By Gurudevi Nirmalananda  

Like a pizza shop, we deliver.  Our new Telecourses are designed to meet you where you live, right at home.  When the pandemic began, I contemplated the best way to serve those seeking enlightenment.  The inner answer that arose was delightfully startling, “Use any means necessary.”   

How liberating!  I’d been using yoga’s traditional teaching methodology, which is a well-developed tradition spanning thousands of years.  Leaning into those ancient roots, I created trainings and residential programs.  I also offered my Year-Long Programme for over 10 years, a type of correspondence course.  Now the methodology has become — whatever works!  

Yet the teachings have not changed.  Human nature is still Divine, with the human condition limited and too often painful.  Yoga shines light on the inner pathway that frees you from limitation and pain.  Beyond the healing power of the poses, the teachings are illuminating.  The meditative processes open up an inner dimensionality that enlivens your whole being. 

Therefore, I redesigned last year’s Year-Long Programme, incorporating more video as well as online connectivity.  That is now one of our Telecourses, so it’s not time-limited.  It is available anytime, and you can move through it at your own pace. 

Now I’m bringing out one of the most important themes I’ve offered so far: 

Enlightenment: Stages & Steps 

This course helps you recognize the stages you’ve been through already, as well as the process you’re in now.  The pathway to enlightenment is well mapped, but it’s mostly hidden in secret teachings and arcane terminology.  Based in the texts, I describe the landmarks along the way as well as how to navigate the tricky parts.  Along with the sutras and oral tradition, the teachings are enlivened by the personal stories I include. 

All of it is designed to speed you along your way.  The reason the yogic sages shared these profound teachings is to make it easier for those who follow.  I benefitted from close study with a Master who gave it all.  I walk in his footsteps, like following an experienced trail guide up a mountain path.  I invite you to join me in this Divine Quest. 

By Kristine (Dhairyavati) Freeman, SVA Board Member

Namah.  It’s a beautiful Sanskrit word.  It is one of the words in our tradition’s meditation mantra.  Namah means to honor, to bow to.  Whom do I honor or bow to when I repeat our mantra?  The mantra contains the answer: my own Self, my own Divine Essence.  

Repeating mantra is the most effective way for me to access my Self within.  I repeat mantra out loud or silently.  Both ways of applying my mind to mantra take me inward to expansive stillness.  I immerse in that nurturing inner space of fullness just waiting for me to arrive.

In gratitude, I provide financial support to the Ashram, through which Gurudevi’s teachings flow.  I give back in gratitude for the Teacher and teachings.  They  have given me my Self.  This is the yogic practice of dakshina. Practicing dakshina is another way I honor my mystical inner dimension.  I contribute to our spring and fall fundraising campaigns as well as offer a monthly donation.  

Please reflect on what you have received through the Ashram.  Then join me in expressing your gratitude by making a donation today.

My spiritual path has been more marathon than sprint.  And Gurudevi and the Ashram have been there supporting me mile by mile.  I am filled with gratitude for the Ashram’s full spectrum of online and on-site programming.  It is an extraordinary gift.

Let the deep well of your innermost essence bubble up.  Recognize this One being you and being all.  Take your yoga into the world, and into your own being.  And in return, know the gratitude and devotion with which the Ashram honors You.  Choose to donate to the category that means the most to you:

• Honoring your teacher(s)
• Honoring the Ashram 
• Honoring the free teachings

Donate now on our website or call us at (610) 644-7555.  Or you can send your check to Svaroopa Vidya Ashram, 116 E. Lancaster Ave., Downingtown, PA 19335. Thank You!

By Gurudevi Nirmalananda  

What’s the difference between psychology and spirituality?  I wondered about this for years.  As a spiritual seeker and a student of psychology, I was getting something from both areas.  Yet neither alone satisfied me, not until I found yoga’s profound teachings.  Yoga clearly defines the difference, while warning of the traps in each approach. 

Psychology is the study of the mind, while spirituality is about getting beyond your mind.  Psychology analyzes mind and emotions.  By contrast, seekers are trying to get past their mind.  They seek a spiritual experience, an expansive and blissful moment, something that transports them afar.  Yoga says neither is enough.  What you really want, and what you really need, is to know your expansive inner essence, even while you use your mind.  The point is to live in your own multi-dimensionality all the time. 

