easy to get motivated to do this, as using your mind the way have been means you get the results you’ve been getting. The bottom-line question is…

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Leaps & Bounds

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By Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

I remember getting leg pains in my adolescence.  I felt a deep inner ache that had a sharp edge to it.  The doctor called them growing pains.  

He offered no treatment, no help whatsoever, saying I’d outgrow the growing pains.  It’s true; I did.  You will, too.

Those growing pains are caused by muscular tension.  The bones are growing faster than the muscles.  The muscles are holding tight while the bones attached to them are growing longer, stretching the muscles and tendons to a new length.  

If my childhood doctor had simply recommended some gentle massage, or maybe some yoga, my growing pains would have disappeared.  Nowadays, maybe they even recommend yoga?  Looking back, I can see that it would have helped me grow into myself much more smoothly:  on all levels, body, mind, heart and spirit…

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International Day of Yoga 2023

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The World is Doing More Yoga

By Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

Join us in celebrating this UN-proclaimed observance, created in 2014.  The summer solstice was chosen, honored in India for the most daylight (in the northern hemisphere).  The resolution received support from 177 nations, the highest number of co-sponsors for any UN resolution.

Fun Facts:

  • 300 million people worldwide regularly practice yoga
  • 36 million Americans practice yoga regularly
  • 1.7 million American children under 17 practice yoga
  • 1 in 3 Americans have at least tried yoga
  • 150% more men are practicing yoga from 2012-2016, from 4 million to 10 million
  • 86% report a reduction in stress
  • 69% report a positive increase in temperament and mood
  • 59% report an improvement in sleep quality and quantity
  • 86% report an overall improved sense of mental wellness and clarity
  • 79% report a feeling of closeness with their community and wanting to give back
  • 55% of regular yoga practitioners attend 2-3 classes per week
  • 50% increase in USA yoga practitioners since 2017
  • 50% of yoga practitioners focus on meditation
  • 50% of yoga practitioners are more likely to volunteer and have donated to charities in the last year
  • 41% of yogis are vegetarian
  • 5% have given Sanskrit names to either their children or their pets

For this special day, the Indian government has given us some online activities to do – click here for a yoga quiz, an online discussion forum, to share a video, design a mascot, create a poster or a poem, create a doodle, offer a jingle or an essay and more…

Please join us at one of our events:

Free Chant & Meditation
Yoga Wednesday
Telecourse: Leaps & Bounds

Fun Facts:  https://yogaearth.com/yoga-research

Your Mind’s True Capacity

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By Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

Brilliance.  Creativity.  Insight and intelligence. Generosity and boundless love.  Compassion, strength, fortitude – these go together, for you cannot act on your compassion unless you also bring strength and fortitude with you.  Your mind is capable of all this and more.  

You currently use such a small portion of your true capacity that I call it “puny little mind.” This is a trap you can end up living in for lifetimes, as it is baited with sensory delights.

Every athlete knows to restrain their appetites before a competition.  They refrain from intoxicants and sexuality plus they carefully regulate their sleep and food.  This is true of chess players as well.  If you want to get optimum results from the use of your body and mind, you need to take care of them, like you would with any other type of equipment.

For those who wear eyeglasses, you have to clean them regularly.  If you wait too long, you don’t realize that you’re living in a grey and blurry world until you do clean them.  Then you put them back on and wow!  The world is so bright!  And so beautiful!

The yogic sages say that it is not merely your glasses that need cleaning…

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NEW Telecourse:  Leaps & Bounds

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By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

I remember getting leg pains in my adolescence.  I felt a deep inner ache that had a sharp edge to it.  The doctor called them growing pains.  He offered no treatment, no help whatsoever, saying I’d outgrow the growing pains.  It’s true; I did.  You will outgrow your growing pains, too.

The leg pains are caused by muscular tension.  The bones are growing faster than the muscles.  The muscles are holding tight while the bones attached to them are growing longer, stretching the muscles and tendons to a new length.  

