February 28, 2025 • 63 mins
Reverend Jaganath Carrera is a renowned yoga practitioner, teacher, and author with nearly 50 years of dedication to the path of yoga. He studied under the esteemed Swami Satchidananda, an iconic pioneering force in bringing yoga to the West and founder of the Integral Yoga Institute. Reverend Jaganath is recognized for his insightful translations and interpretations of the Yoga Sutras, most notably authoring "Inside the Yoga Sutras." As an Integral Yoga minister, he has been pivotal in advancing the understanding and practice of yoga philosophy, also serving as a revered mentor and teacher to many in the field.
Visit him on his website: https://www.yogalifecenter.org/
Key Takeaways:
- Reverend Jaganath Carrera's introduction to yoga was sparked by Richard Hittleman’s television program, further deepened upon exposure to Swami Satchidananda's teachings.
- "Inside the Yoga Sutras" was created as a response to a call for modern interpretations, aiming to update and simplify the complex language of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras.
- The essence of yoga lies in a harmonious relationship with nature, fostering experiences and realizations that lead to enlightenment.
- Reverend Jaganath emphasizes the power of humility and service in spiritual practice, viewing life as a continuous opportunity for learning and sharing wisdom.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:33):
Welcome to Native Yoga Toddcast,so happy you are here. My goal
(00:56):
All right, let's begin. Welcometo Native Yoga Toddcast, I'm so
happy that you're here today. Myvery special guest is Reverend
Jaganath Carrera. You've alreadyhad a chance to listen to the
previous episode where I got achance to interview Margabandhu
and this week, I have one of hisclose friends, Reverend Jaganath
(01:19):
Carrera, here on the show.
Reverend Jaganath Carrera is theauthor of a book called inside
the Yoga Sutras, a ComprehensiveSource Book for the Study and
Practice of Patanjali YogaSutras. He is a student of Swami
Satchidananda and ReverendJagannath Carrera I read his a
short bio. Has shared the joyand wisdom of the Yoga Sutras
(01:40):
with 1000s of students for overthree decades. He's a long time
Disciple of Sri SwamiSatchidananda. He's taught all
facets of yoga at universities,prisons, yoga centers and
interfaith programs. Heestablished the Integral Yoga
ministry and as a spiritualadvisor and visiting lecturer on
(02:00):
Hinduism for the one spiritSeminary in New York City. He is
a former chief administrator ofsuch an Ananda ashram YogaVille,
and founded the integral YogaInstitute of New Brunswick, New
Jersey, where he is the directorfor 14 years. But this book was
written in 2006 so it's beenmuch longer than that. He served
(02:23):
as a dean of academics at thewith this channel is to bring
inspirational speakers to theeastern School of acupuncture
and as a member of its governingmic in the field of yoga,
massage, body work and beyond.
board, senior member of theintegral yoga teachers Council.
He co developed highly regardedintegral yoga meditation and
Raja yoga teacher trainingcertification program. Yes,
(02:44):
that's what I'm talking about.
And so I'm so glad that you'rehere. You get a chance to meet
and listen to Reverend Jaganath.
I'm so grateful for thisopportunity to to learn and
listen and speak with him. Andthen on the next episode to
follow, you're going to get achance to hear me interview both
Follow us at @nativeyoga andcheck us out at
(03:05):
Reverend Jaganath andMargabandhu together. These guys
have such a incredible rapportwith one another, so much mutual
respect and love, and I can'twait for you to hear it. Thank
you so much for joining in.
Let's go ahead and begin.
I'm so delighted to have thisopportunity to bring Reverend
nativeyogacenter.com.
(03:26):
Jagannath Cora on to the podcasttoday. Reverend Jaganath, thank
you so much for joining me. Ireally appreciate this.
Well, thank you, Todd. It's apleasure to be with you. Well,
thank you. I feel honored, and Ihave the pleasure. My first yoga
sutras book was Yoga Sutras ofPatanjali, a translation and
(03:46):
commentary by Swami satchanAnanda, and because I in part,
was really, I don't want to sayconfused, but I found it
challenging. I didn't know howto make sense of it, in which
case, I found your book, whichwas published in 2006 called
inside the Yoga Sutras, acomprehensive source book for
(04:08):
the study and practice ofPatanjali yoga sutras. And I
started being able to make alittle more sense out of things.
So first of all, thank you forputting your energy in time.
It's an incredible book, and tonow be able to sit down with you
here and ask you questions, Ifeel really lucky. So thank you.
(04:28):
Thank you. But I have to saythat sometimes people will
publish a quote from the book,and I don't recognize it at all.
You're like I wrote that.
Wow, this guy could really soundso erudite.
Maybe even start wondering,like, Are you sure you got that
(04:49):
from my book? Maybe, maybe youmaybe got the authors mixed up
here everyday, there was a quote that was
published, and I said, I have totake the notes about this. I. I
think in a certain ways, timehas gone on, while a lot of the
technical aspects of theteachings are still important
(05:11):
for me to speak on, I findmyself getting in a way simpler
and maybe in a certain way, morefocused and maybe even deeper.
Mm, you go through all the fluffof the sutras, because a lot of
them are difficult, yeah. Andthen the whole idea, even behind
(05:32):
doing the book, was not reallyoriginally my idea. I would just
make notes on everything,wherever I was, napkin envelopes
and things, and I wanted toorganize it. And then somehow I
must have mentioned that tosomeone. And then it was a
matter of people asking me whenmy book was going to be on. And
(05:53):
said, there is no book. Wow.
After a while, it seemed like areality I had to face. And I
spoke to Swami Satchidananda,and he said, It's time to update
the book. You know, the languagethat you have is not the same
language at that point, yearsand years ago. So that's how I
(06:17):
got involved in doing it. I wasreally his inspiration, and I
kept telling him that I didn'tthink we needed another book.
His was fine. That's six timeshe got stern with me. He says,
Just do the bookwell. I mean, on the back of the
book, the first recommendationwe get is from Swami
(06:38):
satchananda, saying Patanjaliwas really with them when he
wrote this book. I mean, that'sa that's a really good
compliment.
Yeah, yeah. I had, at that time,I just printed out and put it in
a three ring binder. It wasn'tcompletely finished yet, yeah,
but I just wanted to offer it tohim and say, This is what I've
(06:59):
been doing. And he paged throughit and page through it, and
quoted parts of the book, whichthey found, you know, wonderful.
And then he made that quote,wow. He didn't say him. He said,
patanja is really with you whenyou wrote this book. We felt it
didn't fit, yeah, yeah.
But he said that, and that wasnothing could have been greater
(07:22):
for me. Yes,I hear it. Oh man. What a what a
compliment. That's incredible.
You know, you've, you've had,well, let's see, how many years
have you had, officially, as ayoga practitioner? Can you, can
you pinpoint the first time yogabecame apparent to you.
(07:45):
I'll tell you the more importantversion, and there's another
version that might say somethingabout me. But getting into yoga
as a path and a practice in asteady way probably started in
around 1973 or 1974 so it'sabout 50 years. Yeah. And before
(08:09):
that, when I was much younger inmy teens, there was a show
Richard hittlemandoing asanas. I've heard about
this. I've never seen any of thefootage from it, but so
I would get in the morning, itwas on a TV, and he would have
two models do the asanas, and Iwould copy that. And what I
(08:30):
loved is, at the end, he alwayshad a meditation, and that
really somehow spoke to me evenmore than the asanas. For me to
was a peek into somethingspecial and subtle, and at the
same time, something very deepand genuine about the practice,
so that it was that whichlasted, you know, maybe six
(08:51):
months, then the wastelandthings that we do when we're
teens, yeah, Yeah. Did you haveexposure to philosophical and or
religious idea ideas as a childand or teenager,
I think I was brought up RomanCatholic, and when I was really
(09:14):
young, that to me, that's areal. Was a reality. You know,
Jesus was still accessiblethrough prayer and through
works, and at a certain pointmust have been the confirmation.
I think you're 12 or 13 yearsold. I had a really, I think,
(09:35):
important but disturbingexperience. You go. We had four
years of classes, which I didn'tattend because my father didn't
want to drive me to the church,and I was happy to just go out
and play baseball with myfriends. And yes, so anyway,
right at the end, we go into thechurch itself, and there's a
(09:58):
rehearsal because there's abishop. And he's supposed to ask
you questions and all. And thefirst thing he said was, the
first thing we're supposed tolearn is who made me? God made
me. This was the one that got mein trouble. Why did God make
you? God made you because Heloves you. That in the
vernacular of the day, it blewmy mind. I said, I'm sitting
(10:21):
here and I'm looking at thisgiant crucifix, and I'm looking
and saying, How can I love you?
You don't know you?
Yeah? And I just startedweeping, yeah.
I felt awful. I just couldn't Icouldn't justify and find, how
can I love someone I don't know.
And then I became very agnosticfor a number of years, until I
(10:43):
saw Swami Satan Ananda and say,Oh yeah, this is something that
could be known. This issomething to be experiencing.
That's when I got serious. Andfrom then on, from around 1973
or so, it's been the center ofmy life. Amazing
(11:04):
story I love that. Do you feellike he brought this sort of
connection of understanding,where it felt real versus
disjointed and or far removedfrom from possibility?
Yeah, there was the love that heexuded his incredible sense of
(11:25):
humor. I mean, you go to alecture, a two hour lecture, and
you spend 50% of the timelaughing at his jokes, but they
all had it like a message too.
Yeah, yeah. And first time I sawhim in person, this is an
interesting to me. It's aninteresting story. Before I saw
in person, there's a verypowerful moment that I that I
(11:45):
heard with him. I was paintingmy bedroom, and it was late at
night, and everything gotdelayed, and it was somewhere
around nine or 10 at night, I'mpainting and painting. And at
that time, there was a radiostation, WPLJ, I think it was
played rock and roll. And I wasa musician then, so I was
(12:06):
listening to the music. And thenat a certain time, this was a
Sunday night, they stopped themusic, and it became a talk
show, yeah, so I didn't knowthat. Anyway, I turned on the
radio. I'm painting with theroller and what the first thing
I hear is a young man's voice isthe first words I heard from
(12:27):
him. He said to someone at thattime I didn't know who said, If
you don't give me a reason tolive tonight, I'm going to kill
myself. Wow, wow. And there wasno sense of like that. He was
like, putting it up, because youcould hear it in his voice. It
was trembling, clearly fightingback tears. And I stopped with
(12:47):
painting, and I was sittingthere, holding the roller,
sitting in a chair, and Icouldn't, I couldn't turn away
from this man with an Indianaccent. Turned out to be good.
Wow. I don't remember what hesaid now, yeah, but I was in
tears. Wow. At the end of like,five or 10 minutes of talking by
(13:11):
him, this young man said, Ithink I have a reason to live.
Wow. Fortunately, he lived inManhattan and could go to the
Integra Yoga Institute there todelve into the teachings.
Amazing. That was a first realimpression of who dies. Who is
this in God,and this is before you actually
(13:31):
met him in person. So you heardthis through the and you hadn't
heard of him prior to this.
You're just painting andlistening to music. And here
comes this yoga teacher. Thisthis spiritual master. Oh, man,
that's an interesting yeah,who is that guy? And then it
just fell away for a few years.
