A yoga school sees the light of day

Silver Jubilee in 1972 Håå Course

Center was founded,
1970 - 1995 beautifully situated in
25 years ago Swami southern Sweden, about
Janakananda returned from 150 km north of
India and started the Copenhagen. It has
Scandinavian Yoga and become an international
Meditation School. course center that has
After using yoga for given many different
many years to obtain people, from
increased creativity with Scandinavia, the rest of
theatre and painting, for Europe, USA, Australia
well-being and as a means and elsewhere, the
to discover more about possibility to discover
him-self, Swami their potential, obtain
Janakananda was inspired perspective, insight and
by his teacher Swami energy - a spiritual power
Satyananda to share his center, where we build a
experience with others bridge between the inner
(read more about it in the and the outer life.
article Kriya Yoga III). Bindu appeared in
It all began in the Danish already in 1971,
summer of 1970 in a little with Swami Janakananda
shop in Østerbro, as the driving force. He
Copenhagen. The school wrote the book “Yoga,
grew quickly, people Tantra and Meditation in
moved in to become yoga Daily Life” in 1975; in
Sohan Qadri - Moola-Mukhi Yantra

teachers and/or get a 1978 it was published in

closer contact with the English, and has been
spiritual side of life. republished in an
Already after a year, it expanded and revised
was necessary to move to edition in 1992 by
larger premises. The Rider Books in the UK
choice fell on a villa in and Weiser in USA.
Hellerup, a suburb of It has now been
Copenhagen, and in translated into 8
1974, when this also languages. The cassette
became too small, the tape with the deep
school moved to a large relaxation “Experience
building in central Yoga Nidra” was
Copenhagen - and was made a non-profit tank, a lay-out studio and a large ashram released in English in 1983.
organisation. The school is still there, with accomodation for the yoga teachers. In 1977 the school organised an
and is an active center for yoga and international yoga congress in
meditation with a shop, 5 large halls for Very soon the teachers started looking Stockholm, Meditation Yoga 77, with
teaching, “the Pyramid” - an isolation for a place to have intensive retreats, and participants from all over the world.

2
Apart from Swami Satyananda, who
during those years often visited the
school, yogis came from India, Europe
and USA. Yoga teachers and pupils,
artists, psychologists, sociologists,
musicians, people from the film world,
philosophers and therapists met and
received inspiration, attended courses,
lectures, meditations and concerts.
Swami Janakananda is the leader of
the school’s comprehensive yoga teacher
education, a process that gives a stable
personal experience of Tantric yoga and
meditation. Besides training yoga
teachers he teaches the annual 3-month
courses and a few shorter courses at Håå
Course Center. He also gives lectures,
satsangs and meditation courses at the
different city schools. From 1979 Swami
Janakananda has travelled a lot, teach ing
in America, Australia, New Zeeland,
Singapore and around Europe. He now
spends more time writing, but he still
finds time for his international students,
for example a tour to Australia is
scheduled.
As the yoga teachers gained in
experience and became independent
many chose to continue the co-operation
with the school and founded new
branches. Today the Scandinavian Yoga
and Meditation School consists of ten
mutually independent schools.
Apart from the ordinary classes, the
teachers of the school have taught in the
most varied of places over the years:
hospitals, sports clubs, associations and
music festivals. Major companies and
banks, health fairs, prisons and
orchestras invite us to teach. We arrange
courses on charter- and health tours to
the Mediterranean and on holiday camps.
Schools and other educational
establishments frequently employ us for
theoretical and practical introductions.
Meditative art
Swami Janakananda was one of the
pioneers of the 1970 Poex-exhibition in
Copenhagen and Århus, when meditative
art, yoga and meditation could be
experienced together for the first time in
Denmark. In the course of time the
school has on several occasions held art
exhibitions on its premises.
In this silver jubilee year we have
opened the doors to an exhibition of
meditative art by the internationally
recognised artist, Sohan Qadri (see
illustrations on pages 2 and 35). He was
born in north India and raised with the
Tantric tradition, but today he lives
mostly in Copenhagen.
The exhibition is in Hannover until
Oct. 15th, then in Århus, Stockholm and
Copenhagen.
The goal of the school is:
l to raise the teaching of yoga to a level
where it is free of all superstition and
with no extras attached, based on a
profound knowledge that stems from
the sources of the tradition, personal
experience, human contact between
teacher and student, and the research
of modern psychology and medicine.
l to be able to offer a practical yoga
ranging from physical and mental
well-being to spiritual insight, which
for instance C.G. Jung asks for in our
culture, where man not only lives
superficially, but has a creative and
conscious relationship to all of
himself and to life around him.
l to be an independent school where
people can come and go as they like,
with no attachment other than the
teaching they participate in.
Franz Jervidalo q

Contents Savasana 29
To lie completely still on the back - a simple, but nevertheless
Editorial 2 deep-reaching method...
25 years with the Scandinavian Yoga and Meditation School, a
historical retrospect. Håå International Course Center in south Sweden 30
Holiday and initiation in Tantric meditation.
Yoga for pregnant women 4 Programme for autumn and winter, plus the 3-Months Course
- before, during and after birth. The yoga courses for pregnant from January to April 1996
women are very popular, and are recommended by doctors and
midwives. Yoga, Tantra and Meditation in daily life 32
Swami Janakananda’s book on yoga from
Kriya Yoga III 9 a yogi’s point of view.
- Time for learning... time for insight... time for teaching...In this
silver jubilee article, Swami Janakananda delves into his own The Yoga shop 33
background within meditation and yoga. Neti pots, tapes, books...

3
Yoga for pregnant women - before, during and after birth
by Laxmi
Some believe that the best way to we start by lying down for a The blood circulation is stimulated
prepare for birth is to sing, be happy and few minutes, completely still by blood-pumping exercises, where
just take the birth as it comes, trusting with the eyes closed, to calm the legs, feet and toes are bent and
one’s intuition. In one way I agree. down. Then we work through stretched. This helps prevent cramps
However, if you are not familiar with the whole body with a and varicose veins in the legs. All
using your body, and you are not aware programme of physical the poses where the weight of the
of your own breath, then when it really exercises and poses, where child is removed from the pelvis
counts the best solutions do not always the breath usually follows relieve and give rest to the most
appear by themselves. the movements. After that burdened areas of the pregnant
we go on to various
During pregnancy many changes occur breathing exercises,
in the woman’s body and mental state. ending with half an hour of
The growing weight of the baby and the guided Yoga Nidra, deep
increased amount of blood in the body relaxation.
necessitates more physical training, both A yoga
to stimulate the blood circulation and programme is
counteract fatigue. She also needs to comprised of
relax, to feel the child in the womb and both dynamic
to be able to accept her reactions and movements
trust her own sentiments. using deep, calm
breathing, and
If you already do yoga before pregnancy, poses which
or start well in advance, before you get stretch and twist
“big” or “troubled”, then the yoga poses the body in
provide well-being and they very different ways.
effectively help to prevent many This ensures that
common inconveniences. However, it is virtually no part
never too late to begin, as even a short of the body is
period of yoga can be effective and give left untouched.
you resources to use during the birth The muscles are
itself. strengthened and
made supple, the
various organs
Practical ante-natal classes, and glands are
with a varied programme stimulated and the
A yoga course primarily consists of digestion is
different practical methods. Each time activated.

“When I was six months pregnant, I got depressed and tired to such an extent that everyday life became a nuisance. I lay down most
of the time, and got back problems as the child grew bigger. I cried almost all the time, and was fearful for the rest of the pregnancy,
where I might be confined to bed.
Even after a few classes of yoga, I experienced greatly increased well-being and energy. Now I am seldom tired, go to bed late
and wake up fresh and rested in the morning. I am happy and look forward to giving birth.” (Britta from Copenhagen)

4
woman’s body; moreover the blood
supply to the child is increased. This
includes, for instance, standing on all
fours, standing up with the upper part of
the body hanging down and in
Shoulderstand and Headstand (you are
actually able to do much more than you
may think is possible during pregnancy).
There is another group of exercises,
attitudes and locks (Mudra and
Bandha), where you gain a good contact
with your pelvic floor and train its
muscles. Here you contract the anus, the
sexual organs and the perineum -
separately and simultaneously - hold the
tension for a while and then let go again.
This is repeated very slowly and in a
concentrated manner several times. It has
both a relaxing and strengthening effect
on the area of the pelvic floor and is
good for haemorrhoids. However, the
attitudes and locks do not only work
physically, they also remove psychic
tensions, for example headaches and
depressions. These exercises are not only
beneficial for pregnant women, they are
also used as preparation for relaxation
and meditation in other classes.
Many pregnant women discover that it
becomes more difficult for them to
breathe through the nose. The hormonal
changes affect the mucous membranes in
the nose. This can be remedied with nose
cleansing. With a special pot you pour
lukewarm salt water through the nose, so
it runs in through one nostril and out of
the other, and vice versa. It has a
refreshing effect and keeps the mucous
membranes of the nose clean and in
balance, so that the breathing is not
impeded, and it also prevents colds. (See
also Bindu no. 3).
You can help your child by
using your breath
The breathing exercises provide more
oxygen and energy, both to the mother
and the child. When I was pregnant, I
experienced how these exercises gave me
more tranquillity and concentration in
my daily life, throughout the pregnancy.
One of the most harmonious and fast
working breathing exercises is the
Psychic Breathing. The breathing is
“stretched”, i.e. made even and deep; and
the breath is retained for a short while,
both after inhalation and exhalation. This
breathing technique is undertaken by
making a soft, whispering sound in the
bottom of the throat, which sounds like a
child in deep sleep (see Bindu no. 4, The
Source of Energy). It has been proven
that the Psychic Breathing activates the
parasympathetic nervous system, which
means that you calm down. It is a good
daily practise both for relaxation and for
gaining more energy.
During my birth the midwife commented
during a contraction: “Do go on with the
deep breathing. I can hear from the
child’s heart beat that it helps him,
specially during the contractions where
he is pressed”. So, I continued and
experienced how the Psychic Breathing
made it easier to relax - to such an extent
that the pain almost disappeared.
Thus, it is effective to use the Psychic
Breathing both between the contractions,
to make the most of the break, and also
during the contractions - in this way
“lifting yourself over and across the
pain”, as one women expressed it.
At a post-natal yoga course in Århus
there were two friends, who had both
benefited greatly from the Psychic
Breathing whilst giving birth. One had
used it throughout her whole birth - eight
hours in all - because it relieved the pain
so well. The other related: “I couldn’t
open more than a couple of centimetres.
The contractions didn’t really have an
effect, and I got more and more tense and
worried. The midwife believed my pelvic
floor was too tight, and that soon we
would have to prepare ourselves for a
caesarean. My husband suggested that
we did the Psychic Breathing that we had
Midwife Mila Pajovic from Århus
Maternity Ward is one of the midwives
who consistently recommends yoga to
the pregnant women. Why?
- The women become more supple and
mobile, and they profit from this
during the birth. Many of the yoga
poses are also very good to use during
labour. By becoming familiar with the
different poses, the woman feels more
clearly which ones will have the best
effect during the birth. They learn to
make use of the breath in different
ways so that the child gets more
oxygen, both during pregnancy and
the birth itself. Also some yoga poses
can turn the baby in the womb, if it is
lying in the wrong way.
Are you able to see or feel during the
birth, whether a woman has attended
yoga classes?
- Yes, usually they are better at coping
with the pain and using it in a positive
way. They are more secure, and they
are able to use the breath to influence
their own state. They are good at
relaxing, including when it hurts. With
the yoga techniques you get to know
your body, breath and yourself better.
What benefits do the pregnant women
tell you they have gained from their
yoga course?
- I mostly hear about practical and
tangible problems that yoga has
helped them to overcome, for example
pains in the back and the pelvis.
Frequently they mention that they no
longer have cramps in the legs, or feel
that their digestion is functioning
properly again. Even those with a very
big stomach can feel lightness in the
body. They find that giving themselves
time to practise yoga creates mental
well-being. For the two and a half
hours duration of a lesson, she can
take a break from all the everyday
chores. You wind down and enjoy
having only yourself and your baby to
take care of. q
5

