Yesterday was an interesting day. The morning at work began fine, outwardly, but my heart and mind were not in the right place. This showed up in a lack of kindness to some of my co-workers.
In the afternoon, this lack of harmony, as if reflecting itself in the world around me, began to express itself: we found out that a key component of the Clarity Magazine site had broken.
While I was trying to fix this, I accidentally took down our network-wide backup, which supports perhaps 60 people or more and is one of the most important things that our IT department works on. (Peter’s classic comment: “Well, I was looking for something to do!”)
Later, another bug came up, this time on Ananda.org. Fixing it was like something between talking to a blank wall and banging my head on my desk.
Okay, all that sounds… unfortunate. Parts of it I found funny at the time, and other parts I didn’t. Poetically, I imagined above my head, floating just under the ceiling, a light grey cloud.
After spending over an hour on this last problem, continually making small changes, testing, tweaking, and checking, it went away.
In the website troubleshooting world, you want to know why something was fixed, and I frantically tried different things, attempting to backtrack. It wasn’t possible. It was all okay, and the bug was gone, I just clearly had no control over it.
Okay. Finally, it was time to breathe — something I should have been doing more of all along!
In that moment of relaxation (the calm after the storm), I decided that my Guru and God had fixed the problem. I imagined God looking at me and saying, “You do not decide the outcome of what you do; I haven’t given humanity that choice.”
A nice idea, I reflected. We don’t choose the result of our actions.
This is surely true in finance — can we prevent an unexpected disease, fire, or relative needing money? — in relationships, where people can and do act whatever way they wish; and even in ourselves. It’s common for people (including myself) to have difficulty controlling even their emotions.
All we can really control, the famous Indian saint, Anandamoyee Ma said, is whether we think of God or not. (!!) And Swami Kriyananda, who has quoted this often, has also pointed out that when we think of God, everything goes well, and when we don’t, things fall apart.
Yesterday was humbling. But, well, Lord, You are the Doer. Maybe the best we can hope for, when tests come, is to be awake and ready enough to change. So the question is…
Seven years ago, unexpectedly, I woke up one morning with a strong desire to meditate.
I’d thought meditation was a good idea for some time — but meditation was something that other people did. I’d tried it and it hadn’t worked out. But, here was this new feeling: “I must find God!”
I struggled on my own for a month or two, until I discovered Ananda’s center in Seattle and learned the Hong-Sau Technique from Nayaswami Hriman, one of the spiritual directors there.
This started my lifelong journey of meditation.
Meditate Without Fail
“Struggles of the battlefield pale to insignificance, when man first contends with inner enemies.”
— Paramhansa Yogananda, Autobiography of a Yogi
In the beginning of the spiritual path, it is good to dive as deeply as you can — you have an enthusiasm then, that, if put to good use, can serve you throughout the rest of your life.
As an example, a goal that served me very well was this: create a daily habit of meditation. I had heard that Swami Kriyananda had meditated every day since he first learned how, without fail.
Great! I would do the same. But it was harder than I thought.
First, I started having back problems. At times, I could only sit for 15 minutes at most. Then, there were other days that my mind was so resistant to meditation, it was all I could do to drag myself, literally crawling! (self-pityingly), to the chair in front of my altar, there to sit for a moment and finally flop over onto the floor.
I was determined to meditate at least some every day. This meant no vacations, no holidays, and no Sundays off. (Thinking back on this, I realize this absolute, unwavering method is not the route everyone takes to daily meditation, but it is what got me to a strong daily practice the fastest.) A funny realization is that I’d probably never been this consistent about anything else in my entire life.
And finally, strange to relate, my first meditations resulted in an unpleasant feeling of disorientation. (For at least a month, I couldn’t meditate at all: I read books of Paramhansa Yogananda’s instead.) There was a solution: Nayaswami Hriman guided me to meditate with my eyes open, in the beginning, and gave other suggestions, which in time cured the problems entirely.
But, in the beginning, I didn’t know that these problems had solutions: they all seemed like impossible challenges.
Back pain was a good example. Many meditators have experienced it — perhaps including yourself!
Once I moved to Ananda Village, over a year later, I went to see Dr. Peter Van Houten, an Ananda Minister and doctor at the local (award-winning) Sierra Family Medical Clinic. At this time, by one trick or another, though physical therapy, and perseverance, I was able to meditate for more than an hour at a time, but still felt limited by discomfort.