(13:53):
Then when I got back into yoga,there was a program at in New
York City. I forget the name ofthe church. And I've been into
yoga for a while, like sixmonths or so, and doing asanas
and meditation, and I wanted, Iwas really attracted to what I
heard from him, and he gave awonderful talk. But the this is
(14:16):
a little hard to put into words,but it's, it's the essence of
what really kept me into yoga.
At the end of the program,number of people went up to the
stage where he was and there wasthis, I only can think of
calling it one thing, a ballet.
People would give him often,like a banana or an apple or
(14:38):
something, and they would offerit to him. He's leaning forward,
he's up high, and they'rereaching up, and he would take
it, and then he wouldimmediately give it to someone
else, then another person. Andit was such an ease and flow.
And I saw the love they had forhim, the respect they had for
him. I couldn't I couldn't turnaway for. Of it. And I came with
(15:01):
these other people. I said, Comeon, we have to go. And I I said,
I can't, I can't. I had to stay.
There was something in that, anoffering that was accepted with
such care and love, and thencost passed on to someone else.
And I thought, this is the yogicpath. You've gained something,
but you give Yeah, yeah, that'sserious answer that program.
(15:29):
That's when you really kind ofknew I want to dig in on this
Yeah, and so I I'm picking up onthe fact that you you recognized
early that you gravitated towardthe philosophy or toward the
teachings that you liked, theposes that was neat. But then
the the meditation that wasgiven at the was it hittleman On
(15:52):
his on his show, on hisshow, he would do little
meditation at the end of eachprogram. What was
the transition then, from thispoint of meeting such an Ananda,
what did it? How did yourpractice unfold in relation to
your development of your yogapractice? Did you start diving
head in, then into yogaphilosophy and investigating
(16:14):
different texts, or was it morethat you? How did what did that?
How did he end up teaching you.
I mean, there were a couple ofthings. I lived in New
Brunswick, New Jersey, home ofRutgers University. And I was
getting involved at that pointin just seeing a flyer on a tree
(16:37):
or something said, free yogaclasses, integral yoga club. So
I said, this is great. I can goat once a week and for free, and
take the class and to get intothe Yas in his own I got very
friendly with the teachers.
There were two teachers. Bothwere disciples of Swami Satya
nada, so they helped me answer alot of my questions. And that's
(17:01):
when it started getting reallymore regular for me. And I had
someone to, you know, the shortstory is one of them. Name was
Nataraj. He recognized my likezeal. Who was which is really, I
was in high gear. He said. Hesays, Look, anytime you have a
(17:24):
question, anytime you could callme, I took it seriously. I'd be
reading these books. Oh yeah,one time I called him at 230 in
the morning. Oh man, I'm sorry,but is this really? Did you
mean? He said, Yes. He came overto my apartment, wow. And I
said, I don't understand this.
(17:44):
And it seems to, I don'tremember what the questions
were, but it seems like there'sanother teaching that
contradicted it, contradicted ita bit. So that was a big help to
me to have these senior people.
Yes, it's like guides for me.
And I really, I learned a lotfrom them.
(18:04):
And reallyseeing, seeing Gurudev in
person, towards again, that howhe treated people, made me think
like, you know, I want toeverybody wants to be happy and
have a meaningful life. Andbefore getting involved with
yoga on that level with hisguidance, I didn't see how you
(18:26):
could have that. I could see thepain. I could see that, you
know, that could see happythings too. It wasn't like I
wasn't depressed, but I wantedlife to have meaning. I wanted
to believe in the Jesus that wason the cross, yes, spiritual
being. And here was someone whohad, at least for me, exuded
(18:47):
that kind of care, that kind oflove. And that's really how I
got got involved more and morewith him when, especially when
his book came out. But when Igot involved, there was no book.
There were little pamphlets thatthey had at the centers.
Interesting, because you thereprobably wasn't there was so at
(19:10):
that time period, there was noaccess to a a Yoga Sutras of
Patanjali.
It was there was one book calledHow to know God, which is not,
it was a suture book byChristopher issue, would I think
was in Swami prabhavananda.
Those two people did this book,and I read that, and that was,
(19:30):
that was helpful. But when Iwent to get it, I read about it
somewhere, and it was abookstore in New Brunswick, and
I went in there and I said, Iwent this book. He said, What
kind of a book is? I said,What's a Yoga Book? He took me,
brought me to the section ofcookbooks.
Thought you said, yogurt. Oh mygosh, that is
(19:55):
we don't know where to put thesebooks. That was so unknown, in a
way. So unknown. Oh my gosh. Foreveryone joking off, that's
funny. That reminds me of a timewhere, when my wife and I were
opening up our yoga studio, herewe were inside painting, and
some guy walks by and he goes ayogurt shop. You guys are gonna
have yogurt? And we were like,Oh, I'm sorry to disappoint you,
(20:17):
but it's gonna be yoga. And hejust like, was like, that's not
what I want. And he took off,and I thought, oh, no, we got a
big hill to climb here. Butthat's so funny. I love hearing
that story. I mean, I like thefact that you're bringing
attention to the reality withwhich the amount of information
we have access to now and withthe ease with which we have
(20:39):
access but in that time period,it was totally different. And so
I'm so curious to hear how thisevolved for you did when? When,
when Swami satananda Did hiscommentary on the yoga sutras.
Were you with him when he wasdoing that? What? What were you
aware that he was writing thiscommentary, and
(21:01):
I was aware of it. There was nobook then, you know, you little
cassette tapes who had parts oftalks that we had. We had that
and, yeah, there was the bookcame years later. But that also
in a similar way, if I couldbacktrack a little bit earlier
(21:22):
on, please, a really importantfeature of his teachings, I
think, motivated me. And itstarted with a book from another
spiritual group, which I won'tname, and it was very it was all
about meditation, and veryintense, very thick, but pretty
(21:46):
much, I'm not exaggerating,almost every page this author
said, and this can only beachieved by and then their
brand, this can only be achievedby. Got it, I started getting
depressed. And didn't have thatrelationship with Guru Dev,
yeah, where it was, yeah. And Iwas asked my my wife asked me to
(22:11):
go to Barnes and Nobles inManhattan to buy some books she
needed for class. So I thoughtthey might have some books on
yoga. And they did. And I wantedsomething deeply, you know,
intellectual and filled withideas. And I went through one
book after another, and theyusually would have a picture of
the author. None of them lookedvery happy. And all the way at
(22:36):
the bottom, on the bottom shelf,I picked up this book this
before I saw and here's thisband with the flowing orange
robes, and the wind is blowingin his hair, and he's on top of
a mountain. There's clouds allaround him, and he has the most
amazing happy smile. But it wasa biography, biography, but I
kept picking it up, and finallyI said, I have to, I have to get
(23:01):
this. And I got home that night,and I spent, well, I don't know
how many hours from probablyaround supper time until the
next morning, reading the book,because a part of it, one of the
strong things was the interfaithside of the teachings truth is
(23:23):
one, pairs are many. And thatreally spoke to my heart, too.
I hear you. I hear that. Well,which book was this?
Of his book? It was, it's hisbiography, Apostle of peace. Is
what they rewrote it. Now it'scalled apostle of peace. This.
This is such an anonymousbiography, Yeah, amazing. So you
(23:43):
oh so now you have been able toread this before actually
meeting him as well. You heardthe radio. You heard the radio
story. You're at the bookstore.
You see the picture of him, orthis book from him. Oh, man,
that's cool. All right, I hear,yeah, it's
a nice biography, becausethere's the biographical
information interspersed withquotes from him that are
(24:03):
pertinent. So you're getting theteaching in these nice little
chunks, nice that go on with theassist experiences in his life.
I'll definitely check it out. Ido not have that one. Thank you
for telling me.
Yeah, it's a nice read. Youknow, it's really, it's not like
real technical, yeah, but itsays a lot about how a human
being can experience what we'reall looking for, you know, to
(24:27):
have a life with meaning, a lifethat has that we perceive our
life as having some value, andthat, as he always says, life is
for fun. Life is for fun. Weshould really have joy in life,
and yoga is one of the ways toattain that. So, yeah, the
(24:48):
biography is something that Iwould recommend. Very
cool. I'll definitely read that.
And I like the fact that you'repointing out that coming across
a tradition that says the onlyway you'll achieve. This is
through us. That's aninteresting element in yoga.
Surely, since then, you've comeacross that a lot more than just
that. Has that always been adeterrent for you? Has that been
(25:12):
a little bit of a once you comeacross that type of idea that my
way is the fastest and the mosteffective way, and don't mess
with anybody else's way. My wayis the quickest, the quickest
way to to liberation orenlightenment. Have you always
seen that as a little bit of atrickery, in a sense,
(25:35):
yeah, it's, it's still here, Ithink, like, I mean, there's
certainly potential for egoisticmotives that kind of blind you
to certain realities. And Ithink there's also the brand
people this is a way to makemoney saying, like, you know, we
(25:58):
have this one simple way to dothis, and it might be a
wonderful way, by the way, notcriticizing, necessarily that
understood. But like I said, forme, I was surprised, and I was I
don't tend, I never tendedtowards depression. If I was
something got me off the kilter,it was anger. I would be I would
get angry so. But I was readingthis one book that's about three
(26:23):
quarters the way through, I wasgetting depressed.
Like, seriously depressed, yeah?
Like, I might be that guycalling up on the radio station
next saying, If you don't giveme a reason,
yeah, for that. It was like,yes, yes. I think part of it is
(26:46):
maybe not a clear understandingof how important wisdom and
knowledge have to be passed downfrom person to person. Good
point, not person to videos. Imean, all those have a place.
They're essential, but at somepoint, there's a quote I just
(27:08):
read. It was a Tibetan Buddhistmaster that wisdom is not never
self evident. It has to berepealed or revealed. That just
just a superficial, you know,look at it isn't that isn't
going to do it. It has to berevealed. And that means there
(27:28):
has to be an interaction withsomeone who maybe knows a little
more of whatever it is you'reinterested in. And I think yoga
and all spiritual paths flourishmost when it's based on an
apprentice student relationship.
(27:50):
Dude, yeah, I agree. Idefinitely see the distinction
between these two methods oftransmission. What? What medium
Do you currently work with? Doyou do one on one mentorship as
well as larger group teaching?
(28:11):
Yeah, we have, I mean, we haveprograms where people come to,
don't get really close, but theycome to. We have every Friday
night, we have a SATs ondifferent subjects and different
things that we do, and guestspeakers. So that could be
anything, but there are a numberof people, probably 3040
(28:33):
students, who are initiates intoour style of yoga. And then
there's a lot of individualthings, you know, problems come
up. And it's getting to thepoint now what some of our
teachers have been 18 years withus, wow. So now it's like they
(28:56):
could see that person, yes,like, I'm really interested in
passing this on. I don't want itto be all on me. So now it's
like, you know, my focus is moreand more like, what can I do to
prepare you for when I'm nolonger available? Which, you
know, it could sound grisly, butit's important. I hear you.
That's cool,that you're looking forward like
(29:18):
that. I appreciate that what wasthe catalyst and or time that
you were transitioning frombeing a student to taking on the
role of being a teacher?
