In Paramhansa Yogananda’s remarkable poem “God! God! God!” there is a verse whose deeper meaning eluded me for a long time:

When my mind weaves dreams

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Recently I had two experiences that helped me understand the hidden truths in his words. The first occurred one night after a disturbing dream in which people were treating me cruelly and abusively. At first I felt agitated and upset, but then the verse came into my mind, and I thought, “These are just past memories that you’re weaving into a dream. None of them are real now. Release the memories, and think of God.” As I held the thought of God in my mind, immediately the dream faded and was replaced by a sense of deep peace and well-being.

When I awoke the next morning and recalled what had happened, I realized that it opened up the verse’s deeper meaning for me. In the dream state, subconscious memories can surface and project disturbing images on the screen of our mind. But if we remember that they are not real, and superimpose the thought of God on the “magic cloth” of our consciousness, we can free ourselves from the unsettling feeling of a bad dream. Even more importantly, we can take control of our subconscious mental patterns so that the memories themselves lose their power and begin to dissolve.

The second experience which helped me better understand Master’s words came one morning during meditation. As I tried to focus mentally and practice the techniques, my mind was flooded with memories of the past, or images of what was soon to come—not unusual for me, nor, I expect, for many of us. 

But on that day something different happened. I recalled the verse from “God! God! God!” and began to think, “You are weaving unneeded threads upon the ‘magic cloth’ of your consciousness. Relax your mind, let these thoughts recede, and think of God.” This became a different experience of meditation and was a tremendous help in keeping my mind calm and uplifted.

Swami Kriyananda tells a story in Conversations with Yogananda that is helpful in this regard. It took place during his early days with Yoganandaji when he was trying hard to go deep in meditation, but felt he wasn’t succeeding.

One day during this period, Swami asked Master, “Am I not trying hard enough?”

Yoganandaji replied, “You are trying too hard. You are using too much willpower.”

Too much willpower brings tension. To make progress in meditation, it’s important to recognize the difference between tension and attention. Meditation with tension stirs up restless thoughts and mental planning, no matter how hard we try to push them away. Meditation with calm attention, by contrast, helps us override the intrusion of past memories and projections of the future.

Remember that meditating with attention is not a passive state that allows memories to bring themselves to the forefront of our mind. Rather, it is a state of relaxed but dynamic focus that creates a strong energy field within our mind which keeps us from slipping into daydreaming.

So, my friends, let’s use the needle of our attention to emboss the thought of God on the magic cloth of our consciousness. The more we do so, the more we can live constantly in the state that Master describes in the last verse of this poem:

In waking, eating, working, dreaming, sleeping,

May each step you take bring you closer to union with God.

In loving friendship,

Nayaswami Devi

P.S. By the time that you read this, Jyotish and I will be en route to India for the next part of our journey. New adventures await which we’ll be sharing.

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Jyotish and I are currently visiting the Ananda community in the hills above Assisi, Italy. A few days ago, we had a beautiful launch for the Italian translations of our new books, Divine Awakening: The Mission of Paramhansa Yogananda and His Disciple, Swami Kriyananda and The Heart of Service. This week we’ve begun the Centennial Celebration for Swamiji, with a large number of guests attending from all over Europe.

Jyotish and Devi at their book launch in Assisi.

Feeling the divine joy radiating powerfully from here, I was reminded of a story from our visit to Ananda Assisi thirty years ago for the dedication of their new Temple of Light. (With its domed blue-tiled roof, it is the prototype of our temples at Ananda Village and Ananda Seattle.)

For the dedication, they had invited a number of local dignitaries and religious leaders to speak. One was a priest who had helped organize the Assisi Underground, which hid Jews in monasteries under Italy’s Fascist regime during World War II. Adults and children were given new identification papers and eventually helped to escape to safe countries. Hundreds of people were saved through the efforts of this priest.

When he spoke at the dedication, he shared a remarkable story. During the dark days of the war, this priest would often see lights shining at night in the hills above Assisi. At first he thought the lights were coming from structures, but then realized that no buildings existed there. One evening as he gazed up at the radiance, he was struck by the thought, “These are the lights of spiritual souls who will live there one day.”

He concluded his story by saying, “All of you are the souls whose light I saw many years ago.” God’s ways are not easily seen with our limited human sight, but His power exists nonetheless, beyond our perception of time and space.