Dr. Peter offered some advice, and said this sort of thing is pretty normal — and that it usually goes away in “three to five years.”
The “three to five years” have since come and gone. And he was right! Now, it’s rare for any back pain to interfere with meditation. However, if you do have trouble with back pain, or any other medical issue, seeing a doctor is still probably the best first step to handling it.
As to the other challenge, the daily one of meditation itself — it became easier over time, and has been the most rewarding discipline of my life.
The Journey Continues
My favorite advice from that time period were quotes from Yogananda and Kriyananda like, “The only thing you have to do is never give up,” “The path is not really so difficult, if you but take it one step at a time,” and “A saint is a sinner who never gave up.”
Connecting regularly with Hriman, I continued to meditate and seek advice when I felt stuck, or was confused on some point. I owe a lot to the opportunity to have asked so many questions, and received such useful and kind guidance.
Three months into my practice, I started taking classes at Ananda Sangha in Seattle, and began to meet fellow devotees. After a class on how to play the harmonium, Satyaki Brockschmidt, the teacher and author of The Harmonium Handbook, asked how long I’d been meditating.
“Three months,” I replied.
“Ah, those are the most difficult. Once you’re through those, you’re pretty well set.” Another man there agreed.
Hopeful words! Though I’ve had other struggles — some with meditation, some not — and also been blessed in many ways — including learning Kriya Yoga, and taking the vows of brahmacharya and discipleship — I don’t suppose any three months in my life have been so strikingly challenging or positive.
And here we are, several years later. Life is an adventure, isn’t it? Who can say with confidence what we’ll be doing even a year from now — and what new things we’ll have learned, or gained in that time?
Everyone’s challenges are different. We may face great tests, and reap great gains — usually they come hand in hand — but if we do, may we have the clear devotion that Swami Kriyananda did, when he said, during one of his own major battles:
“Divine Mother, you can take away everything, but you can never take away my love for you.”
After Yogananda told Nayaswami Kriyananda that his life’s work was “writing, editing, and lecturing,” Kriyananda asked, “But Sir, haven’t you already written everything that is necessary?”
Yogananda looked shocked. “Don’t say that,” he replied. “Much more is needed.”
Since then, Nayaswami Kriyananda has gone on to write almost 100 books. And even so, I doubt he has covered even a tenth of all the ways of bringing Yogananda’s teachings into every part of life, if that! I expect the number could even be as small as a thousandth.
Kriyananda has said that he writes “seminally” — he wants his writing to inspire other works. I could see these delving more deeply into specific concepts, or into how those concepts apply in new fields. An effect of him writing in this way is that passages in his books often have deep meaning.
A small example: he wrote two plays, The Peace Treaty and The Jewel in the Lotus. But in each, how full of meaning the lines are! A close study of them, as an actor playing one of their parts must make, yields a wealth of insight.
Right now we’re rehearsing The Jewel in the Lotus at Ananda Village, which we’ll perform on March 6. The beginning of the play reveals a conflict between father and his son. The father is trying to get the son, who only wants God, to work for him in his shop. “My dear boy,” he says, “It’s perfectly obvious. Didn’t you yourself just say God is the money that we spend? Well, then — the more you have of money, the more you’ll have of God. Simple!”
I love that argument — the reasoning is perfect on it’s own level of ignorance!
The struggle between the father and his son represents the timeless struggle between material consciousness and soul aspiration. The son says, “I want to find God,” and the father responds by trying to pull him back into the father’s own very material world.
Nayaswami Kriyananda’s and Yogananda’s works reward exploration. In fact, as a “live” experiment, let me open a random page of Swami Kriyananda’s The New Path, and we’ll see where it takes us…
Daya Mata [a direct disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda, and the president of Self-Realization Fellowship] tells a story dating back to when she was a teenager and new on the path. At first, in her association with him, he had treated her lovingly, like a daughter (which indeed she had been to him in a former incarnation). Once her feet were planted firmly on the path, however, he began to teach her the superior merits of impersonal love. To her now, feeling for him as she did the affection of a devoted daughter, he seemed all at once aloof, even stern.
One evening in Encinitas he addressed her that way. She went out onto the bluff above the ocean behind the hermitage, and prayed deeply for understanding. At last she reached a firm resolution. “Divine Mother,” she vowed, “from now on I will love only Thee. In beholding him, I will see Thee alone in him.”
Suddenly she felt as though a great weight had been lifted from her. Later she went indoors and knelt before Master for his blessing, as she always did before retiring for the night. This time he greeted her gently, saying, “Very good!”
