Svaroopa Vidya Ashram’s Podcast

Teachings Article - Learning Your Lessons

When you experience your own Divine Essence there is an inner unfolding, a blossoming forth of Consciousness. It’s already there hidden within you. Bliss is not something you acquire, it is your true nature. All you have to do is dive inward. Then you learn to trickle Consciousness through your mind. Once you know who you are, how could you ever be anyone else?

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Propelled Deeper Within

Most people think that meditation is about what you do with your mind. But Svaroopa® Vidya Meditation is about using your mind to get beyond your mind. I’ll teach you and, for many of you, remind you to use mantra during meditation. When you fill your mind with the mantra, you are propelled deeper within. In that depth, you find your own Divine Essence. This is called meditation on your own Self. – Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here. 

2/12/2023 Lost & Found

You get lost out in the world – what you lose is your own Self. The way home is found within. With the Guru’s grace you come to know that which you’ve always been, your own Self. Grace shows you the way when you’re lost. Don’t let your life be ruled by your senses and your mind. When you know your own Self you are in the world but not lost in it.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

2/5/2023 Clarity & Compassion

Living with clarity and compassion gives you the ability to live with an open heart, while you let your intelligence lead the way. Meditation gives you access to the deeper dimension of your own being, which is where both clarity and compassion come from. You become a means by which God’s light shines into the world. Clarity and compassion, head and heart together. What a way to live!

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Meditation Matters Most

Keep going. Keep doing your practices. Most importantly, keep meditating. It’s meditation that matters most. All the other practices help. They help you with your body. They help you with your mind. But most importantly, they help you with your meditation. Even if you haven’t found the universe within, somehow, you get it when I tell you it’s there. You already have a sense of the truth of it. – Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here. 

1/29/2023 Enlightenment Makes You Happier

When you’re enlightened, the light of Consciousness shines through you. It is to attain that bliss and establish ourselves in it that we meditate. In meditation you go into the source of the bliss, into the Consciousness that is your own Beingness, your own Self. When you live in the light of your own Beingness, you are happier.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Teachings Article - Choosing Your State

You can choose your attitude as well as your words and actions. You are choosing how to live and who to be. Use your mind without losing your inner state. Your mind functions with more clarity and creativity, when it is rooted in your deeper essence called Self.  Your choices are based in Consciousness. So is your life. So are you.

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1/22/2023 Living on an Even Keel

You can live life on an even keel by meditating and with the help of a Guru. You discover the tangible and vast reality within. When you live from this inner dimensionality, no matter what happens you sail right through it. Even through the storms you are supported by Grace and grounded in your own Self.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Where Is the Happiness?

Bliss happens inside. Happiness happens inside. You already know this when the weather is just right, or when everybody is doing exactly what you want. Ha! And it all works so you can be happy. Where do you feel the happiness? Where is it? It’s inside. Happiness is just a hint of the bliss that’s a little deeper within. So go for the source. Dive inside, and then bring your bliss with you. – Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

1/15/2023 Brimming with Joy and Peace

You want a life that is free from pain and agitation, a life that is brimming with joy and peace. Turn your mind toward something that reliably and consistently gives you peace and joy. The only reliable source is the Divine source of all, found when you look within.  Bring your own Self with you everywhere you go. 

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

1/8/2023 The World Needs More Yogis

Yogis shine with the light of Consciousness. As a yogi, you can bring that light into your life and into the world. Live your life from an inner steadiness and with an evenness of mind. It’s all about your ability to take your own Self into your life with you. Bring your own Self with you everywhere you go.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Inner Spaces

Now, my spiritual geography might be different than yours. When I think of God, or when I look for God, I look in the inner spaces of my own being. I remember when I used to look outside for God. I confess that I didn’t really know where to look. I’d look up toward the sky, and if there were clouds, I’d wonder, “Well, which one is God on?” And if the sky were clear, well, in that vast space, where would I find God? – Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

1/1/2023 Proactive

On New Year’s Day make a resolution to decide what direction you want to go. This is called being proactive. If you’re not getting what you want, you must put forth effort to change what you’ve got. You get to steer toward whatever destination you choose. The world around you will adapt to your new trajectory. You can change the world by changing yourself. 