We recently heard another remarkable story from Ananda Assisi. Some years ago, a young devotee visited Swami Kriyananda here and asked him for a particular favor. He replied, “No, I can’t do that for you, but I will heal you.” Puzzled by his response, she thought, “But I’m in good health. I don’t need healing,” and she forgot about his words.

Twenty years passed, and she was diagnosed with cancer. As she was going into surgery, his forgotten words came into her mind, and she felt enveloped in an aura of blessing and peace. Afterward, the surgeon told her that he’d been able to remove all the cancer, and that no more treatment was needed. Her healing was complete. Another example of God’s hidden power.

Paramhansa Yogananda said, “When your will is very strong it touches the Father, and the Father wills that your desire be fulfilled. When He wills, all nature takes notice. God does respond when you deeply pray to Him with faith and determination. . . . You don’t realize how wonderfully this great power works. It operates mathematically. There is no ‘if’ about it. And that is what the Bible means by faith: it is proof of things unseen.

“If you practice the presence of God, you will know that what I am saying is truth. Go to God; pray and cry to Him until He shows the workings of His laws to you and guides you.”*

It is our job to meditate deeply and offer our love to God until we feel His presence. Then, from the calm center of faith within, we can draw answers to our problems and find solutions to every challenge before us. The more we practice this, the more we can experience God’s hand in every aspect of our life.

When we look at the lives of saints, we can see that they had arrived at the point where their faith in God no longer needed to be tested or proved. They knew His presence in all things—seen and unseen.

Yogananda concluded his talk quoted above with these words: “If you can just remember and apply the truths I have told you, there is nothing you cannot accomplish in life. And the greatest of all achievements is to find God. Your uncertain belief in spiritual possibilities can become realization of their highest fulfillment.”

With faith and love,

Nayaswami Devi

* The Divine Romance, Self-Realization Fellowship, p. 41.

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There’s a story that I’ve always enjoyed about a tourist who was lost in a rural area, searching for a nearby town—in the old days, you know, before GPS. After driving around fruitlessly for some time, he finally spotted an old farmer standing in his field by the side of the road.

“Thank goodness, I’ve found you,” the traveler burst out. “Can you give me directions to Portsmouth?”

“Well,” the farmer began, scratching his head, “you follow the road that you’re on till you come to a fork, then make a right turn.” After a thoughtful pause, he said, “No, that won’t work. Let me see . . .”

He began again, “Turn back the way you came until you cross a small bridge. Then go left until you come to an old barn.” Once more he paused, brow furrowed, and shook his head. “No, that won’t work either . . .”

Finally he shrugged his shoulders and concluded, “You know, you can’t get there from here.”

Funny as it is, this story carries a larger meaning too. Problems can’t be solved on the level at which they exist. We need to stand back to get a bigger picture. For those of us whose goal is finding God, as long as we remain trapped in our own egoic reactions—our own likes and dislikes—the final destination eludes us. “We can’t get there from here” hints at a deeper truth: No matter how hard we try or how sincere we are, unless we are willing to transcend the ego, we can’t achieve union with God.

So how do we rise above egoic self-identity? Swami Kriyananda said that the secret to dissolving the ego is longer, deeper meditations, and seeing God as the Doer in everything.

By putting more quality time into our meditations, we can begin to experience a calm, watchful presence within. Ego-born restless thoughts may cry out, “But what about us? Are you ignoring us—the demands of your life?” Over time, we can calm these whining voices with the reassurance, “I will respond to you later, but for now I have a more important responsibility.” The more we can rest in our higher Self, the less hold the ego has on us.

Seeing God as the Doer in all of our activities is not an easy task. The ego wants to step in and say, “Look what a great job I did. I deserve some recognition for this.” But the watchful inner presence knows that the energy, the ideas, the manifestation of anything we do come from God. We can think that we did it, but this is just as untrue as thinking we are responsible for our own heartbeat or breathing. It is all part of a greater reality of which we are a very small part.

It’s also important to stay vigilant and watch your reactive thought processes. If you find that you repeatedly react negatively to a certain person or situation, stop and feel where your energy is centered at that time. Most likely, it is based in the medulla, the seat of ego-consciousness.

Try some deep breathing, and bring your awareness to the spiritual eye, the seat of soul awareness. Hold the person or situation at the spiritual eye, and see how your thoughts begin to change. You may find that you can accept and understand that person better, or see why you were resisting that situation in the first place. The more you practice this, the more you will find that you—not subconscious reactions—are in control of your life.

