The Vital Veda Podcast: Ayurveda | Holistic Health | Cosmic and Natural Law

Gurudev's Global Movement for Peace and Harmony | Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar #141

• Dylan Smith: Ayurvedic Practitioner, Holistic Health Educator, Conscious Entrepreneur • Season 1

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For this episode I had the honour of interviewing Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, a world-renowned spiritual teacher and the founder of one of the largest spiritual organisations in the world today, Art of Living.

This interview occurred in person, after the unforgettable Navaratri celebrations at the Art of Living Ashram in Bangalore. This sacred festival drew over 40,000 people together, creating a profound atmosphere of worship, meditation and spiritual harmony.

Join us as we delve into the teachings of Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, including the life-changing Sudarshan Kriya, a powerful breathing and meditative technique taking the world by storm as it reaching millions, including acclaimed universities studying the effects for sudarshan Kriya.

 We also discuss the growing global embrace of meditation and spirituality, highlighting the crucial role of silence in elevating consciousness and resolving inner conflicts.

Immerse yourself in the vibrant teachings of the founder of the Art of Living, from its cutting-edge environmental initiatives to its focus on education and natural farming. Through personal stories and reflections from this spiritual hub, discover how Gurudev’s dedication to service is inspiring a worldwide movement for peace, positivity, and collective transformation.

Don’t miss this chance to hear Gurudev’s insights firsthand and learn how you can be part of his upcoming global events. Tune in for an inspiring journey into the heart of Vedic wisdom and spiritual practice.

IN THIS EPISODE WE DISCUSS:
🧘 The Chandi Homa and Navaratri Celebrations
🧘 The Power of Sudarshan Kriya
🧘 The Role of Silence in Enhancing Consciousness
🧘 Life at the Art of Living Ashram: A Hub for Transformation
🧘 Gurudev’s Global Movement for Peace and Positivity

RESOURCES:

Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Sankar is coming to Australia & New Zealand:

  • Perth, WA - October 16-17th, 2024
  • Melbourne, VIC - October 18-19th, 2024
  • Sydney, NSW - October 20-22nd, 2024
  • Auckland, NZ - October 22-24th, 2024

Gurudev intervening with peace at war zones (profound video):

RELATED LISTENS:

ABOUT OUR GUEST: Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Sankar

Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar is a globally renowned spiritual leader, humanitarian, and founder of the Art of Living Foundation. 

He has dedicated his life to promoting peace, compassion, and the well-being of individuals and societies through the practice of meditation, yoga, and Sudarshan Kriya—a powerful breathing technique he developed. With a vision to create a stress-free, violence-free world, Gurudev's teachings transcend cultural and religious boundaries, inspiring millions across more than 180 countries. 

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Vital Veda podcast. I am your host, dylan Smith. I'm an Ayurvedic practitioner and holistic health educator based in Australia, but our clinic and our education platform is worldwide. It's online, it's in person where we travel around the world, and you can check all that at Vital Veda. And one of the things we do at Vital Veda is we have a podcast and this is the podcast you're listening to Welcome if you're new and it's on health, consciousness, spirituality and the Veda the laws of nature.

Speaker 1:

And I'm absolutely honored to have our guest today, gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, who is one of the foremost spiritual masters of today, and this is a short interview I did with him in person in his ashram in Bangalore, south India. But before I get into the interview, I'm going to let you know that I am going to break up this interview and share with you my experiences in the ashram. Share with you my experiences of speaking to other people in the ashram other senior teachers, other people who were there for the first time, and it was absolutely a profound place, and guru dev, as commonly referred to, is, is profound and he's inspired a wave of volunteeringism and service, resulting in one of the largest volunteer-based organizations in the world. Art of living, which is an organization spreading humanitarian actions and values and teaching spiritual values and techniques, is comprising of more than 30,000 teachers and over 1 million volunteers engaged in services over 180 countries. It's been going for 43 years. It's got 10 000 centers across the world. In 180 countries. Art of living has touched half a billion of lives and one of the things they do is create schools and they've got over 100 000 students that have provided education who would not have education otherwise. They have trained over 2.2 million farmers in natural farming methods. They have restored and rejuvenated 70 rivers or streams across India.