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

12/25/2022 The Three Teachings

Baba Muktananda gave three main interconnected teachings; honor your own Self, see God in each other, and the Guru makes both possible. Jesus gave the same teachings.  See how they correspond.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Teachings Article - Being a Yogi in the World

Being a yogi in the world doesn’t mean withdrawing from the world. What seems to be only a mundane world is divinely designed to engage you fully. When you ground your sense of self in the deeper dimension of your own being, you are you, even in the midst of life’s realities. Bring the light of your own Being into the world.

Read by Aanandi Ross.

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Sound Bite: Experience Your Own Self

That’s why everything we do here is to give you this extraordinary inner experience, the experience of God within. God being you. This is the experience of your own Self. This is what meditation is about, and all of yoga’s other wonderful practices. From poses through breathing, chanting, seva, and certainly the study of the teachings, they all prepare you for this experience. The whole point is for you to have an experience of your own Self. – Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

12/18/2022 Family Time

The holidays are family time for most people. While you look forward to the time with your loved ones, it can be a challenging time. Your expectations, needs and desires get in the way. You get caught in the multiplicity of small-s selves. Or you can base yourself in a deeper dimension, your capital-S Self. Who do you want to be? You choose.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

12/11/2022 The Bliss That Rages Continually

If you’re not yet living in the bliss that rages continually, it means you lose your own Self. You get caught up in your mind. Yoga is about the mystical inner experience - that there is only One Reality here, which is God being you. Spend time with a teacher who knows the Self and you will experience your own Self.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: What You Put into It

To pour your energies toward something that has meaning to you. To volunteer your time, and do simple tasks that support the Ashram and the Guru’s work. It makes your life more meaning filled. The meaning of life is found in what you put into it, not what you get out of it.  – Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

12/4/2022 You’re in the Holidays

The end of the year holidays, or holy days is a sweet and sacred time. The point of a holy day is that your inner world stops its usual whirling, and you enjoy some inner peace. It’s about finding the light of Consciousness within. See the sacredness in a day, a place, yourself, and in all. 

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

11/27/2022 Pleasurable & Beneficial

It`s rare that something is both pleasurable and beneficial. More often, you`re choosing between these things. When you persist in your yogic practices, the inner bliss becomes more fulfilling than any momentary pleasure. Fill your mind with yoga and your mind will be transformed. For as you are uplifted, the beneficial will become more pleasurable to you than anything else could ever be.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Teachings Article - Wholeness

Yoga is about an integrated way of living. It makes you able to express yourself powerfully, yet lovingly at the same time. The essence of tantra is that you know your own Capital-S Self while doing all the things that your many small-s selves do. You are you, at all levels of your being. In your wholeness, you see the sacred in yourself and all that exists.

Read by Swami Samvidaananda

Read Gurudevi's Teachings Article in our Freebies.

Sound Bite: Your Notebook

All the papers have painful stories written on them. Some of them are true, and some of them are just your take on things. You carry your notebook with you everywhere you go. You read and re-read the stories, and share them with other people, even if you’ve shared them before… Instead, I recommend you take a new notebook, even a small one. Like the one we have for newcomers, our welcome journal notebook. And, all those lovely blank pages, and all of those empty spaces, you can write mantra.  – Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

11/20/2022 Divine Intoxication

Divine intoxication means living in a perpetual state of bliss. However, Self-Realization is more: you see God in all. You have an undeniable inner knowing of your own Self. Yoga and meditation are about prompting this experience again and again, until again turns into always. You don’t merely see Shiva, you be Shiva. And you see Shiva in everyone.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

11/13/2022 Your Precious Body

Yoga works with your body to settle your mind. Thus you can experience the deeper dimensionality that is your Essence. Shaktipat initiation awakens the power of Consciousness within you, so the deeper inner knowing of your own Shivaness can arise. You are a living temple of the One Divine Reality. Let your cosmic light shine inside and out.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Spending Time with a Saint

If you don’t know your Self yet, not all the time, and if you don’t live in the bliss of Consciousness yet, not all the time, what’s the best way to get there? My Baba said if you want to become a siddha, a realized master, you have to spend enough time with a siddha. Really? Just spending time with a saint makes you more saintly? Yes! He described it this way. If you keep the company of a saint, your inner being changes.  – Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

11/6/2022 Happiness & Upliftment

You want to be happy. Gurudevi Nirmalananda helps turn your attention inward to find an inner current of energy that uplifts you, while giving you inner bliss. The current of bliss arising frees you from the things that entangle your mind and hold you back. Your own Self is the source of joy arising from within. Elevate your state, do more yoga.  