In his Centennial Celebration talk at Ananda Village in June, Nayaswami Devarshi read a passage from Swami Kriyananda’s book Sadhu, Beware! that had a deep impact on me:

Don’t let your mind play with the thought of where and how you yourself fit into any picture. Don’t toy with flattery by entertaining it even lightly in your mind. Reject sternly any thought of self-importance, self-praise, self-justification, and blame.

This subject is as important for you as your own salvation, for your spiritual liberation depends upon release from ego-consciousness.

If release from the prison of delusion is important to you, then everything I have written above is of supreme importance. It is a question of the direction you give your energy and consciousness. If you allow yourself to be affected, even minutely, by flattery, to that extent you will be affixing one more iron bar in the prison of your ego. And to the extent that you allow yourself to accept in your ego even the slightest energy, to that exact extent you will create more bondage for yourself.

So, my friend, we can get there from here if we start from the calm center of our own being that always knows it’s part of a greater reality. And “there” is the unconditional, omnipresent love of God for all of His creation.

With joy,

Nayaswami Devi

P.S. Jyotish and I leave on August 10 for our annual visit to Ananda Assisi and India. We’ll return to Ananda Village on October 20, but you’ll be hearing from us on our travels.

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If we think that miraculous events happened only in distant times and places, we are mistaken. The Age of Miracles is not over. Divine acts did not end with Moses parting the Red Sea, Christ turning water into wine, or Babaji materializing a golden palace.

Miracles are happening around us all the time; we simply need to open our eyes to see God’s constant presence in our lives. In the past week alone, two friends shared with me extraordinary experiences of their own.

I heard the first story when I was sitting at a table with a young man who lives at Ananda Village. A visitor asked him, “Did you ever meet Swami Kriyananda?” After a pause, as though weighing in his mind whether or not to tell the story, he began:

“I had a difficult childhood with an alcoholic father. Eventually he left my mother and me, and we had to fend for ourselves. Those were not easy years, and I grew up holding a lot of anger and resentment toward him. Fortunately, I discovered Master’s path, and though I was still a troubled young adult, I enrolled in Ananda College.

“One day Swami Kriyananda invited the college students to a satsang at his home. When he offered to take questions, I blurted out something about how to overcome anger toward my father. I don’t remember his exact words in response, but to this day I remember the look in his eyes—one of unconditional love and acceptance. In that moment, I knew I had found my true father, and my heart was healed of years of resentment. Later, to my amazement, I learned that on that very day my father had stopped drinking. Over the years he worked hard to make up for his mistakes, and now we have a good relationship.”

The Madonna at the site of miracles in Lourdes, France.

The second story took place in Lourdes, France, which a friend of mine visited a few years ago. This is the site where the Madonna appeared to a fourteen-year-old girl, later canonized as St. Bernadette. Divine Mother in that form told Bernadette to drink from a spring in the grotto where she appeared, and to bathe in it. Since Bernadette could see no spring, she dug where the Mother pointed, and water began to trickle from the hole. A spring quickly emerged, and it flows to this day. Millions of pilgrims visit this grotto each year, and countless healings have occurred there through its holy water.

When my friend traveled to Lourdes, she held high hopes of a miraculous experience of her own, but to her disappointment, nothing happened. She waited, she meditated, she called deeply to Divine Mother—still nothing. Feeling defeated and unsure of what else to do, she took from her backpack the Ananda Village phone list, and began praying for each of the residents. “As soon as I started praying for others,” she told me, “I felt God’s peace enveloping me in a way I had never before known. As I continued praying, the divine presence deepened and expanded. It was one of the most profound spiritual experiences of my life.”

The two stories—the first of divine intervention, the second of guidance on how to draw blessings—stirred in me memories of other miracles of divine protection that had occurred at Ananda over the years. There is the story of the stalled car engine suddenly igniting and badly burning the face of Seva, one of Ananda’s most beloved members. Though her face was burned beyond recognition, she felt no pain and healed without a scar.

Another time, one of our members was driving a pickup truck to Nevada City, along the narrow, winding road through the Yuba River gorge. Suddenly the truck’s brakes gave out. He had to choose between turning down the steep slope and swerving into oncoming traffic, and he chose the slope. As the truck began its rapid descent, it was inexplicably stopped by a small bush—just long enough for him to jump out before it continued down and was destroyed in the crash below.

These are only a few of the many stories I could tell, but they all lead to the same

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truth: Miracles are happening around us all the time. There are several that have happened in my own life, and I invite you to think about some that you’ve experienced yourself.