The shoulder pose is one of the poses that can turn the baby, so that the head points
downwards if it is lying upside-down in the womb. See below.
learnt at a week end course. After just a
few breaths I relaxed and the birth
developed completely normally. I now
use the same form of breathing for breast
feeding, to calm myself and the baby.”
The breathing exercises in yoga each
have their own special effect. Some
cleanse and refresh, others are calming.
All of them harmonise the blood
pressure. They make it easier to let go of
a stressed and nervous state and also to
overcome fatigue and depression.
Relaxation can be learnt
A genuine relaxation gives rest to body
and mind, and you benefit more from
your night’s sleep. During relaxation the
nervous system changes from
sympathetic to parasympathetic activity,
the latter being associated with the
restorative processes of the body. This is
needed both by the pregnant woman and
the child. “Yoga Nidra is the peak of my
whole day”, I have heard many expectant
mothers say. Once you know the relaxed
state, it is easier to return to it when you
need it.
The yoga tradition contains various
relaxation techniques. A simple way of
practising daily deep relaxation is to
have it on a tape - Experience Yoga
Nidra by Swami Janakananda has two
relaxations, a short one to start with, and
a longer and deeper one, when you want
to go further (see page 33).
The relationship to pain
Most women experience pain when they
give birth. However, regarding her
choice of methods to manage or relieve
the pain, the woman’s own inner security
and self knowledge are important factors
- as is her ability to relax and
concentrate.
Within the yoga tradition there is a
technique through which you learn to
deal with sense impressions or influences
without yielding to them. The method is
called Pratyahara and is valuable to use
during the birth. (It is described in detail
in the book Yoga, Tantra and Meditation
in Daily Life by Swami Janakananda).
In Pratyahara you direct your whole
attention towards the “disturbance”, for
instance a pain, instead of trying to avoid
or suppress it. You accept it and allow
yourself to experience it. Thus, it ceases
to be something “dangerous”, that you
want to avoid at any price; by getting to
know it you manage it. And you may
well “forget” it. Perhaps the pains do not
disappear entirely, although you relax,
but the fear of the pain disappears - and
the birth becomes a powerful experience.
Some women have related in detail how
they were able to feel the movements of
the uterus. Others have described that
they were able to permit the force of
nature or energy to work - energy which,
behind everything, governs life and birth.
Many women actually have such a
surplus of energy during the whole birth
that they can freely use their knowledge
of the yoga techniques, to choose those

“Shortly before my first birth, the midwife discovered that the child was lying in the wrong direction with the legs down. We went to
the hospital, where the doctors tried to turn him around, but without success. They said he was very big and that it was physically
impossible to turn the baby. They insisted on doing a caecerian! I was under immense pressure from the staff, because I didn’t
accept the authority of the doctors. In the end we left the hospital. At home I started to practise the Shoulder Pose for a long time,
many times each day. I continued because I could feel something was happening inside of me. It was as if there was tremendous
movement inside. The following day the midwife came to examine me, and I could hardly believe her, when she said that the baby
had turned around. Shortly afterwards I had an easy and harmonious home birth, where my experience with Pratyahara and
visualisation proved a great help”. (Anne from Aalborg, Denmark)

6
of the greatest possible help in the actual
situation.
“Thank you for the course”, a woman
said, who had attended an ante-natal
yoga course prior to the birth of her
daughter. “It was so wonderful... but the
greatest was to do the lion’s roar during
labour.” When you open your mouth,
stretch the tongue far out and make a
relaxed, deep sound throughout the
exhalation, then it automatically has an
effect all the way down to the groin and
the pelvic floor. This may be due to an
interaction between the nerves in the
region of the mouth and jaw and the
muscles of the pelvic floor. For each
contraction, she became better and better
at “controlling the pain by means of the
sound”, even those pains which are
normally the strongest.
birth is going to be. However, when the
contractions really get going, you can
easily hand over the responsibility to the
hospital staff, unless you are in shape to
go through with what you really want.
On the other hand, a birth is no athletic
feat, where the woman is either “good”
or “bad”. And should something
unexpected occur, such as a protracted
birth where the child suffers from a lack
of oxygen, then it is fine to have access
to all the resources offered by a modern
maternity ward, and not least to the
doctors and midwives with all their
knowledge and experience.
To practise yoga during pregnancy
does not guarantee an easy and
unproblematic birth. But I am certain,
that what ever kind of birth you choose -
in water, standing up or lying down, at
home or in a hospital - and no matter
how the birth unfolds, then yoga gives
you your own experiences and a set of
“tools” which help you to accept and
manage any given situation.
In shape again
- on a course or at home
At the post-natal yoga courses most
mothers are accompanied by their
children, who alternate between sleeping,
being breast fed or getting changed.

When I gave birth to my own child,

roughly six years ago, I used many of the
techniques I teach in the ante-natal
classes. It was a quiet birth,
and I had plenty of time
to move around. During
the first stage I sat in the
squatting position, stood
up with the upper part of the
body hanging horizontally and
stood on all fours. During the last,
forceful contractions of the first stage, I
really needed my ability to concentrate to
avoid tensing. An old Tantric poem on
devotion to all the various aspects of life
arose in my mind. “Devotion, devotion,
devotion...” I thought and experienced
pain. I was pain and devotion at the same
time. It was so intense, that there was
neither the need nor the time for thoughts
about any kind of pain-killers. It became
a strong “here and now” experience.

To be yourself
during the birth
Many women have quite a rose-coloured
idea of how natural and beautiful their

7
Some look intensely at the yoga
exercises. One can join the course as
soon as the desire and inspiration are
present. Some even start just a few days
after the birth, while others need more
time.
If you have attended yoga classes during
pregnancy, you can still use the same
exercises at home, including
immediately after the birth. It is still
important to do those dynamic
movements which stimulate the blood
circulation and the digestion. Afterwards
Kriya’s Birth
In 1978 two of the yoga teachers at our
school in Stockholm, Tove and Jan,
were expecting a child. Like most
others they wished for the greatest
possible harmony during the
pregnancy and to be well prepared for
the birth itself. Tove was therefore very
careful about doing her Kriya Yoga
every day and in addition she did
ordinary yoga poses. The birth should
preferably be as natural as possible,
and at home, even though it was just
about impossible to be allowed to do
that in Sweden at that time. No doctors
would take the responsibility and
therefore no midwives would
undertake it either.
The pregnancy proceeded according
to plan until she was 7 months
pregnant. Supported by the Kriya
Yoga, Tove experienced her pregnancy
with great intensity and energy.
Nevertheless, during a routine
examination at the hospital she was
informed that possibly the child was
not growing properly. This was
demonstrated by measuring the size of
the stomach. To be on the safe side, the
doctor suggested she be hospitalised. It
would then be possible to regularly
check the amount of the hormone
oestriol in the urine, which is related to
8
it is great to once again lie on the
stomach, resting or doing the back
strengthening poses where you lift the
upper part of the body or the legs (such
as Cobra, Locust and Bow).
Simultaneously the stomach is pressed
against the floor, and this promotes
contraction of the uterus and the return to
its normal size. It is also good to stretch
the stomach. In the Wave Breath, you lie
on your back, and alternately draw in and
push the stomach out, holding the breath
after having inhaled or exhaled fully. The
more forceful exercises for the
the placenta’s capability of functioning.
At the same time the hospital would offer
some peace and quiet, in case she was
overworked.
This was not exactly according to
Tove’s taste, but she agreed to be
hospitalised and in the subsequent period
she was required to rest as much as
possible. She almost had to cheat to do
her Kriya Yoga now and then! She
quickly got tired of this kind of life, and
therefore “fought” to be allowed to take
the samples of urine at home and then
deliver them to the hospital. Later, when
the results of the examinations of the
urine were known, they revealed that the
amount of the hormone was fine, and it
had all been a storm in a teacup.
As the time of the birth approached,
Tove and Jan participated in a weekend
course for yoga teachers at Håå Course
Center in south Sweden. They wished to
give birth at the course center, in the
countryside and among good friends.
They had therefore found a Danish
doctor in the neighbourhood who would
take the responsibility, should the baby
arrive during this weekend. (As
mentioned earlier it was not common
for Swedish doctors to participate in
home births). They also succeeded in
finding a midwife who wanted to come.
abdominal muscles can strain the pelvic
floor, especially those where straight legs
are raised and lowered. These should
therefore be delayed until after the
muscles of the pelvic floor have been
trained with the aforementioned Mudra
(contractions).
If you spend just a little time using yoga,
relaxation and meditation daily, it
benefits yourself, your surroundings and
your baby - who will definitely
appreciate an energetic and harmonious
mother. q
However, the midwife made it a
condition that the baby should arrive
on Saturday, as she was busy during
the other days.
The baby “of course” came on
Saturday. Some time during the
afternoon the contractions started
slowly, and the midwife was there
around five o’clock. After another
three hours, where Tove alternately sat
in the squatting position and walked
around, the child was born after 3-4
second stage contractions. The
midwife thought it was an unusually
fast and harmonious birth, considering
that it was her first one. The child got
the highest possible amount of points.
Length and weight were fine. The skin
was ideal both concerning colour and
elasticity. From the healthy placenta it
was clear that the child had
experienced no difficulties in taking
nourishment, and there were no
indications of hardening of the arteries.
The midwife was so amazed by the
ease and success of the birth, that she
decided to start yoga on account of
this. And the parents who had observed
Kriya Yoga’s good influence on Tove’s
well-being throughout the pregnancy
and the smooth birth, named their
daughter Kriya. q
Kriya Yoga III
Time for learning... time for insight... time for teaching...
Kriya Yoga can be compared to a fire
that burns constantly during the
meditation, cleansing the body and
mind of limitations, inhibitions and
confusion; whatever stands in the way
of clarity, energy and balance and for
which you have no use.
Consistency is necessary if you want
to reach the essential. All roads lead to
Rome, it is said. Yes, but you have to
choose one road to get there. It is not
knowledge of all kinds of methods and
therapies that matters, but knowledge
of yourself. What matters first and
foremost is stability, investigation
through one’s meditation and gaining
insight. I see how difficult it is for
© 1995 Lars Magnusson
people who have tried all sorts of
things to take the final steps and break
through the wall isolating us from a
deeper insight and an experience of a
greater reality - they become rich with
understanding, with opinions and
theoretical knowledge, yes, even with
certain experiences, but the eye of the
needle has become too small for them
to pass through.
Life is a creative process
When I planned these articles on Kriya
Yoga, I did some fundamental thinking
about the content. This third article
should, among other things, be about
conditions for teaching and learning
Kriya Yoga, and about Kriya Yoga
itself. However, I saw that I couldn’t
just write an article based on rules and
facts that everybody should adhere to
just because I wrote it.
I therefore decided to write this third
- a Silver jubilee article by Swami Janakananda
article as an account based on my own
life and experiences. It is then up to the
reader to decide whether there is any
meaning in what I say, especially in
relation to who teaches advanced yoga
and how it is taught. I think that such
teaching ought to have other conditions
than ordinary weekly yoga and
elementary meditation.
Here I will write about what made
me investigate and use precisely yoga,
in light of the experience I have had as
a teacher for 25 years, and about the
influence of yoga in my life.
Creativity can have many
expressions, particularly when it is
about human evolution and one’s
insight into oneself. And when I
describe my life in relation to yoga and
my “truth”, then I must also accept
other’s truth - the life they lead, their
background and the experience they
have had.
Still, I do not wish to be gentle on
anyone who is trying to get away with
making the teaching “easy”, and in so
doing spoiling something unbelievably
valuable for all those who are
searching for real tools on the path of
self realisation.
Of course, one cannot guarantee that
all the teachers one trains have the
same attitude towards life as oneself -
and it would be absurd to expect so.
But it is not as simple as it appears. A
yoga teacher can, for example, be
materialistic and “capable”, and firmly
believe that the limited reality he sees
is the whole reality. His or her teaching
or propagating will stem from that
notion. When one has the whole thing
in one’s head and no longer uses yoga
in practice or meditates for real, then
how can one keep open the doors to
mysticism and insights? A teacher-
student, for whom career and position
are more important, and who has
finance and material needs as a goal in
itself, can only take students to a
certain limit, no matter what his (or
her) ideas are about his own worth...
He has not awakened his psychic
abilities or realised his spiritual gifts,
those gifts that reach beyond the
limitations of the mind. A student once
asked such a teacher: “What have you
got out of yoga?” “I’ve got a good
job,” was the reply.
For the mystic, all possibilities are
open, also those that he does not know
himself, but which are possible for
9
others. Nothing is final or permanent,
the mystic wishes to discover life anew
every day. Therefore the mystic attains
the unattainable - the impossible - that
which the materialist thinks is delusion
or wrong because it is not described, or
is described differently, in his
textbooks.
Indeed, life is a creative process.
My background
Yoga in my life
How did I come to use yoga in my
life? What impulses gave me the
inspiration? Basically I find it difficult
to separate life into the spiritual and
profane, into play and work, into
everyday life and celebration. I do not
believe that all our endeavours in life
are to survive, but that life is a journey
of discovery, where everything belongs
and has meaning. All we need is to be
sufficiently awake to realise it.
Still, I use these words:
- spiritual, to be in contact with the
whole of yourself, or to be on your
way towards a greater consciousness;
- psychic, the processes in us that we
are normally unaware of and, amongst
other things, include energy as an
overriding principle that is the
foundation of life in the physical
dimension, but which we are often
completely ignorant of; and energy, as
a field in and around our body, and as
flows that we can learn to direct to
change our state or heal ourselves or
others; and chakra, as connecting links
between body, energy, feelings and
thoughts - our psychic senses.
Are we today so alienated from the
spiritual reality that we, apparently
without knowing it, are a part of? Must
we take literally mythological and
limited descriptions of this reality?
10
Descriptions that have nothing to do Near death
with our conscious life, at least, not as I got the idea to write this article based
it has been officially interpreted for the on my own life, after having given an
last 1600 years. Must we base this interview with Danish Radio P1,
belief solely on other people’s range of Autumn 1993, in the programme
vision, sometimes under force or “Sunday morning, the programme
pressure, for example from a church about ourselves and what we believe
and a society that does not want the in”. I will begin by quoting from that:
single human being to make his or her
own explorations? Why? As children
we know that we are part of something
greater, greater than that picture which
upbringing and education later gives
us. As children we take this greater
reality for granted - this is how it is.
The yoga I know is principally based
upon people doing something - they
receive certain “keys”, they learn to
use methods that create balance in
body and mind and expand
consciousness - so they themselves can
feel a result. Yoga should not give you
a ready-made attitude to life, but
should make it possible for you to go
in the direction you want and thereby
become one with your life.
Naturally, when one has to
discriminate between dreams, “Anders Laugesen: That source,
expectations, wishes, worries on the which you have sought and presumably
one hand and experiences of an altered also found, this has some connection
consciousness with greater clarity and with yoga...?
more energy on the other, the question Swami Janakananda: Yes, you
arises as to what is real and what is could say that, even though yoga in
illusion. After all, a whole culture can itself is only a tool. The reason why I
live on illusions and psychoses; as it felt attracted especially to yoga
happened in periods of European probably is found far back in my life,
history where people were burnt as yes, maybe even before life. It also
witches and heretics for having another springs from some thinking I have
understanding of life, other than that of done, some experiences I have had,
the religious and political rulers and memories or whatever you call it.
the common superstition. Something that suggests to myself why
The ability to discriminate is I went in this direction.
therefore most important in spiritual When I was 8 years old, I learned a
yoga - every day the individual must be yoga exercise, where one has to lie
trained in especially that ability - with completely still on the back. I was a
the tradition, the personal teacher and nervous child and to lie completely still
even science as helpers. for a quarter of an hour - not in bed,
but on the living room floor, wasn’t so
easy. I was not to fall asleep, nor do
anything else. At first I couldn’t
understand the meaning of this. I lay
there and looked around. But then,
when I had been lying there for a while,
I closed my eyes and began to realise
what a revolution it was, just to lie and
be still. My senses opened and the more
I used the exercise, the more aware I
became and the more I calmed down.
This is an exercise that I still use and
teach others with great enthusiasm.
Anders Laugesen: Were your
parents interested in Asian mysticism
and yoga?
Swami Janakananda: No, not at
all, but they were both devout
Christians. And there was an incident
early in my life that possibly made
them even more so.
My mother was a nurse, and very
active within the Methodist Church
where she did social work trying to
help people who had gone astray and
were in social distress. I don’t know
whether my father was especially
religious when she met him.
Something happened to him in those
years before I came along, where he
incidentally joined a church other than
that of my mother. I have often looked
back on this with a smile, as I
experienced a very great tolerance in
my home - especially between my
parents’ different churches. One was
the Methodist Church and the other the
Apostolic Church. The Methodist
Church was cosy and safe, it was the
Jerusalem Church in Copenhagen. We
went there especially at Christmas,
Easter and so on. But on ordinary
Sundays, we would attend the large
grey wooden building which at that
time was at Østerbro in Copenhagen.
That was the stronghold of the
Apostolic Church, where my father
was an Elder. It was an entertaining
church, with a large stringed orchestra
and choir that really went for it, a large
baptismal font, or rather a little
swimming pool, where people were
baptised in white robes and white
socks. My mother and I always sat
right next to the font and got a few
splashes into the bargain. It was a
strong experience to attend church on
Sunday morning - until I grew up and
started resisting, as one does... They
prayed very loudly and spoke in
tongues all at once, and they often
stood up and raised their arms in the
air. Interesting foreigners from other
countries often came to visit and were
interpreted from the pulpit. All that
was exciting...
Anders Laugesen: Was it rebellion
against your father and mother that you
didn’t choose to work in an
ecclesiastical environment ...
Swami Janakananda: It started a
little bit earlier than the typical teenage
rebellion, and I don’t think that at the
time it was directed towards my
parents, but rather was a stance against
what I saw and experienced. I think I
began to resist already at the age of 10
or 11. We moved around a lot also. For
some years I went to boarding school
and saw things from a distance. But let
me begin earlier.
You said you wanted to talk about
reincarnation today, but I had an
experience of a slightly different kind
when I was two years old. It made a
great impression on everyone. I was
dying. The doctor had actually given
up on me. He had gone home. I lay
there hovering between life and death -
I was probably close to crossing the
threshold of death. I had an experience,
which I later had confirmed in various
literature. I saw a being of light
standing in front of me. It was simply
made of light, and there was no doubt
that it was a being. When I look back, I
sensed it as if it were in the room
where I lay - now it is so long ago, that
I don’t remember whether I was in the
body or somewhere else, but that’s how
I remember it anyway. When I spoke
about it later, my parents thought it was
an angel - it was interpreted
immediately.
I don’t know how this has influenced
the rest of my life. People who have
experienced this as adults, can notice a
change in their attitude to life, but I
was only between two and three years
old.
Shortly before my condition
worsened, I asked my parents: “But,
why don’t you pray?!” - Two years old,
how could I have thought of that? Can
a child just say something like that, in
complete seriousness, to his despairing
parents? Or does one bring something
with oneself into life? I said: “Pray for
me!” - and so they did. They were
deeply shocked, I know that. All the
Elders in the Apostolic Church
interceded for me, and my mother
prayed. And she phoned the priest at
the Methodist Church, and he prayed
and I don’t know who else prayed. I
wasn’t very old so it’s just what I’ve
been told.
After the experience with the
luminous being, I became conscious
again. Immediately I asked for some
milk, and was given a glass, despite the
doctor’s order that milk was the one
thing I was not allowed to have,
perhaps to avoid the formation of
mucus in the respiratory passages.
Then my mother phones the doctor and
tells him: “Now the boy is sitting up in
bed, drinking milk.” He comes as fast
as possible to give her some sedatives.
He figured I was dead and that my
mother had begun to imagine things.
11