From then on he showed himself once more affectionate toward her. Now, however, their relationship was on a deeper level, for the disciple saw him at last in that impersonal light in which he beheld himself.
Nayaswami Devi once told me that, if ever she related to Nayaswami Kriyananda in a personal way, it was like a wall went up between them. I realized later that he didn’t put up that wall; it was the inevitable result of holding a personal attitude towards anyone. We have a choice in how to relate to people: as personalities; or as souls, unique expressions of God.
I’ve noticed this with Devi herself. I often relate to her as a personality, and at these times she can seem distant. But the more impersonally loving I am, and the more I think of God instead of “Devi,” the more expressive her friendship is.
And I’ve sometimes thought, What a gift! She places my spiritual needs above everything else. And she isn’t just doing this for me, she’s doing it for many, many people — maybe everyone. Wouldn’t you call this Divine Friendship?
Last weekend I wrote an email to my family, sharing with them about the lifetime monastic vow that I took on Christmas Eve at Ananda Village.
In the email, I wrote,
This is something that I’ve been hoping to do for years — so, understandably, I’m thrilled about it.
What changes for me? Outwardly, very little. The vows aren’t “I renounce the world” kind of vows, but more, “I want to live for God alone” kind of vows. (I often think of “God” as “Divine Joy.”) The way I’ve been living already is simply the way I’ll keep living.
Yellow is my monastic color, so I wear yellow shirts now, but it looks pretty normal — you wouldn’t think it at all unusual! (The color is yellow because a pure, golden orange-yellow is symbolic of calm, or joyful, wisdom.) I was already doing this when I visited a few weeks ago.
Inwardly, I’m making the effort to dedicate myself more completely to my chosen path of meditation and yoga, which has already been a transforming experience for me over the past several years. If we’ve talked about it much, you probably already know this.
One of my most noticeable outward changes is a new title: “Brahmachari.” This means “flowing with Brahma,” or “flowing with God.” So my full name now is “Brahmachari Nabha.” There’s no need for you to use the title — I only want you to know so you aren’t bewildered when it appears online and in my emails.
Apart from all this, I’m still as you know me — with all that this entails!
If you have any questions, I’d love to share more, I just don’t want to impose on anyone. In any case, thank you for being a part of such a beautiful, loving, and supportive family. It is something that I always appreciate when I come visit and get the chance to spend time with you.
I didn’t know for sure what kind of a response I’d get, but my family — including grandparents, parents, cousins, and brother — are supportive of the spiritual life choices I’ve made. I was on pretty safe ground expressing myself this way. Also, they all knew that I’ve lived as a monk for years.
One of my grandmothers wrote to ask more about what all this meant, what interested me in Ananda in the first place, what renunciation was about, and how we practiced it. I’m answering her separately, but I’d like to share the thoughts with you, too.
What Vow Did I Take?
I took the vow of brahmacharya in the Nayaswami Order, founded by Nayaswami Kriyananda a few months ago. More than 70 others at Ananda Village took vows on the same day — most of them becoming swamis, or, as they are called in this order, nayaswamis. Initiations have also been held in Italy (pictured below), Palo Alto, Seattle, and India.
Why Live a Spiritual Life?
The goal of the spiritual life is Divine Joy — a union of our little self, the ego, with the infinite Self, God. This is a truth expressed in all religions, though not always grasped by the followers of those religions.
Meditation is one way to forget ourselves and experience God-as-Joy directly. Early experiences of Him often comes as peace, which Yogananda compared to a cooling mist, or a weightless waterfall.
Service is another way, because thinking of others’ needs can help us to expand beyond our own.
But in all of this, the goal is the same: renounce our little selves, our little ego with its “needs” and daily desires, and become a part of something much bigger and more beautiful, the vast tapestry of life; and to live in Divine Joy.
That is pretty abstract. It is what got me interested in being part of Ananda, though, which my grandmother asked about.
What Makes Ananda Special?
Until I found the yogic teachings, my religious experience was mainly with mainstream Christian churches. Compared to finding union with “ever-existing, ever-conscious, ever-new joy” — according to Yogananda, a good definition of God — the goals they had were very low.
By my first day as a Christian, I had already attained the heights that most of my peers aspired to: believe in God, believe in Jesus, and don’t be a bad person. These are good things, no doubt, but I came to feel that they weren’t enough.