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

10/30/2022 Halloween & All Saints’ Day

Do you want to celebrate a day dedicated to ghouls, vampires and witches, or a day dedicated to saints? Saints are real people who opened themselves to the Divine. When you spend time with one who lives in Consciousness, it changes you. You get Consciousness imprints. Help your mind discover the Light of your own Being, so it shines through your mind all the time.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Prana

“Prana is the most important element in the body. When the prana leaves the body, it becomes worth only a few pennies,” my Baba explained.  Prana is what makes your body a living body. Prana makes your heart beat. It makes your eyes able to see. It makes your breath move. 

It’s interesting that we use yogic breathing to move your prana, yet it is the prana that makes your breath move. Your breath is at a crossroads, a place where you can use the physical to affect the subtle. – Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

10/23/2022 Shakti, Divine Power

Shakti, or Ma, is the Divine Power that is the source of all life. She is the energy of inner awakening that is the mystical core of yoga. She coalesces into all of us forming objects, creatures, people. When you recognize that you are Consciousness-Itself, you embrace all that is within you. It’s easy to get lost in the outer dance of life, yet the answer is inside.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

10/16/2022 The Greatest Motivator

Prana is the enlivening source, it’s the power of life. Prana is what keeps you alive, vibrant, healthy, and happy. Pain calls your attention to the area that is low on prana and motivates you to do something about it. Pain is the greatest motivator and can be felt at the physical, mental, emotional, psychic, or soul level.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Teachings Article - A Living Temple

Your body is a living temple, housing the One Divine Reality. Yoga helps you develop your ability to tune in and to discern the difference between your purpose and your desires. Then your worldly actions will be an outer expression of your inner peace and dimensionality. Your life will be a celebration of the interweaving of the Divine in the mundane.

Hear it read by Yogaratna Yogyananda.

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Sound Bite: Self Is the Source

The Guru makes himself into what he himself is, the Self. And when you have your own Self, you have everything. For your own Self is the source of joy, the source of love, the source of healing, the source of life itself, the source of your own existence, the source of all existence, the source of the universe. By delving within, you discover that it is all contained within you. – Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

10/09/2022 Inside Out

Yoga gives you direct access to the bliss of your own Beingness. The closer you get to your own Self, the more happiness you experience. You become smarter, more focused, more intentional and less driven by instinct, fear and desire. This all comes from the inside out. When you know your own Innermost Essence, you are fully and authentically yourself.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

10/2/2022 The Greatness Within

We are celebrating the 40th anniversary of Baba Muktananda’s mahasamadhi. Muktananda didn’t merely inspire people to follow him, he gave them greatness itself. Greatness lies within you; you simply haven’t tapped into it fully yet. What Muktananda found within is Self.  Self is you; Self is all, Self is beyond all. But the closest is within.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Meditation

Some people think that meditation is about reducing stress, which is true. Others say that meditation is about healing, or improving your relationships, which also does happen. Others say that meditation is about equanimity in the face of difficulties. Good stuff! Yet, all of this happens because meditation gives you your own Self. When you are your own Self, you are not as stressed by stressful things. Your body and your mind heal more deeply and more easily. You are more present in your relationships. – Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

9/25/2022 A Dedicated Lifestyle

A living master lives in the continuous flow of Divine Grace and can reveal the mystery hidden within you. What do you want and what are you willing to do to get it? It’s about seeing your own Divinity again and again, until again turns into always.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

9/18/2022 When You Look Inward

What you find when you look inward depends on how deeply you look. Yoga says to look deeper than your mind. The purpose of meditation is to establish yourself in the bliss of your own Self. When you attain the light of your own Self within yourself, that light emerges as supreme love. When you look inward what will you find?