But I was actually awake and well when
he came, and he was very surprised.
I am in no doubt about the power of
prayer, but I do not consider myself
religious...”
So much for the interview.
The luminous being actually
appeared a few times in my early
childhood. The last time was when I
attended a holiday camp run by the
Apostolic Church, “The King Camp”
at Sejerø Bay. This incident was
probably the beginning of the end of
my childhood faith. I saw the luminous
being again one evening, standing at
the foot of my bed. Not only that, other
children in the dormitory saw it too,
and it caused quite a stir. The reason
for my dissociation from the church
was that this was exploited by the
adults to create a religious fervour.
Next day we children were told that all
except one had been redeemed, as a
result of that incident. Of course, no
one dared to confess that they were the
12
one who hadn’t been redeemed. I
didn’t know of the word manipulation
as yet, but I now knew what it was.
My first experiences of
silence
Silence and stillness, “mauna”, is a part
of the practice of yoga - and an
important part of the fine tuning of the
mind so that it can learn or perceive
Kriya Yoga in the best possible way. I
will cover this in the next article on
Kriya Yoga, where I will also explain
the importance of the length of the
initiation period. When I was six years
old, I didn’t know anything about the
silence in yoga. Nevertheless, I had
some experiences of silence which I
still remember clearly.
The most important was a way to be
silent that I began to appreciate in
those years. It was the twilight hour, a
quiet hour observed as the sun was
setting, late in the afternoon. I, together
with others, have described this in the
previous issue of Bindu, both the way
it was (and still is) practised in our
culture and as a supplementary
knowledge of this phenomenon in the
yoga tradition. Sitting completely still
in the living room together with other
members of the family and sensing
how darkness settles, was my first
experience of a state of peace that
came very close to meditation.
The other experience is maybe just a
curiosity for the reader, but for me this
silence made an indelible impression.
It must have been the first year after
the war, April 9, the day when we
remembered the Nazi invasion of
Denmark. Everyone in Denmark
commemorated this day with two
minutes of silence at noon. All traffic
stopped in Copenhagen - trams, the
few cars there were at that time, horse
carts and bicycles. People came out of
their houses well in advance, stopped
talking and went to the main street
nearby. Together we stood completely
still on the pavements. For a child,
living very much in the present, two
minutes are long and full of
happenings, and I realised that silence
is a valuable act and a powerful means
of expression.
When the silence had descended
over the entire country, then something
happened that made one become even
more aware of the total stillness. A
coachman suddenly lost control of his
horses. They were scared by the silence
and bolted. They ran right past my
mother and me, past the terminus of
tram line 14 and along Peter Bang’s
Street. The only thing to be heard in
the whole city were the horse hooves
and the wheels rumbling on the cobble
stones - and I saw a completely over-
whelmed coachman on the driver’s box.
He probably wished himself far away.
 The third kind of silence I have
already mentioned - that was the
silence and stillness I experienced
when I lay completely still on the back
in the living room and came into
contact with my being.
Authority, your own or
others?
I did not know
I learnt early on that lack of knowledge
of the law (also the unwritten) cannot
be excused. When one grows up, one
gradually conforms to society or to
those one knows, family, playmates...
One cannot know beforehand how to
behave. This is learnt through
upbringing.
If one breaks unwritten rules, even
those one does not know, then one is
sentenced anyway - unless one is sure
of oneself.
I did as I was told
I was in the school yard of the
Søndermarks School, one day right
after school in 1951.
One of the teachers, on playground
duty, had asked me earlier in the day to
let down the tyres of the bicycles found
outside the bike stand and leaning
against the trees in the school yard. So
I did as I was told.
And now they stood and waited for
me by their bicycles. The teacher did
not get a thrashing, but I did. I was
really boxed around by those bigger
and older than myself, and whose tyres
I had deflated. Hanne, the blond girl
from my class stood and watched while
I lay by the bike stands, holding up my
arm in order not to receive any more
blows to my head.
I did not know that I should not do
as the teacher had asked me, but I was
about to learn now.
At least I learnt to see the task I had
been told to do and had also done, from
a new angle.
“You could have just pretended to do
it. You could have bent down and said
pssst with your mouth near the valve.”
I wonder whether it was the same
day and for the same reason that in a
break, I had the whole school after me,
whistling and shouting boo! boo! boo!
in unison - all 300 children. A teacher
came towards me and asked what was
wrong. “Nothing,” I said as I ran past
him.
Well, at least I got Hanne’s
sympathy out of it. We were the last to
leave the bicycle stands and the school
yard. Very much in love, we rode home
from school holding hands.
A teenager’s thoughts and
wishes on telepathy
When I was a teenager, I imagined how
it would be when all people could read
each other’s thoughts and emotions. I
expected it was something we all
would attain.
I could not see the wood for the
trees.
I was fascinated by the thought and
at the same time I feared it. I fantasised
how others would react to what I was
thinking, or rather how I would feel
about having my innermost thoughts
revealed. But why first as a teenager?
Well, small children do not bother with
thoughts in that way, they have not
been hurt yet. Fear has not yet made
them form rigid ideas on life, they have
not yet learnt to take credit for what
happens. Maybe children take it for
granted that we all know everything. A
child does not understand that adults
are affected when he/she expresses
what is in the air...
“Imagine if others knew what I was
thinking.” All the “flippy” thoughts a
teenager has on the way into the adult
universe.
All the reactions that arise when one
goes from one age group to another.
Values that no longer hold, because
experience grows and tells you that
there are also other ways to see things.
All my “own” desires and longings,
it would be embarrassing if everyone
could see what I was thinking.
Maybe in my thoughts I would
reveal something I had done, or wanted
to do. Or things I cannot, or dare not,
tell people but deep inside dream about
telling - they would just be able to read
in me:
My fear, my longings about sex,
romance and excitement, my love!
It will be unbearable, I thought, and
I imagined how one must learn to
control one’s thoughts. I imagined, mis-
takenly, that this was what the yogis
did. No one should see what I think.
All the same... as much as I feared it, I
wished for it and expected it to happen,
that all of us little by little would
become telepathic. So that we did not
need to hide anything from each other
and, therefore, did not need to feel fear
or insecurity towards each other.
At that time I did not know what I know
today. I did not know that almost all
people identify themselves with all
thoughts, that they make the thoughts
their own and isolate themselves behind
pride, guilt or embarrassment. Rather
than hide something from others, they
hide things from themselves. Instead of
experiencing the thoughts that appear
in the mind, as something just going by
of their own accord - as thoughts that
are connected to situations and habits
and learned ways of reacting. I did not
know that certain thoughts are utterly
13
basic reactions to life, and that they
keep coming up, because we never stop
clinging to them or fearing them. And
that real telepathy is impossible under
such circumstances.
Very few people (whom we can call
yogis) do not bother why thoughts are
there or from where they come.
Basically they look at them as just
thoughts. They are around here and
therefore they also pass through my
head. If I allow thoughts and emotions
to pass and just look on, then by and by
they cease to return. This I learn
through meditation.
After all, one does not have to
follow all the whims that pass through
one’s mind, or all the dreams one
dreams, all that one hears in the mind.
There is telepathy and telepathy. Today
I do not “flip” if somebody nearby
expresses the same thoughts I just had,
or if somebody “steals” “my” ideas,
before I have shared them.
Maybe you think that if you cling to
your tensions, they will not affect
others, but it is quite the opposite. If
you relax and stop hanging on to what
happens in the mind, then there is a
chance that you in that way help others
to do the same. But that does not give
you the right to accuse others of
blocking energy. If you are blocked,
then it is your problem. You cannot run
away from it by making anyone else
the scapegoat. And conversely, you are
not responsible for how others feel
about themselves. But you can help
them by being yourself.
Liberation from school and
apprenticeship
It is not my intention to write an
autobiography, with all the joys and
sorrows, emotional involvement and
14
torments - all that life is full of - and
even in regard to yoga I must limit
myself to a few things that led up to
what I chose, to Kriya Yoga and what I
do today.
In the following years, from when I
was fourteen to twenty-one, I managed
to be a carpenter’s apprentice for almost
four years; attended a residential tech-
nical college one winter; lived for three
years abroad, where, among other things,
I worked at a saw-mill in Sweden; at
the harbour in Bremen and eventually
went to London. There I attended a
language school for a large part of the
time and almost every evening learnt to
draw at St. Martins School of Art in
Soho. Finally, I worked for a few
months at the east London docks.
The school years, and especially the
period of apprenticeship, had both
humiliations and limitations. Now, I had
to become independent of these influ-
ences and try to see through my com-
plexes. I received great help through my
discovery of literature. The first two
books I read after boy’s books were East
of Eden by Steinbeck and A Refugee
Crosses His Tracks by Aksel Sandemose.
Both deal with the crisis in a young
person’s life, when he must liberate him-
self with regards to family and society.
The Law of Jante is rather well-
known in Scandinavia today, but at the
time it was a revelation to read about
Aksel Sandemose’s Espen and his
struggle. The Law of Jante involves the
mutual oppressive mechanisms in a
society that is closed by convention.
You must not stick your head out and
create your own life, for then you’ll get
it in the neck. Because: 1. You shall not
think you are somebody. 2. You shall
not think you are equal to us. 3. You
shall not think you are smarter than us.
4. You shall not believe you are better
than us. 5. You shall not think you
know more than us. 6. You shall not
think you are more than us. 7. You
shall not think you are worth anything.
8. You shall not laugh at us. 9. You
shall not think anybody cares about
you. 10. You shall not think you can
teach us anything.
And last, but not least, The Criminal
Law of Jante, which is also very
effective for keeping a person
restrained from taking initiatives: We
know something about you.
And what they do not know, is
fabricated.
Youth
What has The Law of Jante to do with
yoga? one might well ask. Well, if one
sees yoga as a kind of gymnastics, then
perhaps there is no connection.
However, for myself the whole thing is
part of a larger process, which makes
me conscious and sensitive in relation
to life, myself and others - and that is
also what yoga is about.
I was not yet aware, however, of
what I was seeking. I still wonder why
my interest turned especially to yoga. I
hardly knew what it was, and I also did
not know that the exercises I learnt as
an 8 year old were yoga, they were just
some exercises.
Was I carrying the seed of yoga
within me before I was born? Perhaps,
at any rate I carried the seed of spiritual
growth for my journey through life.
I remember how with great interest I
got into the weekly magazines in the
50‘s, when on a rare occasion I found
something about yoga; just as Gandhi
and his life had caught my attention:
“True morality consists, not in
following the beaten track, but in
finding out the true path for ourselves
and fearlessly follow it.”
(Gandhi, All Men Are Brothers).
 The winter of 1957-58, I spent at
Ollerup Technical College. It was a
completely new perspective that
unfolded after four years as a
carpenter’s apprentice. Inspiration
came at first from a good Danish
teacher, and then from all the
interesting people who came to give
lectures. One of the lecturers told us
that meditation gives the ability to live
in the midst of life’s bustle - and be
yourself. Not buried in your own
thoughts but resting in yourself, acting
freely from your own center. What he
said captivated me so much that I never
forgot it - I quoted it in my book, Yoga,
Tantra and Meditation in Daily Life: “I
© 1995 Bo Olsson
heard about a man who had a well-run
shop, a wife and a lot of screaming
children, with the shop opening on to a
street in the noisiest, busiest part of
town. Yet that man could cut off at any
time; wherever he was, he shut his eyes
and entered a deep rest within himself.
And when he reopened his eyes after
any length of time, he was refreshed.”
After Ollerup, I went to Sweden to
work at Sparreholm Sawmill, in
Södermanland. For a few months, I
worked on the sorting bridge. It had a
large, long “table” on which the planks
were conveyed. There were a few of us
sorting the planks and boards and
placing them on the right wagons,
according to dimensions and quality. I
stood furthest down the bridge with
five to six wagons to load. It could get
very busy and I had to get all the
remaining boards on to the wagons,
before they reached the end of the table.
Otherwise they would pile up and I
would stop the whole sawing process.
However, several times a day a nail
in a log would make the saw stop and
then nothing came out to us for a while.
It was in these breaks that I began to
tilt the body up to the horizontal in the
Peacock (Mayurasana), while
supporting myself on the edge of the
table and balancing the body on the
forearms. The Peacock is a very
effective pose for the digestion and
metabolism. Yes, it is even said, that
one can
become
immune to
poisons if it
is practised
regularly. I
was
completely
unaware of
all this,
though. I just felt like doing it and
mastering it. I did not “know” that I
was doing yoga. At that time I had
never seen a book on yoga, but it did
me good and I used it several times a
day. Was it something I “remembered”?
At the end of the year, I attended the
Forest and Sawmill College in
Härnösand, Sweden for three months.
Here, I began to seek a little more
consciously - a quote from my diary:
“26/9/1958. Today, like so many other
days, I have thought how I should go
about building my knowledge of other
people and how I can develop my
thoughts - in other words, develop a
little knowledge of human nature and
teach myself to think as concentrated
as possible.
I have talked myself into being
interested in philosophy without
actually knowing anything about
philosophy, so I have begun to read a
little and have thought about starting
to explore psychology. Henry David
Thoureau says in “Walden”, which I
am presently reading, that you should
not just study life, but also live it and
take part in what you want to study. I
quote: “Which would have advanced
the most at the end of a month, - the
boy who had made his own jackknife
from the ore which he had dug and
smelted, reading as much as would be
necessary for this - or the boy who had
attended the lectures on metallurgy at
the Institute in the meanwhile, and had
received a Rodgers penknife from his
father? Which would be most likely to
cut his fingers?...”
At the time I sought knowledge of
others and not foremost of myself. That
was my mistake and the reason why the
psychology literature I had found did
not satisfy me. All in all it was about
judging others, instead of experiencing
and gaining first hand knowledge.
There was no guidance in how one
could work with oneself, no wisdom.
From Härnösand, the journey went via
Copenhagen at Christmas, to Bremen
in Germany. Here I was to spend a year,
working in the Industrihafen in a large
veneer yard. Apart from what I learnt
from my older work mates, about their
lives and what they had experienced
during the war in the various countries
where they were stationed, I became
very active in my free time.
I came into contact with a large
international group of young people, I
plunged into modern literature,
especially the German writers, such as
Stefan Zweig, Max Frisch, Ingeborg
Bachman, Wolfgang Borchert and
15
Heinrich Böll, as well as Franz Kafka.
I earnestly acquainted myself with
classical music and, together with my
friends, I joined in the cultural and
night life of Bremen. One could say I
had a thorough cultural expansion of
consciousness, plus a little tennis as
well!
I now lived in a completely new
and freer part of my life and I felt
very content with that. My literature
teacher, Mr. Joneweit, at The German
School of Commerce for Foreigners
(which I attended the last three
months of my stay in Germany) gave
me the following poem, Stages, by
Hermann Hesse. It has been with me
ever since. It is originally published
in the book The Glass Bead Game,
as one of Magister Ludi’s, Josef
Knecht’s posthumous works.
Yoga
My interest was not only about
culture just for culture’s sake, the
more “secret” or “spiritual” search in Even the hour of our death may send
my life still smouldered. Literature,
my work and the people I knew
satisfied some of my needs for
knowledge of life, but not enough.
One day I bought a couple of books
on yoga: Das Herzensgebet, Mystik
und Yoga der Ostkirche, which was
especially about the use of the Prayer
of the Heart connected with the breath,
as a form of meditation in the Russian
Orthodox Church; and the book which
made me start on the yoga exercises
myself: Das Yoga-System der
Gesundheit (The Yoga System of
Health) by Yogi Vithaldas.
Not only did I begin to practise the
classical yoga poses with great
seriousness and some effort, I also
imagined that I would be like the man
pictured in the book. I stared intensely
16
(Tratak) at this picture time and again,
without knowing that this form of
concentration on a wish can very well
influence the direction life is taking.
But I also had other wishes, and in
Stages
As every flower fades and as all youth
Departs, so life at every stage,
So every virtue, so our grasp of truth,
Blooms in its day and may not last forever.
Since life may summon us at every age
Be ready, heart, for parting, new endeavor,
Be ready bravely and without remorse
To find new light that old ties cannot give.
In all beginnings dwells a magic force
For guarding us and helping us to live.
Serenely let us move to distant places
And let no sentiment of home detain us.
The Cosmic Spirit seeks not to restrain us
But lifts us stage by stage to wider spaces.
If we accept a home of our own making,
Familiar habit makes for indolence.
We must prepare for parting and leave-taking
Or else remain the slaves of permanence.
Us speeding on to fresh and newer spaces,
And life may summon us to newer races.
So be it, heart: bid farewell without end.
(Hermann Hesse) I had almost forgotten my original
the years to follow events would take
me - via a university degree course to
the Faculty of History at the University
of Copenhagen, (studies which I spiced
with English, a little philosophy and
Sanskrit studies) - on to the theatre,
among other things to modern
pantomime, and that way back to yoga.
I was now going to learn to use yoga in
quite another robust and sober way.
During my stay in Germany I was
apparently more interested in
developing my concentration and
skills. Just like the concept of key-
energy, as described by Yogi Vithaldas,
fascinated me - or was it more than
that, a notion of something that reached
further...?
The following year I lived in
England, where, besides working and
attending a language school, I
continued my journey of discovery
into European culture. Now I was
also involved with theatre and art,
not just as a passive spectator, but as
a student at one of the art schools
there. That aspects of modern art
influence our consciousness and our
spiritual development, I was not in
doubt about for a moment. It is such
a large and multifaceted topic,
however, that I will have to return to
it another time. “Art, when it is
genuine”, I wrote in my diary, “is
the mirror of consciousness, whether
it be the inner or the outer world it
reflects - and in his creative
expression the artist becomes present,
a presence, that, if only for a moment,
can be conveyed to the observer.”
The pantomime
Little by little, the wish or resolution
I had made in Bremen gradually
began to express itself; even though
intent, then it was to be yoga all the
way.
In that period a strong belief in
nonviolence grew in my mind, inspired
above all by Gandhi, and as I could no
longer postpone my military service, I
had to object to bearing arms. Conse-
quently, I spent 22 months in a camp
for conscientious objectors in Gribskov,
Denmark and at the naval museum at
Kronborg Castle in Elsinore. It was to
be a profitable period where I came in
contact with like-minded people and,
through a teacher, also with people
from the theatre. It quickly developed,
I became a member of a professional
pantomime group and later active in
the Student Theatre in Copenhagen.