With Ananda, I found many people who sincerely wanted to dedicate themselves to the highest that they could, saying, “I want to find true, eternal joy; to this I give my life.” And also, “I want to help those who want to, to do the same, regardless of their path.”
The sincerity of their dedication is still something I admire, even after years of living at Ananda Village.
What Do Members of the Nayaswami Order Renounce?
It can be hard to tell from the outside. If you came to visit Ananda Village, you’d see a community of men and women with jobs and bank accounts, getting up, making breakfast, meditating together, going to movies, getting the car fixed, working in their gardens on the weekend, and doing many other normal, everyday activities, which of course vary from person to person.
You’d see that they are good people, and happy, but also that they are people like you and I.
What is unusual is something they have inside: their goals in life are centered on realizing that what they truly are is the soul: a part of us that stretches beyond this lifetime, and is said to be changeless and eternal.
Contrast that with what many people’s goals are focused on: the stuff of daily life: the garden itself, the new car, or the new husband or wife.
It’s that narrow focus, rather than the stuff itself, that members of the Nayaswami Order are making the effort to renounce. They want to give up identifying with a passing reality in favor of identifying with something much greater.
There’s an emphasis here on inner renunciation, which is different from past forms of monasticism. So I can’t compare it easily with traditions that you might already be familiar with. As Nayaswami Jyotish recently put it, the classic vows of Christian monastics — poverty, chastity, and obedience — or Ananda’s equivalent, simplicity, chastity, and cooperative obedience — are still very important, but they can’t be the focus, because we can have them and still not have God.
The Renunciate Vow of Brahmacharya
A brahmacharya-color scarf
There are four vows in this renunciate order: the vow of the pilgrim, which anyone can take; the vow of brahmacharya, for people who are single; the vow of tyaga, for (usually married) couples; and the vow of nayaswami, a vow of complete renunciation for people who are single or for married couples.
More detailed explanations of the brahmacharya, tyaga, and nayaswami vows are in the chapter of A Renunciate Order for the New Age, The Vows of Renunciation. The vow of the pilgrim is new, so there isn’t yet any comprehensive information online about it. (I believe Nayaswami Kriyananda will be adding it to the book first.) If you’re interested in taking that vow, or any of these vows, please fill out this form.
I took the vow of brahmacharya, so I’ll quote from it to talk about on what I’ve made a commitment to, and what others do when they join this order.
Excerpts from the Vow of Brahmacharya
In pursuit of that goal [of seeking God], I offer my own life unreservedly to seeking my Divine Source.
In other words, “I want to find God (Divine Joy), and I’m giving it everything I possibly can.”
I will retain no ego-gratifying goal in my life, but will strive always, and above all, to please God.
To me this means, “I don’t want to serve my little self, my petty desires, my passing likes, dislikes, and selfish thoughts — I want to live only for the attainment of Divine Joy.”
It would be hard to make such a definite commitment if I hadn’t already (by God’s grace) experienced some (small) part of this joy in meditation. Even a slight touch of it is more interesting than any other experience.
I renounce attachment to things, people, places, and all self-definitions…
Traditionally, monastics have often taken vows of poverty, which I mentioned earlier. This is so they don’t become attached to money or possessions, which might pull them away from their spiritual goals.
This brahmacharya vow makes the firm commitment to renounce the attachment itself, which after all is the important thing to be free of.
This new form of renunciation may still mean living very simply, but it depends on the individual. I do, after all, live in a canvas tent. On the other hand, it has electricity, heat, a laptop, and an iPhone!, which I use for service as much as possible, instead of just for entertainment.
Christmas Eve morning found over 100 devotees filling our largest temple at Ananda Village
We began the ceremony at 10:00 am after an hour-long meditation. Afterward the meditation, Jyotish gave a short talk, which you can listen to here, or download from The Nayaswami Order website:
Jyotish talked about the sacredness of the occasion; about renunciation; and about how one who is ready to dedicate their lives to God is very close to the end of the soul’s long journey through delusion.
His talk ended with an invitation to those taking, first, the brahmacharya vow to come forward. I was in this group, so I stood up and walked to the center area, which you can see in the photos. We knelt, and as Jyotish read the vow a line at a time, we repeated it after him.
We then came forward to be blessed individually and receive a scarf. As Jyotish blessed me, I felt within myself a deep commitment to live for God alone.
After a moment, I rose and stood before Devi, who put a scarf, yellow for the color of brahmacharya, around my neck. In the photo above, you may see what I saw in her expression at the time: her respect for those coming forward, and for the important step on the spiritual journey that this vow signifies.