The word “psychology” comes from “psyche.”  The ancient Greeks worshipped the goddess Psyche, a human girl who became immortal.  Always depicted with the wings of a butterfly, she embodied the divinity in every soul.  We also see the word psyche in the New Testament, used 95 times.  It is translated into English as “a living soul,” “the soul that can attain its highest end and secure eternal blessedness,” and as “an essence which differs from the body and is not dissolved by death.” 

Since psyche means soul and -ology means “the science or the study of,” you might expect psychology to study the soul.  How did they come to focus on mind and emotions?  Again, we turn to the ancient Greeks.  Socrates taught that the soul is immortal.  His student Plato described soul as the essence of a person — non-physical, eternal and reincarnating. 

However, Plato’s student Aristotle argued against the psyche or soul being separate from the physical body. He concluded in his treatise, On The Soul, that the human intellect is immortal. Thus the focus turned to the mind.  Unfortunately, the tool you use to study your mind is your own mind.  Pitfalls ensue. 

Yoga looks at the mind from a deeper vantage point, from the inner dimension of pure Beingness, your own Self. This is deeper than your mind, even deeper than soul level, for the soul reincarnates through many lifetimes.  The deeper dimension of your own existence is Existence-Itself, that which is being all that exists.  This is the One Self being all, including you. 

It’s very good news when you realize that you are not your mind.  Neither are you your body.  You are not even your mind and your body put together.  You are more, so much more.  That “more” is Self, your own immortal essence.  Your body and mind are made of the same primal substance of which everything is made. 

citireva cetana-padaad avaruu.dhaa cetya-sa.mkocinii cittam.

— Pratyabhij~nah.rdayam 5 

Supreme Consciousness becomes the individual mind, by descending from the plane of pure Consciousness, contracting in accordance with the object perceived. 

Though your mind is made of Consciousness, it is a contracted form of Consciousness.  Like a mirror, it reflects the objects it perceives.  It can even reflect them when the object is absent, which is memory or fantasy, even worry.  Your mind has the creative power of Consciousness, but uses it to create limited scenarios and lopsided narratives.  Then it obsesses on them. 

Psychology studies the scenarios and narratives, not the Consciousness that creates them.  Like in any science, they analyze similar patterns that are presented by different people.  Then they categorize and label them, hopefully leading to useful therapies.  In college, I was fascinated by this, which led me to take psychology classes and try out encounter groups.  Eventually I found yoga, and saw that I was trying to understand my own mind’s patterns, specifically so I could get beyond them.   

By Swami Prajñananda

Interviewed by Lori (Priya) Kenney

I love the transformative power of fire.  Living with Gurudevi, there’s the constant inner fire burning away my limitations — it is called the Fire of Yoga.  This fire polishes the gem of my small s-self.  The unique way that I show up in the world does not go away.  Instead, it is refined and even concentrated.  This refinement allows my own Divine Essence, my Self, to shine through my body and mind even more fully.  

This is possible because of Gurudevi’s Grace.  This Grace is the energy that reveals your own Self to you. While this energy of revelation is always available, it is magnified at the Ashram. Living at the Ashram feels like I am swimming in a river of Grace.  It feels very natural, like I am a fish in water.  It is easy to forget you are in water because it is always there supporting and nourishing you.  

I feel blessed to be here, and I feel challenged. I love how Gurudevi shows me my blind spots so that I can clear them.  Even when it’s hard, there is an ease and a rightness to it.  The flow of Grace is my support.  When I move out of that current, even slightly, I feel it strongly.  That is my guide to get back in the flow.  

This environment supports me toward my goal, which is to be established in Self.  I’ve known for a long time that dedicating my life to the Self is my dharma.  It is my purpose in this world and why I moved into the Ashram.  Living with Gurudevi helps me to stay on track. 