Speaker 1:

And another thing that Gurudev has and I highly suggest you check out the show notes of this podcast episode is he has restored conflict resolution. He was fundamental in mediating the 53-year-long war of armed conflict between the Colombian government and FARC, which is one of the rebel groups in Colombia, and he was the one who pursued this peace resolution and played a significant role. He's done so many more efforts of actively being involved in peace building in areas of conflict around the world Iraq as well as Colombia, in the region of Janmoo and Kashmir in India. All over the world he has met with prime ministers, presidencies, dignitaries. He has been fundamental in many things. He has been very much him and his organization very interlinked with disaster relief and trauma care and we speak about this in our episode with one of the senior teachers, patty Montella, in the Vital Veda podcast. But going to tsunamis, going to Syrian refugee camps, victims of civil conflicts, uttarakhand floods in India, ukraine, haiti earthquake the list goes on. They've been fundamental and one of the main organizations that people in the local area can rely on. They're involved in Prison Smart, which is stress management and rehabilitation training in prisons. They've transformed the lives of over 800,000 prisoners worldwide, across 60 countries. They implement this prison program, environmental and rural developments, mental health and stress relief programs.

Speaker 1:

Over 700 universities, fortune 500 companies they have their own method for dealing with the corporate companies Interfaith dialogue and spiritual leadership. Srishti Ravi Sangha has been invited to speak at global platforms like United Nations, world Economic Forum it goes on and on and on. The World Economic Forum it goes on and on and on. They did a World Cultural Festival in 2016 in New Delhi, which was one of the largest cultural events ever organized. It brought together 3.75 million people from 155 countries to celebrate diversity, cultural unity and global peace, and this highlights Sri Sri Ravi Shankar's commitment to fostering global harmony. And they meditate among. Imagine meditating with over 3 million people in a group meditation.

Speaker 1:

Sri Sri has also promoted yoga and Ayurveda. He's a big proponent of that. He's created universities which are teaching Ayurveda courses, bams program, which is the doctor's degree. It goes on and on and on. The impact that he is having, and not just him, but those around him, those part of the organization. And this I could really feel when my family and I visited the ashram and I'm going to speak more about that at the end, because it is a significant, profound place. It's like a mini city, a mini Vedic city, and in this interview with Shri Shri, which I did with him in person at the Art of Living Ashram in Bangalore, south India, we speak a bit about one of his gurus, maharishi Mahesh Yogi, who was my guru's guru, and Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was it's Sri Sri.

Speaker 1:

What he's doing now reminds me of what Maharishi did in the 80s, 90s, whenever it was. Maharishi would get all the best Ayurvedic doctors and all the Ayurvedic astrologers and all the Vedic architects, the Vastu consultants, and he would really spread the Vedas. He revived the Vedas. He was instrumental in reviving the Vedic knowledge and the way he did that, the way Maharishi did that, was making it popular in the West and then the West would influence India and then it would become popular in India as well. And Sri Sri kind of is doing that now but magnified the scale. He is spreading Vedic wisdom and is incorporating Vedic wisdom into our world all across the world I mean literally all across the world is absolutely significant. Plus, he really has that humanitarian value extremely focused.

Speaker 1:

And I'll read a quote from Sri Sri and it's Our first and foremost commitment is to do seva, which is service in the world. When you make service your sole purpose of life, it eliminates fear, it brings focus in our mind, purposefulness in action and long-term joy. So, as you can see, the first and foremost commitment is to do seva and we're going to speak in this podcast episode about a bunch of Vedic fun stuff, like what is Gurudev about? Yagi's Vedic fire ceremonies, about the origins of art of living, about Kriya and about also dealing with these very hard times which we're dealing with, these turbulent times of war, of ignorance, of darkness. So we're going to get into this in the podcast. I am going to break up the podcast with implementing some of my experiences throughout.

Speaker 1:

Because this interview was short, I didn't have much time to ask questions and I was pretty nervous. It was me sitting opposite Sri Sri in front of a crowd of about 8,000 people, which was quite a small crowd compared to the days before because we were there for a festival called Navaratri, which I'll be sharing more about. Check out the show notes. There's a lot of resources for this one, including other interviews I've done with other senior teachers of Art of Living and some of the videos, like one video on Sri Sri's impact and mediation involvement in war and conflict areas, which is a very profound video and it just really shows how on the ground he is and how powerful his influence is. So I hope you can enjoy this episode and much love, much love. First question is Jai Gurudev, this common greeting and gesture that we hear so often. Can you elaborate what it means?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, guru means the biggest. Jai means May the victory be for the biggest Divinity, biggest principle in us. That's what it is, because you have a small mind and a big mind. So when the small mind wins, you become miserable. When the big mind wins, you always have happiness.