If my childhood doctor had simply recommended some gentle massage, or maybe some yoga, my growing pains would have disappeared.  Nowadays, maybe they even recommend yoga?  Looking back, I can see that it would have helped me grow into myself much more smoothly:  on all levels, body, mind, heart and spirit. 

Everyone wants to get a boost.  Like a child sitting on daddy’s shoulders, you want to see beyond where you’re stuck. You’re hoping to bound into the next level, leaving this one behind.  Of course, you can do things to move that along.  However, your ability to discern what to do, as well as to actually do it, is part of what you’re growing into.  

The biggest boost is Shaktipat, the initiation into Self-Knowingness. Yet Shaktipat doesn’t give you the ability to avoid your growth processes.  Instead, it gives you the clarity of knowing what you need to do, why to do it and where you’ll be when you’ve done it…

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What Kind of Karma?

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By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

No one talks about their karma when life is flowing smoothly, when finances fall together and they’re getting what they want. That’s called “good karma.” But you may complain when things are falling apart and life is hard. That’s called “bad karma.” However, complaining about it does not help. You already know this. It’s like complaining about the weather. No matter what you say, it is what it is.

Where I live, the weather blows in from the Arctic or the Caribbean, sometimes from the Great Plains. Whatever blows through, all I can do is manage myself in the midst of it. Rain gear, snow gear, summery clothes and sunscreen – all are in my repertoire and in my closet.

Similarly, your karma is coming from somewhere – maybe things you did yesterday or last week, perhaps from decades or lifetimes ago. In meditation, I‘ve had clear memories of being a Greek soldier in a prior life. Karma can be nasty stuff! But it’s only if you did nasty stuff in the past. And we all have.

You have also done good things. Big stuff and even little stuff matters. Sometimes when I’m driving, I…

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Changing Your Future

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By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

For weeks, I meditated at a cremation ground in Kashi, the holiest city in India. Liberation is assured for one who departs from this sacred city, so people go there to die. I went daily to the main burning ghat, alongside the divine Ganga (Ganges) River, for sunrise meditations.

On one day, a cremation fire shone brightly, flames leaping higher than I’d ever seen before. My guide said, “This was a good person.” The quality of the fire is determined by the quality of the fuel, even when it is a human body. Yoga’s goal is to make you shine brightly while alive. Yet your luminosity affects your death as well as your life.

Usually we focus on how yoga and meditation improve your life. However, once you’re born, death is certain. In between, quality of life matters. It matters a lot. Yet the quality of your death matters as well. Yoga and meditation help with both.

I went to meditate there because my Guru had repeatedly urged us to contemplate death. In facing death so deeply and tangibly, I became free from fear. And I found the current of life, ever flowing, present within all and beyond all. If you have attended a death, you already know it’s not an ending, but a passageway to another dimension. That’s why we say, “They left.”

While death is inevitable, it’s not predictable. When you truly understand this, you treasure every moment of life. Yet you tend to forget this. In an epic poem from ancient India, a wise king was asked, “What is truly amazing in this world?” He answered:

Every day, thousands of living beings die,
but while living, one foolishly thinks himself immortal
and does not prepare for death.
This is the most amazing thing in the world.

— Mahabharata, Vana-Parva 313.116

Sometimes you just can’t see past your nose. When you’re so focused on the here and now, it’s not cosmic. Unfortunately, you’re focused on your needs and fears, or on your perceived needs and fears. Most yogis live comfortable lives, yet they focus on their discomforts. I’ll call it “being short-sighted.”

When you become farsighted, you can see your own future. And you can see options to change your path. It’s like having a cosmic GPS, showing you the route you’re on as well as some alternative roads. You get to choose the road, which also determines the scenery along the way.

Your future does include death as well as what leads up to it. Death is not what’s scary for most people. What’s scary is the…

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