The room was silent while everyone who had taken the vow came forward one at a time. (This took some time.)
Next, those taking the vow of tyaga rose, repeated the vow, and were blessed; and finally, those taking the nayaswami vow came forward.
The nayaswami vow is the “Vow of Complete Renunciation.” Jyotish said one line of it at time, and those taking the vow repeated it before stepping forward and offer a spoonful of ghee into a blazing fire, placed in the center of the temple. (Ghee is purified butter and symbolizes pure spiritual aspiration.)
The next part of the ceremony was for those taking the vow to prostrate themselves before the fire. This symbolized unconditional surrender to the divine will.
The atmosphere was very still. I imagine that those taking the vow were making a supreme effort to offer their lives to God as completely as they could.
Finally, each person came forward to be blessed and to officially become a swami.
Two and a half hours from the time we had first started the meditation, the ceremony finished with Jyotish offering a few words and leading us in a closing prayer, that we might become free from ego in this lifetime.
Final Thoughts, and How I Decided to Take the Vow
These vows are holy. Just as I felt unusually calm after taking them, for days afterward I noticed an other-worldly joy emanating from those who took the nayaswami vow, the “Vow of Complete Renunciation.” Indeed, I still often noticed it weeks later.
Freedom! Bliss! This is the fruit of a life of renunciation — not a painful emptiness, which so many people imagine it to be.
This renunciate order is just being born; surely, in the years (and centuries) to come, it will change and grow. Certain details about exactly how it will work, we may only discover through day-to-day experience. If you have questions, or if you felt something was confusing in this post, please do mention it in the comments.
Taking a vow of renunciation is something that some here felt unsure about, in part because the idea is so awe-inspiring. Some of us wondered, “Am I worthy?” or, “Can I do it?”
Whether I’m “worthy” or not, I don’t know, but I did have a memorable experience a few weeks ago when I was reading one of the final chapters of A Renunciate Order for the New Age, in preparation for taking the vow.
The true renunciate is one who is willing to face any obstacle in his struggle to reach the goal, for he knows that there is no acceptable alternative.… even if he is killed, he knows that he belongs utterly and completely to God alone.
I was starting to question, “Could I be ready for this? What if I’m not? Yes, I’ve already decided to take the vow, but perhaps I should back out…”
As I thought this, a tightness formed around my heart. “No!” some deep part of myself cried, “I must do this! This — the search for God — is my life!”
I felt this was the answer to my question.
In fact, it is the answer for everyone eventually, in the final stages of their soul’s long journey away from God. For there is simply no other way, without at least inner renunciation, to find true happiness.
There was a time in my life, which ended relatively recently, when I simply couldn’t appreciate why people thought gratitude was so important. At least, I didn’t resonate with the way most people expressed it.
When I came onto the spiritual path, however, I found that there are actually different kinds of gratitude. The normal kind is gratitude for things — good people, good surroundings, and good food — but the Divine kind is gratitude for everything, good and bad.
Pancakes vs. the Sky
I live at the Ananda Meditation Retreat, which I often think is one of the most beautiful places on earth. Each season, its extraordinary gardens have something unique to offer. In the spring, there are newly-blossomed flowers and plants, vibrant with life. In the winter, there is coolness, stillness, and the silent invitation to become more still, oneself.
There are, of course, many things to be grateful for here. Some are transitory, while others are more permanent. I was particularly touched to hear what the 2nd and 3rd graders at Ananda Village’s elementary school were grateful for, when yesterday the entire school, kindergarten through 12th grade, came up to the retreat.
They were grateful for trees, forests, and the sky; for fish, birds, and the ocean. It wasn’t a put-on; many of them shared these things spontaneously during an activity led by the college students. Surely it takes a refined nature to place thesky high on a list of what you are grateful for. It speaks of a feeling of being connected to all life around you, and to realities that expand beyond the present moment.
If, instead of focusing on the calm, eternal expansiveness of the sky, I was busy being grateful for pancakes — as, in fact, I was this morning — and if all of the pancakes were gone — as, in fact, they were — I might have lost some of my gratitude, which I did. That was conditioned gratitude, which isn’t bad, just limited. (A fresh batch of pancakes arrived in short order.)
Maybe this is a key to a higher form of gratitude: being grateful without limitation. One way to do this would be to be grateful for things that don’t change.