Speaker 1:

And how did the title or address of Guru Dev become associated with your name?

Speaker 2:

Well, it is very common. Like you have father, mother, and like that you have guru, you have a teacher, you have guide. If you ask me how the word guide comes to you, you know, or coach comes to you, it comes very naturally by what you do.

Speaker 1:

Right. So before we get into the next question about Yajna's Vedic fire ceremony, I want to share with you that my family and I went to this ashram during what's called Navaratri, the nine nights of Mother Divine, the nine nights that comes on the new moon, after the equinox around October, and this was October 2024. So, just like Ayurveda honors the profound nature of seasonal transitions and the rhythms of nature, one thing is the day, the rhythms of the day, one thing is the rhythm of the seasons, even the rhythms of the moon. But then we can increase our sophistication to the rhythms of the equinoxes and the solstices and the rhythm of the equinox, particularly if you're in the Northern Hemisphere, all around the world, but governed by the Northern Hemisphere, governed by India, the equinox that is leading into the winter, the autumn equinox. That is a very profound time when the sun is moving. Similarly, our digestive fire is moving, our metabolic fire is moving, our agni is moving and transforming. So we can utilize these nine days to regenerate, rejuvenate our body, to restore health, and not just our physical body but our mind, our consciousness, our mental body, and that's why a lot of people, such as the Art of Living Ashram, will do significant rites during these nine days.

Speaker 1:

So we went to the Art of Living Ashram on the eighth day of Navaratri we arrived at about 2 am after a long delayed flight and the eighth day known as Ashtami of Navaratri. So the eighth day of Navaratri is actually the most significant day in Out of Living Ashram. It's when they do a big Yajna, a big Vedic fire ceremony called Chandi Homa, and this was a massive Yajna. It was unbelievable. They had pundits, which are the Vedic priests, chanting, many of them in harmony, in beautiful, sweet harmony. It was so potent.

Speaker 1:

And when we arrived in the early morning at about 8 am, the yajna was starting at 9 am. Everywhere there were people. There was about over 30,000 people attending this Yajna. There was about 20,000 people in the shed in the big hall in front of the Yajna and then outside of that hall was about another 20,000 people, and that was more the public, more people who aren't necessarily so connected with the movement of art of living, or they were locals. But in the main hall there's the yagya going on.

Speaker 1:

You needed a pass to get in there, so you needed to either be involved in the art of living movement or you could buy a pass, and then there was about 20 000 people outside as well, and when we, as soon as we walked into the ashram, this big piece of land in South Bangalore, there were people transcending everywhere. I mean, there were taxi drivers, there were construction workers, all these mundane Indians. They just had their heads. It was clear to me that they were transcending. Their neck was tilted, their chin was towards the chest and they were just in deep transcendence.

Speaker 1:

While these pundits were chanting, there was this beautiful, harmonious vibration emanating throughout the ashram, throughout this I don't know how many acres this area of the ashram that the Yajna was being conducted in. So that was my first impression. And me who has spent quite a lot of time in India, I mean a decent percentage of my life so far, my time in this life has been in India and I've never seen so many Indians meditating and experiencing a deep meditation, deep transcendence or meditation you want to call it, or just transcending, from the pundits chanting.

Speaker 1:

I've seen a lot of Indians, I've seen more Indians doing pujas and attending a temple and praying and lining up, but I've never seen so many meditating and really in this other level of consciousness, which is beyond the body, beyond the mind, of praying or moving, walking towards a temple. You know, I've been in temples where there's literally hundreds of thousands of people in a day attending to it, but I've never seen anything like this and this is testimony to what they do with the art of living, of increasing the collective consciousness. So my next question to Sri Sri is about the Yagyas, because after this particular Yagya, which was the biggest Yagya of the Navaratri you know they do one Yagya every day over the nine days, at least one main yagya, which Sri Sri also is there. He's sitting in front of the pundits, he's doing the ceremony with them and most of the time he's either transcending or he's rolling his eyes up to his third eye and you can see the whites of his eyes, or he's tearing up, he's drooping tears, he's crying because of how powerful this is and everyone is there and singing.