When I joined the pantomime group, it

took up almost all of my time. A day
would look like this: two to three hours
of yoga exercises, then some hours of
free improvisation with the pantomime
body language, and finally certain
disciplined classic tasks within the
repertoire of the pantomime.
Yoga was part of the warming up
and had become part of the pantomime

© 1995 Bengt Magnuzon

from the Peking Opera via the French
pantomimes Etienne Decroux, Jean-
Louis Barrault and Marcel Marceau.
The purpose of yoga was to make
the body supple and master its every
movements. It turned out to be many of
the same exercises, that I later learned
in India. But it involved more than that.
First of all a little revolution happened
in my consciousness: I became awake,
present and concentrated in quite a new
way, and it became easier to express
myself in art, both in painting and in
the theatre.
Let me quote Jean Soubeyran from
the book “The language without words”:
“If an outsider should happen to come
into the room, where the dramatic
improvisation takes place, he would be
very surprised by the unusual picture
confronting him. In almost total silence
and immobility, a group of people are
sitting in a semicircle. They watch a
single student, who is sitting in front of
them on a stool. He too is motionless,
and his eyes are firmly focused on one
point. For the uninitiated this may look
like a spiritualistic meeting. It appears
as if nothing at all is happening in this
hall. But such a dense and sensitive
atmosphere of work and concentration
reigns here, that this stranger’s
intrusion would immediately disturb it.
From the 3-months course 1995 with Síta as teacher
For these almost motionless people
work. After having trained their bodies
for several hours in body technique,
they now train that other part of the
body, which is not carried by the legs,
but by feelings and emotions.”
The repertoire of pantomime is to a
certain degree limited by its language
and therefore has given rise to certain
fields of expression or styles that show
itself in plots which have cycles as form.
One can choose a certain style as the
basis for the play one wants to create.
These styles illustrate fundamental
attitudes or types of man. You have the
mime of the little man, mime de salon
(the parlour room mime) where one is
preoccupied and involved in the small
daily events, often presented in a
comical way, as by Marcel Marceau’s
clown Bib. Or the beach boy, the
sportsman, physically exaggerated, the
achiever, mime de sport, the mime of
fight, but fight as a sport, carried out by
one who rests in his body with calmness
and fullness in every movement.
In mime de passion we meet the
idealist, the passionate, who will do
anything to reach his goal. It illustrates
a fight different to the one of the
sportsman, a performance where
consciousness is not always present. At
last, if the goal has been lost or given
up, mime de reve, the mime of dream
or rather of the dreamer which in its
extreme becomes the psychosis - where
everything is based on illusion. The
concrete act is no more, it has been
given up and substituted by dreams and
imagination. In this way the difference
between fantasies and real experiences
is illustrated in pantomime.
In Yoga, to see through this
difference, time and again one may
have to walk alone, but preferably, and
at least in the beginning, with the help
of a teacher or guru. It can be
disastrous to underrate the importance
of a guru here, for society possesses no
fundamental knowledge of this -

