{"id":1995,"date":"2026-01-10T21:52:32","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T21:52:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.yoganandafortheworld.com\/story\/?p=1995"},"modified":"2026-01-10T21:52:32","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T21:52:32","slug":"swami-kriyananda-as-we-have-known-him-shouldnt-i-give-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.yoganandafortheworld.com\/story\/swami-kriyananda-as-we-have-known-him-shouldnt-i-give-up\/","title":{"rendered":"Swami Kriyananda \u2014 As We Have Known Him: Shouldn\u2019t I Give Up?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>\u201dThe doctors have offered me more chemotherapy,\u201d Happy Winingham (an Ananda member) said to Swamiji.<\/strong> \u201cThey say it will keep me going for at least another few years. Should I take it?\u201d Happy had AIDS and several times had come close to dying. \u201dThe treatment could be quite unpleasant. Death doesn\u2019t frighten me, and maybe it would be better to get on with the process of dying.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you die, you\u2019ll just have to start over in a new incarnation,\u201d Swamiji said to her. \u201cIt may take you a long time to get to where you are now &#8211; all those years of childhood, then finding your spiritual path and learning Kriya again. If it were I, I would keep trying to live until I couldn\u2019t meditate anymore. Or until I felt that the treatments or the body itself was an insurmountable obstacle to spiritual progress. Then I would consider letting it go.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSwamiji\u2019s advice was a great comfort,\u201d Happy said later. \u201cIt became my criterion for how much treatment to take. As long as I could meditate or at least practice the presence of God I would do everything I could to stay in the body.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Happy lived on for several years more. She was never really well, so it took considerable effort to keep her body going. The will power and understanding she gained was of great spiritual benefit to her, progress she wouldn\u2019t have made if she had given up sooner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201dThe doctors have offered me more chemotherapy,\u201d Happy Winingham (an Ananda member) said to Swamiji. \u201cThey say it will keep me going for at least another few years. Should I take it?\u201d Happy had AIDS and several times had come close to dying. \u201dThe treatment could be quite unpleasant. Death doesn\u2019t frighten me, and maybe &#8230; <a title=\"Swami Kriyananda \u2014 As We Have Known Him: Shouldn\u2019t I Give Up?\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.yoganandafortheworld.com\/story\/swami-kriyananda-as-we-have-known-him-shouldnt-i-give-up\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about Swami Kriyananda \u2014 As We Have Known Him: Shouldn\u2019t I Give Up?\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1995","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Swami Kriyananda \u2014 As We Have Known Him: Shouldn\u2019t I Give Up? - Swami Kriyananda: Lightbearer<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A direct disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda counseled a woman who was dying of AIDS.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.yoganandafortheworld.com\/story\/swami-kriyananda-as-we-have-known-him-shouldnt-i-give-up\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Swami Kriyananda \u2014 As We Have Known Him: Shouldn\u2019t I Give Up? 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