Speaker 1:

They have. They have bhajans, which are the holy songs. Throughout they sing and when everyone's singing together or one of the times he cried I remember it was everyone there was about 20 000 people in that room doing Guru Puja, which is a ceremony honoring the tradition of this lineage, which Sri Sri is part of, which we call the holy tradition, the Shankaracharya tradition, and it's also the tradition, same tradition, that Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was from and there's many other people throughout that tradition. Hesh Yogi was from and there's many other people throughout that tradition.

Speaker 1:

Adi Shankara is one of the main gurus that Sri Sri resonates with in his tradition. So we had about 20,000 people chanting that puja all together and these were people who learnt one of the courses Out of Living has something around 64 courses, and one of those courses is you can learn this Guru, puja, and I believe the main teacher of that course is Sri Sri's sister, manu, who we're going to speak about later in the podcast. But these yagyas, the energy was profound and this Chandihoma on the eighth day was the biggest one. They had 108 plates of rare herbs being offered into the fire. I mean, I could go on about this Yajna.

Speaker 1:

It went on for about six hours or so and after the Yajna, at a very precise time towards the end, it poured down with rain. It poured, it poured and it poured after that for about an hour and I spoke to someone who's been at this ashram for 15 years. He's been going. He's one of the senior teachers. He said he's never seen it rain like that in this time of year because it's not monsoon in October 2024. So that's a bit of a overview of of the experience of the yaga, and now I'm going to ask shri, shri. The question on yagyas. I have some question on yaga, this vedic technology that is like a cosmic mobile phone allowing us to commune with the divine, and it's a central part of art, of living programs, especially during navaratri, and three days ago we had a lot of rain after a yajna, so I hear that this is a feat of a successful yajna.

Speaker 2:

Is that the end of the Yajna showers do come. Nature responds to Yajna. Yajna means following the nature of creation, how the five elements come together and created the whole universe and so, going into that mechanics, you know, so they they use all the five elements. There is fire and there is water and there is chanting that represents the space element, and then the flowers and fruits and herbs all that is present in the universe, you know, that is life-supporting, is all used in the yajnas and to create that unseen impact in the consciousness and that is so uplifting. You know the karma. It erases all the negative karmas in the atmosphere. It erases the negative collective karmas and gives very positive vibes.

Speaker 1:

It was a lot of rain after that Chandihoma. I mean there was some even slight flooding. Have you ever seen so much rain in all your time at this time of year?

Speaker 2:

Oh, yeah, yeah, it happens.

Speaker 1:

All right. I would like to ask you about the origin of the art of living and how did your sadhana transition to incorporate Kriya and catalyze this worldwide movement? I'd like to provide some more context around this question. Guru devshri ravi shankarji one of his gurus was maharishi mahesh yogi and maharishi, of course, taught transcendental meditation. He was famous for teaching the beetles to meditate. It was a very transcendental meditation. He was famous for teaching the Beatles to meditate. It was a very transcendental technique. It was quite a lot of masculine energy, transcend right. Of course, he also taught techniques of more of the Shakti, more the feminine, of more of liveliness. But from what I hear from a lot of Sri Sri students and and teachers that he's taught is that he wanted to teach Kriya.

Speaker 1:

Sri Sri cognized this Sudarshan Kriya and he was in meditation. He cognized this and he wanted to purify the body more before transcending, and this is why this came and a bit about Sudarshan Kriya. It's a technique. It's not a classical yoga technique. It was cognized by Sri Sri and it elevates prana by flushing out toxins, and they say that it flushes more than 90% of toxins that come from accumulated stress every day, and what Sri Sri talks about is how the day follows night, and seasons come and go, a tree sheds his leaves and gets new ones. These are the rhythms of nature which we speak so much about in ayurveda. They're biological rhythms of the body, hormonal rhythms, mind, mind rhythms, emotional rhythms, and these all correspond to those found in nature. So stress and illness, they distort these rhythms and then we experience discomfort, you know, discontent, disease and mental issues, feeling upset, unhappy. And what sudarshan kriya does it? It harmonizes these rhythms of the body and the mind and the emotions. And when that's in sync, people apparently experience better health. Not apparently there's been a lot of scientific studies even on this kriya they apparently experience better health. Not apparently, there's been a lot of scientific studies even on this kriya they're experiencing better health, better joy, harmony, right, prolactin increases. So what's really interesting is, similarly, as I said, maharishi you know he also studied TM Like, there's a lot of studies on transcendental meditation and now there's even more studies. You know, out of working with Harvard and all these universities, there's a significant amount of studies on Sudarshan Kriya and on a bunch of other techniques.