17
society lives on its own illusions. For
the one who wants to go beyond the
limitations of consciousness, the
question of what is real and what is
unreal is always burning.
Intense yoga on my own
At the time I could not find anyone in
Denmark who could teach me any yoga
that I did not already know through the
pantomime. I especially wanted to
learn to use the breathing exercises of
yoga (in Sanskrit Pranayama: to make
conscious the dimension of energy),
and mudra (“attitudes” which
harmonises the energy field of the
body). So I had to turn to literature and
follow the rules to the letter.
It was an exciting challenge. The
book that I was now using had been
written by Swami Narayanananda, an
orthodox person who demanded a lot
in regard to your way of living, but
who also was exact enough in his
instructions, so that I did not make any
errors.
The more “philosophical” and
inspirational I found in Swami
Yogananda’s book. While reading
“Autobiography of a Yogi”, I had
experiences of different kriya that I did
not quite dare to believe. Even though
Yogananda talks about Kriya Yoga all
the time, he does not describe it directly.
When I came to India and learned the
great Kriya Yoga, I realised only then
that I had already spontaneously
experienced a couple of other kriya.
From the middle of the sixties my
yoga practice consisted of yoga
exercises in the morning and breathing
exercises four times in twenty-four
hours. For a couple of years I had the
opportunity to live in this way, apart
from directing a few plays at the
theatre. The result was that I became
18
aware of my psychic energy, as
something that one can canalise and by
which one can influence the physical
and psychic state - besides keeping the
inspiration flowing in my artistic
expression.
The vision
I came to a place that I can best
describe as golden. I sat in front of a
semicircle or as part of a circle of
meditating individuals who seemed to
consist of light. I had the impression
that I had been summoned there for a
certain reason. What I learned was not
directly expressed in words, but
communicated through experiences
and states. However, it also involved
giving my life (or my calling if you
like) an even more defined direction.
One must realise that what I learned
here is partly secret, and also impossible
to describe - I was made aware of an
altered state of consciousness - and a
fundamental form of meditation - a
connection or a connectedness, which
at the same time I see as a process, or
as an ability to set such a process in
motion. It has been with me ever since.
More and more has it found expression
in my teaching in later years. It is also
secret in that, if I use it in my teaching,
then not all students perceive all that
happens - the individual person takes
in that which he or she is ready to use.
Behind it all, this ability helps me to
remove tensions from participants, so
they can remain more open and aware -
and realise their own and Kriya Yoga’s
potential. It makes it easier to impart
the insight, that there is nothing you
need to hang on to or figure out - that it
is something you do and experience.
And the process can be passed on to
others, who in their turn can use it in
their meditation and teaching. I can call
it Chit-Agni-Kriya - or in honour of the
Siddhas that initiated me: Siddha
Kriya. I can give a hint of this kriya by
quoting Satprem in his book about Sri
Aurobindo, so those who have sensed it
will be able to recognise what I am
writing about: “We speak of the
descending Force or the ascending
Force or the internal force or of mental
force, vital force, material force, but
there are not so many different forces -
there is but one Force in the world, a
single unique current which passes
through us and through all things and
which puts on one substance or
another according to the level of its
action. Our electric current may light
up a tabernacle or a tavern, a school
room, a refectory, and it continues to
be the same current though it illumines
different objects. So too, this Force or
this Heat, agni, continues to be the
same, whether it animates or illumines
our inner retreat, our mental den; from
level to level it wraps itself in a more
or less intense light and more or less
heavy vibrations - supramental,
mental, vital, material - but it is this
force which links up everything,
animates everything; this, the
fundamental substance of the universe:
Consciousness-Force, Chit-Agni.
If it be true that consciousness is a
force, inversely, force is consciousness
and all the forces are conscious. The
universal Force is a universal
Consciousness. This is what the seeker
discovers. When he has contacted this
current of consciousness-force in
himself...”
Can a Westerner meet with an
experience which many indigenous
people have as part of their culture and
in their spiritual life? Is it, or could it
be, part of our possibilities? Can we
oblige one of our own (C.G.Jung)
when he proclaims that we must
rediscover our soul? A soul that
different cultures and indigenous
people still have intact, whether they
live on a so called “high” or “low”
material plane, some in tune with
nature, others in overpopulated
countries.
I usually say: can you
imagine that your neighbour is
in a state of Samadhi or
Nirvana? Can you imagine that
your teacher has reached that
far, and that he knows what he
talks about, at the same time,
that he remains a human being
with emotions and thoughts,
and with a body, that he, like
anyone else, must take good
care of? And if you answer no,
then I must tell you, that you
have no perspective of your
own possibilities - for what
you are really saying, is that
you are not allowed such
things.
If one is denying such a
possibility, then one also
denies that, on which many
© 1995 Lombard - Derib
cultures base their
mythologies, their psychic life,
and their capacities to heal.
To me this was a vision that
does not occur every day, but
perhaps only once in a
lifetime. A vision which came
unexpectedly, in such a way that I did
not know anything about it in advance
nor did I have any expectations of it.
At that time, also, I was not floating
around in daydreams or thoughts of
celestial things. My everyday state was
clear and normal, strengthened by my
yoga practice and my attitude to life.
But of course I was prepared, in
such a way that I could hold on to that
tiny intense point of light, which
appeared in my mind, long enough for it
to change and take the form of a crystal,
which again changed into a corridor
that I flew through without thoughts of
body or ideas of my own worth.
It was not an outer ritual, but a
important inner event - an initiation. It
may have been spontaneous, but it was
a result of a long training in
concentration and awareness. I had
observed all conditions to be able to
receive my vision. I lived alone and in
continence. I kept a moderate diet and
did intense yoga, so my body was light
and pure. Therefore I did not block the
experience.
The knowledge and the capacities
that it gave me, have never left me.
Swamiji in Copenhagen
There have been other visions since.
Some of them I have described in my
book, Yoga, Tantra and Meditation in
Daily Life, in the form of dreams. Others
I have never told about, for example,
one I had on the roof of a house
one night in Nagpur, during a tour
of Northern India with my teacher:
I had taught the whole day.
Following Swamiji’s diagnosis
and instructions, I had been giving
different people precisely the
methods each had to use. I
remember we had had a lot of
melons at the evening meal, and I
had stuffed myself with them.
Afterwards I sat down to meditate.
It started with a certain sign that I
saw, a kind of code that told me
that this was no ordinary dream or
thought: A wellknown Danish
actor appears before me and asks
whether it is really the theatre I
want to devote my life to, whether
I will be content with entertaining
the bourgeoisie evening after
evening with all kinds of plays, of
which many would probably not
be of my own choosing.
Again a vision that became
important for the direction my life
was to take - in spite of my love for
the theatre. Later on I also had to
conclude, that as far as I was
concerned, it had more meaning to give
people an experience once or twice a
week on a course, or on a short or long
residential course - an experience of
being able to relax with life, to be able
to find well-being, an experience the
individual could use creatively in his life,
and maybe even get closer to one self.
That period of my life started with
meeting my teacher and guru in
Copenhagen.
19
One day, a close friend, the painter
Knud Hvidberg, dropped by, wanting
me to come along to a lecture on yoga,
I resisted at first. There were so many
lectures, and so many Indians and
others travelling around... I had enough
with my own yoga, I thought; it was
intense and exciting. But Knud insisted
and showed me a picture of Swami
Satyananda from the newspaper. This
made me change my mind. He seemed
somehow familiar, and at the same
time both intelligent and practical. I
went, reluctantly, to the lecture.
Swami Satyananda gave two public
lectures in Copenhagen. One evening
he spoke about mantra and guided a
meditation afterwards, based on such a
sound. The second evening the topic
was on how to use a psychic symbol in
meditation and it was also used in the
following meditation. What he said fell
upon fertile soil with me and my
experiences that evening convinced me
of the value of his teaching. My psychic
symbol appeared for the first time and I
still use it now, almost thirty years later.
“When one, through one’s practice,
has begun to come in contact with not
only the subconscious but also with the
unconscious, with the things where it is
almost impossible to penetrate, then
the psychic symbol appears as a life
line...” (Swami Satyananda)
When I found a small, modest
brochure on a chair at the rear of the
hall, on some courses he was giving in
Kriya Yoga that same year in India, then
I had something to think about. Kriya
Yoga was precisely the meditation I
wanted to learn most of all! But did I
really have to travel to India for it?
Normally I was of the opinion that things
were always found close at hand and
that the first was the best - but maybe...
After weeks of deliberation, I realised
that this was indeed the first time I had
20
an offer to learn Kriya Yoga. Together
with Knud Hvidberg, I left by train to
Moscow, and plane, via Tashkent and
Kabul, to Delhi, and eventually to Mon-
ghyr, to my teacher’s ashram and school.
Training in India
Just as had been for Swami Satyananda,
so it was for me. The training in the
ashram did not have the objective of
generating lots of fantastic experiences.
On the contrary, one is to a certain
degree sheltered from developing too
many abilities, so as not to lose sight of
the goal. The period in the ashram
should form a solid foundation for the
unfoldment of life, both inwardly and
outwardly. After learning Kriya Yoga, I
remained in the ashram, because I
realised that I had found a teacher
capable of helping me to strengthen the
bridge between the normal external life
and the new inner world that I was in
the process of conquering.
Sannyasa
At Shivaratri, the 15th of February,
1969, I took Sannyasa diksha in the
Paramahamsa order, Dasanama
Sannyasa’s spiritual order, founded by
Srimat Sankaracharya (788 - 822), in
the branch of the Swami tradition
called Saraswati.
I was alone in being initiated that
night. There was, apart from Swamiji
and myself, just one other Swami
present as witness. Besides the
initiation as Swami, earlier
“initiations”, that I had in the form of
visions and experiences in meditation,
were also confirmed as very real and as
something I could continue with. My
teacher knew, that yoga was not just a
hobby for me, but that I needed a large
degree of freedom and independence.
He confirmed this with my initiation.
Let me quote a fragment of what
Swami Satyananda has said and written
about Sannyasa, to be a Swami, which
means to master oneself:
“Sannyasa has arisen as a means to
overcome and remove conditioning of
the mind, false beliefs, dogmas,
concepts, etc. that prevents the mind
functioning as a perfect instrument. It
has been adopted by those people who
wanted to free the mind of its bondage
and thereby gain an insight into the
deeper aspects of existence. It seems to
have existed, though not under the
specific name of sannyasa, since the
dawn of history. It arose with the
progressive development of society as a
means to liberate the individual from
the indoctrination inherent in the
particular society in which he lived.
It is more than possible that
‚primitive‘ man had no need for any
form of sannyasa, for he was probably
harmonious in his way of life,
integrated with his deeper being and
able to perfectly combine worldly and
spiritual life...
Therefore, sannyasa arose
simultaneously with the advent of
social living as a means for man to re-
integrate himself with his deeper
nature. As social pressures become
greater, so man becomes excessively
ambitious, neurotic and egotistical. It
is these and other discordant
tendencies that imprison man and
cause him to remain at and function on
the surface layers of his being...”
Outwardly it usually implies that one
chooses to wear the orange colour. This
act expresses an attitude and declares
that one is part of a tradition. But orange
is also worn because of its activating
effect on the one who spends a lot of
time in meditation and teaching
meditation. It is a neutral clothing
which, to a certain degree prevents
 AND “SOMEWHERE ELSE” CLOUDBURST EXPERIENCES THE MEETING WAKANTANKA HAD PROMISED
...HE KNOWS US AND WE KNOW HIM...
BUT IT IS A LONG TIME SINCE HE WE REPRESENT WEST, NORTH, EAST,
WAKANTANKA HAS CHOSEN YOU TO BE VISITED THE LAND OF THE SPIRITS... SOUTH, THE SKY AND THE EARTH... WE
INITIATED BY US INTO THIS WORLD. ARE GATHERED HERE FOR YOU TO
WE HAVE ALWAYS KNOWN YOU, IN THE WORLD YOU COME FROM, COME TO AN UNDERSTANDING OF THE
CLOUDBURST. YOU ARE IN OUR RUNNING BEAR IS YOUR TEACHER... FORCES WHICH WE EMBODY, AND FOR
WORLD... WE, THE SPIRITS OF FIRE YOU TO LEARN NOT TO FEAR THEM.
AND THUNDER, ARE AS OLD AS THE THESE FORCES ARE THE FORCES OF
WORLD. THEREFORE YOU SEE US AS NATURE, NATURE OUR MOTHER. IT IS
SIX OLD MEN... NECESSARY TO RESPECT THEM AND
LIVE IN PEACE WITH THEM.