When I took swami vows and Gurudevi gave me my name, my dharma was refined. Prajñananda means the bliss of illumined knowledge. My name is both a promise and a reality.  The teachings have always been natural and important to me. As soon as I heard them, I understood them.  I always had this feeling that it was up to me to be an ambassador of these ancient teachings in our modern world.  My name expands and focuses my capacity to be an instrument of the teachings and Gurudevi’s Grace. 

Whether I’m teaching meditation, philosophy, asana or yoga therapy, my purpose is to be a pathway for the Grace to flow.  My goal is to be a pure instrument to serve God’s will. I have the perfect role model for this in Gurudevi. She is always serving others.  She has so much to give because she is sourced from Self.

And she is a good sharer! Simply being in her presence shifts me inside.  While I love to study the teachings, it is Gurudevi’s presence and service that I study the most.  I feel blessed to have this time with her and to live in the presence of other great yogis, my fellow residents.  I know this time is precious, and I treasure every moment.

By Pat (Sumati) Morrison

Interviewed by Marlene (Matrikaa) Gast, Yogaratna

When I met Gurudevi, I was an avowed, proud agnostic.  Over the decades, I’ve often felt led by my nose, sometimes kicking and screaming!  Yet thanks to Gurudevi, I have been in the big-S Self so deeply that there wasn’t anything else.  Each experience has brought me closer to being in that state all the time.  I know the Self is here within no matter what.  It’s closer than my breath.  I am Self and Self is me as well as all.  From Gurudevi, I know that Self-Realization is possible in this lifetime.

Every program with Gurudevi has been wonderful.  Each was filled with profound, often blissful experiences, understandings, insights and expanded awareness.  Always, more unfolded as I returned home.

Once, arriving at my driveway after a retreat, I saw my house as an external thing.  It had no meaning for me.  I didn’t identify with it in any way.  Neither blissful nor ecstatic, this experience was a deep knowing, free of attributes.  I was present within my Self.  “Wow — this is big,” I thought.  As my mind kicked in, the house began to look familiar.

Given Gurudevi’s teachings, I understand my experiences.  In another program, Gurudevi asked a question of the group.  I answered, “I’m not sure this is germane to what you asked.  But years ago, during a training run for a marathon, I was stopped in my tracks by a feeling of intense love and caring for myself, within myself.  I wrapped my arms around myself and heard, ‘I love you. I have always loved you and have been waiting for you.’”  In that moment, I knew this love was all I ever needed or would need.

Gurudevi replied, “You pierced anava mala.”  I could not believe what she was saying.  But after she repeated it several times, I allowed myself to believe it.  I then felt something extraordinarily ecstatic.  

Recently, this memory opened me to a wisp of ecstasy.  It began expanding and filling me.  I somehow knew I’d have no room for judging and controlling if the ecstasy filled me completely.  I’d have no way to check for and insure that “I was doing what would get me what I wanted.” 

I knew I was both the small-s self and Self.  There was a sense of the glorious possibility of surrender even though there was also something akin to fear.  It seemed as though I was in a different space or dimension.  The description that best fits is Pure Is-ness: Self.

Over the years, I have learned in Gurudevi’s Shaktipat Retreats that anava mala is the veil that keeps us from knowing the Self.  Once her gift of Shaktipat shreds this veil, we can never not-know our own Self, the One Being All.

In one Shaktipat Retreat, I felt the mantra flowing blissfully over me and through me.  I remember filling with gratitude in another, so much so I could barely contain the feelings.  Physical kriyas have included my spine extending upward higher than I would have thought possible, arching into a backbend and my body expanding.  Once, my hands extended straight out flat.  I was aware I could not hold on, could not grab for anything. 

So I continue to attend Gurudevi’s retreats and do the practices she teaches.  Control doesn’t matter.  Control is a figment, a smoke screen.  The only thing that stands between me and this state of Self Knowingness is my mind.  I know and feel it.  There really is “beyond my mind.”

By Carol Grigson
Interviewed by Marlene (Matrikaa) Gast, Yogaratna

During the pandemic, I took some online Svaroopa^® yoga classes through Downingtown Yoga & Meditation Center. But I really prefer in person classes at DYMC. I get more out of them. In person, I know my teacher can clearly see my pose angles. If realignment is needed, she will give me hands-on assistance, a pose modification or extra blankets. My DYMC teachers take care of me!