Speaker 1:

And another thing I would like to share with you about incorporating Kriya, which is this purifying method of breath and movement with meditation and I'm going to share with you what I was told by one of the Art of Living teachers, and they speak about meditation it settles rajas down, it settles that agitated light down so that sattva, the unconditional love, can increase. But meditation may also increase tamas, which is why sometimes meditation can feel dull and sleepy. But what they were telling me is that Kriya eliminates both tamas and rajas so that we are certain, so the person is certain, to dwell in sattva that unconditional love, radiant light. So Kriya, when done before meditation, it eliminates the possibility of tamas coming into your meditation. For me I've experienced, when I'm very fatigued my meditation can be sleepy. And when doing this Kriya before, it's meant to completely remove that rajas and that tamas so that the meditation can be deep and it can be pure energy meditation can be deep and it can be pure energy.

Speaker 2:

Well, that's a history, how it happened in the past. For 43 years we have been it's 44 now, actually but it has grown throughout the world. But this is what is needed. You know, 40 years back, spirituality was a big taboo in the world, even to sing together or meditation. You need to have a lot of explanation to people, because people are so stuck in their intellect and everything has to be reasoned out, everything has to have a purpose. They don't see, they won't see beyond that. There is something that conscious, the aspect of consciousness, is so missing. The human touch was so missing. Today, wellness is a word and meditation is part of the planet and everybody is accepted, and that's a very big transformation in the society. That has happened. From where we were and where we are, there's a huge difference in the world.

Speaker 2:

But, just yet. It is not enough. Still there are a lot of conflicts. The pockets of people are completely ignorant of meditation. They are ignorant of healthy lifestyles. They don't know how to handle their mind, their emotions. This is an issue you know. If you were leaders who know how they can handle the mind and the ego of themselves and others, there wouldn't have been conflicts in the world. Wars will not happen. That is why there is much more work is needed to be done to bring harmony and sense into people's life, and art of living is bringing that sense, much needed sensibility and sensitivity in one's life.

Speaker 1:

Meditation is very common, as you said, but Kriya not so much. And when you cognize this Srdhāsaṁkriya, that was perhaps not so common when you did that and you came from a tradition of meditation with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. So how was that integration and what did Maharishi think at the time?

Speaker 2:

Oh, very well integrated, it was very nicely. Yeah, just compliments.

Speaker 1:

Also, silence is a common practice here at the Art of Living, and you go into silence a few days each year. Your guru, maharishi Mahesh Yogi, went in for seven days a year and out of living offers courses on silence. So what is the significance and power of practicing silence?

Speaker 2:

Silence is the mother of all creativity, and in silence you get into another dimension which is beyond, you know, the gross expression in life. So here people are getting a taste of what it is to go into silence and consolidate their energy and focus. And you know so I'm doing silence only so that I can tell others to be silent.

Speaker 2:

Actually, I don't need to go into silence, but you know, when you don't do it something yourself, you have no right to tell others. You should do this correct. So that's the reason that it is needed to calm the mind. But once you have no mind, then you don't need anything. No silence, silence or no silence doesn't make a difference. Okay, One last question.

Speaker 1:

Sure, and it's a question. You get a lot, and it's about the turbulence and the ignorance today and I want to ask what's your advice for people who are already meditating every day to take actional steps in supporting peace in these turbulent times?

Speaker 2:

Spread the word around, Make people be aware of the goodness of meditation, and then you know you cannot do everything, but at least you can start uniting, creating positive atmosphere around, Because, see, there are many positive things also happening in the world, but focus is mostly on what is negative. The negative people are more active than the positive. It's mostly not everywhere, but in the art of living is an exception. The people who are positive and zeal and enthusiasm they are even more active. But that is necessary. Wonderful, Did you have a good time here?