Someone once asked Yogananda, “Should one thank God for His gifts?” Yogananda replied, “Thank him, rather, for His love.” Indeed, what could be more changeless?
Grateful Without Cause
Another way to be grateful without limitation is to be equally grateful for all experiences, including painful ones, like, ahem, missing pancakes. (Admittedly, absence-of-pancakes is not very painful — say, on a scale of one to ten.)
Gratitude, properly understood, has no reason: It is simply an aspect of the pure joy of our existence — so much a part of it that one can hardly be distinguished from the other.
This passage finally explained to me why reading something like the comments of this post is inspiring: because gratitude itself is joyful!
If we needed an external, scientific proof of this, there is one: Facebook’s United States National Gross Happiness Index. This chart on this webpage shows a large spike on Thanksgiving day, indicating that people express themselves to be much happier (using words like “happy” and “elated”) on that day than on any other, with the exception of Christmas.
Surely this is, at least in part, because on Thanksgiving people are making a conscious effort to be grateful — and even if that gratitude is sometimes for things, and not for God, it is still ennobling, and expresses an aspect of the Divine joy that we all have within us.
In this way, a stepping-stone to being grateful for everything might be, first, to be grateful for the things we naturally like. This would begin a habit of gratitude, which in time could expand to include everything — especially the source of everything.
But still, the clearest and quickest path must be going straight to the source itself, through the joy and peace found in meditation. Certainly this has been my own experience: gratitude comes most easily in the presence of even a small amount of Divine Joy.
I hope you had a joyful Thanksgiving, and may your next several weeks — from Thanksgiving through Yogananda’s birthday on January 5th — be particularly deeply blessed.
In 2005 I was asked to create the Swami Kriyananda website as part of my work with Ananda’s outreach ministry. It will probably remain one of the best writing projects I’ll ever work on, though I continue to write for 60 years or more.
Particularly amusing — and also indicative of Ananda’s good character in the way it serves its members, rather than expecting to be served by them — was that at that time, I was one of the few people at Ananda Village who had never met Swami Kriyananda in person! I was also the youngest person in Ananda’s outreach ministry, and there, the only one who had never met Swamiji in person.
If that wasn’t enough, I was also almost completely untried as a writer. But somehow, owing to my job with websites and the fact that my job commitments were flexible (I was able to set aside of lot of time to tackle a specific project), I had this opportunity.
2005 was also my first year as a monk; during that time I usually spent Saturdays in silence and partial seclusion.
My Saturday routine, after being given this assignment, soon changed to this: after a long morning meditation, I would return to my bungalow and write as much as I could in an uplifted state of consciousness, filling in the details of an outline proposed by Dave Warner. In the afternoon I usually took a walk. I might do some editing, or read something of Swamiji’s, before meditating again in the evening.
Devi Novak, one of the founding members of Ananda and a close friend of Swamiji’s, helped with the editing and made suggestions for the writing. Her biography of him, Faith is My Armor, was the primary guide for me in determining how to treat Swamiji’s life.
One section of Swamiji’s life that I was leaving out was the period of time when Ananda was attacked with dual lawsuits (you can read more about it in The Lawsuits, and the Fight for Freedom). Strangely — I don’t know why — my experience mirrors the one Devi describes in writing her book.
In an interview in Clarity Magazine, she said,
I had collected a lot of information on the lawsuit, but when it came time to write about it, I decided not to discuss it in depth.
Interestingly, Swamiji called around that time and asked, “How are you going to deal with the lawsuit?”
I said, “So much has been written about it already that I’ll only touch on it lightly – two or three pages.”
He replied, “Oh, okay.”
That night I woke up at 3 o’clock in the morning, and I saw how to do the entire chapter on the lawsuit.… I later refined it, but the entire chapter came in that flow of energy.
I knew quite a lot about the lawsuits, but was hoping I could skirt by without needing to address them in depth — “Maybe just two or three paragraphs,” I thought. Then Devi asked me if I was going to write about them. Suddenly, remembering her story above, I said, “They need to be dealt with!”
Thinking on it later, I realized, “Of course you have to deal with those lawsuits in telling Swamiji’s story.” It is a story with an incredible, beautiful conclusion of triumph. Even the title for Devi’s book is a quote from Swamiji about that period of time. (She had told him she didn’t think she could go through what he had gone through, and he replied, with conviction, “I didn’t know that I had the strength, but faith is my armor.”) However, as Swamiji had done for her, Devi gave me the choice whether or not to address them.