The greatest miracle behind all of these stories is the eternal nature of God’s love for us, His children—a love that transcends time and space. As Paramhansa Yogananda puts it so eloquently in a prayer-demand from Whispers from Eternity:

“Mother Divine, the brave may laugh as they pass among flying bullets though death threatens with each one. I laugh, however, because whether I am floating on the surface of this present life or sinking beneath the waves of death, I rest forever in Thy protecting, omnipresent, eternal life, held safely forever in Thy immortal arms.”

With joy and gratitude,

Nayaswami Devi

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Sitting near a flowing river can bring a great sense of expansion and peace. Recently we were in Minneapolis visiting family members whose home is on the banks of the Mississippi River, not far from its headwaters. The river here is beautiful, its water pure, with magnificent bald eagles and blue herons nesting along its shore.

As we sat by the river each day to meditate in the early dawn hours, we began to feel that the Mississippi is a conscious being with much to teach us. It reminded us of a similar experience we’d had a few years earlier, staying in a guesthouse on the Ganges above Rishikesh. In both places, as we quieted our mind, the rivers spoke to us.

First they whispered about the timeless nature of reality. Outwardly the world may seem to be forever caught in cycles of good and bad, peace and turmoil. Yet beneath all of this is a changeless, eternal presence that flows on unaffected. It is impersonal, but consciously present, telling us of a greater reality beneath all the changes of this world. Though the droplets of water are never the same twice, the flow of the river remains constant through great cycles of time.

Then the rivers showed us that they hold both smooth currents reflecting the light, and foaming eddies stirred up by rocks hidden below. These currents mirror the energy in our own spine. When the mind is calm and inward, energy flows smoothly upward toward higher states of awareness. But when negative thought patterns, attachments, or subconscious desires lying beneath the surface stir up our mind, we get caught in turbulent whirlpools.

The practice of meditation and Kriya Yoga helps dislodge these unseen rocks—old samskaras, the karmic patterns that keep us bound in delusion. Gradually, with continued practice, we can dissolve these blocks in our spine, and a soothing inner current begins to rise unimpeded.

The rivers also spoke to us of their ceaseless giving of themselves to nourish and support life around them. All great rivers—like the Mississippi, the Ganges, the Amazon, the Nile—have sustained life on the continents through which they flow, and have in many ways defined their civilizations. Yet, quietly, humbly, and often unappreciated, they let all forms of life—worthy or unworthy—be sustained by the waters flowing from their breast. What a beautiful manifestation of Divine Mother’s love!

Then there is the quiet murmuring of rivers that gradually transforms into the resonant sound of AUM—expansive, all-pervasive, a sound that at last melts away all individual forms into the one divine vibration of God. And this is the river’s final message to us: Everything in the end merges into the infinite sea of God-consciousness. Swami Kriyananda captures all these messages in his song “Life Flows On like a River”:

Life flows on like a river

None may linger on the way:

Never grieve to be alone.

The river of life sustains us all, until at last we surrender our separate existence and merge into the peace of our greater reality—our home in God.

Let us move forward to that great ocean of Divine Consciousness.

With joy,

Nayaswami Devi

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By the time you read this, dear friend, we will already be well into the Centennial Celebration week at Ananda Village, which will be attended by over seven hundred people from around the world. I’m writing to you the week before this powerful event begins, because I may not have time once things get started.

The week preceding the event has been its own inspiration, with volunteers coming from all over the world to help prepare for the arrival of the guests. I’ve been mentally sharing with Swamiji all the remarkable things we’ve been witnessing, and I thought I’d write him a letter with these reflections. You’re welcome to read along.

Dear Swamiji,

Two years ago we realized that 2026 would be the one hundredth anniversary of your birth, and that we needed to celebrate your life. Though many of us have been giving thought to the event since then, it wasn’t until January of this year that planning began in earnest.

Here at the Village, members have been pouring tremendous energy into upgrading the community. Over the past few months, Master’s Market has been completely renovated; new cameras and broadcast systems have been put into the Temple of Light; the amphitheater finally has a good internet connection so that we can livestream events from there; Lotus Lake has been transformed with beautiful shrines of saints from the Autobiography encircling it; and five new guest cabins have been built at The Expanding Light—to name just a few.

But this week before the event has been something to behold. Volunteers from many countries have come to help with the final preparations. People with little training have dived in wholeheartedly with cleaning, cooking, gardening, decorating, making the guest rooms ready, and more.