Speaker 1:

Extremely powerful. The yagyas the pandits. Very expansive, very good, the yagyas the pandas very expansive.

Speaker 2:

We have now the scanning into the time, knowledge of the time so we have many senior teachers who are initiated into it. They can see through the time and tell you that it helps people to get over the anxiety. So many times people ask me questions so I direct them because it is the same whether I say it or what Kal Gyanis say, so they get the solution to the problem. It probably yeah.

Speaker 1:

So that was the handful of questions that I got to ask shri shri, and before I talk more about my experience of art of living, I want to share with you just what he just mentioned, how he said scanning into the time or the color gyan. Basically, this is scanning your future. It's a process where senior teachers of Art of Living have been blessed by Sri Sri to scan your future and answer questions that you may have about anything in your life and that you need an answer to. So that is Dhamur explaining what he meant by that Kalagyan.

Speaker 1:

So, thank you so much for listening. I highly recommend visiting the Art of Living ashram. It was something very profound. As I said, it's a Vedic city. The amount of energy and soma and yagis I mean the creativity there is phenomenal. We were there, of course, at the heightened time, like the time of the year, the Navaratri, but one day they come out with constant days. Okay, we were launching two new books today. One was on classical music, one was on the Buddha. Like the books that they release in Outer Living are profound.

Speaker 1:

They were launching a new paint, a toxic-free paint that is made by their cows in the local Goshala, in the cow shed. They have, I mean, there's a gurukul at our living, which is where they train young boys to become pundits or to become Vedic masters of ceremony or to become knowledgeable in certain rites and rituals. They have wonderful places to meditate. They have permaculture going on there. They have wonderful places to meditate. They have permaculture going on there. They have initiatives to make plastic-free India and making biodegradable plastic bags in India, because it's such a big problem, plastic in India. They have their own aerobatic pharmacy and dispensary. I mean it goes on. The creativity is next level. They have AI apps. They're making an hour TV tv show about adi shankara. I mean, the creativity there is so high it can't even keep up, like the infrastructure can't keep up with this city, this vedic city. They have a bunch of karma clinic, they have a hospital, it's. It just goes on and on and s.

Speaker 1:

Sri Ravi Shankar is visiting Australia very, very soon if you listen to this on time, in October 2024. He's in Perth, is sold out on the 17th of October. He's visiting Melbourne on the 19th of October and he's visiting Sydney on the 20th of October and he's visiting Auckland in New Zealand. I believe it's the 24th of October. So, for all that, you can check out auartoflivingorg. I would definitely recommend. It's his first time in Australia for 15 years and I would highly recommend to experience the collective consciousness of being in the room with so many people who are going towards those same intentions of consciousness.

Speaker 1:

Now, before we go, go, I also want to share with you a lovely excerpt that I came across in the biography of guru devashushu ravishankar by his sister banu and it was a question I was going to ask him but I did not have time and it's an excerpt from his sister about ananda maima. Ananda maima was a great saint of North India. She was one who was known as the Mother Divine and she had siddhis, she had supernatural human capabilities who did amazing things. And I'm just going to share with you an excerpt which I love from the book because I know her well. And she was this woman who Maharishi Mahesh Yogi also was very fond of, this woman who Maharishi Maheshwagyi also was very fond of. So the quote is when Maharishi brought a shy young Ravi to Anandamayi Ma, she said Ah, you have brought me the Ganga, which is the Ganges Rivers. My brother wondered what she was talking about. Anandamayi Ma continued you have brought me the one who will wash away the ignorance of the world. Maharishi was very proud of young Ravi and he used to say the sun Ravi is a name for the sun. The sun rises and there will be light everywhere. So this is really testimony to the recognition that Ananda Mahima, as well as Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, knew this Sri Sri would wash away the ignorance of the world, would bring light everywhere. And you can really see from the work that he's doing and that the Art of Living is doing all the teachers involved, all the volunteers. It's not just one man, it's initiated by this man. He's the divine center of this shakti field, this field of energy which is absolutely emanating and brings great positivity to this world, and I highly recommend you get to know the movement more, get to know the offerings more, collaborate with them if you can, involve yourself with them if you can, and stay tuned for more around this and for more of this.

