Gurumayi Chidvilasananda

Chidvilasananda

Gurumayi Chidvilasananda in 1984.
Born June 24, 1955 (1955-06-24) (age 56)
Bangalore

Gurumayi Chidvilasananda is the commonly used name of Malti Shetty (Mumbai, India, June 24, 1955), who is the current guru of the Siddha Yoga lineage. She is formally known as Swami Chidvilasananda or more casually as Gurumayi (the word translates to Guru Mother[1]). The Siddha Yoga lineage (parampara) was established by Bhagawan Nityananda, whose disciple Swami Muktananda was Gurumayi's guru.

Contents

Biography

Malti Shetty was the oldest child of a Mumbai restaurateur; he and his wife were devotees of Swami Muktananda in the 1950s. Malti was brought the first time to the Gurudev Siddha Peeth ashram at Ganeshpuri when she was five years old. During her childhood, her parents brought her, her sister, and two brothers to the ashram on weekends.[2]

After she had been initiated by Muktananda through shaktipat at age fourteen,[3] Malti moved to the ashram as a formal disciple and yoga student. [4] At age fifteen, Muktananda made her his official English language translator and she accompanied him on his world tours.[5]

On May 3, 1982, Malti Shetty was initiated as a sannyasin into the Saraswati order, taking vows of poverty, celibacy and obedience, and acquiring the title and monastic name of Swami Chidvilasananda, (literally, "bliss of the play of consciousness"). At this time Muktananda formally designated her as one of his successors, along with her brother Subhash Shetty, now known by his monastic name of Mahamandaleshwar Nityananda.[6]

Muktananda died in October 1982.

The two co-gurus disagreed in 1985.[7] According to his 1986 interview in Hinduism Today, Nityananda left by his own choice, deciding to cease to be a Siddha Yoga Sannyasin but wishing his sister well as sole guru.[8] In 1987, Nityananda founded the Shanti Mandir ('Temple of Peace'), a separate organization which "continues the spiritual work of his Guru, the renowned sage Baba Muktananda, whom he succeeded in 1982." Shanti Mandir runs two Ashrams in India, and - like Gurumayi - one in New York State. [9]

In 1992 she incorporated the PRASAD Project in the United States.[10] The PRASAD project is an NGO in Special Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nation.[11]

In 1997 she founded the Muktabodha Indological Research Institute with its own publishing imprint, Agama Press.[12]

Chidvilasananda "is a superb singer", with a "deep, resonant contralto" voice which she uses to great effect when leading her devotees in chanting.[13] She has recorded several CDs of chanting, including the mantra "Om Namah Shivaya".[14]

Salon.com and The New York Post have each speculated that Chidvilasananda was the guru featured in Elizabeth Gilbert's memoir Eat, Pray, Love and its film adaptation. Gilbert has not identified by name the real-life ashram and guru featured in the book.[15][16]

The New York Times, New Yorker and Salon.com have all claimed that Chidvilasananda’s ashrams have attracted celebrities, including Meg Ryan[17], Melanie Griffith, Isabella Rossellini, Diana Ross and Don Johnson.[18][15] The Telegraph states that Scottish pop singer Lulu met Gurumayi.[19]

In 1994, Lis Harris noted that Gurumayi's ashram in New York State is "sleekly modernized, in country-club-glitz style" from three prewar Catskill hotels "in neatly landscaped grounds" of 550 acres, and had "an estimated market value of fifteen to seventeen million dollars" in 1994[18]. The ashram was able to earn "well over four million dollars" in 1989 selling books and other merchandise, and by running workshops (called intensives).[18]

Her critics believe that she associates with celebrities and runs opulent ashrams. They believe that behavior contradicts what is expected of a renunciate. Linda Johnsen observed the appearance of wealth at the ashram and took it positively. She noted that the ascetic traditions of yoga are only one type and that others exist. She quotes a brahmin priest who told her "The Goddess is beauty and wealth. Prosperity is a gift of the Mother."[20]