I mean, early on with theIntegra Yoga I was asked to
(29:43):
teach. I didn't know, when I wasin grade school, you had report
cards and have like, I don'tknow if they still do it, but
there'd be a thing on likebehavior.
Yes,every every marking period Am I
get my card. Yeah, and it wouldalways say, he never talks so
quiet. So I think it was I waslike saving it up. I didn't know
(30:06):
that at the time when I got intoGuru Yoga. I don't know how or
why it happened. I was askedmore and more often to give
talks. Then Guru DevSatchitananda asked me to be
part of teacher training. So Iwas doing teacher training, one
of the main teachers for the 10day retreats we would have once
a year. So I was gettingexperience that way. And at one
(30:29):
point, I don't know what yearwould have been, 1987 maybe he
asked me to move to VirginiaSatchidananda ashram, which I
did, left New Brunswick, went toVirginia, and I was still
teaching then. Then he had mebecome, I think it was vice
(30:49):
president, administrator. That'sthat was my title at such a
Genda ashram. And then through anumber of things that are
particularly pertinent. It wasimportant for me and my wife to
come back to New Jersey, whichhe was actually fine with. He
understood why. And he said,Yeah, go and do that. And I was
(31:12):
actually going to acupunctureschool.
I saw, I read that you're inacupuncturist as well. Yeah, I
haven'tbeen practicing in a while
because of the teaching, but Icame and did that. And then it
started where I would give atalk, and people started wanting
to be more and more with me. Andit started happening where
(31:39):
people said, Well, I see you aslike a guru for me. And I said,
No, he was keeping track, trackof it. And said, for six years,
you said, No, everything. You'reconstantly being yesterday and
saying, no, no, no. And then Iremember what, what Gurudev once
(32:00):
said to me. He said, If someonesees something beautiful you've
developed in you don't disturbthat. It's their vision that's
causing they are seeing it. It'snot you as the teacher, in a
way, it's the student's abilityto see something in the teacher,
like I saw in him, somethingthat attracted them, and so that
(32:24):
became the beginning of yogalife society. It was never my
intention to do that, but theywere these initial group of
students really wanted to havesomething of their own. I'm
still teaching the same thing Itaught Guru Dev. I'm still, you
know, an integral yoga minister,but we have yoga life ministers,
(32:46):
and really it's just a lineage,yeah. So I understand. I
understand. Can you explain thetitle your reverend? Jagannath,
where does and how does thetitle Reverend come in?
(33:07):
It's kind of my fault. Ofcourse, in the intra group yoga,
we had Sanyasi Swamis monastics,and I saw the benefit of that
kind of formal commitment, ofcourse, the commitment more or
(33:28):
less like the typical monk ornun, poverty, celibacy,
obedience, although it's alittle bit different the way
it's presented in yoga. And youknow, I was very close to know
them. I was working with himside by side for years, and I
saw the power of a formalcommitment in a way, like
(33:49):
letting letting your mind knowto the roots. This is serious.
I'm doing this. Yeah, I'm notbacking. I want to serve all in.
Yeah, it's all in but then Istarted thinking. I said, What I
know all these householders thatare just as connected and real
(34:11):
about this. So I wrote a letterto Swami Satchidananda at one
point. Said, No, this one stepback, my mother had something
inadvertently to do with this. Iwas telling her about Gurudev.
My mother was born in Italy. Shewas a war bride. Me a load of
(34:31):
bride. And she was asking meabout go to death. And I was
feeling so tortured, trying toput it in a way that she would
understand and accept it. Andshe was one point she was
thinking, thinking, come followme. She went up in the bedroom,
opened up a dress and drawer,and she pulled out this
information with Saint Francison it. She says, oh, it's the
(34:53):
Third Order of Saint Francis.
You have the poor clears for thewomen and the friars for the.
The men, but then you have forhouseholders, the Third Order of
Saint Francis. So that was in myhead, putting it back now into
Integra yoga. I thought maybethat would be appropriate for it
for us as well. I wrote aletter. And those days it was
(35:14):
all slow like that, a letter,thank you for reminding us,
because I love that time period,but thank you. I agree with you.
I hear you. Yeah,it was a whole different world
then, yeah, he wrote back to meand saying, I think this almost
(35:37):
his exact words is, I've beenthinking of this for a long
time, just waiting for someoneto come forward. Let's do it.
And it was only a couple ofmonths. Let's do it in July that
year, Guru celebrating theteacher. Yes, we can have our
own ministry. And that's how itstarted. We weren't sure that
(36:00):
you'd be called ministers or besomething else, but, you know,
he, along with other people,decided, let's keep it in a way
that people can relate to. Soit's, we're it's an interfaith
yoga ministry.
Very cool. I did not know that Iwas so curious about that
(36:21):
1980 that was, huh, that's what.
Thatmakes a lot of sense, too, to
have a intermediary role andmaybe task to play, like you
said, for the where, where forthe householders. That, yeah,
that allows you to be ahouseholder, but also take maybe
a more formal, formal role. Isthat? How you see being able to
(36:45):
be a reverend within this yogaschool allows for you to be kind
of like a sannyasin, kind oflike a renunciate, but but on
the role of with fourhouseholders, yeah, yeah. That
makes sense.
(37:06):
Yeah. It's, in fact, the the vowof the Minister is based on the
vow from the sannyasins. Butinstead of, like poverty, it's
like non attachment to thosethings. So it's, you know,
you're not, you're not making avow of celibacy if you're a
married person. So it's, youknow, shaped in a little
(37:27):
different way, so that theessence of what that Mind and
Life is about is the same. Yes,he would, he said they're
married monks. That's how hewould jokingly. Would say, this
is not that much differencebetween the ministers in the
sanyas. He said it's only acouple of things that are
different, but essentially,you're like a married monk. And
(37:51):
over the years, maybe a littlebit surprising to me, how often
our ministers are called on todo memorial services, weddings,
baby, blessings, all thosethings in in groups of where
people are not Yogis, you know,and can can see again, this goes
(38:14):
back to the idea of theinterfaith. You know, our logo
has a yantra with all thedifferent faith symbols around
it, yes. And there was a time Iwas I was doing a wedding in
Montreal, and the couple thisinsisted that it be done
(38:39):
outside, and it was in theLaurentian mountains outside of
Montreal, and I was setting upthe altar outside, and I knew
that the father of the groomhated the idea that I would be
there, and he said he's reallykind of a little bit violent
(39:00):
guy. Want to talk to him? Isaid, No, after, because right
now this is really getting meexcited here to do this, this
ceremony. Yeah.
So I said, Okay, after andceremony happens. My robe caught
fire. We're up the tail of myrobe, and it fell on the water
(39:27):
by a candle, and it was on fire,and the person who's assisting
me is waving Frank frantically.
Why is she waving like that? Shecame with a bowl of water, and
anyway, so afterwards, you knowthere's like the receiving line,
right? You come people, Hello,how are you? Thank you. So this
one little fellow comes up andhe saw tears. He's in his 60s,
he's all tears. And he said,Thank you so much. He said, I
(39:51):
hated this because I'm inbusiness. The guy said, and my
partner's daughter. Got Married.
Got married in the church, butthe minister refused to look at
her because it wasn't the samereligion like literally, he
said, would not, would not,would talk only to the male and
(40:13):
not to the female, yeah, I gotit. And he saw the entre with
all the symbols, yeah? And hejust fell in love with it, and
he was very wealthy guy. He tookme to his home to stay with me
tonight. Stay with me tonight.
The next morning, we're walkingaround outside his beautiful
day, and other people werewalking around, he would stop.
(40:34):
Everyone says you should listento what he said is one truth.
When he passed, he was justcompletely changed just by
having that servicethat's so cool. It is, yeah,
like, ofcourse, I'm feeling great
because, like, yeah, they'regetting it, yeah, yes. One
Truth, many pairs whenyou're when your outfit caught
(40:56):
on fire, though, did you have amoment of thinking this, this is
not going how I had planned.
Yeah? Well, yeah, this isnot looking so good here. This
guy's judging me. I'm catchingon fire.
Yeah? It seemed like it wasgoing to be exciting. It was
beautiful area. And the thingis, in this case, the brine
(41:20):
insisted on outside. Oh yeah.
They said, You know, it's prettywindy. It could be. She said,
No, it has to be. Has to be.
It's my dream. It's okay. You'reflying all the flower petals
rule. It was just a myth. And Icouldn't, you know the altar was
behind me, and it had slits upthe side, so I'm talking. And
then it rose in the air and fellon the candle. It was started
(41:43):
burning. Oh my gosh. And thisperson was with me, who was just
said, Yasi was like croucheddown and waving furiously. And
I'm thinking, why is she doingthat? It never occurred to me.
Then I turned my head and I seesmoke and flames, and she picked
up a bowl of water and threw iton my robe, and then we finished
(42:04):
theprogram. Oh my gosh, that's all.
And it sounds like you've beenable to do weddings and
different ceremonies. I'mcurious, have you supported in
the role of palliative care?
Have you have you sat with anyfolks that are transitioning and
or ready to pass? Has that? Hasthat come into your sphere at
(42:27):
all?
Yeah, there's been, there's beensome of that. My wife, even
worse, my wife is right now.
She's retired, but she's ahospice nurse. Oh, wow.
I have so much respect forhospice. Well, my mom passed
away, and we called hospice, andI was blown away at the level of
service that they they'reangels, and that's where I
thought, maybe with you, withwith the realm of what you with
(42:49):
you do, I bet that you've comeinto that sphere, but that's
amazing that your wife did that.
And what a path of humility. Inoticed that she's a reverend as
well, so she took the same vowsthat you have and you got, you
both have been able to worktogether. This is incredible.
Oh yeah, I've been with her 57years. Oh yes, congratulations.
That's yeah.
(43:12):
I found the right way, and it'snot going anywhere. This is it?
Wow, yes, yes. One thing aboutthe ceremonies is it maybe a bit
of evidence, because it's notlike lots and lots of these
ceremonies, but it's fairlyconsistent that at a wedding or
some other kind of program thatyou do that to be someone who's
(43:35):
at least suspicious of what'sgoing on, you know, and someone
like me shows up with a robe andthe hair and all that, which is
just because I I'm too lazy toshave, I'm going to grow a
beard. So there's always, likealways, but usually there's some
people that aren't very happythat you're there. But my
(43:57):
experience is every ceremony hadlike a little miracle. One of
the most moving was I was calledby our New York Center. We need
this woman, needs memorialservice, needs someone to lead
it. And the one who passed awaywas her brother. He was gay, he
(44:21):
had AIDS, and said he would loveinto Guru Yoga. And asked that,
can we do something for him? Isaid, Sure, we'll do it. But she
said, The whole family isagainst you being
(44:43):
there, wow, but this iswhat he wanted. I said, fine.
Well, you know, I'm happy to goand do that. I'm up for the
challenge. Yeah, yeah. I mean,because what he wanted. So, you
know, yes, it was meaningful tohim, yes. But I talked to her a
bit because I said, I don't knowthis fellow. I said, Tell me
about him a little bit. And theday before he passed, the two of
(45:04):
them were singing old rock androll songs. And then soon, a
couple hours later, he passedaway. And that image, to me was
very beautiful. So when I didthe service, I said I had to
find that something, you had tosay something about the person.