SIT DOWN AMONGST US. YOU HAVE HEARD

WAKANTANKA’S VOICE AND YOU HAVE OVERCOME FROM NOW ON THE FORCES OF FIRE AND
THE SUFFERING OF THE BODY. THE FIRE THAT THUNDER LIVE IN YOU. THEY WILL MAKE YOU A
BURNS ALSO CLEANSES. YOU HAVE BEEN BURNT BY SEER AND HEALER AMONG YOUR PEOPLE. SHOW
FIRE, YOU HAVE BEEN CLEANSED BY FIRE, AND YOU THYSELF WORTHY OF THIS PRIVILEGE.
WILL BE HEALED BY FIRE.
© 1995 Lombard - Derib

Comics are a popular form, which most often contain no deeper meaning. All the same it can, like any other media, be used to convey
“secret” messages, just as fairy tales once did. The central character in the comic, He who was born twice, and his encounter with “the
elders,” I came across 16 years after my vision. It contains an account very close to my own experience, except my communication was
non-verbal and those present were experienced as yogis (siddhas). The similarities however were great: e.g. both the Indian boy and I had
left the physical dimension and found ourselves on a completely different plane of consciousness.q

role-playing when one dresses “geru” or orange earth colour that since from Peter Nilson’s book Home to
according to different moods; and the seventh century is part of the Earth. It deals with the more material
finally it turns its back on materialism swami tradition. It must however be side of the problem: “When we left the
in preventing one from dressing mentioned that the participants of our pastoral age [the food gatherer’s age],
provocatively or flamboyantly - yet various courses, naturally do not have we took the first step towards a
another aid for stabilising the mind. to wear orange. It is something we do catastrophe, we opened the door to
It can be mentioned as a curiosity, for our own sake, as teachers in an misfortune and misery which is today
that many indigenous people dress ancient and contemporary tradition. threatening our existence...
alike in their tribes, or are naked, as Farming, which no doubt gave us
they share everything and unreservedly That the aforementioned thoughts not food and prosperity, can paradoxically
help each other. In certain tribes in only stir in Swami Satyananda’s mind, also have made us starving and poor
Africa they even dress in the same is shown by the following passage and led us towards our present epoch’s

21
population catastrophe. Rousseau
would have recognised these thoughts,
which in an unforeseen way illustrates
the dilemma in everything we call
‚development‘.”
On the inner sides of society’s
unconscious influence, professor Henri
Laborit is expressing himself in the
film, My Uncle From America, by
Alain Resnais: “The unconscious
constitutes a fearsome instrument, not
so much because of its repressed part,
repressed because too painful to
express and because the socio-cultural
environment would have punished it;
but on the contrary by what this very
same socio-cultural environment
allows and sometimes even rewards.
All is put in the person’s mind since
early childhood, the individual being
unconscious of it, and yet being led
into action just by that part. It is this
unconscious - different from the
Freudian one - which is the most
dangerous.
What we define as personality is a
mish-mash of value judgements,
prejudices, common truths becoming
more rigid as the individual grows
older and questions it less and less.
Taking away but one stone from this
building will be enough to see it
crumble down. Then appears anxiety.
To express itself, this anxiety will not
stop for murder, on the level of the
individual, nor for genocide or war on
the level of social groups.
We are just starting to understand by
which mechanism, how and why,
levels of hierarchy and dominance
have been established through all of
history up to our present time.
We have to know the laws of gravity
so as to travel to the moon. Knowing
the laws does not imply that we are
free of gravity. It just means that we
22
can use them to do something else.
As long as we haven’t publicised
very widely, for the individuals of this
planet, how their brain is functioning
and how they use it, as long as we
don’t tell that its function has always
been, up to now, to dominate others,
there will be little chance for changes.”
Ideals and daily life
I believe that ideals are quite
dangerous for our existence, as they
easily make us go to extremes, both
politically, spiritually and culturally
February 1969, the day after sannyasa.
and consequently miss the goal. They
deprive us of our ability to appreciate
what is happening in the situation we
are in. It is important, especially for the
yogi, not to pull the wool over people’s
eyes, which can develop into
intolerance and sectarianism. There are
no easy solutions, it requires our own
commitment. Also for our own sake,
we must take heed to, for example, the
Zen monk, who discovers that it is in
daily life the miracle is found. That we
should occupy ourselves with what lies
directly before us, tasks, people close
to us and what we carry within us and
wish to express.
The ideal easily creates neurosis, as
when one sees nothing but smiling
people in advertisements for healing,
religion, New Age, positive thinking,
etc. Where is the deeper earnestness, I
am tempted to ask, and the knowledge
that working with oneself implies that
one undauntingly meets all aspects of
one’s mind and personality? Can one
allow oneself to see and, more
importantly, to feel these aspects -
without it leading to self-indulgence?
The teacher who has not permitted the
crisis in him or herself, will have a
tendency to suppress it in teaching
situations by avoiding to let go.
Stability, discipline and consistency are
certainly called for, a choice one makes
oneself, and a necessity if one does not
want to get lost in one’s own fantasies,
or be restrained by other’s
thoughtlessness.
In another way, too, ideals create
intolerance and hypocrisy. Is it not true
that it is often demanded of our
teachers to be pure saints that we can
imitate or fantasise about? That they
are not allowed to be ordinary people,
capable of expressing sorrow, anger,
childishness, pride, jealousy,
disappointment or spontaneous joy -
not to mention a sense of humour?
I am not implying that the teacher
should be an inverted snob and try to
be someone else other than he or she is
- but there is no reason to be afraid of
showing one’s true colours. When we
ourselves know what is behind the
mask, then we can also stand by what
is natural. Once we have learnt that the
mind and personality are tools for
surviving in the physical dimension - a
surface through which we
communicate with the world around us
- then we can fearlessly go deeper and
become one with our whole being, our
true identity.
The Tantric attitude helps here: by
unhesitatingly remaining in the state
we find ourselves in, the state can be
made conscious and thereby exhausted.
Here is a very old instruction:
“Lie down as dead. Enraged in
wrath, stay so. Or stare without moving
an eyelash. Or suck something and
become the sucking”
(Malini Vijaya Tantra)
There are also what I would call
escapist ideals. I have met people who
dream of living in the primitive tribes
found on the outskirts of civilisation, in
the rain forests or deserts of Asia,
Australia or South America and in the
Arctic regions of northern Europe and
North America. Cultures that are
unfortunately dying out. No doubt they
represent values that we indeed have
use for. When, however, it becomes an
ideal for people, who are unable to
meet the challenges and undergo a
process of liberation in daily life or the
society they live in, then they have an
excuse for dreaming instead of acting.
And isn’t it here you find many so-
called teachers and movements -
between ideals of the primitive society
with tepees, and the super high
technology society with spaceships,
where people do not use money
(nothing wrong with that), where they
communicate telepathically and move
almost floatingly over the earth so as
not to harm plant life? Such cultures
are placed both in the past and the
future, in Atlantis and Lemuria, in the
Central American and Egyptian
cultures, on other planets, or after an
upheaval on our planet in a not too
distant future. And what is worse,
people are sitting waiting for
spaceships, expecting them to come
and save us from life on this globe!
Should such dreams (and anxieties)
justify (regardless of whether they are
based on facts or not):
- that one cannot make oneself do what
has to be done here and now in our
time, in our cities, in our countries?
And live this life and use the abilities
that one has received, instead of
dreaming?
- that we do not dare to receive a
knowledge, that enables one to
disregard one’s limitations, instead of
magnanimously passing our limitations
on to others under the guise of wisdom,
healing or religion?
- that we are not capable of taking life
as it comes and deal with the tasks that
lie to hand? Why must everything be
looked upon as problems? Everything
is part of life and life is an exciting
challenge!
Those who have actually heard the
message from the “past”, “future” or
the “dream time” do not use it as an
excuse to dream themselves away from
the life they were born to, but throw
themselves into a work to come in
harmony again with themselves and
nature, and then help others and the
society they live in to do likewise. It
happens without thought of comfort
and not in a state of self-absorbed
hypochondria. One contributes where it
is most needed. Each according to
background and abilities.
Or said in the words of Walt Whitman
in Song of the open road:
Hence forth I ask not good-fortune,
I myself am good-fortune,
Henceforth I whimper no more,
postpone no more, need nothing,
Done with indoor complaints,
libraries, querulous criticisms,
Strong and content I travel the open
road.
The earth, that is sufficient,
I do not want the constellations any
nearer,
I know they are very well where they
are,
I know they suffice for those who
belong to them.
The force of example
Personally I don’t think that the force
of example is worth much for the one
who really works with him/herself.
Where it is important for children to
have a firm example in an adult and
stable guidelines as a basis - an adult,
who wants to discover more about life
and one’s own depths, does not find it
by copying other’s lives, only by living
one’s own. In this endeavour, one must
be able to make qualified choices with
regards to oneself and not decide from
imitation or habitual norms.
However, discipline and other
conditions should not be confused with
ideals. In my opinion, one should be
able to let oneself be initiated, dare
accomplish what one really wants and
overcome one’s fear and in this way
acquire useful knowledge. My
collaboration with Swamiji, that he
could tease me, test my pride or my
fear, wake me up, give me tasks, and
above all, that he could bring me down
to earth when imagination ran away
with me, had the result that I learned a
potent, useful and, not least, deep-
going yoga, giving me presence and
willingness to act. On the other hand,
the decisions I took, the conclusions I
drew, my inner objectives and the
amount of perseverance I displayed
23

Students on the 3-momths course 1995
was up to me.
Not only for my own part, but also
with students I have had over the years,
have I seen the importance of periods
to withdraw and gain perspective.
There are, no doubt, people in society
critical of such an act, perhaps because
they fear that the illusions we grew up
with, and which are partly
unconscious, could be seen through.
For me, however, it was necessary to
see through them to become
independent. It meant that I had to give
up demanding anything in advance and
dare to accept situations as they came.
Thereby, and with the help of yoga and
meditation and my teacher’s guidance,
I began to discover the limiting
attitudes and habits that had influenced
24
my life. Through this process I realised
what true independence involves.
A quote from my diary, in India,
1969: “Reaction and submission - to
react against or to submit to -
environment, conditions, etc., it is all
the same, both are dependence.
To mature, to be able to regard
everything equally - without comparing
it to oneself - that is perhaps what
between people is called brother- or
friendship- or true social-mindedness,
no blind following, no rebellion against
others, but empathy.”
That such an attitude can transform
most situations, may be a secret to
many. To dare to live in accordance
with this could very well reveal a fear
of letting go - in oneself.
As to being a yoga teacher, I do not
believe one should struggle for power
or compete in a reckless way. Instead,
it is good that what one achieves is
based on one’s own merit, but with
respect both for the tradition and for
those from whom you learnt it. This
ensures that one does not get into self-
glorification, on a so called “ego-trip”,
feel threatened or make out to be clever
at the expense of another. After all it
was not I who invented what I teach,
but my teacher, and not him either, but
his teacher, and not him either ...
“Do not try to persuade the students
that already go to other teachers, let
the students come by themselves, when
it gets about that your teaching is
good. And if one day they don’t come
anymore, then that part of your karma
is over”, Swamiji said to me in 1970,
when I was on my way back to
Scandinavia to teach.
In Tantra it is said that even a dog can
be your teacher - and at another time I
shall take up the relationship between
the expectations and ideals we have
and the true wisdom of certain people
that far from resembles the current
model we dream of finding in the yoga
tradition or in modern movements. An
initiation and the decision to live as a
swami, for example, have to do with
everyday life and normal
communication with other people. At
the same time, it involves consistency
on another level that reaches far
beyond what is taught in Sunday
school, or what is contained in the soft,
fluid New Age philosophy presently in
vogue. This is about a goal that one
does not want to miss, neither through
idleness, romantic ideas nor fanaticism
and which has nothing to do with
whatever time one happens to be living
in.
 After all, it is not just the laughing or
crying personality, who can be happy
or full of sorrow, the one who feels
attracted to or repulsed by what it
meets in life, but also the deeper
dimensions that reach beyond what is
seen on the surface, beyond the states
of body and mind that you know
already - the whole of your being - that
you can become one with.
“Any therapist who would lead others
to psychic heights and depths must,
himself, be able to attain these heights
and depths of the psyche.
Contemporary psychotherapists will
have to begin by training themselves to
ascend and descend through their own
psyche and thereby experience the
manifold components within man and
the driving forces behind human life.”
(Wolfgang Kretschmer, Meditative
Techniques in Psychotherapy, referring
to his colleague Desoille).
Ashram
In the ashram, the everyday life and the
daily tasks (Karma Yoga) are essential.
In everyday life the residents keep a
routine, and the transformation happens
imperceptibly, naturally with the help
of yoga and meditation - and, in my
experience, above all with Kriya Yoga.
While living in my teacher’s ashram
in Bihar, India, and one day the
conversation turned to the conditions
for teaching Kriya Yoga, he said,
“Kriya Yoga should only be taught
under ashram conditions.”
An ashram is a place where people
live, and they are continuously devoted
to a Sadhana. Sadhana actually means
“that which leads to the goal” and
includes everything that awakens
consciousness and keeps it awake. The
ashram is a place where people do not
pursue any other value than the
spiritual, a place that makes it possible
to take time to rediscover both mental
and physical well-being. Such a place
is built up gradually, with all the daily
pursuits, with facilities for teaching,
but most of all, with a core of people
who are not just visiting, or have
different motives for being there, other
than taking part in this work.
The ashram should give an
atmosphere of security and peace, so
students coming from outside for a
short period, for example on a 3-
months sadhana course, can
undisturbedly devote themselves to
what they came for, with support from
the surroundings, and without feeling
exploited economically or otherwise,
such as it happens constantly in
society. But at the same time the
ashram should be full of challenges,
both in terms of tasks and opportunities
for training and initiation.
Here, however, it is not a question of
striving for a “certificate” one can
flaunt. It is a way of living. I often
heard my teacher say to those present:
“Think about what people normally
pursue, how much time they spend on
education and career, an education
they can use for only a few decades out
of life, and how little time they use for
their spiritual development, a
development they benefit from their
whole life - and for more than that.”
An ashram is traditionally led by one
or more swamis. In such an ashram,
Kriya Yoga can be taught (if it is used
daily by the permanent residents) so
that everybody is intimately acquainted
with what is being taught. The ashram
and its residents must be able to convey
an experience that reaches further than
a mechanical or theoretical learning.
The way I have become familiar
with an ashram, both the one I was in,
in India and the one that has come into
existence here in Scandinavia, is that it
is based on voluntary participation and
interest from the residents and from the
students coming on courses. The
aspirants can stay as long as they want,
but while they are there, it is important
that they do not forget the purpose of
being there and that they want to
participate in all activities - then indeed
the desired effect can be reached.
“You cannot force somebody to be
happy” said Swami Yogananda. Yes,
isn’t it odd, and neither can you force a
flower to unfold. But one hopes it will,
by supplying good conditions,
enriching the soil, giving it light and
air, together with protecting it from
negative influences during growth and
maturation.
Education, school and
ashram
I have called Scandinavian Yoga and
Meditation School a school, because
people should be able to come and go
as they please, without further
attachment than the teaching in which
they participate. This is how it has
functioned for the 25 years the school
has existed.
I have, however, called the yoga
teacher education an ashram. Formerly
in India there was no question of a
yoga teacher education. Education is a
modern concept that is based largely on
theory and learning in class rooms. In
the tradition, however, yoga was learnt
in everyday life - and so it was for a
large part in my training with Swami
Satyananda. Wisdom comes through
the situations where you wake up and
use your awareness and goodwill. This
happens via a daily work so close to
the teacher that at any time he or she
can reflect when you forget yourself,
25
and show you how to return to yourself The teacher is simply at the disposal nothing, or worse, turn into fanaticism
- and this happens in a community with of the one who wants to use him or her. or intolerance.
others who have the same goals. It Furthermore, the teacher or leader can The outcome of the life in the ashram
takes place in the daily work, but also on equal terms with the others take is individuals who are independent in
in practical classes as well as in theory initiatives regarding the running of the relation to many of the influences that
during satsang with the teacher and school and tasks in the ashram. By are around us and in relation to the fear
naturally through common and virtue of experience, the person and in certain cases the superstition
individual meditation. concerned will endeavour to impede that limits certain yoga teachers who
In my opinion, life in an ashram lethargy and sleepiness, personally and have a short, formal and theoretical
should not (only) education. They have
be based on learned not undergone any
theoretical schol- initiation or test and
asticism, but on a thus have not really
constant vigilance - met themselves -
a training that due which to my mind
to the nature of the must be a prerequisite
ashram happens for a person who is
largely by itself: it going to guide others.
makes the partici- The creative
pants both more person, the seeking,
robust and softer, perceptive person,
gives inner lives till he or she
© 1995 Swami Janakananda