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Get in Your Body

We begin with, “Notice your toes… all ten toes… all at the same time. Become aware of both feet… outside and inside.” We talk you through the process of becoming present in your own body. Right here, in this body, in this place, in this moment in time. You see, your body is never in the future. It is never in the past. When you get in your body, you are present in the present moment. It’s a fantastic pathway to the here and now.  – Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

Teachings Article - Consciousness Imprints

Meditation leaves Consciousness imprints in your mind. Not only does your mind become filled with Consciousness, each of these impressions dissolves prior impressions, freeing you from your history. The goal is to always live based in the Consciousness that you are. Yoga makes you able to harness the energy of your mind and pour it toward your inherent Divinity.

Hear it read by Swami Prajñananda.

Read Gurudevi's Teachings Article in our Freebies.

9/11/22 I, Me, My, Mine

Your focus is on your mind and heart, your body and life.  But you are the one who HAS a mind, who has a body, who has a life, who has a past and who has a future. Yoga says you are more than who you think you are. You are that existence which is being all that exists. There is more to you on the inside than the outside can ever convey.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

9/4/2022 What You Are Not

You grab on to things to construct your sense of self. Wherever you go, whatever you do, who you know, none of it makes you who you really are. Your core Essence is intact no matter what comes your way. Can you stay in the Self while you do what you do?

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Filled From the Inside

Yes, my body needs care. But here I am in my seventies, with less aches and pains than I had in my thirties. I don’t have to press the reset button. I don’t have to push myself to get going. Why? Because I’m filled from the inside. Baba gave me that. That which is called That. That reality that pervades all of existence, and also pervades inside my own existence, and inside yours. There is only one.  – Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

8/28/2022 Finding Your Inner Light

The light of your own Divinity shines in you and through you. Yoga is about finding, knowing and being the Self that you already are. There is more to you than what you experience by seeing, thinking, feeling or doing. Cultivate the inner experience of your own Self and live in that experience all the time.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Teachings Article - Perception & Action

Yoga says that you are the perceiver, not what you perceive. Know who you are, even while you are perceiving and acting. You can use your mind without getting trapped in it. Let the light of your own Self shine through your mind and into the world, so all your actions are based in love and generosity. 

Read by Aanandi Ross.

Read Gurudevi's Teachings Article in our Freebies.

8/14/2022 I was Clueless

Shaktipat is an initiation that awakens your own Divine energy within, but you need to nurture it afterward, by repeating the mantra of this tradition. The mantra is powerful due to the energy installed in it by the Guru.  It is filled with the Light of Consciousness. Every time you say the mantra you draw on the Guru’s energy, which helps you know your own Self.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Yoga is Amazing

Yoga is amazing. You step on to the path followed by other yogis for millenia, and you just put one foot in front of the other. How limiting that sounds. Yet, it is the path to freedom and its fruits are reliable. I was standing outside the other day, watching some of our regular yoga students as they walked to their cars. They moved so freely. They called to each other and laughed so freely. Doing the poses makes such a difference…  – Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

8/7/2022 Limitation & Beyond

Your true essence is completely free of limitations, even while you are in a body and often trapped in your own mind. You can know your own Self and still be engaged with the world. Yoga shows you how to use your mind to get beyond the limitations, so you can be free to be who you really are.

Join Gurudevi online at her next Meditation Program.

Sound Bite: Stay in Your Own Skin

You’re used to jumping out of your own skin. Moving forward into the space in front of your body. Racing against time, and trying to prove your worth. Instead, stay in your own skin. Be present in the space of your own body. – Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

Listen to Gurudevi’s full discourse here.

Teachings Article - No More Negativity

Yoga works on dissolving your resistances, melting your negativities, and freeing you from your fears. Once you get past the ways you negate yourself, you discover the vast dimensionality of your own existence. Gurudevi Nirmalananda clears your access to the inner light that is always within, so that it will shine and illumine your mind from the inside outward. Learn how to stop using external things to give you a sense of self-worth. What if you said “yes” to life more often?

Read by Yogaratna Yogyananda.

Read Gurudevi's Teachings Article in our Freebies.