The real bulk of the writing was done during a four-day seclusion at Ananda’s Meditation Retreat. (I recalled Devi saying that she had needed to go into seclusion to write sections of Faith is My Armor.) These several days remain my treasured gift to Swami Kriyananda — which it was my blessing and honor to give.
During the seclusion, I would wake up, meditate longer than usual, eat breakfast, and spend the morning writing new sections of the site. In the afternoon I would edit. Then I meditated again as evening fell, and after dinner read or listened to a talk of Swami Kriyananda’s.
Writing took longer than I imagined it would — so many hours for so few pages! I tried to deeply understand the meaning in the words and be conscientious in writing. Especially important, I tried to tune in to the consciousness of Swami Kriyananda, and even tried to feel that he was writing it. How successful I was in this, I can’t say. But by making the attempt, I felt that insights came which wouldn’t have otherwise.
Truth told, I did feel, particularly during that seclusion, that I had a lot of help in writing the site. Certainly I prayed to God and to Yogananda to be guided in what I was doing.
Once the writing was done, Jyotish and Devi Novak, Spiritual Directors of Ananda Worldwide, contributed to the editing, as well as Maria Warner, who manages Ananda.org and the other websites of Ananda’s worldwide outreach ministry.
And at this point we come to a fascinating part of the story.
They edited so little.
It isn’t that the writing was perfect. Far from it! I read through it all more than a year later on my own and found a number of mistakes. But Jyotish, Devi, and Maria were demonstrating two principles which I’ve seen applied so often at Ananda:
A willingness to really let others go ahead and make mistakes, if it will help them learn
Guiding a person when they are receptive, but not to the point where that person might become dependant upon their guidance
As I look back on one of the old edited copies of the site (we printed everything out before editing), I see that many of the suggested changes have spiritual lessons behind them.
These are a few:
In the sentence, “Many times his Guru told Kriyananda, ‘You have a great work to do,’ — or perhaps, ‘You must do such and such, because you have a great work to do,’” she crossed off “or perhaps,” and suggested “and also” in its place, because the latter expresses greater conviction. Literarily, I think both ways work, but for me, this change provided a useful lesson.
Devi changed “lead a Sunday Service” to “conduct a Sunday Service,” shifting the personal emphasis on the importance of the minister to a more impersonal emphasis on the Service itself.
In place of “Given thousands of lectures all over the world,” Devi suggested “Given thousands of lectures based on his Guru’s teachings.” This edit clarifies what is really important: not just reaching large numbers of people, but reaching them with something of value, something that is in tune with what Yogananda brought.
In this first round of editing, when you would expect the most changes, there were rarely more than a couple of suggestions per page.
Considering that Devi had recently finished a 250-page book on the same subject, one which she considered incredibly important (she described herself as feeling “inadequate” to the “magnitude” of the work — of needing to do justice to such a great soul like Swamiji), I find the willingness to give me this degree of freedom doubly-amazing.
Today, almost 1,000 monthly visitors come to www.swamikriyananda.org, and there have been nearly 50,000 visits to the site since it was first launched. A special newsletter, which has its goal as keeping people up to date on Swami Kriyananda’s new projects, talks, and public services, has close to 500 subscribers. (Since we’ve never advertised the newsletter, this seems like a reasonable number. If you want to sign up, you can do so on the home page of the website.) Of course, I’m very grateful to have played a part in its creation.
The greatest honor, though, came about a year ago, when Swami Kriyananda finally read the site himself (he’s not much of a web surfer! I think someone printed it for him). I was told that, reading it, he exclaimed, “Who wrote this? This is excellent!”
When I first heard that, I thought, “Oh my gosh, I must be a good writer,” but something in his choice of words made me pause. I remembered the seclusion, and how I had tried to tune into what he and Yogananda wanted to write through me. Anything that was inspired, therefore, I couldn’t claim as my own.
Like the painter who paints a beautiful sunset, and cannot claim credit for the scene, the quality of the canvas, or the brilliant hues of the paint, I was drawing material from sources that others had put together, using an outline suggested by a friend, and helped by others’ editing.
Besides, it was Swami Kriyananda who had lived the drama in the first place, and had made his life worth writing about — a life which he, in turn, gives all the credit for to God. My only work was in adapting his story for the web, which in comparison was nothing at all!
“Of course it’s good,” I realized, laughing to myself. “He wrote it!”
When I was in high school, a friend of mine said to our class, “My goal for this year is that I want to have no regrets.”
