Kriya Yoga
Kriya yoga offers a powerful set of techniques for self-transformation and self-liberation, and may be shared by Swami Nityananda with a qualified student upon request. Paraphrasing Lahiri Mahasaya, who began teaching such techniques in 1861, we prepare ourselves for Kriya by practicing spiritual honesty, inner purity, which propels forward movement on the spiritual path.
Kriya yoga connects us with divine energy—quickens divine light, calm clear awareness, pure love, that are already with us and within us. In turn, we open our hearts, minds, awareness, to receive infinite blessings and Grace that shower down upon us. As we step toward the Divine, the Divine rushes toward us, enfolding us in welcome, sacred Light, and pure rejoicing Love.
Our practice also shows us our human selves, including areas where we have carried or created resistance, blockages, or stuck energy within our bodies, minds, or lives. We learn how to heal and transform from within. We become aware that we are never done with spiritual practice, that as long as we have a body, mind, and heart, we are here to offer them joyfully to the Divine.
Then we realize absolute clarity, humility, spiritual strength, good humor, steadiness, sweetness, unfailing generosity, courage, thoughtfulness, the ability to be considerate, respectful, and helpful in our daily lives. All of life becomes a divine dance, a joyful sharing, a glad helpfulness. And we recognize in fullness, we cannot help another without also blessing ourselves. We cannot harm another without causing pain to ourselves. We gain poise, balance, ability to choose, freedom to be eternal kindness.
Kriya yoga delivers us to that which is beyond senses, mind, speech, effects of duality—calm, clear, bright, vivid eternal awareness, generosity of Soul, true nature, divinity, connectedness, caring, that we are forever.
Kriya Yoga: Inner Path to God
Learn more about Kriya Yoga in Swami Shankarananda’s beloved series of talks on the “spiritual science of Self-enlightenment.”