Plus, I appreciate the camaraderie that develops in an in-person yoga class. We’re all from different backgrounds and know one another only by first names. Yet a spiritual element, a bond emerges as we all release spinal tension together. Class is always a positive experience. In this day and age, that’s worth a lot. I can arrive nervous about things and leave feeling terrific — calm. And after my Monday evening class, I sleep really well.

Nothing succeeds like success. Because of the way I feel afterward, I continue with this yoga. Friends who see its effects in me are inspired to try it too. From a friend who joined me for a class recently, I heard “You’re right. I slept really well!” I had encouraged her to speak up in class if she needed any help. She did so when her hip was hurting. Our teacher provided extra propping. At the end of the class, my friend couldn’t believe how good she felt.

Four years ago, I began yoga at DYMC at age 76. My first class was in response to a postcard invitation. Addressed to my deceased husband, it was for a free class. With 20 years of caregiving completed, I was poised to start my life anew. It was time for me to explore and figure out who I am and where I’m going. The yoga has become a doorway.

A longtime dream was to climb Machu Picchu. My teacher emphasized regular Ujjayi breathing practice. She promised that consistency with it and other Svaroopa^® yoga practices would be the key. Ujjayi breathing got me through a day-and-a-half flight that should have been only seven hours. I realized my dream of trekking the site of that ancient civilization at high altitude.

I now take two DYMC classes weekly and just completed 10 weeks of yoga therapy. Last year I required back surgery to address discs pressing on nerves in my spinal column. The surgery was successful, and after yoga therapy I can walk without pain. And more — I feel newly invigorated.

My daily home practice comprises 20 minutes of Ujjayi plus 20 minutes of spinal release poses. If I’ve had a stressful day, I feel that I’m starting over after this 40-minute practice. I have new energy, a clearer head and greater insight. I am so grateful to have shown up at DYMC.

By Barbara (Girijananda) Hess, SVA Board Member

How do you honor your own Self?  Asked this question, I had the answer at once, “I practice the vyutthana.”  This Sanskrit word names the threshold between meditative and wakeful consciousness.  Throughout each day, I practice staying in the vyutthana — being inside and seeing outside simultaneously.  It is Gurudevi Nirmalananda who teaches me how.  

The mere thought of her service to us brings my head into a bow.  My hands come together at my heart in deep reverence.  Gurudevi gives me my Self over and over and over again.  How do you thank one who has given so much?  

One way is through dakshina.  I gratefully give financial support to our Ashram.  It supports the worldwide reach of Gurudevi’s teachings.  Thus others can experience what I receive from her — the experience of my own Self.

Please join me in honoring your own Self.  Donate to our Ashram during our spring fundraiser.  You will be giving back in gratitude for what you’ve received.  Honoring Gurudevi in this way brings her teachings into your life profoundly.

I experienced Self the first time I met Gurudevi.  I did not understand it.  Nor did I know how to put words to it.  In time, I realized everything she says and does is for the purpose of our experience of Self.  By example, Gurudevi has taught me this tantric living.  I am more compassionate with myself and others.  I give myself space and time for yoga.  Instead of rushing, I luxuriate in a sense of Infinite Beingness.  Yet I still attend to my daily schedule.  Then the transformation occurs.

While Gurudevi freely serves, the Ashram and its programs cannot carry on without financial support.  Your donation supports Gurudevi’s teachings in reaching worldwide.  Your gift offers the experience of Self to all who step on this path.  You keep the flame that Gurudevi carries available for all. 

I am deeply grateful for Gurudevi’s teachings.  They open me into Self so that I can live from that Divine Essence.  So I put my gratitude into action by donating, and I invite you to join me.  Then all of us can continue to receive Gurudevi’s teachings, which she freely bestows.

Donate now on our website.  You can call us at (610) 644-7555.  Or you can send your check to Svaroopa Vidya Ashram, 116 E. Lancaster Ave., Downingtown, PA 19335. Thank You,

By Marlene (Matrikaa) Gast, Yogaratna 

I am grateful for Gurudevi’s guidance in walking the walk each day.  I’m eager to register for the upcoming Telecourse: Enlightenment: Stages & Steps.  Gurudevi is including articles and videos in three self-paced modules. 