“That isn’t something you can achieve through your actions,” I thought, in an unusually insightful moment. “Who can act perfectly? Having no regretshas to be a consequence of a decision you make!”
Living in Ananda communities, I’ve seen more clearly that the habit of regret is not a virtue, it’s a fault! By returning my mind to its mistakes, regret usually makes it harder, not easier, to improve myself.
If you feel the same way, these simple practices have helped me — perhaps you’ll also find them useful.
What Can I Do Now?
“I wish that hadn’t happened!” What a drain on life the attitude of regret is!
Regret is a form of desire that refers to the past. Therefore, I find that the more I keep my awareness in the present, the more easily I can let go.
What I try to say to myself is, “What happened has already happened. What can I do now, to improve things?” Even if I can’t change the situation itself, sending prayers, blessings, or making an affirmation to do better next time are almost always available as options.
Voila! After answering this simple question, I have a constructive activity to occupy my mind; my mental state improves immediately.
(In the same way, concentrating on the present moment is also an effective way to deal with fear — a form of desire that refers to the future. Is it even possible to fear something that is happening right now?)
The Carping Spirit
Today (as I write), I missed an opportunity that I regretted afterwards. The nagging, though, stayed with me for hours, like a dark bird on my shoulder, harping in complaining tones, now and again returning my mind to the cause of regret.
I got fed up with it while walking through the forested hills of Ananda Village this summer afternoon. The outer scenery was beautiful and harmonious; my “inner scenery” was less so.
Finally, I turned to this nagging aspect of my mind, and said, mentally, “Well, if you are complaining so much, what do you suggest that I do about it?” I waited, keeping my attention on the source of the complaining, and waiting for constructive input. “All right, then — if you don’t have any suggestions, I’m going to let it go.”
(Would this technique always work? I don’t know! Unlike the other tips, it wasn’t directly inspired by Paramhansa Yogananda’s teachings. So use it with caution: asking your subconscious mind for suggestions comes with no guarantees!)
It isn’t the end of the story — I still face this regret tonight, even as I write — but, in the struggle against it, that was the turning point. It was easier then to be more positive and to forget the incident — both of these are things, I’ve found, that require courage.
Interesting coincidence, at that moment, the most positive and courageous person I have ever met passed by in a car! That person was Swami Kriyananda.
God Is the Doer
An incredible disadvantage the kind of regret I’ve been talking about — besides the fact that it is just painful — is that it tends to focus us on our ego. As Swami Kriyananda often says, “Someone who is throwing dust on their own head thinks only of dust, and their own head!”
Thinking of God as the Doer, instead, gets our thoughts moving in the right direction. You can’t beat darkness out of the room with a stick, but you can turn on the light.
One way to “turn on the light” is to give the responsibility for your actions to God. I love this passage from The Art of Supportive Leadership, by Swami Kriyananda:
See God as the Doer. Give Him the credit for any good that you do. Offer your work as a service to Him.
… you will also find it easy, in this case, to give God the blame — not in a spirit of accusation, but in the thought that, if a project failed, maybe it did so for a good reason.
The Darkest Time of My Life, For Which I Am Very Grateful
There’s a period in my life I don’t often talk about, before I really came onto the spiritual path, though I refer to it in this article in Clarity Magazine. It was a dark time, and painful, and because of the depths of my own moods, I lost almost all my friendships twice over.
Once I was through the worst of it, I looked back, and was intensely embarrassed at my behavior.
But, a year and a half later, I stepped onto this spiritual path, and found that this period in my life had helped me tremendously in my personal growth. (As Yogananda said, “You don’t get strong by fighting weaklings!”)
Was that time bad, because it was painful or because my friendships turned to dust? Or was it good, because it helped me look for an inner solution to life’s problems and made it easier for me to have a clean break with the past? Either way, surely the important thing was that it brought me closer to God. I can see that now, and can no longer even think of regretting the experience, at least not as a whole. It was so clearly a blessing.
This attitude took time to reach, however. With the passing years came detachment and perspective; these opened the door to gratitude.
I suppose that if I want to regret, there will always be something to regret. (“Oh, if only I had said the right, inspiring thing!” “Oh, if only I had been calmer!” “Oh, if only I hadn’t been five minutes late and missed the opening previews!”)
If that is so, the only way to overcome this type of suffering is to change my attitudes. Focusing on the present moment, confronting the attitude directly, and giving my actions to God are all things that have seemed to work. If you know of others, please share them — add your comment below!