Bibliography

By Chidvilasananda

About Chidvilasananda

References

  1. ^ Johnsen, Linda. Daughters of the Goddess: The Women Saints of India. p. 73. 
  2. ^ Douglas Brooks, Swami Durgananda, Paul E. Muller-Ortega, Constantina Rhodes Bailly, S.P. Sabharathnam. Meditation Revolution: a History and Theology of the Siddha Yoga lineage. (Agama Press) 1997, p.62
  3. ^ Meditation Revolution, p.64
  4. ^ The Graceful Guru: Hindu Female Gurus in India and the United States, Karen Pechilis, Oxford University Press US, 2004, pg. 225
  5. ^ Sarah Caldwell (2001). "The Heart of the Secret: A Personal and Scholarly Encounter with Shakta Tantrism in Siddha Yoga" (Reprint). Nova Religio 5 (1): 9–51. doi:10.1525/nr.2001.5.1.9. http://caliber.ucpress.net/doi/pdf/10.1525/nr.2001.5.1.9.  PDF - page 22. Note that Caldwell gives the age of Gurumayi's shaktipat as thirteen, not fourteen as stated by Pechilis.
  6. ^ Meditation Revolution, p.115
  7. ^ S.P. Sabharathnam Douglas Brooks. Meditation Revolution: A History and Theology of the Siddha Yoga Lineage. Agama Press, 1997. page 115. ISBN 978-0965409605
  8. ^ "Former SYDA Co-Guru Explains". Hinduism Today. 1986. http://www.hinduismtoday.com/modules/smartsection/item.php?itemid=358. Retrieved November 07, 2011. 
  9. ^ "Shanti Mandir". About Shanti Mandir. Shanti Mandir.com. http://www.shantimandir.com/en/about. Retrieved November 07, 2011. 
  10. ^ "PRASAD Project". http://www.prasad.org/about-prasad/index.php. Retrieved 2007-03-18. 
  11. ^ "Department of Economic and Social Affairs - Non-Governmental Organizations Section". http://www.un.org/esa/coordination/ngo/. Retrieved 2008-11-16. 
  12. ^ "Muktabodha Webpage". http://www.muktabodha.org. Retrieved 2007-03-18. 
  13. ^ Linda Johnsen 1994, pages 76-77
  14. ^ Chidvilasananda, Gurumayi (1987). "The Power of the Mantra (CD)". The Power of the Mantra - Om Namah Shivaya. SYDA Foundation. http://siddhayogabookstore.org/powerofthemantra.aspx. Retrieved November 09, 2011. 
  15. ^ a b Shah, Riddhi. The "Eat, Pray, Love" guru's troubling past." Salon.com, August 14, 2010. Retrieved November 07, 2011
  16. ^ Stewart, Sara. "Eat pray zilch." The New York Post, 2010-08-10.
  17. ^ "NYTimes:Style:New York". This Year, the Jet Set Is Seeking Nirvana. New York Times. June 7, 1998. http://www.nytimes.com/1998/06/07/style/this-year-the-jet-set-is-seeking-nirvana.html?pagewanted=3&src=pm. Retrieved November 07, 2011. 
  18. ^ a b c Harris, Lis (November 14, 1994). "New Yorker". O Guru, Guru, Guru. NewYorker.com. http://www.newyorker.com/archive/1994/11/14/1994_11_14_092_TNY_CARDS_000370306. Retrieved November 08, 2011. 
  19. ^ Grice, Elizabeth (February 04, 2008). "The Telegraph". Lulu:'I think the best is yet to come - even now'. telegraph.co.uk. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/features/3635501/LuluI-think-the-best-is-yet-to-come-even-now.html. Retrieved November 08, 2011. 
  20. ^ Linda Johnsen 1994, pages 78-9

External links

Siddha Yoga
Main article
Gurus
Gurumayi Chidvilasananda · Swami Muktananda · Bhagawan Nityananda
Ashrams