(45:27):
I told them that story, and Isaid, it's like, I don't know if
you knew about this. You know,swan song. You crazy people
here, yes, but the the story isthat swans are so beautiful, but
they make the most ugly sound,except when they're passing,
they make the most this is thestory. I don't know if it's
(45:49):
true.
I didn't know that. Yeah, that'scool.
And when they when they whenthey're passing, it's the most
beautiful sound on the planet.
Yeah, that's why he called aswan song. It always happens at
the end of something that makessense. So I don't remember his
name, you know, I said, and thisis what happened, and that was
his swan song. And afterwards,his mother came up to me, and
(46:15):
she put a hug on me that waslike shown and other. It's
always like, not everybody. It'snot like, you know, weird
Hollywood or everybody suddenly,is it? But there's almost always
one or two people that thismessage that we have in yoga
reaches them. Yeah, there'ssomething about its purity, its
(46:37):
power, if we live by it. I'msure you said that even with
Margo bonded, he lives, it giveshim that wonderful power, yes,
change people's lives. That'syoga. To me,
that is amazing. Reverendjagnath, I really appreciate
(46:59):
that perspective, I agree withyou, getting right down to the
essence. And you kind of mademention of that in relation to
your your time with the teachingand the practice over so long,
like when you were talking aboutthe Yoga Sutras, that you feel
like, okay, yeah, there is somemaybe confusion here and
difficulty, but that you're ableto kind of bring it down to its
(47:21):
essence and to its core, andwhich sounds to me like what you
are explaining in relation tothese ceremonies, where, and if
it only, if it's only one personlike and like, the fact there's
like, hey, it's not the wholegroup. It's not like that
everybody comes up. But if youcan, if one person has that
type, that type of connection,then I feel like that's probably
(47:42):
what's keeping you going too,right? Is that, would you say
that's one of the big sparks infuel that's keeping you engaged
in the yoga community for 50plus years now that that's a
huge inspiration to me, both youand Margo bond do. I can't tell
you how much like I really justwant to do, I want to follow in
your, in both of your guys'sfootsteps, and just keep going
(48:04):
here. So it's, it's encouragingto to have an elder that's,
that's that's focused on thisand following through and
keeping it going. And when I gota chance to speak with you
prior, and I've been thinkingabout this over the past couple
days, because I thought, well,maybe I think I heard him right,
and maybe I misunderstood, butmaybe I did hear you right. I
(48:26):
said something. I asked you if,if there was any, if you had any
sites on retirement, and I thinkyou said, as long as there's
books, I'll never retire. Isthat what you said?
Can't remember what I said, butyeah, it
made me think that, like, aslong as there's food for you,
fuel for you, to keep digestingand like information and just
(48:50):
this, like passion for this,that there will never be such a
thing as retirement. So I don'tknow if I got that right, but
did I? Did I touch upon somesort long Is there something I
can do? I'll do it. Yeah. Ithink one of my motives in that,
but we call it the purple book,the purple book that to try to
(49:11):
find the language of the sutras,that a language that is a more
updated, you know, just a coupleof words, not like, you know, it
won't hit you over the head, butlike to make the sutra itself. I
didn't want it to be just that.
(49:31):
You had to leave lean on thecommentary, that just reading
the sutra becomes a little moremeaningful. So I didn't try to
keep it like word for word.
Sometimes one word in Sanskritturns out to be like three words
in English, because I wanted tosee one thing from different
angles, yes, which is reallyimportant to me that you take. A
(49:56):
word like some veganum, which isone of my favorite words. I just
just love the way it sounds. Butusually it's translated as
something like fervor, like you,the results are near in yoga
when you practice with fervor,the basic idea but the word some
veganum, it's not just fervor,like in intensity. If you look
(50:23):
at in a dictionary, it means,like, explosion, you know, it's
like, there's this feeling oflike thrust and power. And the
sutra just before that hasanother word, dacara, that also
gets translated as like fervor,but it's different. Satkara is
(50:45):
not the same as spent some bigSaqqara. One, one of the
meanings of it is hospitality.
So now I'm looking at Patanjalisaying there's two different
ways of looking at fervor. Oneis seeing the beauty of yoga and
(51:07):
the teachings, and that is yourinspiration is you're invited in
right hospitality. The sutrasare inviting you, and then you
go a couple sutures later, andnow there's explosions, yes, and
I think that's on purpose. Ithink that potentially has that
that gradation, and I don't seeit anywhere else. But to me, I
(51:29):
look at the differenttranslations, it's not just
academic. I have to feel someconnection to it. It has some
reality to me, even if it's notperfect, and it's not the only
way, for sure, has to besomething that I can really feel
connected to and then be able tomaybe transmit a little bit of
(51:52):
it. So that kind of thing, indoing the books
I love, thinking about theconnection of hospitality and
explosive thrust forwardness.
Yeah, that it would start fromservice and humility, and it
could turn into or eventuate asthis explosion, so to speak, of
(52:14):
bliss or connection. How do youhow do you relate to it? And
when we talk about words likeSamadhi, and if there's this
idea of like an eventuationtoward bliss or Samadhi, what is
your interpretation? Now, afterhaving years to mull over this
(52:39):
and meditate on it. Yeah,I go through different periods
of time where certain sutrasjust like, Oh, I love that
sutra. And I love just spendingtime with it, like person one,
that I think might be a backdoorway of addressing your question
is, i is, this is sutra aboutproperty, right, material
(53:04):
universe, and it says thatproperty gives us knowledge so
that we can become enlightened,right? It's because we get this
knowledge from it's a teacherliberation comes from dealing
with nature. What I can't thinkof the word right now in
(53:25):
Sanskrit, but the translation ofit, that property is something
worthwhile and beautiful. Theword in Sanskrit still not
coming to me, but word inSanskrit as as its translation,
something that's worthwhile andbeautiful. So now there's a
tendency, at least I found,among very ardent students of
(53:49):
yoga, to view the materialuniverse as something you have
to overcome. And I can see theway that you know it's not like
it's wrong, but that's theimage. And I see that
translation that talks aboutworthwhile and beautiful because
it gives us experiences thatlead to liberation. I see that
(54:12):
as something gorgeous, and itreminds me of St Francis, this
this beauty of nature, that'sthere, that's he was like that.
He never thought that Godappeared his nature. It wasn't
in his philosophy, but thateverything in nature was God
sending a message, and it's ahopeful message, and it's a
(54:34):
supporting message, and it'ssomething that protect, yes,
yeah, I love that. That is areally great way to look at it.
Reverend Jagannath, Have you,have you explored multiple other
texts, really universe? Oh mygosh, I think what happened,
(54:58):
Reverend Jagannath, is we got alittle glitch. Where, where the
Zoom kind of glitched, and Ididn't see you moving. And I
thought, oh, did I lose him? SoI started talking, and then, and
then you came back in. So Ireally apologize there. I did
follow you along the lines ofFrance, the French St Francis of
Assisi, and this appreciationfor nature and the way that that
(55:21):
can produce a connection likethis, as opposed to the yogi
moving beyond nature, or like,let me, let me try to put that
aside and put myself over here,in this place that I but I
didn't hear your finalstatement. Would you be able to
repeat it,there's a law. I can only say it
(55:42):
once, and thenthe universe didn't want me to
hear it. I guess IYeah, it's, I think it's the
point of that to me, is to notget into seeing or any of nature
as an obstacle or anoppositional way that it's
there, it's beautiful. We canlearn from it, and we should
(56:04):
learn to appreciate it, becauseit's nature, it's the universe,
yes, and it's not to beconquered. It's so clear to me,
the sutures, it's so clear. Itgives you experiences and
liberation. Experiencesliberation. It's your friend.
(56:25):
Yeah, we have issues with it,right, the parts of nature that
are difficult for us, but noneof it is really opposition.
Oppositional. Is that a word?
Yeah? Yeah. Oppositional, all ofit is should be seen as this
(56:47):
incredible encyclopedia thatnature is, and it's there to
teach and to guide and to bringus to pure spirit.
Yes, nature, thank you for forfollowing that idea through I
did. I did not hear you. End itlike that. Thank you. Do you?
Sometimes people could willcritique yoga sutures as being a
(57:10):
dualistic philosophy, and maybefrom say Tantra literature, will
say Our philosophy is non dual.
But I, from what you just said,it sounds to me like you're
almost now interpreting thesutras as as a an element of non
dualism. In this in this idea oftouching the ground and feeling
(57:31):
the earth as that's one of theplaces we can really find
liberation, is through thisexperience of living, does? Does
that resonate with you?
Yeah, yeah, I think it does.
Actually, it was interestingbecause I've been studying up
more on the this whole thing,like the I'd like to Vedanta and
(57:53):
Sankhya and Sankhya yoga, whichis another thing, and I think
ultimately they're all valid.
We're just trying to find a wayof establishing a relationship
that makes sense in reality. Andlike, let me get involved in
that relationship, whether it'snon dual or, like, soccer, where
(58:15):
you have the two parts, andyoga, which has the third part
with the swara right, the godlevel. If it gets me to
understand, have anunderstanding, even we know that
isn't going to be exact. I wantto have a relationship with with
the universe, with nature, withconsciousness. I want to
(58:37):
understand, what isconsciousness? But how does that
happen? I mean, the simplestthing is, like, how do I know
that it's me? I close my eyes,say, That's me. What did I just
see? What was that I'm lookingthere's nothing but dark. But I
know it's me. You know, anyphilosophy that that gets me to
(59:00):
to embrace and ponder and dancewith all the aspects of creation
and and of self with small s andcapital S both. Yes, that's a
fine philosophy for me.
I hear ya Yes. And interestinglyenough, Reverend jognath, when
we started, for those of youthat are listening. We're also
(59:21):
recording this now. This on ourYouTube channel. When we started
the we're on the set. You're onthe East Coast. I'm on the East
Coast. I'm a lot further southhere in Florida. You're up in
New Jersey. It's already gettingdark there. Here, we still have
some sun. And when we started itwas it was a lot brighter behind
you, but now you're illuminatedbecause the the it's dark behind
(59:44):
you and the computer screen islike shedding all this light on
you. So slowly, through thisconversation, you've become more
illuminated.
I didn't see this.
Yeah, right,that's the image of me.
Whatever, rightcoming back to that question of
like, who am I? And what isconsciousness? And it's becoming
(01:00:07):
clear. I can see you a lotclearer now, over this one hour,
you've become more much moreclear to me. Oh man, well, I'm
so thankful Reverend John ganathfor this opportunity. And what
I'm so excited about is, youknow, I've been able to have
Margo Bandu, and now you andthen our next episode is an
(01:00:30):
interview with the three of ustogether. I get to talk to both
of you together, which I'm soexcited for everybody to have a
chance to hear. And again, I'mso grateful. Every morning I'm
waking up and I'm writing in mygratitude journal, you know,
three things that I'm gratefulfor, and this morning was I get
to talk to Reverend Jagannath.
(01:00:52):
So I feel really, you know, I'vebeen excited all day for this,
and I really enjoy thisopportunity. I'm grateful. Thank
you.
Thank you. May all the blessingsflow to you always. Thank
you so much. Well, I lookforward to our next session, and
I wish you a wonderful evening.