Several Indians who’d had no experience in this sort of thing were out in the heat of the day with handheld electric weed-eaters, clearing away the growth along the roads. Arudra, one of the leaders from Assisi, was asked by his team leader, “Have you ever driven a tractor before?”

Arudra, who confided to us later that since childhood he’d had a fascination with tractors, replied, “No.” “It’s easy,” said his team leader. And for the rest of the day, Arudra enjoyed driving a big red tractor to clear paths.

As the week progressed, one could feel something special taking shape as residents and volunteers alike grew increasingly energized and joyful. During a tea with a group of our friends from Pune who were volunteering, one of them said, “This feels like what Ananda must have been like in the early days.” And indeed it was.

Our friend Nayaswami Aditya commented, “When I was a schoolboy in India, the first long Hindi word I learned was swavalamban. It means ‘self-reliance, self-sufficiency, and independence’ and was a favorite of Mahatma Gandhi’s. This is what it feels like here at Ananda Village now.”

Truly, Swamiji, your creation of Ananda as an expression of Master’s “world brotherhood colonies” is the answer to the problems plaguing global society now. It holds the key to a future of unity and harmony, and spiritual growth for individuals. I came across something you’d once said in a talk: “If we hadn’t taken up the job of building communities, others would have done it, because it’s God’s will that it happen now as part of the divine plan for Dwapara Yuga. But it has been our blessing to do so.” Yes, our blessing—but it’s a blessing that will radiate for generations to come.

Last night your dear friend and global ambassador, Sri Kaarthikeyan, arrived to take part in the events honoring your life.

Last night your dear friend and global ambassador, Sri Kaarthikeyan, arrived to take part in the events honoring your life. After dinner with him and a small group, we were all driving home when we beheld a glorious sunset unlike any we’d ever seen. It was as though the Masters were showing us that their light is shining on the celebration and on the work you’ve started. (These are a few photos.) The power of this light is what will guide Ananda forward in the decades to come and will eventually bless receptive souls around the world.

Thank you, dear Swamiji, for your life of discipleship and service to Master. There is no way to adequately express our gratitude, except perhaps to continue to share with others, to the best of our ability, what you have given so selflessly to the world.

Your child in God,

Devi

Listen to Devi as she first reads the blog, then expands on its meaning and messages for readers with behind-the-blog commentary. Subscribe to the podcast or download the audio recording by right-clicking here. Or listen to it here (8:54): 

The guru’s love for his disciples is far more than just a sweet sentiment. It is rooted in a deep understanding of how to find soul freedom. Sometimes this love is expressed in kindly support, sometimes in impersonal guidance, and sometimes it pushes the disciple to the breaking point. I’d like to share with you a few stories of how Swami Kriyananda’s guiding hand of love shaped my life.

When I came to Ananda, I had received a good education and had done well academically, but had few practical skills. Being new to Master’s teachings, I also felt spiritually inadequate, which led me to be shy around Swamiji. Adding to this, I had been conditioned throughout my life to believe that love and acceptance had to be earned by excelling at whatever one did.

All of these self-limiting thoughts came to the fore one morning when I was asked to bring Swamiji’s mail to his home. As usual, he was busily engaged in writing a book. As I quietly placed his mail in a tray by the door, he glanced up, saw me, and asked:

“Could you make me a cup of coffee before you leave?”

“Yes, Swamiji,” I replied—though in truth I didn’t know how.

I knew that it had something to do with boiling water, so I put some water in a pot and brought it to a boil. And that was as far as I could go. The water continued to boil until very little remained. Swamiji must have realized that enough time had passed, so he left his typewriter and came into the kitchen to see what was happening.

Now came the moment of truth. Glancing at the scant amount of water remaining in the pot, he asked, somewhat incredulously, “Don’t you know how to make coffee?”

“No,” I replied, looking down with embarrassment. “Now,” I thought, “he’ll see what a fool I am, and perhaps suggest I’d be happier living elsewhere.” But this is not what happened.

He threw back his head, laughed, and gave me a sweet, fatherly hug—the first such personal expression of love that I’d ever received from him. “Come,” he said, “I’ll show you how.” This was a significant turning point for me: to be loved and accepted not for my accomplishments, but in spite of my failure.

The second story took place a few years later. I had first learned to drive at Ananda in an old farm pickup truck on bumpy gravel roads, and though I had very little experience driving in traffic, I managed to get my driver’s license. One weekend Swamiji was offering programs in San Francisco, and a group of us joined him there. On Sunday afternoon as he was preparing to return to Ananda Village, he said—much to my shock—“I’d like Devi to drive me home.”