strength and dies. No period in life

sensitivity to- involves waiting,
wards others, one each moment has its
is both naked and tasks and
resting in oneself. opportunities, but life
The individual and life in the
must himself ashram, and your
make use of the spiritual search
situation, Group of sculptures of meditating beings from Mexico. Maya, the classic period 100 depends very much
however, and BC - 800 AD. National Museum Mexico City. Even though the “psychic” form of this on your own
group is limited by the ceramic, it has an astonishing similarity with the Siddhas in
choose how long he initiative.
my vision. Photo 1980.
or she wants to stay
(besides the minimal demands required in the group, probably more often than
for the formal education, first as yoga the beginner or someone who has for-
Sex or celibacy
teacher and later as meditation gotten the purpose of being in the ashram In the mid 70’s, we experimented with
teacher). Theoretically it is possible to and just wants to be comfortable. Just as the Tantric sexual rituals for a few
be more or less in contact with an he or she will detect earlier than others weekends at our course center. It caused
ashram. Whether it works depends not if superficial attitudes are spreading, quite a stir and fuss. Christian funda-
only on the teacher or the leader, or on such as joviality where everything is mentalists tried to label us with their
the ashram residents at that specific laughed off (not to be confused with a ideas of group sex, etc. - which it was not.
time. The one who just sits in a corner sense of humour); or if people are It made me consider whether, by
and looks around with too much constantly therapeutic with each other occupying myself with these rituals, I
respect, or the one who only wishes to and suffocate one another with criticism was not losing what I value most in my
pick a quarrel, probably do not belong or caring; or if exaggerated enthusiasm teaching, which is meditation.
in an ashram. arises, for it may quickly burn out to Originally I had included and described

26
the sexual element of Tantra in my
book to refute the idea (which certain
orthodox yogis had tried to spread) that
yoga required absolute chastity.
However, I will say in defence of
celibacy that it has a great effect in
relation to one’s spiritual strength and
determination, as long as one does not
do it with fanaticism and turn “the lust
of the flesh” into something sinful or
dirty, in order to defend oneself against
it.
If one cannot or does not want to
live in brahmacharya (actually, “to be
one with the whole - with the all,”
commonly interpreted as celibacy) for
the whole of one’s life, it is
recommended to keep celibacy during
the periods where one works intensely
with oneself and/or goes through an
initiation. Then there is a greater
chance of a breakthrough to true
calmness, insight and stability.
Continence, or a moderate or
economical sex life, can bring about
quite a different strength and
invulnerability - compared to the
perforated, depressed or emotionally
irritable state, one is in, without
knowing why, when maintaining an
exaggerated or disharmonious sex life.
The Tradition
There is no doubt that a teacher, when
he or she has finished the training, can
grow and become unique in relation to
his or her teacher - however, to teach
from the tradition implies that a direct
break with the teacher does not take
place. My relationship with Swami
Satyananda has evolved from just
being a pupil, to the somewhat closer
relationship of being a disciple, to a
period where I had to show what I
stood for, each day - time in itself gave
me no credit; to a friendship, to
something more, based on great mutual
respect for each other, based on an
experience of unity and on an
acknowledgement of each other’s
differences. (See also Bindu no. 5.)
How does this relationship start? A
short quotation from my diary in India:
The fear that exists of everything
new,can also emerge during learning,
when ideas and expectationsmingle
with understanding.
The teacher must be able to take away
fear from the pupil,
so that the pupil can experience and
understand the new
without hindrance -
and in so doing later meet and conquer
fear on his own,
with greater wisdom and strength.
And another time, under different
circumstances, I wrote:
To slate your teacher,
in your thoughts or in front of others,
does not change reality, and
does not entitle you to take something,
to which you have no claim.
I cannot take credit for the yoga I teach
or for Kriya Yoga; nor can my teacher
Swami Satyananda - although, the way
I see it, he has really shed light upon
Kriya Yoga - and nor can his teacher
Swami Sivananda, no matter how great
pedagogues they were and how much
they have brought forth from the
tradition.
With this attitude, peace of mind is
maintained, and one can teach without
the fear that arises when one is assertive
at the expense of others, or takes credit
for something which can not be owned,
or is stolen (in the sense that one
reduces one’s demands on oneself and
on the conditions of teaching).
The pupil can, nevertheless, very well
become an exceptionally good teacher.
“The disciple may well be psychically
higher developed than oneself” Swami
Satyananda said (one evening in
Gondia, where we rested between two
of our arrangements, in a private home
where we stayed as guests - “we” were
a small group of 9 people, on a 3
months tour round northern India).
But who can compare?
The answer came one day when he
said to me: “Have respect for where
you are, and be who you are, then all
thoughts of who is higher or lower, in
front or behind, lose meaning.”
Liberation, when seen from this
point of view, lies in being yourself -
and, as I see it, in looking upon life as
a gift and receiving this gift. Not what
you are going to achieve tomorrow, or
the unpleasant events that might come,
but what happens now, is where you
really live the life that you after all
have been given. Without fear of how
others live and without the wish to live
like others - thereby frustration and
misery are avoided.
Concerning the teaching of Kriya Yoga,
then the task is entrusted to you, you
are permitted, and you are prepared for
it and tested - beyond what even a
comprehensive yoga teacher education
otherwise consists of. That is why, so
far, it is only swamis who teach the
tradition I have chosen to teach from.
“Earlier, Kriya Yoga was only for us,
the swamis, it was our meditation. It
was secret and we used it for our own
sake. It was only passed on to the ones
who had taken sannyasa.”
(Swami Satyananda).
Also see the two previous articles on
Kriya Yoga in Bindu no. 4 and 5.
27

This was a little about my life as a
yogi, on the occasion of the School’s
silver jubilee - and about the conditions
for teaching Kriya Yoga. My writing
has become so long, that I must here
apologise to you, dear reader. I will
have to wait till another time to tell
more about Kriya Yoga itself and about
the conditions for learning it, and
whatever else I have promised earlier,
for instance about the silence and why
Leif Madsen (1967) - Invitation to Phoenix
28
we keep at least 21 and preferably 33
days of silence during the initiation. In
the meantime I can recommend the
previous issues of Bindu - and above
all to use the exercises of yoga in
practice.
“Focus on fire rising through your
form from the toes up until the body
burns to ashes but not you.”
(Malini Vijaya Tantra) q
Savasana
A paradox within yoga is that some
of the most advanced and deep-
reaching techniques are so simple
that if you only read the instructions
in a book, then the chance of
obtaining a genuine experience is
very small. At some point or other it
is a good idea to find a yogi who
lives and teaches here and now.
Savasana, “Dead still”, can at first seem
so simple that you say to yourself: surely
I’ve been doing that all my life. But,
Savasana, lying completely still on the
back, is not the same as flopping down in
front of the TV, or dozing off on the sofa
(which might not be so bad either).
What makes all the difference to the
experience is your alertness. Instead of
habitually letting the thoughts wander,
daydreaming, perhaps planning a little...
then you keep your attention with the
experience of the whole body lying
completely still.
Savasana can help with stress, insomnia,
nervousness, etc., but you don’t have to
suffer from any of these to get something
out of this technique. In the afternoon,
for instance, after a long day full of
activity, Savasana can be a good way of
giving the body and nervous system a
much-needed break. Instead of
“refuelling” with artificial energy, give
yourself a conscious break - and
afterwards the energy and inspiration
will reappear by itself.
In connection with the physical yoga
exercises, Savasana also plays a very
important part, but it is used in a slightly
- one of the most important yoga poses
different way. You will always begin a
programme of yoga poses by lying on the
back for a while, while you experience
the body and breath calm down. A yoga
programme can consist of several poses
complementing each other in pairs, e.g.
one forward- and one
backward bending pose.
Following a group of poses
like that, lie in Savasana for
a moment before doing the
next group.
Savasana should not be
confused with Yoga Nidra,
meditative deep relaxation,
in which you also lie still on
the back. In Yoga Nidra
your attention is captured in
a far more dynamic way. By
listening to the instructions
from the teacher or the tape
your awareness is guided
throughout the body, to the
breath and to various
pictures and symbols, at a somewhat
brisk but calm pace. This triggers a deep
relaxation. Every time you get lost in a
thought and forget what you are actually
doing, the instructions pick you up again
and lead you back. In that way, Yoga
Nidra makes it easy, even for beginners,
to enter a very deep relaxation. You
should have a prior experience with Yoga
Nidra to fully appreciate Savasana.
by Robert Nilsson
If you meditate, Savasana can enrich
your meditation, as the ability to be still
is an important prerequisite if you really
want to go deep. You will also find
various meditation techniques where you
meditate on stillness.
In Savasana you maintain, in
a relaxed way, the
experience of the whole
body lying still. Sometimes
when you lie down to
practise Savasana you might
feel restless. Then you can
use breath awareness for
about one minute, right in
the beginning of the ten
minutes, to deepen your
state. But only for one
minute.
Savasana is silence, the body
doesn’t make a sound, it is
completely motionless, not a
finger moves. It is an
experience of stillness in the whole
body... q

The technique
Lie down on a quilt or blanket on the floor - not in bed or on the sofa. Lie full length on the back with the feet a little bit apart
and the arms comfortably extended alongside the body; you can if necessary cover yourself with a thin blanket. Lie for ten
minutes only, so you don’t get sleepy or restless.
Be aware of your body, the whole body, of the stillness in the body and remain with this experience. Even though you might
want to adjust the body as you go along or scratch yourself or the like, then relax towards this impulse and remain still,
completely still. If your concentration slips, and it usually does once in a while, and something else takes up your attention, then
that’s all right. But let go of the disturbance as soon as you discover it and return to the experience of stillness. It might happen
several times; in a firm but patient way you return to the technique every time.