Youtoo. You too. Thank you. Todd,
(01:01:14):
thank you so thank you. Shanti,you native yoga Todd cast is
produced by myself. The thememusic is dreamed up by Bryce
Allen. If you like this show,let me know if there's room for
improvement. I want to hear thattoo. We are curious to know what
(01:01:37):
you think and what you want moreof what I can improve. And if
you have ideas for future guestsor topics, please send us your
thoughts to info at Native yogacenter. You can find us at
Native yoga center.com, and hey,if you did like this episode,
share it with your friends. Rateit and review and join us next
(01:02:00):
time you.
Welcome to Native Yoga Toddcast,so happy you are here. My goal
(00:56):
All right, let's begin. Welcometo Native Yoga Toddcast, I'm so
happy that you're here today. Myvery special guest is Reverend
Jaganath Carrera. You've alreadyhad a chance to listen to the
previous episode where I got achance to interview Margabandhu
and this week, I have one of hisclose friends, Reverend Jaganath
(01:19):
Carrera, here on the show.
Reverend Jaganath Carrera is theauthor of a book called inside
the Yoga Sutras, a ComprehensiveSource Book for the Study and
Practice of Patanjali YogaSutras. He is a student of Swami
Satchidananda and ReverendJagannath Carrera I read his a
short bio. Has shared the joyand wisdom of the Yoga Sutras
(01:40):
with 1000s of students for overthree decades. He's a long time
Disciple of Sri SwamiSatchidananda. He's taught all
facets of yoga at universities,prisons, yoga centers and
interfaith programs. Heestablished the Integral Yoga
ministry and as a spiritualadvisor and visiting lecturer on
(02:00):
Hinduism for the one spiritSeminary in New York City. He is
a former chief administrator ofsuch an Ananda ashram YogaVille,
and founded the integral YogaInstitute of New Brunswick, New
Jersey, where he is the directorfor 14 years. But this book was
written in 2006 so it's beenmuch longer than that. He served
(02:23):
as a dean of academics at thewith this channel is to bring
inspirational speakers to theeastern School of acupuncture
and as a member of its governingmic in the field of yoga,
massage, body work and beyond.
board, senior member of theintegral yoga teachers Council.
He co developed highly regardedintegral yoga meditation and
Raja yoga teacher trainingcertification program. Yes,
(02:44):
that's what I'm talking about.
And so I'm so glad that you'rehere. You get a chance to meet
and listen to Reverend Jaganath.
I'm so grateful for thisopportunity to to learn and
listen and speak with him. Andthen on the next episode to
follow, you're going to get achance to hear me interview both
Follow us at @nativeyoga andcheck us out at
(03:05):
Reverend Jaganath andMargabandhu together. These guys
have such a incredible rapportwith one another, so much mutual
respect and love, and I can'twait for you to hear it. Thank
you so much for joining in.
Let's go ahead and begin.
I'm so delighted to have thisopportunity to bring Reverend
nativeyogacenter.com.
(03:26):
Jagannath Cora on to the podcasttoday. Reverend Jaganath, thank
you so much for joining me. Ireally appreciate this.
Well, thank you, Todd. It's apleasure to be with you. Well,
thank you. I feel honored, and Ihave the pleasure. My first yoga
sutras book was Yoga Sutras ofPatanjali, a translation and
(03:46):
commentary by Swami satchanAnanda, and because I in part,
was really, I don't want to sayconfused, but I found it
challenging. I didn't know howto make sense of it, in which
case, I found your book, whichwas published in 2006 called
inside the Yoga Sutras, acomprehensive source book for
(04:08):
the study and practice ofPatanjali yoga sutras. And I
started being able to make alittle more sense out of things.
So first of all, thank you forputting your energy in time.
It's an incredible book, and tonow be able to sit down with you
here and ask you questions, Ifeel really lucky. So thank you.
(04:28):
Thank you. But I have to saythat sometimes people will
publish a quote from the book,and I don't recognize it at all.
You're like I wrote that.
Wow, this guy could really soundso erudite.
Maybe even start wondering,like, Are you sure you got that
(04:49):
from my book? Maybe, maybe youmaybe got the authors mixed up
here everyday, there was a quote that was
published, and I said, I have totake the notes about this. I. I
think in a certain ways, timehas gone on, while a lot of the
technical aspects of theteachings are still important
(05:11):
for me to speak on, I findmyself getting in a way simpler
and maybe in a certain way, morefocused and maybe even deeper.
Mm, you go through all the fluffof the sutras, because a lot of
them are difficult, yeah. Andthen the whole idea, even behind
(05:32):
doing the book, was not reallyoriginally my idea. I would just
make notes on everything,wherever I was, napkin envelopes
and things, and I wanted toorganize it. And then somehow I
must have mentioned that tosomeone. And then it was a
matter of people asking me whenmy book was going to be on. And
(05:53):
said, there is no book. Wow.
After a while, it seemed like areality I had to face. And I
spoke to Swami Satchidananda,and he said, It's time to update
the book. You know, the languagethat you have is not the same
language at that point, yearsand years ago. So that's how I
(06:17):
got involved in doing it. I wasreally his inspiration, and I
kept telling him that I didn'tthink we needed another book.
His was fine. That's six timeshe got stern with me. He says,
Just do the bookwell. I mean, on the back of the
book, the first recommendationwe get is from Swami
(06:38):
satchananda, saying Patanjaliwas really with them when he
wrote this book. I mean, that'sa that's a really good
compliment.
Yeah, yeah. I had, at that time,I just printed out and put it in
a three ring binder. It wasn'tcompletely finished yet, yeah,
but I just wanted to offer it tohim and say, This is what I've
(06:59):
been doing. And he paged throughit and page through it, and
quoted parts of the book, whichthey found, you know, wonderful.
And then he made that quote,wow. He didn't say him. He said,
patanja is really with you whenyou wrote this book. We felt it
didn't fit, yeah, yeah.
But he said that, and that wasnothing could have been greater
(07:22):
for me. Yes,I hear it. Oh man. What a what a
compliment. That's incredible.
You know, you've, you've had,well, let's see, how many years
have you had, officially, as ayoga practitioner? Can you, can
you pinpoint the first time yogabecame apparent to you.
(07:45):
I'll tell you the more importantversion, and there's another
version that might say somethingabout me. But getting into yoga
as a path and a practice in asteady way probably started in
around 1973 or 1974 so it'sabout 50 years. Yeah. And before
(08:09):
that, when I was much younger inmy teens, there was a show
Richard hittlemandoing asanas. I've heard about
this. I've never seen any of thefootage from it, but so
I would get in the morning, itwas on a TV, and he would have
two models do the asanas, and Iwould copy that. And what I
(08:30):
loved is, at the end, he alwayshad a meditation, and that
really somehow spoke to me evenmore than the asanas. For me to
was a peek into somethingspecial and subtle, and at the
same time, something very deepand genuine about the practice,
so that it was that whichlasted, you know, maybe six
(08:51):
months, then the wastelandthings that we do when we're
teens, yeah, Yeah. Did you haveexposure to philosophical and or
religious idea ideas as a childand or teenager,
I think I was brought up RomanCatholic, and when I was really
(09:14):
young, that to me, that's areal. Was a reality. You know,
Jesus was still accessiblethrough prayer and through
works, and at a certain pointmust have been the confirmation.
I think you're 12 or 13 yearsold. I had a really, I think,
(09:35):
important but disturbingexperience. You go. We had four
years of classes, which I didn'tattend because my father didn't
want to drive me to the church,and I was happy to just go out
and play baseball with myfriends. And yes, so anyway,
right at the end, we go into thechurch itself, and there's a
(09:58):
rehearsal because there's abishop. And he's supposed to ask
you questions and all. And thefirst thing he said was, the
first thing we're supposed tolearn is who made me? God made
me. This was the one that got mein trouble. Why did God make
you? God made you because Heloves you. That in the
vernacular of the day, it blewmy mind. I said, I'm sitting
(10:21):
here and I'm looking at thisgiant crucifix, and I'm looking
and saying, How can I love you?
You don't know you?
Yeah? And I just startedweeping, yeah.
I felt awful. I just couldn't Icouldn't justify and find, how
can I love someone I don't know.
And then I became very agnosticfor a number of years, until I
(10:43):
saw Swami Satan Ananda and say,Oh yeah, this is something that
could be known. This issomething to be experiencing.
That's when I got serious. Andfrom then on, from around 1973
or so, it's been the center ofmy life. Amazing
(11:04):
story I love that. Do you feellike he brought this sort of
connection of understanding,where it felt real versus
disjointed and or far removedfrom from possibility?
Yeah, there was the love that heexuded his incredible sense of
(11:25):
humor. I mean, you go to alecture, a two hour lecture, and
you spend 50% of the timelaughing at his jokes, but they
all had it like a message too.
Yeah, yeah. And first time I sawhim in person, this is an
interesting to me. It's aninteresting story. Before I saw
in person, there's a verypowerful moment that I that I
(11:45):
heard with him. I was paintingmy bedroom, and it was late at
night, and everything gotdelayed, and it was somewhere
around nine or 10 at night, I'mpainting and painting. And at
that time, there was a radiostation, WPLJ, I think it was
played rock and roll. And I wasa musician then, so I was
(12:06):
listening to the music. And thenat a certain time, this was a
Sunday night, they stopped themusic, and it became a talk
show, yeah, so I didn't knowthat. Anyway, I turned on the
radio. I'm painting with theroller and what the first thing
I hear is a young man's voice isthe first words I heard from
(12:27):
him. He said to someone at thattime I didn't know who said, If
you don't give me a reason tolive tonight, I'm going to kill
myself. Wow, wow. And there wasno sense of like that. He was
like, putting it up, because youcould hear it in his voice. It
was trembling, clearly fightingback tears. And I stopped with
(12:47):
painting, and I was sittingthere, holding the roller,
sitting in a chair, and Icouldn't, I couldn't turn away
from this man with an Indianaccent. Turned out to be good.
Wow. I don't remember what hesaid now, yeah, but I was in
tears. Wow. At the end of like,five or 10 minutes of talking by
(13:11):
him, this young man said, Ithink I have a reason to live.
Wow. Fortunately, he lived inManhattan and could go to the
Integra Yoga Institute there todelve into the teachings.
Amazing. That was a first realimpression of who dies. Who is
this in God,and this is before you actually
(13:31):
met him in person. So you heardthis through the and you hadn't
heard of him prior to this.
You're just painting andlistening to music. And here
comes this yoga teacher. Thisthis spiritual master. Oh, man,
that's an interesting yeah,who is that guy? And then it
just fell away for a few years.
(13:53):
Then when I got back into yoga,there was a program at in New
York City. I forget the name ofthe church. And I've been into
yoga for a while, like sixmonths or so, and doing asanas
and meditation, and I wanted, Iwas really attracted to what I
heard from him, and he gave awonderful talk. But the this is
(14:16):
a little hard to put into words,but it's, it's the essence of
what really kept me into yoga.
At the end of the program,number of people went up to the
stage where he was and there wasthis, I only can think of
calling it one thing, a ballet.