“What could he be thinking?” I wondered fearfully. “Does he really want to risk his life?” Having never driven on a freeway and hoping to get out of it, I said, “I don’t know the way, Swamiji.” (This was in the days before GPS.)

“Don’t worry,” he replied, “I’ll guide you.” And guide me he did—not just with directions, but by bestowing on me a quiet sense of confidence about driving. This skill is surely not essential to finding God, but he was giving me the inner strength to overcome fear and obstacles—strength that would serve me well in the years ahead.

Finally, there is the experience of how Swamiji guided me in learning to teach, which has formed a major part of my life’s service. Though I’d led a few small classes at the Retreat, I’d never taught in large public venues. One time he was giving a three-day workshop at the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco, with over five hundred people attending. With his usual depth, clarity, and magnetism, he gave wonderful classes on Friday night and all day on Saturday.

On Saturday night, Swamiji phoned Jyotish and me to say, “I’d like you both to give part of the talk on Sunday morning. I’ll speak first and then call you up.” It would be hard to convey the panic that engulfed me that night. On Sunday morning we dutifully sat in the front row of the auditorium, waiting to be invited onto the stage. The words that kept repeating in my mind were: “I can’t do this. I can’t do this.”

At last, as it became clear that he was finishing his talk and we would be up next, something remarkable happened. Almost physically, I felt his hand reaching out to my mind with love and support. I don’t recall what I said during the talk, but to this day I clearly remember the feeling: “If you are open and get yourself out of the way, I will speak through you.” This experience has proved to be one of the most formative of my life.

So, my friends, though Swamiji’s body has passed, his loving guidance is not a thing of the past: It continues into the present for anyone who inwardly reaches for it. As Master concludes his beautiful poem “When I Am Only a Dream”:

And yet when I am only a dream to you,

In divine friendship,

Nayaswami Devi

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Paramhansa Yogananda said that a yogi should be able to stand unshaken amidst the crash of breaking worlds. In celebrating the centennial of Swami Kriyananda’s birth, I want to share a few episodes from his life that illustrate exactly this quality.

During Ananda’s early years, Swamiji’s classes were Ananda’s primary source of income, funding the purchase of property and the construction of its first buildings. He taught classes every weeknight throughout the San Francisco Bay Area, and led programs at the Meditation (now Seclusion) Retreat on weekends. Few people could sustain such a schedule, but so determined was he to serve his guru that he found the strength to continue for several years.

It was during this period that Swamiji received troubling news from a local lumber company from which Ananda purchased building materials. The community had fallen behind in its payments, but for many months had been adhering faithfully to an agreement with the owner to catch up. Nevertheless, the owner had suddenly placed a lien on the property, and was threatening to foreclose. News like this would have crushed anyone without deep inner strength.

Swamiji had already been doing all he could to cover his many expenses, and had reached out to generous friends for financial help. Even so, he had no way of meeting this new test. “Knowledge alone,” he later wrote, “could not have helped me over this hurdle. The only thing that works in a real crisis, I’ve discovered, is faith in God.”

Several days later, a young man attending one of his classes asked Swamiji if he would accept a donation for his work. It was for $3,000! Swamiji called the owner that evening and told him, “I have the money you want, but I won’t pay you until you’ve incurred all the legal fees you can. Recalling your demonstration of greed, I’ll just wait till the last moment before I pay you what I owe.” The man offered Swamiji a big discount if he would pay him promptly. This ability not only to rise above challenges, but to turn them into opportunities, has been at the very heart of Ananda’s success.

In his book The Need for Spiritual Communities, Kriyananda wrote: “Many are the lessons that these past years have taught me. . . . My first suggestion [to those interested in starting communities] would be: Be prepared for hardships and difficulties. . . . I have learned that divine grace grows in the soil of hearts that have been softened by suffering.”

Another demonstration of Swamiji’s courage and resilience came in 1976 when Ananda was devastated by a forest fire. Twenty-one of the existing twenty-two homes were lost, and hundreds of acres of land were reduced to ashes. There was no insurance to cover the losses.

Once again rising to the occasion, he called an all-community meeting a few days later. With calm, focused positive energy, he asked: “Who is willing to go out to earn the money to rebuild?” Many hands went up.

Then: “Does anyone know of jobs available that would allow us to work together?” Someone said that there were government contracts available to groups for tree-planting in deforested areas. Again, many volunteers stepped forward.