Speaker 1:

And if you enjoyed this episode and you want to hear more like it, I've got three episodes for you from other Art of Living senior teachers. The first one, which is one of my favorite episodes on the Vital Vader podcast, is episode 102, japa Mantra Sound Energy, rites of passage and expert guidance with swami purna chaitanya. Swamiji is a wonderful man, a wonderful speaker from the netherlands, became devoted his whole life to his work and became a celibate, became ramacharya and at a young age and he's very close to srisu ravavi shankar ji. So check that out. That's about sound energy. We speak about gurus, about japa great stuff episode 102.

Speaker 1:

The next episode which has been a big hit is episode 131 on the vital beta podcast and that is with michael collins, and that episode is called Superhuman Intuition Reading and Cycling Blindfolded Mental Health Evolution, and that is about a documentary that is being made, based on one of the Art of Living courses, which is called Intuition, and it's for children and it's developing intuition in children in a profound level. I'm talking, as I said, reading and cycling blindfolded. I'm talking police using children to locate missing people through their intuition. And even kids moving a pen on the table. You know there's supernatural capabilities when they move, moving a pen across the table. So this is much easier for children to develop these capabilities because of their purity and innocence. So that's a wonderful episode.

Speaker 1:

Episode 131, superhuman intuition, with michael collins, the filmmaker, who's a brother of mine and a legend. And the last one is episode number 135 and that is how to share yoga and meditation to the mainstream and heal collective ignorance with patty montella, and patty is a senior art of living teacher who is really good at accessing those mainstream crowds and and communities and audiences to teach them meditation and teach them yoga. And and she's very much on the ground she's one of those people who go to the disaster zones. She's currently right now as I record this, and while I was in the art of living ashram she couldn't be there because she was in us handling hurricane helene. She said it was horrific and she's really in these deep, dark areas of horror playing a role, and so she speaks about her experiences as episode 135 with Patti Montella.

Speaker 1:

So I hope you enjoyed this episode. I hope you enjoyed my sharing on top of the short interview and if you have any questions or have any feedback, please let us know. You can leave a review on this podcast on iTunes. It would be appreciated. You can subscribe so you hear more of when we're releasing episodes on health, consciousness and spirituality. We're moving to about releasing once a month. This is an exception. This is a bit of a bonus episode after our episode all about the best water you can create. We've got episodes everywhere after our episode all about the best water you can create. We got episodes everywhere.

Speaker 1:

If you want to learn more from me and my teachers, my gurus, who were very close disciples of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, who are Ayurvedic doctors, we're teaching an Ayurvedic course in April 2025 on Marma and Pulse. Marma is the vital points of the anatomy, vital points of the physiology, where mind and consciousness and body meet, where consciousness is located anatomically. And how do we access these vital points for circulating prana, life force, energy and clearing blockages in the body through these marama points and we learn to do that. It's a very unique seven-day retreat course in Australia on April 2nd, starting 2025. And it's a very unique process of initiating people into these techniques of marma and pulse diagnosis. And self-pulse is absolutely involved, since pulse is the king of touch and touch is the king of the senses. So if you're interested in learning Ayurveda for yourself, like more deep, subtle treatment and subtle is where the power is then check out this course.

Speaker 1:

And the second type of person it is beyond. If you want to heal yourself is for practitioners, for those who want to enhance their super subtle sensory capabilities. How can you use your senses to heal others? How can you heal others through their senses and, in this case, the sense of touch? So for any body workers, any ayurvedic therapists and of course it's beyond therapists, it's beyond or it's it's for, for just Ayurvedic knowledge in general. We talk about medical astrology with Dr Harsha Raju and Dr Parvani Raju and they're both experts in Marama, in Ayurveda, in Panchakarma. They come from a long lineage of distinguished, internationally renowned Vedas and Dr Harsha is also an astrologer Vedic astrologer so we bring medical astrology into this. So for the Maraman Pulse Retreat, you can check out vitalvedacomau forward slash courses the early bird for that retreat. The early bird price finishes on October 31st. After that we'll be back to full price. The link will no longer work for the early bird. So check out vitalvatorcomau forward slash courses for that Marama Retreat. And until next time, see you on the Vital Vator Podcast show.