People would give him often,like a banana or an apple or
(14:38):
something, and they would offerit to him. He's leaning forward,
he's up high, and they'rereaching up, and he would take
it, and then he wouldimmediately give it to someone
else, then another person. Andit was such an ease and flow.
And I saw the love they had forhim, the respect they had for
him. I couldn't I couldn't turnaway for. Of it. And I came with
(15:01):
these other people. I said, Comeon, we have to go. And I I said,
I can't, I can't. I had to stay.
There was something in that, anoffering that was accepted with
such care and love, and thencost passed on to someone else.
And I thought, this is the yogicpath. You've gained something,
but you give Yeah, yeah, that'sserious answer that program.
(15:29):
That's when you really kind ofknew I want to dig in on this
Yeah, and so I I'm picking up onthe fact that you you recognized
early that you gravitated towardthe philosophy or toward the
teachings that you liked, theposes that was neat. But then
the the meditation that wasgiven at the was it hittleman On
(15:52):
his on his show, on hisshow, he would do little
meditation at the end of eachprogram. What was
the transition then, from thispoint of meeting such an Ananda,
what did it? How did yourpractice unfold in relation to
your development of your yogapractice? Did you start diving
head in, then into yogaphilosophy and investigating
(16:14):
different texts, or was it morethat you? How did what did that?
How did he end up teaching you.
I mean, there were a couple ofthings. I lived in New
Brunswick, New Jersey, home ofRutgers University. And I was
getting involved at that pointin just seeing a flyer on a tree
(16:37):
or something said, free yogaclasses, integral yoga club. So
I said, this is great. I can goat once a week and for free, and
take the class and to get intothe Yas in his own I got very
friendly with the teachers.
There were two teachers. Bothwere disciples of Swami Satya
nada, so they helped me answer alot of my questions. And that's
(17:01):
when it started getting reallymore regular for me. And I had
someone to, you know, the shortstory is one of them. Name was
Nataraj. He recognized my likezeal. Who was which is really, I
was in high gear. He said. Hesays, Look, anytime you have a
(17:24):
question, anytime you could callme, I took it seriously. I'd be
reading these books. Oh yeah,one time I called him at 230 in
the morning. Oh man, I'm sorry,but is this really? Did you
mean? He said, Yes. He came overto my apartment, wow. And I
said, I don't understand this.
(17:44):
And it seems to, I don'tremember what the questions
were, but it seems like there'sanother teaching that
contradicted it, contradicted ita bit. So that was a big help to
me to have these senior people.
Yes, it's like guides for me.
And I really, I learned a lotfrom them.
(18:04):
And reallyseeing, seeing Gurudev in
person, towards again, that howhe treated people, made me think
like, you know, I want toeverybody wants to be happy and
have a meaningful life. Andbefore getting involved with
yoga on that level with hisguidance, I didn't see how you
(18:26):
could have that. I could see thepain. I could see that, you
know, that could see happythings too. It wasn't like I
wasn't depressed, but I wantedlife to have meaning. I wanted
to believe in the Jesus that wason the cross, yes, spiritual
being. And here was someone whohad, at least for me, exuded
(18:47):
that kind of care, that kind oflove. And that's really how I
got got involved more and morewith him when, especially when
his book came out. But when Igot involved, there was no book.
There were little pamphlets thatthey had at the centers.
Interesting, because you thereprobably wasn't there was so at
(19:10):
that time period, there was noaccess to a a Yoga Sutras of
Patanjali.
It was there was one book calledHow to know God, which is not,
it was a suture book byChristopher issue, would I think
was in Swami prabhavananda.
Those two people did this book,and I read that, and that was,
(19:30):
that was helpful. But when Iwent to get it, I read about it
somewhere, and it was abookstore in New Brunswick, and
I went in there and I said, Iwent this book. He said, What
kind of a book is? I said,What's a Yoga Book? He took me,
brought me to the section ofcookbooks.
Thought you said, yogurt. Oh mygosh, that is
(19:55):
we don't know where to put thesebooks. That was so unknown, in a
way. So unknown. Oh my gosh. Foreveryone joking off, that's
funny. That reminds me of a timewhere, when my wife and I were
opening up our yoga studio, herewe were inside painting, and
some guy walks by and he goes ayogurt shop. You guys are gonna
have yogurt? And we were like,Oh, I'm sorry to disappoint you,
(20:17):
but it's gonna be yoga. And hejust like, was like, that's not
what I want. And he took off,and I thought, oh, no, we got a
big hill to climb here. Butthat's so funny. I love hearing
that story. I mean, I like thefact that you're bringing
attention to the reality withwhich the amount of information
we have access to now and withthe ease with which we have
(20:39):
access but in that time period,it was totally different. And so
I'm so curious to hear how thisevolved for you did when? When,
when Swami satananda Did hiscommentary on the yoga sutras.
Were you with him when he wasdoing that? What? What were you
aware that he was writing thiscommentary, and
(21:01):
I was aware of it. There was nobook then, you know, you little
cassette tapes who had parts oftalks that we had. We had that
and, yeah, there was the bookcame years later. But that also
in a similar way, if I couldbacktrack a little bit earlier
(21:22):
on, please, a really importantfeature of his teachings, I
think, motivated me. And itstarted with a book from another
spiritual group, which I won'tname, and it was very it was all
about meditation, and veryintense, very thick, but pretty
(21:46):
much, I'm not exaggerating,almost every page this author
said, and this can only beachieved by and then their
brand, this can only be achievedby. Got it, I started getting
depressed. And didn't have thatrelationship with Guru Dev,
yeah, where it was, yeah. And Iwas asked my my wife asked me to
(22:11):
go to Barnes and Nobles inManhattan to buy some books she
needed for class. So I thoughtthey might have some books on
yoga. And they did. And I wantedsomething deeply, you know,
intellectual and filled withideas. And I went through one
book after another, and theyusually would have a picture of
the author. None of them lookedvery happy. And all the way at
(22:36):
the bottom, on the bottom shelf,I picked up this book this
before I saw and here's thisband with the flowing orange
robes, and the wind is blowingin his hair, and he's on top of
a mountain. There's clouds allaround him, and he has the most
amazing happy smile. But it wasa biography, biography, but I
kept picking it up, and finallyI said, I have to, I have to get
(23:01):
this. And I got home that night,and I spent, well, I don't know
how many hours from probablyaround supper time until the
next morning, reading the book,because a part of it, one of the
strong things was the interfaithside of the teachings truth is
(23:23):
one, pairs are many. And thatreally spoke to my heart, too.
I hear you. I hear that. Well,which book was this?
Of his book? It was, it's hisbiography, Apostle of peace. Is
what they rewrote it. Now it'scalled apostle of peace. This.
This is such an anonymousbiography, Yeah, amazing. So you
(23:43):
oh so now you have been able toread this before actually
meeting him as well. You heardthe radio. You heard the radio
story. You're at the bookstore.
You see the picture of him, orthis book from him. Oh, man,
that's cool. All right, I hear,yeah, it's
a nice biography, becausethere's the biographical
information interspersed withquotes from him that are
(24:03):
pertinent. So you're getting theteaching in these nice little
chunks, nice that go on with theassist experiences in his life.
I'll definitely check it out. Ido not have that one. Thank you
for telling me.
Yeah, it's a nice read. Youknow, it's really, it's not like
real technical, yeah, but itsays a lot about how a human
being can experience what we'reall looking for, you know, to
(24:27):
have a life with meaning, a lifethat has that we perceive our
life as having some value, andthat, as he always says, life is
for fun. Life is for fun. Weshould really have joy in life,
and yoga is one of the ways toattain that. So, yeah, the
(24:48):
biography is something that Iwould recommend. Very
cool. I'll definitely read that.
And I like the fact that you'repointing out that coming across
a tradition that says the onlyway you'll achieve. This is
through us. That's aninteresting element in yoga.
Surely, since then, you've comeacross that a lot more than just
that. Has that always been adeterrent for you? Has that been
(25:12):
a little bit of a once you comeacross that type of idea that my
way is the fastest and the mosteffective way, and don't mess
with anybody else's way. My wayis the quickest, the quickest
way to to liberation orenlightenment. Have you always
seen that as a little bit of atrickery, in a sense,
(25:35):
yeah, it's, it's still here, Ithink, like, I mean, there's
certainly potential for egoisticmotives that kind of blind you
to certain realities. And Ithink there's also the brand
people this is a way to makemoney saying, like, you know, we
(25:58):
have this one simple way to dothis, and it might be a
wonderful way, by the way, notcriticizing, necessarily that
understood. But like I said, forme, I was surprised, and I was I
don't tend, I never tendedtowards depression. If I was
something got me off the kilter,it was anger. I would be I would
get angry so. But I was readingthis one book that's about three
(26:23):
quarters the way through, I wasgetting depressed.
Like, seriously depressed, yeah?
Like, I might be that guycalling up on the radio station
next saying, If you don't giveme a reason,
yeah, for that. It was like,yes, yes. I think part of it is
(26:46):
maybe not a clear understandingof how important wisdom and
knowledge have to be passed downfrom person to person. Good
point, not person to videos. Imean, all those have a place.
They're essential, but at somepoint, there's a quote I just
(27:08):
read. It was a Tibetan Buddhistmaster that wisdom is not never
self evident. It has to berepealed or revealed. That just
just a superficial, you know,look at it isn't that isn't
going to do it. It has to berevealed. And that means there
(27:28):
has to be an interaction withsomeone who maybe knows a little
more of whatever it is you'reinterested in. And I think yoga
and all spiritual paths flourishmost when it's based on an
apprentice student relationship.
(27:50):
Dude, yeah, I agree. Idefinitely see the distinction
between these two methods oftransmission. What? What medium
Do you currently work with? Doyou do one on one mentorship as
well as larger group teaching?
(28:11):
Yeah, we have, I mean, we haveprograms where people come to,
don't get really close, but theycome to. We have every Friday
night, we have a SATs ondifferent subjects and different
things that we do, and guestspeakers. So that could be
anything, but there are a numberof people, probably 3040
(28:33):
students, who are initiates intoour style of yoga. And then
there's a lot of individualthings, you know, problems come
up. And it's getting to thepoint now what some of our
teachers have been 18 years withus, wow. So now it's like they
(28:56):
could see that person, yes,like, I'm really interested in
passing this on. I don't want itto be all on me. So now it's
like, you know, my focus is moreand more like, what can I do to
prepare you for when I'm nolonger available? Which, you
know, it could sound grisly, butit's important. I hear you.
That's cool,that you're looking forward like
(29:18):
that. I appreciate that what wasthe catalyst and or time that
you were transitioning frombeing a student to taking on the
role of being a teacher?
I mean, early on with theIntegra Yoga I was asked to
(29:43):
teach. I didn't know, when I wasin grade school, you had report
cards and have like, I don'tknow if they still do it, but
there'd be a thing on likebehavior.