I took this course with her “live” in 2015.  It mapped where I was and how to move forward.  I saw that my practices had resulted in progress.  The course illuminated what lay ahead and how to effectively go the distance.   

The yearning is the first stage of the journey.  Again and again I return to this teaching at the beginning of Gurudevi’s first article: 

Whatever you get in life, you gotta want it or it’s not get-able.  Wanting it keeps you in the game.  Patanjali is telling you to put your heart in it.  It’s not just yoga for your body, or yoga for stress, or yoga for health, youth or beauty.  It’s yoga for consciousness.  This is the yoga that will give you your Self. 

My mind still doubts sometimes.  It can make me think I don’t have the right stuff for Self-Realization.  But this paragraph picks me up, carries me over that hurdle, and drops me in Self.  Being there all the time is all I want.  I open inward to the deep yearning.  I am on my way to Self-Realization, no matter what. 

I learned how to act on the yearning, which everyone feels.  Gurudevi’s teachings showed me how to effectively navigate the stages and steps.  Her recordings reassured me that I had the stuff to travel the path.  Finding I had already completed some stages and steps motivated me to keep going. 

In the past, I always downloaded and archived the articles.  Now I’m looking back over the articles.  It makes me eager to take the Telecourse, with new videos from Gurudevi.  I know it is just what I need.  In this form, the teachings will illuminate where I am on the path now.  Seeing any progress is deeply reassuring!  As the destination of Self-Realization beckons me, I’ll be supported in my next steps and stages. 

Now you can do more yoga at Downingtown Yoga in our new Yoga Quickie classes.  Plus you have all the workshops and/or satsangs as well as weekly classes.  Gurudevi teaches us that the bliss you experience is a landmark on your yoga journey.  It signals you are getting ever closer to home —the knowing of your own Self.  A new student described her first class, taught by Swami Praj~nanada:

“Great … with much individual attention.” — Paula W.

Study with Gurudevi Nirmalananda directly in her Swami Sunday from 10‒11:30.  This is a traditional satsang, a Sanskrit word meaning “in the company of Truth.” Yogis describe the experience of being in Gurudevi’s presence:

“You are blessed to be in Gurudevi’s presence and learn so much through her discourses.” — Leanne C.

“Gurudevi’s very presence sparks the opening of the knowing of the Self.” — Maureen S.

“A gift to be in the presence of our Satguru, especially during these challenging times.”
— Kristine F.

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Swami Satrupananda’s Half Day Program tops off your April yoga journey.  You’ll be amazed at what you get from these three hours of yoga poses plus an hour of chanting and meditation.  Going deeper into body, mind, heart and deeper, you open to the profound bliss of consciousness.  It’s all user-friendly, with nourishing, personal attention — guaranteed:

“I love doing yoga in preparation for meditation, and this half day program was just perfect. Swami Satrupananda is such an excellent teacher and delivered the program with grace and commitment.   The time just flew by.” — Gayle C.

By Carolyn (Karuna) Beaver 

What brings you to the doorstep of Self-Realization?  What is it about YOU that has you knocking on it, wanting in? 

Understand your spiritual yearning and how to develop your spirituality.  Gurudevi’s new Telecourse has three Modules, each with written lessons and new videos with Gurudevi.  Enroll in a single module or take them all, available May 19:

1. The Power of Yearning 

2. Finding Your Way 

3. Experiencing Freedom 

Uncover what is hidden in your inner yearning to know.  It is your own Self calling to you.  Discover how a living master moves you on your path.. Learn how you can make a difference in your rate of progress.  Find out about the stages and steps of a deepening meditation practice.  Gurudevi details the freedom that comes from understanding who you really are and how this plays out in your life. 

This course begins May 19.  Move through the process at your own pace, whether you complete each module in a few days or a few months.  Once enrolled, you’ll have personal access to the articles and audios in the module for four months.  Dive in deep, reviewing each offering many times.  Shift your sense of who you are.  Support your life in the world from the inside-outward.