Tip: Try also to experience stillness in the body in other situations, for instance sitting where you are right now, just close the
eyes and experience stillness in the whole body for a couple of minutes. Or do the same thing in a meditation pose.
You can also try to exhaust yourself physically, in work or sports, and immediately afterwards lie down, completely still in
Savasana. q

29
 Håå International Course Center
- holiday and initiation in Tantric meditation
The setting for the
holiday courses in yoga
and meditation at Håå
Course Center is a little village with red
painted wooden houses, situated in the
beautiful countryside of southern Sweden.
There are activities tending the horses,
the ecological farming, maybe some
people feel like canoeing, swimming or
skating on the lake, others go for walks
in the woods, go skiing or horseback
riding, the children are looked after and
play together. But parallel to this idyllic
holiday scene something else is going on,
something people come here to
experience from many parts of the world.
Today it is commonly known and
scientifically documented that yoga
works. But the yoga tradition can take us
further than health and relaxation.
Whatever this implies, however, is up to
the individual to experience. I don’t say
this to be secretive, as this science is
about human beings and is open to all.
The Tantric tradition might be the only
esoteric or mystical science that is still
30
unbroken today.
Thousands of years of experience has
not been diluted into empty words or ideals
far from everyday life. The tradition is
passed on directly from teacher to pupil
and in that way it is secret. When you learn
the more deepreaching meditations it will
always be during a period of silence, which
enhances your receptivity and awareness.
Nothing is incidental during the process
of such a course, everything contributes
to ensure that the initiation takes place.
A dream about initiation
“The year before I learned yoga and
meditation, I took my General Certificate
of Education and got a job as a postman
for six months to make enough money to
go travelling.
One day during the journey I take a
nap and dream, as I have done many
times before, that I am in a big house
with my family, friends, animals and
many dream symbols.
But this time I’m looking out of the
window and I see that a fire is burning
outside. I go out to the fire (in the same
instant I am conscious and wide awake
in the dream), and I’m thinking about
children, how in some societies they
learn in their dreams to confront
monsters, animals or the like and not be
afraid of dying - and then I choose to go
into the fire!
Everything turns into white light and
I’m flying or falling while a blissful
feeling flows through me.
I awaken and sit up, the dream or
whatever it was is gone, but I am left with
an intense experience of being present.
A few months later I am in Håå
attending the 3-Months Course. My
inspiration, creativity and joy of living
grow as the course proceeds, and I begin
to realise why it says ‚for the art of
living‘ on the course brochure. And when
Swami Janakananda, who leads the
course, tells us that fire is an old symbol
for a process of liberation, I remember
my dream and understand that I was
being prepared for what was later to
happen in Håå” (Omkarananda)
Welcome to our Courses
10 and 14 days courses 1995
12 - 22 October 4000/3200 SwCr
Shanti and Adam Chr. Moltke
19 December - 1 January 4700 SwCr
Swami Janakananda and Sita
2 - 12 January 4000/3200 SwCr
Kim Paulsen and Bhawana Murti
3-Months Course 1996
23 January - 20 April 17500 SwCr
Swami Janakananda, Sita and others
Summer Courses 1996
16 - 26 May, 26 May - 8 June,
9 - 22 June, 23 June - 6 July,
7 - 20 July.
Our courses are at present about 25-30%
cheaper for other nationalities, due to the
low exchange rate for Swedish Crowns.
The second prices are for students,
unemployed and pensioners.
Get the brochure for Håå Course Center,
it describes it all thoroughly. q
31
Yoga, Tantra and Meditation in Daily Life
Swami Janakananda’s book in a revised and extended edition
(Rider Books, UK and Weiser, USA. Yoga, Tantra et Méditation dans la Vie Quotodienne, Editions Satyanandashram, France)
This book offers an alternative to the
way many books deal with yoga, when
they maintain the misunderstanding
that one must take on a new life style to
use yoga and meditation. Swami
Janakananda does not only stress the
practical side of yoga and meditation in
this book, but shares the Tantric
wisdom and view, that gives you the
freedom to practise yoga and
meditation entirely on your own terms.
Many attempts have been made to
ex-plain yoga from a scholarly or
religious viewpoint. This book instead
describes yoga from within, based on
the author’s own understanding - from
a yogi’s point of view. Yoga has,
through many thousands of years,
developed into a system that deals with
human develop-ment and health. We
find traces of yoga from the past on
earth’s various continents. Today yoga
and meditation are both one of the most
used alternative therapy forms in many
countries, and a basis for an active and
creative life for many people.
As you follow the exercises in this
32
book, you will realise that yoga is I saw and heard. I have read many
based on a profound knowledge of yoga books and tried to follow them,
human nature: A knowledge not but they were not filled with much
limited to any age, life-style or information. Your book tends to go into
nationality. It is the fruit of a living more detail about each asana, breathing
tradition, where knowledge is passed exercise and meditation. Many of my
directly from teacher to student, from friends didn’t understand yoga until I
generation to generation. Step by step showed them your book and they found
you are guided through the subject, and it very fascinating. Personally, I have
in a practical manner you can benefit tried different kinds of exercises such
from the different poses, breathing as weight lifting which afterwards
exercises, meditations and the Tantric made me feel very tired and sore. I also
sexual yoga. tried Tai Chi, which is similar to yoga
and meditation, but I found out that
yoga gives a better overall relaxing
A readers effect than Tai Chi. I have only
recommendation been doing yoga for about eight
“I am writing this months, but I am inspired by
letter to tell you yoga more and more each day.
how pleased I am I have been doing the classical
with the book poses in the ‘Yoga, Tantra
‘Yoga, Tantra and Meditation’ book now
and Meditation for a few months. In closing,
in Daily Life’. I I would like to thank you
have also for the wonderful material
recently and some day I would
bought the like to travel to Sweden
tape ‘Yoga and go to your school.
Nidra’. I Sincerely,
am very Clinton Blackmore,
pleased Regina, Canada”
of what
Experience Yoga Nidra w on CD!
Inspiration for a richer life - with SWAMI JANAKANANDA No
1. The Wholeness of Your Nature, the relaxation Yoga Nidra to the sounds of
Mother Earth. Composed and guided by Swami Janakananda. 20.41
2. Travel through the Space of Experience, a piece of music, composed and
played on a Swara-Mandala harp by Roop Verma. 7.44
3. Discover Your Self, the deep Yoga Nidra. The relaxation is guided by
Swami Janakananda, to the music of Roop Verma. 45.16
With the CD there is a 20-page booklet about Yoga Nidra, and how to get the
full benefits from the two relaxations.
“This is a hit, if you can talk about hits within relaxation.”
(A. Thomson, therapist and New Age bookseller in UK)
“The tape is one of the most inspiring I have heard for a long time. It is a
multidimensional work of art of a nature that is rarely seen.”
(M. Lammgård, musician and therapist, Växthuset Kaprifol, Sweden)
“After a number of years of having a stressed life with a job that almost ruined my ability to live in the present, I’m now again
happy to face each new day, not to unnecessarily worry myself about tomorrow. I have learnt to laugh again. I think it’s
fantastic.” (E. Berg, Sweden)
“Yoga Nidra (meditative deep relaxation) is much more than a deep relaxation; it is a total experience that touches and
awakens all parts of your being.” (Swami Janakananda)

Yoga shop Nose cleansing pot

with instruction brochure:
Hopi Ear Candles: made of 100% bees
wax and cotton; cleanses the ears. 50
The book: Yoga, Tantra and Meditation Joghus, (short spout) blue, red, yellow, Sw.Cr. + 30 Sw.Cr. postage.
in Daily Life green or black.
by Swami Janakananda 165 Sw.Cr.+ 55 Sw.Cr. postage.
175 Sw.Cr. + 55 Sw.Cr. postage. Krutis, (long spout) blue, sand, white or
Also available in other languages. green, 195 Sw.Cr. + 105 Sw.Cr. postage.
New French translation of the book! The periodical:
The CD: Experience Yoga Nidra Bindu, no. 3-11,
165 Sw.Cr. + 30 Sw.Cr. postage. 25 Sw.Cr. each + 20 Sw.Cr.
postage. See also page 34.
The tape: Experience Yoga Nidra The brochure (free):
120 Sw.Cr. + 30 Sw.Cr. postage. about the retreats at Håå International
Course Center. (See pages 30-31).
We can only accept payment in Swedish Crowns by Eurocheque, international money order or to our postal giro account
73 86 03 - 0 in Sweden. If you send a personal cheque, please add 50 Sw.Cr. (cashing fee).
Please send money and order to: Scandinavian Yoga and Meditation School, Håå Course Center, 340 13 Hamneda, Sweden.

33
Read Bindu - previous issues are still available
No. 3: The ability to experience.
Headstand. Nose Cleansing...
No. 4: Kriya Yoga I. The effect of yoga
on the finer energy. The Source of
Energy - a Tantric meditation...
Håå Course Center, 340 13 Hamneda, Sweden. Tel. +46 372 55063.
Fax. +46 372 55036. Email: haa.course.center@pp.microbus.se
Sweden
• Västmannagatan 62, 113 25 Stockholm
tel. +46 8 321218, fax. +46 8 314406
email: skanyoga@algonet.se
Denmark
• Købmagergade 65, 1150 Copenhagen
tel. +45 3314 1140, fax. +45 3314 1434
email: bindu@inet.uni2.dk
• Vestergade 45, 8000 Århus
tel. +45 8619 4033, fax. +45 8619 4013
• Kongensgade 12 B, 3000 Elsinore
tel. +45 4921 2068
Internet • www.scand-yoga.org
34
No. 5: Kriya Yoga II. Psychic energy.
Six years of scientific research on the 3-
Months Courses in Håå, Sweden. “The
Pyramid” and Pratyahara.
No. 6: The twilight hour - did we have a
living meditation tradition in the North?
Invent tomorrow's education, about
R.Y.E. (Research on Yoga in Education).
Shoulderstand...
No. 7: Silver Jubilee issue! Read about
Kriya Yoga III. Yoga for pregnant
women. Savasana.
No. 8: Harmony between the experiencer
and the experienced. On the Tantric
meditation Antar Mauna (Inner Silence),
its ancestors and cousins. The Lotus
Pose. Intestinal cleansing.
No. 9: Instructor or Guide? Yoga for the
Back. Experience and Knowledge -
Germany
• Sextrost. 3 (im Hof), 30169 Hannover
tel. +49 511 803 99 41 fax. 803 99 42
email: hannover@scand-yoga.org
Norway
• Georgernes Verft 3, 5011 Bergen
tel. +47 5614 3310 fax. +47 5614 9738
email: bergen@scand-yoga.org
• Skjolden 1, 1322 Høvik, Oslo
tel. +47 8800 6488 fax. +45 6756 9535
email: karuna@online.no
Finland
• Sukula, 30100 Forssa, Helsinki
tel. +358 3 4350599
about the yoga teacher education at the
Scandinavian Yoga and Meditation
School.
No. 10: Nada Yoga, meditation on the
inner sounds. Vibrations create forms.
Song and dance. The Bumble bee.
No. 11: Yoga Nidra: Tantra - Nyasa -
Chakra - Resolution - Consciousness -
Science
Subscription
You are welcome to support us, so
we can continue to publish Bindu.
Pay 45 Sw.Cr. for one issue or 80
Sw.Cr. for 2 issues + 40 Sw.Cr. post-
age (payment, see below). Further
contributions are also welcome.
Publisher: Bindu,
Håa Course Center,
340 13 Hamneda, Sweden.
Circulation: 4,000 in English (Also printed in
German, Swedish and Danish)
Printed: Håå Course Center,
by Erling Christiansen & Mark Richards
Layout: Robert Nilsson & Swami Janakananda.
Translation: Ambika, Mette Kierkgaard, Mark
Richards & Robyn Taylor.
Pictures: Front page & back page “Shakti”
Bjarke, p.4, p.6 & p.7 Birger Vilén-Petersen, p.20
Das Herzengebet, Mystik und Yoga der Ostkirche,
p.12, p.24, p.30, p.31 Omkarananda, p.19 & p.21
from the comic book “He who was born twice”
Derib, p.22 Knud Hvidberg, p.26 Swami
Janakananda, p.28 “Invitation to Phoenix” Leif
Madsen (1967), p.29 Robert Nilsson.
Copyright © 1997 Bindu and Scandinavian Yoga
and Meditation School. All rights reserved.
 Publisher: Bindu,
Håa Course Center,
340 13 Hamneda, Sweden.
Circulation: 4,000 in English (Also printed in
German, Swedish and Danish)
Printed: Håå Course Center,
by Erling Christiansen & Mark Richards
Layout: Robert Nilsson & Swami Janakananda.
Translation: Ambika, Mette Kierkgaard, Mark
Richards & Robyn Taylor.
Pictures: Front page & back page “Shakti”
Bjarke, p.4, p.6 & p.7 Birger Vilén-Petersen, p.20
Das Herzengebet, Mystik und Yoga der Ostkirche,
p.12, p.24, p.30, p.31 Omkarananda, p.19 & p.21
from the comic book “He who was born twice”
Derib, p.22 Knud Hvidberg, p.26 Swami
Janakananda, p.28 “Invitation to Phoenix” Leif
Madsen (1967), p.29 Robert Nilsson.
Copyright © 1997 Bindu and Scandinavian Yoga
and Meditation School. All rights reserved.
Sohan Qadri - Trikaya 1

35
Linda Gustavson Nameth - Concealed Interior