Yes,every every marking period Am I
get my card. Yeah, and it wouldalways say, he never talks so
quiet. So I think it was I waslike saving it up. I didn't know
(30:06):
that at the time when I got intoGuru Yoga. I don't know how or
why it happened. I was askedmore and more often to give
talks. Then Guru DevSatchitananda asked me to be
part of teacher training. So Iwas doing teacher training, one
of the main teachers for the 10day retreats we would have once
a year. So I was gettingexperience that way. And at one
(30:29):
point, I don't know what yearwould have been, 1987 maybe he
asked me to move to VirginiaSatchidananda ashram, which I
did, left New Brunswick, went toVirginia, and I was still
teaching then. Then he had mebecome, I think it was vice
(30:49):
president, administrator. That'sthat was my title at such a
Genda ashram. And then through anumber of things that are
particularly pertinent. It wasimportant for me and my wife to
come back to New Jersey, whichhe was actually fine with. He
understood why. And he said,Yeah, go and do that. And I was
(31:12):
actually going to acupunctureschool.
I saw, I read that you're inacupuncturist as well. Yeah, I
haven'tbeen practicing in a while
because of the teaching, but Icame and did that. And then it
started where I would give atalk, and people started wanting
to be more and more with me. Andit started happening where
(31:39):
people said, Well, I see you aslike a guru for me. And I said,
No, he was keeping track, trackof it. And said, for six years,
you said, No, everything. You'reconstantly being yesterday and
saying, no, no, no. And then Iremember what, what Gurudev once
(32:00):
said to me. He said, If someonesees something beautiful you've
developed in you don't disturbthat. It's their vision that's
causing they are seeing it. It'snot you as the teacher, in a
way, it's the student's abilityto see something in the teacher,
like I saw in him, somethingthat attracted them, and so that
(32:24):
became the beginning of yogalife society. It was never my
intention to do that, but theywere these initial group of
students really wanted to havesomething of their own. I'm
still teaching the same thing Itaught Guru Dev. I'm still, you
know, an integral yoga minister,but we have yoga life ministers,
(32:46):
and really it's just a lineage,yeah. So I understand. I
understand. Can you explain thetitle your reverend? Jagannath,
where does and how does thetitle Reverend come in?
(33:07):
It's kind of my fault. Ofcourse, in the intra group yoga,
we had Sanyasi Swamis monastics,and I saw the benefit of that
kind of formal commitment, ofcourse, the commitment more or
(33:28):
less like the typical monk ornun, poverty, celibacy,
obedience, although it's alittle bit different the way
it's presented in yoga. And youknow, I was very close to know
them. I was working with himside by side for years, and I
saw the power of a formalcommitment in a way, like
(33:49):
letting letting your mind knowto the roots. This is serious.
I'm doing this. Yeah, I'm notbacking. I want to serve all in.
Yeah, it's all in but then Istarted thinking. I said, What I
know all these householders thatare just as connected and real
(34:11):
about this. So I wrote a letterto Swami Satchidananda at one
point. Said, No, this one stepback, my mother had something
inadvertently to do with this. Iwas telling her about Gurudev.
My mother was born in Italy. Shewas a war bride. Me a load of
(34:31):
bride. And she was asking meabout go to death. And I was
feeling so tortured, trying toput it in a way that she would
understand and accept it. Andshe was one point she was
thinking, thinking, come followme. She went up in the bedroom,
opened up a dress and drawer,and she pulled out this
information with Saint Francison it. She says, oh, it's the
(34:53):
Third Order of Saint Francis.
You have the poor clears for thewomen and the friars for the.
The men, but then you have forhouseholders, the Third Order of
Saint Francis. So that was in myhead, putting it back now into
Integra yoga. I thought maybethat would be appropriate for it
for us as well. I wrote aletter. And those days it was
(35:14):
all slow like that, a letter,thank you for reminding us,
because I love that time period,but thank you. I agree with you.
I hear you. Yeah,it was a whole different world
then, yeah, he wrote back to meand saying, I think this almost
(35:37):
his exact words is, I've beenthinking of this for a long
time, just waiting for someoneto come forward. Let's do it.
And it was only a couple ofmonths. Let's do it in July that
year, Guru celebrating theteacher. Yes, we can have our
own ministry. And that's how itstarted. We weren't sure that
(36:00):
you'd be called ministers or besomething else, but, you know,
he, along with other people,decided, let's keep it in a way
that people can relate to. Soit's, we're it's an interfaith
yoga ministry.
Very cool. I did not know that Iwas so curious about that
(36:21):
1980 that was, huh, that's what.
Thatmakes a lot of sense, too, to
have a intermediary role andmaybe task to play, like you
said, for the where, where forthe householders. That, yeah,
that allows you to be ahouseholder, but also take maybe
a more formal, formal role. Isthat? How you see being able to
(36:45):
be a reverend within this yogaschool allows for you to be kind
of like a sannyasin, kind oflike a renunciate, but but on
the role of with fourhouseholders, yeah, yeah. That
makes sense.
(37:06):
Yeah. It's, in fact, the the vowof the Minister is based on the
vow from the sannyasins. Butinstead of, like poverty, it's
like non attachment to thosethings. So it's, you know,
you're not, you're not making avow of celibacy if you're a
married person. So it's, youknow, shaped in a little
(37:27):
different way, so that theessence of what that Mind and
Life is about is the same. Yes,he would, he said they're
married monks. That's how hewould jokingly. Would say, this
is not that much differencebetween the ministers in the
sanyas. He said it's only acouple of things that are
different, but essentially,you're like a married monk. And
(37:51):
over the years, maybe a littlebit surprising to me, how often
our ministers are called on todo memorial services, weddings,
baby, blessings, all thosethings in in groups of where
people are not Yogis, you know,and can can see again, this goes
(38:14):
back to the idea of theinterfaith. You know, our logo
has a yantra with all thedifferent faith symbols around
it, yes. And there was a time Iwas I was doing a wedding in
Montreal, and the couple thisinsisted that it be done
(38:39):
outside, and it was in theLaurentian mountains outside of
Montreal, and I was setting upthe altar outside, and I knew
that the father of the groomhated the idea that I would be
there, and he said he's reallykind of a little bit violent
(39:00):
guy. Want to talk to him? Isaid, No, after, because right
now this is really getting meexcited here to do this, this
ceremony. Yeah.
So I said, Okay, after andceremony happens. My robe caught
fire. We're up the tail of myrobe, and it fell on the water
(39:27):
by a candle, and it was on fire,and the person who's assisting
me is waving Frank frantically.
Why is she waving like that? Shecame with a bowl of water, and
anyway, so afterwards, you knowthere's like the receiving line,
right? You come people, Hello,how are you? Thank you. So this
one little fellow comes up andhe saw tears. He's in his 60s,
he's all tears. And he said,Thank you so much. He said, I
(39:51):
hated this because I'm inbusiness. The guy said, and my
partner's daughter. Got Married.
Got married in the church, butthe minister refused to look at
her because it wasn't the samereligion like literally, he
said, would not, would not,would talk only to the male and
(40:13):
not to the female, yeah, I gotit. And he saw the entre with
all the symbols, yeah? And hejust fell in love with it, and
he was very wealthy guy. He tookme to his home to stay with me
tonight. Stay with me tonight.
The next morning, we're walkingaround outside his beautiful
day, and other people werewalking around, he would stop.
(40:34):
Everyone says you should listento what he said is one truth.
When he passed, he was justcompletely changed just by
having that servicethat's so cool. It is, yeah,
like, ofcourse, I'm feeling great
because, like, yeah, they'regetting it, yeah, yes. One
Truth, many pairs whenyou're when your outfit caught
(40:56):
on fire, though, did you have amoment of thinking this, this is
not going how I had planned.
Yeah? Well, yeah, this isnot looking so good here. This
guy's judging me. I'm catchingon fire.
Yeah? It seemed like it wasgoing to be exciting. It was
beautiful area. And the thingis, in this case, the brine
(41:20):
insisted on outside. Oh yeah.
They said, You know, it's prettywindy. It could be. She said,
No, it has to be. Has to be.
It's my dream. It's okay. You'reflying all the flower petals
rule. It was just a myth. And Icouldn't, you know the altar was
behind me, and it had slits upthe side, so I'm talking. And
then it rose in the air and fellon the candle. It was started
(41:43):
burning. Oh my gosh. And thisperson was with me, who was just
said, Yasi was like croucheddown and waving furiously. And
I'm thinking, why is she doingthat? It never occurred to me.
Then I turned my head and I seesmoke and flames, and she picked
up a bowl of water and threw iton my robe, and then we finished
(42:04):
theprogram. Oh my gosh, that's all.
And it sounds like you've beenable to do weddings and
different ceremonies. I'mcurious, have you supported in
the role of palliative care?
Have you have you sat with anyfolks that are transitioning and
or ready to pass? Has that? Hasthat come into your sphere at
(42:27):
all?
Yeah, there's been, there's beensome of that. My wife, even
worse, my wife is right now.
She's retired, but she's ahospice nurse. Oh, wow.
I have so much respect forhospice. Well, my mom passed
away, and we called hospice, andI was blown away at the level of
service that they they'reangels, and that's where I
thought, maybe with you, withwith the realm of what you with
(42:49):
you do, I bet that you've comeinto that sphere, but that's
amazing that your wife did that.
And what a path of humility. Inoticed that she's a reverend as
well, so she took the same vowsthat you have and you got, you
both have been able to worktogether. This is incredible.
Oh yeah, I've been with her 57years. Oh yes, congratulations.
That's yeah.
(43:12):
I found the right way, and it'snot going anywhere. This is it?
Wow, yes, yes. One thing aboutthe ceremonies is it maybe a bit
of evidence, because it's notlike lots and lots of these
ceremonies, but it's fairlyconsistent that at a wedding or
some other kind of program thatyou do that to be someone who's
(43:35):
at least suspicious of what'sgoing on, you know, and someone
like me shows up with a robe andthe hair and all that, which is
just because I I'm too lazy toshave, I'm going to grow a
beard. So there's always, likealways, but usually there's some
people that aren't very happythat you're there. But my
(43:57):
experience is every ceremony hadlike a little miracle. One of
the most moving was I was calledby our New York Center. We need
this woman, needs memorialservice, needs someone to lead
it. And the one who passed awaywas her brother. He was gay, he
(44:21):
had AIDS, and said he would loveinto Guru Yoga. And asked that,
can we do something for him? Isaid, Sure, we'll do it. But she
said, The whole family isagainst you being
(44:43):
there, wow, but this iswhat he wanted. I said, fine.
Well, you know, I'm happy to goand do that. I'm up for the
challenge. Yeah, yeah. I mean,because what he wanted. So, you
know, yes, it was meaningful tohim, yes. But I talked to her a
bit because I said, I don't knowthis fellow. I said, Tell me
about him a little bit. And theday before he passed, the two of
(45:04):
them were singing old rock androll songs. And then soon, a
couple hours later, he passedaway. And that image, to me was
very beautiful. So when I didthe service, I said I had to
find that something, you had tosay something about the person.
(45:27):
I told them that story, and Isaid, it's like, I don't know if
you knew about this. You know,swan song. You crazy people
here, yes, but the the story isthat swans are so beautiful, but
they make the most ugly sound,except when they're passing,
they make the most this is thestory. I don't know if it's
(45:49):
true.
I didn't know that. Yeah, that'scool.
And when they when they whenthey're passing, it's the most
beautiful sound on the planet.
