HRIDAYA PHILOSOPHY
Yoga of
the Spiritual Heart
Hridaya Yoga is a spiritual path whose purpose is the revelation of our True Self, Atman or the Spiritual Heart.
Developed by Sahajananda, Hridaya Yoga is based on traditional spiritual principles and visions from classical yoga based on Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, Advaita Vedanta, Tantra Yoga, and Kashmir Shaivism.
Hridaya Yoga’s practices include Hatha Yoga, Meditations for the revelation of the Spiritual Heart, and techniques for cultivating Awareness in daily life. Participation in a Hridaya Silent Meditation Retreat is an excellent way to experience these teachings.
“Hridaya means Heart. Hridaya Yoga is the yoga of the sweetness of the Heart. It is the Heart of Yoga.”
-Sahajananda
HRIDAYA YOGA PHILOSOPHY
The teachings present Traditional and Ancient Spiritual Principles in accessible and clear way. They invite you to discover to the Divine Essence of your being and, yet, you are not asked to deny the outer world: on the contrary, you are invited to Celebrate all the Expressions of life as manifestation of the Divine.
You learn how to see the Divine in everything, you reveal your nature of awareness and spaciousness, and this brings Freedom and Peace, Love and Acceptance.
Students engaged on the path of Hridaya Yoga aspire to live in the Heart, in the Supreme Reality, in God, with God being experienced directly, beyond any conceptual and religious definitions.
HRIDAYA MEDITATION
Hridaya Meditation is based on the Indian tradition of Advaita Vedanta, as taught by the great 20th-century sage Ramana Maharshi and now shared by my teacher Sahajananda, one of the leading meditation teachers in the world.
This method is a very profound and yet, very simple: it points directly to the Truth in many different ways so everyone can find the path which best suits him/her.
HRIDAYA HATHA YOGA
Hridaya Hatha Yoga is a unique style developed by Sahajananda. This yoga is not designed for just strengthen and stretch the body but to prepare the mind and the body for the highest purpose, the ultimate goal of authentic Yoga – Union of the individual self with the Supreme Self, reconnection to the core of your being.
That is why the practice emphasizes Calmness, Energetic Balance and Awareness instead of just physical aspects. Because of that it can be practiced by everyone independently from the physical and health conditions.
SELF ENQUIRY - RAMANA MAHARISHI
Ramana Maharshi terms Self-Enquiry as “the most sacred of sacred.”
Indeed, it is a revolutionary method in spirituality. Ramana explains the reason this practice is unique: “What is essential in any sadhana [spiritual practice] is to try to bring back the running mind and fix it on one thing only. Why then should it not be brought back and fixed in Self-attention (To this feeling of ‘I’)? That alone is Self-Enquiry (Atma Vichara). That is all that is to be done!”
Self-Enquiry is the Awareness of Awareness itself. It leads us beyond duality because the object of meditation (the “I”) is ultimately revealed as the Subject itself (transpersonal Consciousness).
ADVAITA VEDANTA
Non-dual Vedanta. It is considered the pearl of Indian philosophy and has influenced virtually all schools of Indian thought. The supreme truth of advaita is the non-dual reality of Brahman, in which Atman (the Supreme Self) and Brahman (the Ultimate Reality) are absolutely unified. Thus, the message of Advaita Vedanta is that only the Absolute, Undivided Self is real. It is the only Truth to be seen, surrendered to, and, ultimately, realized.
Advaita Vedanta is commonly misunderstood as an intellectual philosophy, when it is actually quite practical. It seeks to awaken Viveka (discrimination), which leads to Self-realization.
WHAT IS HRIDAYA - THE SPIRITUAL HEART?
Hridaya, the Spiritual Heart, is our essential and ultimate nature. It is the ineffable dimension of our being. It is another name for Atman (the Supreme Self). The Spiritual Heart is the Supreme Consciousness, the ultimate Subject, the pure “I.” It is the Witness Consciousness, that intimate observer of all our thoughts, emotions, sensations, and the entire Universe in both its inner and outer dimensions.
The Spiritual Heart is not just a spark of God—the Spiritual Heart is God.