Finally: “Where can we find dwellings to house people for the winter?” One member suggested that the local government might temporarily allow us to bring small trailers onto the land—though this was not permitted under county regulations at the time. All of these ideas came to fruition. Swamiji infused everyone present with his own strength and confidence that solutions could be found for whatever challenges lay ahead.

After the fire, Swamiji, ever expansive, began a series of national tours called “The Joy Tours,” in which he traveled across the country multiple times to earn money and draw new members to Ananda. The theme of his programs was “Joy is the solution, not the reward.” Always meeting adversity with steadfast courage and faith, he embodied the truth that there is a solution to every problem.

A verse from Swamiji’s song “The Secret of Laughter” captures his spirit beautifully:

Sing when the sun shines, sing when the rain falls,

Thank you, Swamiji, for standing always unshaken, and showing us how we, too, can “seize the lightning flash, and ride the winds of change.”

With joy and gratitude,

Nayaswami Devi

Listen to Devi as she first reads the blog, then expands on its meaning and messages for readers with behind-the-blog commentary. Subscribe to the podcast or download the audio recording by right-clicking here. Or listen to it here (8:28):

Swamiji always saw the best in everyone. No matter how misguided a person was, Kriyananda never judged—he saw only their highest potential. He rarely gave direct advice unasked for, but often offered subtle guidance whose value revealed itself over time.

I’d like to share three stories in which Swamiji gave me simple advice that changed the course of my life.

The first occurred after I’d been at Ananda for only a few weeks. Since childhood, I had been drawn to all forms of dance—ballet, tap, and modern—and had taken dance classes through college. When I came to Ananda, something told me that the time for studying dance was over.

During those first weeks, I attended hatha yoga sessions led by Swamiji. With a background in dance, I was accustomed to stretching and moving into difficult positions, so the physical postures came easily to me. Being new to the teachings, I began to wonder, “What’s so important about hatha yoga? It seems simple and not very relevant to the spiritual path.”

Around this time, I was attending one of Swamiji’s classes. I don’t remember the topic, but at one point he totally digressed from it to say: “Because some people are more limber, they can do the yoga postures easily—but they are missing the point by thinking of them as only physical exercises. The goal of the postures is to become aware of the flow of subtle energy, to use affirmations to direct our minds to higher centers of awareness, and to prepare us for meditation.” Having said that, he returned to his original subject.

It took me a while to realize that he had been speaking directly to me, and to see how oblivious I had been to the spiritual dimension of yoga postures. His indirect advice became a reference point for the rest of my life: Even if you think you understand something, keep striving to go deeper. When a teaching comes from enlightened masters, there will always be something more to discover.

The second story took place a few years after I’d come to Ananda. I had gone into the nearby town of Nevada City with a friend to run some errands and have lunch. As we were leaving the restaurant, Swami Kriyananda came in accompanied by a few students.

I was totally unprepared when he came over and said, “I’m going to give you the spiritual name ‘Devi.’ It means ‘Divine Mother.’” With great determination in his voice, he added, “And you’d better live up to it!” With that, he walked over to a table to join his students.

Swami saw the highest in each of us.

My mind was in a whirl. I hadn’t asked him for a name. I felt completely unworthy to bear one so significant. Yet, as I said, Swami saw the highest in each of us—and this name has been a guiding light for my spiritual development ever since.

The last story I’ll share here is about five simple words of advice that have always remained with me. The events took place about four years after I’d arrived at Ananda, when I was working in the office at the Meditation (now Seclusion) Retreat. In those early days at the Retreat, we had no phones, let alone computers, for taking reservations. Sometimes guests wrote ahead, but most simply arrived unannounced.

The only accommodations at that time were tent platforms, so guests either brought their own tent or camped out under the stars. We kept a supply of sleeping bags and foam pads in a storage room to loan out to anyone who arrived unprepared.

One particularly busy Friday evening, I had lent out every sleeping bag we had. As I was closing up the office, I heard a car pull up. Out stepped a man who announced, “I’m here for the weekend.”

“Do you have a sleeping bag?” I asked.

“No,” he replied, “I didn’t know that I needed one.”

I asked him to wait a moment, ran back to my small trailer, and gathered my own sleeping bag and pad.

“Here,” I said, handing them to him. That night I slept on the bare wooden platform of my trailer and covered myself with a coat.

I said nothing to anyone about what had happened. The next morning, as I walked to the temple to attend Swamiji’s class, he approached me and with a big smile on his face said, “Now you’re getting the idea.”