Yeah, that's why he called aswan song. It always happens at
the end of something that makessense. So I don't remember his
name, you know, I said, and thisis what happened, and that was
his swan song. And afterwards,his mother came up to me, and
(46:15):
she put a hug on me that waslike shown and other. It's
always like, not everybody. It'snot like, you know, weird
Hollywood or everybody suddenly,is it? But there's almost always
one or two people that thismessage that we have in yoga
reaches them. Yeah, there'ssomething about its purity, its
(46:37):
power, if we live by it. I'msure you said that even with
Margo bonded, he lives, it giveshim that wonderful power, yes,
change people's lives. That'syoga. To me,
that is amazing. Reverendjagnath, I really appreciate
(46:59):
that perspective, I agree withyou, getting right down to the
essence. And you kind of mademention of that in relation to
your your time with the teachingand the practice over so long,
like when you were talking aboutthe Yoga Sutras, that you feel
like, okay, yeah, there is somemaybe confusion here and
difficulty, but that you're ableto kind of bring it down to its
(47:21):
essence and to its core, andwhich sounds to me like what you
are explaining in relation tothese ceremonies, where, and if
it only, if it's only one personlike and like, the fact there's
like, hey, it's not the wholegroup. It's not like that
everybody comes up. But if youcan, if one person has that
type, that type of connection,then I feel like that's probably
(47:42):
what's keeping you going too,right? Is that, would you say
that's one of the big sparks infuel that's keeping you engaged
in the yoga community for 50plus years now that that's a
huge inspiration to me, both youand Margo bond do. I can't tell
you how much like I really justwant to do, I want to follow in
your, in both of your guys'sfootsteps, and just keep going
(48:04):
here. So it's, it's encouragingto to have an elder that's,
that's that's focused on thisand following through and
keeping it going. And when I gota chance to speak with you
prior, and I've been thinkingabout this over the past couple
days, because I thought, well,maybe I think I heard him right,
and maybe I misunderstood, butmaybe I did hear you right. I
(48:26):
said something. I asked you if,if there was any, if you had any
sites on retirement, and I thinkyou said, as long as there's
books, I'll never retire. Isthat what you said?
Can't remember what I said, butyeah, it
made me think that, like, aslong as there's food for you,
fuel for you, to keep digestingand like information and just
(48:50):
this, like passion for this,that there will never be such a
thing as retirement. So I don'tknow if I got that right, but
did I? Did I touch upon somesort long Is there something I
can do? I'll do it. Yeah. Ithink one of my motives in that,
but we call it the purple book,the purple book that to try to
(49:11):
find the language of the sutras,that a language that is a more
updated, you know, just a coupleof words, not like, you know, it
won't hit you over the head, butlike to make the sutra itself. I
didn't want it to be just that.
(49:31):
You had to leave lean on thecommentary, that just reading
the sutra becomes a little moremeaningful. So I didn't try to
keep it like word for word.
Sometimes one word in Sanskritturns out to be like three words
in English, because I wanted tosee one thing from different
angles, yes, which is reallyimportant to me that you take. A
(49:56):
word like some veganum, which isone of my favorite words. I just
just love the way it sounds. Butusually it's translated as
something like fervor, like you,the results are near in yoga
when you practice with fervor,the basic idea but the word some
veganum, it's not just fervor,like in intensity. If you look
(50:23):
at in a dictionary, it means,like, explosion, you know, it's
like, there's this feeling oflike thrust and power. And the
sutra just before that hasanother word, dacara, that also
gets translated as like fervor,but it's different. Satkara is
(50:45):
not the same as spent some bigSaqqara. One, one of the
meanings of it is hospitality.
So now I'm looking at Patanjalisaying there's two different
ways of looking at fervor. Oneis seeing the beauty of yoga and
(51:07):
the teachings, and that is yourinspiration is you're invited in
right hospitality. The sutrasare inviting you, and then you
go a couple sutures later, andnow there's explosions, yes, and
I think that's on purpose. Ithink that potentially has that
that gradation, and I don't seeit anywhere else. But to me, I
(51:29):
look at the differenttranslations, it's not just
academic. I have to feel someconnection to it. It has some
reality to me, even if it's notperfect, and it's not the only
way, for sure, has to besomething that I can really feel
connected to and then be able tomaybe transmit a little bit of
(51:52):
it. So that kind of thing, indoing the books
I love, thinking about theconnection of hospitality and
explosive thrust forwardness.
Yeah, that it would start fromservice and humility, and it
could turn into or eventuate asthis explosion, so to speak, of
(52:14):
bliss or connection. How do youhow do you relate to it? And
when we talk about words likeSamadhi, and if there's this
idea of like an eventuationtoward bliss or Samadhi, what is
your interpretation? Now, afterhaving years to mull over this
(52:39):
and meditate on it. Yeah,I go through different periods
of time where certain sutrasjust like, Oh, I love that
sutra. And I love just spendingtime with it, like person one,
that I think might be a backdoorway of addressing your question
is, i is, this is sutra aboutproperty, right, material
(53:04):
universe, and it says thatproperty gives us knowledge so
that we can become enlightened,right? It's because we get this
knowledge from it's a teacherliberation comes from dealing
with nature. What I can't thinkof the word right now in
(53:25):
Sanskrit, but the translation ofit, that property is something
worthwhile and beautiful. Theword in Sanskrit still not
coming to me, but word inSanskrit as as its translation,
something that's worthwhile andbeautiful. So now there's a
tendency, at least I found,among very ardent students of
(53:49):
yoga, to view the materialuniverse as something you have
to overcome. And I can see theway that you know it's not like
it's wrong, but that's theimage. And I see that
translation that talks aboutworthwhile and beautiful because
it gives us experiences thatlead to liberation. I see that
(54:12):
as something gorgeous, and itreminds me of St Francis, this
this beauty of nature, that'sthere, that's he was like that.
He never thought that Godappeared his nature. It wasn't
in his philosophy, but thateverything in nature was God
sending a message, and it's ahopeful message, and it's a
(54:34):
supporting message, and it'ssomething that protect, yes,
yeah, I love that. That is areally great way to look at it.
Reverend Jagannath, Have you,have you explored multiple other
texts, really universe? Oh mygosh, I think what happened,
(54:58):
Reverend Jagannath, is we got alittle glitch. Where, where the
Zoom kind of glitched, and Ididn't see you moving. And I
thought, oh, did I lose him? SoI started talking, and then, and
then you came back in. So Ireally apologize there. I did
follow you along the lines ofFrance, the French St Francis of
Assisi, and this appreciationfor nature and the way that that
(55:21):
can produce a connection likethis, as opposed to the yogi
moving beyond nature, or like,let me, let me try to put that
aside and put myself over here,in this place that I but I
didn't hear your finalstatement. Would you be able to
repeat it,there's a law. I can only say it
(55:42):
once, and thenthe universe didn't want me to
hear it. I guess IYeah, it's, I think it's the
point of that to me, is to notget into seeing or any of nature
as an obstacle or anoppositional way that it's
there, it's beautiful. We canlearn from it, and we should
(56:04):
learn to appreciate it, becauseit's nature, it's the universe,
yes, and it's not to beconquered. It's so clear to me,
the sutures, it's so clear. Itgives you experiences and
liberation. Experiencesliberation. It's your friend.
(56:25):
Yeah, we have issues with it,right, the parts of nature that
are difficult for us, but noneof it is really opposition.
Oppositional. Is that a word?
Yeah? Yeah. Oppositional, all ofit is should be seen as this
(56:47):
incredible encyclopedia thatnature is, and it's there to
teach and to guide and to bringus to pure spirit.
Yes, nature, thank you for forfollowing that idea through I
did. I did not hear you. End itlike that. Thank you. Do you?
Sometimes people could willcritique yoga sutures as being a
(57:10):
dualistic philosophy, and maybefrom say Tantra literature, will
say Our philosophy is non dual.
But I, from what you just said,it sounds to me like you're
almost now interpreting thesutras as as a an element of non
dualism. In this in this idea oftouching the ground and feeling
(57:31):
the earth as that's one of theplaces we can really find
liberation, is through thisexperience of living, does? Does
that resonate with you?
Yeah, yeah, I think it does.
Actually, it was interestingbecause I've been studying up
more on the this whole thing,like the I'd like to Vedanta and
(57:53):
Sankhya and Sankhya yoga, whichis another thing, and I think
ultimately they're all valid.
We're just trying to find a wayof establishing a relationship
that makes sense in reality. Andlike, let me get involved in
that relationship, whether it'snon dual or, like, soccer, where
(58:15):
you have the two parts, andyoga, which has the third part
with the swara right, the godlevel. If it gets me to
understand, have anunderstanding, even we know that
isn't going to be exact. I wantto have a relationship with with
the universe, with nature, withconsciousness. I want to
(58:37):
understand, what isconsciousness? But how does that
happen? I mean, the simplestthing is, like, how do I know
that it's me? I close my eyes,say, That's me. What did I just
see? What was that I'm lookingthere's nothing but dark. But I
know it's me. You know, anyphilosophy that that gets me to
(59:00):
to embrace and ponder and dancewith all the aspects of creation
and and of self with small s andcapital S both. Yes, that's a
fine philosophy for me.
I hear ya Yes. And interestinglyenough, Reverend jognath, when
we started, for those of youthat are listening. We're also
(59:21):
recording this now. This on ourYouTube channel. When we started
the we're on the set. You're onthe East Coast. I'm on the East
Coast. I'm a lot further southhere in Florida. You're up in
New Jersey. It's already gettingdark there. Here, we still have
some sun. And when we started itwas it was a lot brighter behind
you, but now you're illuminatedbecause the the it's dark behind
(59:44):
you and the computer screen islike shedding all this light on
you. So slowly, through thisconversation, you've become more
illuminated.
I didn't see this.
Yeah, right,that's the image of me.
Whatever, rightcoming back to that question of
like, who am I? And what isconsciousness? And it's becoming
(01:00:07):
clear. I can see you a lotclearer now, over this one hour,
you've become more much moreclear to me. Oh man, well, I'm
so thankful Reverend John ganathfor this opportunity. And what
I'm so excited about is, youknow, I've been able to have
Margo Bandu, and now you andthen our next episode is an
(01:00:30):
interview with the three of ustogether. I get to talk to both
of you together, which I'm soexcited for everybody to have a
chance to hear. And again, I'mso grateful. Every morning I'm
waking up and I'm writing in mygratitude journal, you know,
three things that I'm gratefulfor, and this morning was I get
to talk to Reverend Jagannath.
(01:00:52):
So I feel really, you know, I'vebeen excited all day for this,
and I really enjoy thisopportunity. I'm grateful. Thank
you.
Thank you. May all the blessingsflow to you always. Thank
you so much. Well, I lookforward to our next session, and
I wish you a wonderful evening.
Youtoo. You too. Thank you. Todd,
(01:01:14):
thank you so thank you. Shanti,you native yoga Todd cast is
produced by myself. The thememusic is dreamed up by Bryce
Allen. If you like this show,let me know if there's room for
improvement. I want to hear thattoo. We are curious to know what
(01:01:37):
you think and what you want moreof what I can improve. And if
you have ideas for future guestsor topics, please send us your
thoughts to info at Native yogacenter. You can find us at
Native yoga center.com, and hey,if you did like this episode,
share it with your friends. Rateit and review and join us next
(01:02:00):
time you.
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