2023 Swami Padmanabha

Join in the celebration of the celebratory movements of Divinity as they express the fullness of personhood exchanged through love.

In today’s honoring of Lalita Sakhi and her special role in both Krishna-lila and her expansion into Gaura-lila, many facets of radical personalism were discussed in nuanced ways:

• How much do we relate with divine persons as persons, rather than merely to concepts, or ideas that exist beyond the clouds.

• If we approach Divinity as a passive concept and do not go beyond the collection of technical information about him/her/them, so that the information transforms into a relationship, then we are missing the potential and highest reach of that knowledge.

• How love without suffering is not love, and how to understand this in a way that makes us embrace the possibility rather than run from love

• It is our responsibility to make the needs of those we serve our needs

• How the psychology of Lalita Sakhi plays a unique and crucial role in her serving the necessity of the Divine Couple

• Lalita Sakhi is the acarya of “creative tension”

• As sadhakas we can approach our lives in the same way by allowing our problems to be moments of creativity, an invitation to redefine our conception of life; how we conceive of things—obstacles, certainty, suffering, vulnerability, humanity, divinity, love

▶ WATCH ON YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/live/Pr-LIeYJn5I?si=9xKEdsBfsmBIEFy0

RADICAL PERSONALISM: Revival Manifesto for Proactive Devotion.

Join Swami Padmanabha at Ananda-dhama in Switzerland as he and friends explore:

• the deep, radical, connection between radical personalism and Sri Radhika
• who we are as persons has its root in Krishna
• who is the Absolute and who am I in relationship with him
• how the nature of being is always in a process of becoming
• the role of humanity in spirituality
• how our connection to each other is by listening to each other’s stories
• how Sri Krishna lost himself by stepping into Sri Radha’s love story, and lived thru her heart as Mahaprabhu

During the conversation, probing questions arose:

• if we in our fullness as persons is so wonderful, then why do most people NOT want to be persons?

• people have agency, but if we have agency then how can nothing be out of our control?
• if the nature of being is change, then why as a tradition are we not excited about that?
• how do traditions empower individuals?

▶ WATCH ON YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/live/Zn7X3MVYASA?si=GwvnkxbqOIJRP9in

RADICAL PERSONALISM: Revival Manifesto for Proactive Devotion.

Join Swami Padmanabha and a group of practitioners gathered together in France as they continue to discuss how lofty ideas can be brought to earth and played out in every day life; the role of rules, the heart, and the color of the cloth you wear; does peeling potatoes please God?

Class given in France.

RADICAL PERSONALISM: Revival Manifesto for Proactive Devotion.

Swami Padmanabha speaks about the importance of unifying what we consider our "spiritual" life and our "worldly" life. Everything is interconnected and exists in relationship with other things. An important aspect of life is to integrate our spirituality with our humanity—these two are not opposite, but rather, perfectly compatible. Spiritual practice means to awaken to the reality that everything is connected.

Bhakti is not something we do, but how we live our lives.

Class given in France.

RADICAL PERSONALISM: Revival Manifesto for Proactive Devotion.

Tune in as Swami Padmanabha offers three ways to approach the Srimad Bhagavatam: literally, interpretively and esoterically. And futher draws lessons applicable to practitioners thru an interpretive approach to 3 specific lilas revealed in the Srimad Bhagavatam:

DAMODARA-LILA, from which among many lessons held there, we are able to get a glimpse into the paradox of how being tied can actually increase one's freedom, and how this, in turn, can teach us how to approach rules so that we are not bound by them, but rather experience more freedom through them. Additionally and very importantly, this lila demonstrates that unconditional love does not demand perfection. "First become perfect, and then I will love you" That is not unconditional love; that is ridiculous.

GOVARDHANA-LILA, from which we can learn, among many things, how to navigate the storms of our lives, and to be open to the shape of shelter that might differ from our expectations.

RASA-LILA, from which we can catch a glimpse of the mysterious unfolding of our own spiritual journey. The path of love is crooked, and these curves create blindspots. There are times when it appears that we are farther than ever from God, as if the Divine has just disappeared from our lives. But is that the case, or is he closer than ever?

Class given in France.

RADICAL PERSONALISM: Revival Manifesto for Proactive Devotion.

Join Swami Padmanabha as he dips into the paradox of knowing through unknowing. How much can we know of an unlimited Divine Person who is constantly and continually becoming more himself in love. To think we know god because we have some information about him, even highly detailed information, is not the end of, and may not even have anything to do with, developing a transformed heart.

God is the ultimate mystery and we have to be ok with mystery and not driven by a need for certitude, to cancel darkness and liminality. For most, mystery is to be solved, closed so that our vulnerabilities need not be disclosed.

Certitude stifles our progress. Co-existing with Mystery creates the space for spontaneous wonder, adventure and discovery.

Class given in California, USA.

RADICAL PERSONALISM: Revival Manifesto for Proactive Devotion.

Join Swami Padmanabha as he explores the connection between vulnerability and empowerment in relation to radical personalism—there being no limit to how much of a person we can be in relation to divine love.

Class given in California, USA.

RADICAL PERSONALISM: Revival Manifesto for Proactive Devotion.

Radical Personalism means to relate in personal terms to everything, with everyone—beginning with ourselves—and our connection to the Divine. There’s no limit in how much of a person we can be. Now is the time to inquire into the Absolute, the Divine and the soul. And “now” speaks of not only having a human vehicle, but the necessity and preliminary stage of having our humanity in place, of behaving as fully human as possible so that we may be as fully spiritual as possible.

Join in the conversation which reverses the misconception that the more spiritual you are then the less human you have to be. As humans, we have double homework: we are already spiritual, but how much are we aware of our spiritual identity and our prospect and potential? We have a human vehicle, but what are we doing with the vehicle? How much is that translated into humanity, to human character, to human relationships. Our ongoing challenge is to integrate the two—fully human and fully divine.

RADICAL PERSONALISM: Revival Manifesto for Proactive Devotion.

“Bali Mahārāja, along with all the priests, ācāryas and members of the assembly, observed the Supreme Personality of Godhead’s universal body, which was full of six opulences. That body contained everything within the universe, including all the gross material elements, the senses, the sense objects, the mind, intelligence and false ego, the various kinds of living entities, and the actions and reactions of the three modes of material nature.”

RADICAL PERSONALISM: Revival Manifesto for Proactive Devotion.

“The unlimited Supreme Personality of Godhead, who had assumed the form of Vāmana, then began increasing in size, acting in terms of the material energy, until everything in the universe was within His body, including the earth, the planetary systems, the sky, the directions, the various holes in the universe, the seas, the oceans, the birds, beasts, human beings, the demigods and the great saintly persons.”

RADICAL PERSONALISM: Revival Manifesto for Proactive Devotion.