How often I have drawn on those words throughout my years of service at Ananda: Give everything you have, unreservedly, even if it’s at your own expense.

Swamiji’s guidance has been the foundation of my spiritual life. Thank you, Swamiji, for wisely and lovingly showing us the path to soul freedom.

With joy and blessings in God and Guru,

Nayaswami Devi

Listen to Devi as she first reads the blog, then expands on its meaning and messages for readers with behind-the-blog commentary. Subscribe to the podcast or download the audio recording by right-clicking here. Or listen to it here (11:06):

In this year of Swami Kriyananda’s centennial, we continue to share stories from our experiences with him—in part to help you know him better, but also for the joy of recalling these incidents, as Yogananda wrote, in “the easy resurrection of memory.”

The first story takes place during a period when Swamiji had been in residence at Ananda Assisi for quite some time. We began to miss him deeply and decided to pay him a visit. Unfortunately, our timing was poor—we arrived during a stretch when he was absorbed in writing and teaching. Though he was always gracious, he had little time for personal connection.

One evening as he was leaving the temple after a public satsang, he must have seen the disappointment (and hurt) on my face, for he called me over to him. “Devi,” he said, looking deeply into my eyes, “no one is special to me. I’m not even special to myself.”

And yet. . . . Paramhansa Yogananda wrote in Autobiography of a Yogi that divine vision is “center everywhere, circumference nowhere.” Swamiji’s life, centered as it was in unceasing service and devotion to his guru, was for that very reason centered everywhere. He never lost sight of all those who sincerely opened themselves to him spiritually. His care for his students wasn’t rooted in personal emotions, but was deep and unwavering: a living demonstration of divine love. In truth, he made each one of us feel we were special to him in some meaningful way. During that visit, I felt more strongly than ever before how much we truly meant to him—not in the sense of outward interaction, but through a deep, soul connection.

The second story reflects another facet of divine love. It occurred during my first few years at Ananda. I had faced several setbacks during this time, and I was in a period of discouragement and confusion. It was someone’s task each day to bring Swamiji’s mail to his home at Crystal Hermitage. One day the person who usually did this had another commitment and asked me if I could fill in.

Knowing my mental state was not at its best, I hesitated to bring my inner turmoil into Swamiji’s presence. “Don’t worry,” the regular courier told me. “Swamiji will be writing, and he won’t even notice you. Just put the mail on the table next to the front door and slip away.” I figured even I could do that.

But that was not what happened. After setting down the mail, I turned quickly to leave—when Swamiji, who was in silence and busy writing, glanced up and saw me. Motioning for me to come over, he pulled the sheet of paper that he was working on from his typewriter. (Yes, Swamiji wrote a number of his books in the Dark Ages before computers.)

Inserting a piece of notepaper into the carriage of the typewriter, he typed a single line: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and all these things will be added unto you.” That was all. Pulling it out and handing it to me, he watched as I read it in amazement. Then he smiled, nodded for me to leave, and returned to his writing. Even in the midst of concentrated work, he perceived my confusion and took time to help. From that brief exchange, my energy and perspective dramatically changed, and I was able to move forward into brighter days.

A friend of mine shared with me this final story as we were walking together one day. When I mentioned that Swamiji had called Jyotish and me the previous night, she sighed and said, “He’s never called us”; then she grew thoughtful and quietly added, “but he did once.”

When I looked at her questioningly, she continued: “My husband and I had had a big disagreement one night. Each of us stubbornly refused to concede, and we went to bed without speaking. Then, early the next morning the phone rang—and to our surprise, it was Swamiji. ‘I just want to thank you both for your beautiful spirit,’ he said. That was all. We looked at each other in amazement, then tears filled our eyes, and all the tension and disharmony melted away. We embraced in the aura of Swami’s divine love.”

In Yogananda’s poem “Samadhi” he wrote: “The sparrow, each grain of sand, fall not without my sight.” My friend, the days to experience this did not end with Swamiji’s passing. His presence is always within reach for those who sincerely call on him, for he was a channel for Master’s all-encompassing, eternal love. Each of us is a little sparrow in God’s sight—this is His greatest gift to all His children.

With joy and gratitude,

Nayaswami Devi

Listen to Devi as she first reads the blog, then expands on its meaning and messages for readers with behind-the-blog commentary. Subscribe to the podcast or download the audio recording by right-clicking here. Or listen to it here (10:18):