{"id":909,"date":"2022-08-20T16:38:34","date_gmt":"2022-08-20T16:38:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.yoganandafortheworld.com\/story\/?p=909"},"modified":"2023-04-27T17:17:45","modified_gmt":"2023-04-27T17:17:45","slug":"conversations-with-ananda-ch-6-nayaswami-shivani-learning-to-trust-an-inner-flow-of-intuitive-guidance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.yoganandafortheworld.com\/story\/conversations-with-ananda-ch-6-nayaswami-shivani-learning-to-trust-an-inner-flow-of-intuitive-guidance\/","title":{"rendered":"Conversations With Ananda — Ch. 6: Nayaswami Shivani, Learning to Trust an Inner Flow of Intuitive Guidance"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Shivani, third from right, with Swami Kriyananda, in the biodynamic garden at Ananda Village, 1977. L-R: head gardener Haanel Cassidy, Ananta, Swamiji, Govinda, Shivani, James, and Maria. In the background: (at left) the dairy and (upper right) a log cabin yurt home.<\/p>\n

<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Shivani came to Ananda<\/strong> in the early years of the community. A whirlwind of energy, she naturally assumed positions of responsibility, first in the Ananda Village biodynamic organic garden, then as director of Ananda Publications, and finally in the outreach programs of the Ananda Europa community in Assisi, Italy.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Tell us about your life before you came to Ananda. Did you have an early interest in service?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> It\u2019s something that came out strongly when I was very young. I must have been about eight when I organized a social club for girls that lasted through high school. I can\u2019t say that we had high ideals, because the purpose was social and sports, but we met weekly and did lots of things together and remained friends throughout those years.<\/p>\n

I went to Ohio University in Athens where I was president of my dorm and of a sorority-like organization. After college, I went to law school at George Washington University in Washington, DC. I chose the law for idealistic reasons, but after working as a legal assistant and secretary for two years while I was in law school, I became very disillusioned with the law. I was also discouraged by the curriculum, because of the compromises that constantly had to be made to reach certain objectives. For those reasons, I left law school after two years.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Shivani at Ananda Village, 1977.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I hitchhiked across the country and landed in Palo Alto, California, where I happened to be in the right place at the right time to meet Swami Kriyananda at a yoga class that he was giving. The Ananda community didn\u2019t exist at that point; it was 1968 and Swami had just acquired the property that would eventually be the Meditation Retreat. He had finished writing his book, Cooperative Communities \u2013 How to Start Them, and Why<\/em>, and was letting people read the manuscript. I was very intrigued, because cooperative societies had been a strong interest of mine in law school. In fact, I had written a paper in which I drew up bylaws and a constitution for a cooperative living situation in Washington, DC.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Were you involved in the early stages of planning the community?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Not at all. I arrived at Ananda Village for a visit on June 22, 1969 and never left. I had planned to hitchhike around the country again, and I was carrying everything I owned in a small backpack.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> What convinced you to stay?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Many things. It was peaceful and beautiful, but most of all, it was a chance to build an alternative society from the ground up, which had always been one of my dreams. I had always wanted to be a pioneer, and I saw it happening at Ananda.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Were you attracted by the spiritual ideals of the community?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Not at first. When I arrived I hadn\u2019t even read Autobiography of a Yogi<\/em>, and I hadn\u2019t learned to meditate. I had the Autobiography in my backpack, but I wasn\u2019t even aware that there was a connection between Yogananda and Ananda.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Was there a heart connection that drew you to the community, as well as the vision of establishing an alternative society?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> At that point, I would have to say no. I had spent twenty-two years in school, and my whole life had been oriented toward my intellectual interests, so I can\u2019t say that I was very much in touch with my heart or my feelings. I was definitely not a devotee. Well, let me restate that. I was absolutely, definitely<\/em> not<\/em> a devotee! I was about as far from being a devotee as you can imagine. I had ideas that were diametrically opposed to the life of a devotee \u2013 to sadhana, to discipline, and to commitment. Those were not my ideals.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> The Ananda lore has it that when Shivani arrived, she questioned everything, honestly and openly and straightforwardly.<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Yes, that\u2019s quite right. I did have ideals, and I was committed to those ideals as I understood them. Fortunately, Swamiji was extremely patient with me. He gave me lots of leeway, and he never imposed his ideas. He was not at all controlling, and he never required anything of me. He would offer me opportunities, but if I wasn\u2019t interested, he wouldn\u2019t insist in any way.<\/p>\n

I went for three years without taking Kriya Yoga initiation, which implies formal discipleship to Paramhansa Yogananda. So Swamiji gave me lots of rope, and I certainly could have hung myself with it. But he also gave me lots of blessings and energy and guidance, often in ways that I didn\u2019t perceive as being guidance at the time, or else I might not have accepted them.<\/p>\n

I remember the first time I went and asked him why I needed a guru. His answer was simple: \u201cGod is the guru.\u201d He said, \u201cYou\u2019ve been raised Jewish. You have a direct connection with God. God is the guru.\u201d After that, I kind of calmed down, and instead of fighting against the idea of the guru, I was able to learn more about it. By giving me something I could relate to and letting me come to it in my own time, he took the negative energy out of my sails.<\/p>\n

Lots of saints were coming to this country from India in those years, and I would regularly go to San Francisco to visit them \u2013 Swami Satchidananda, Sant Keshavadas and others. Swami never said anything about it. He was giving me time. He asked if I would work in the publications business, and I said, \u201cNo, I want to work in the garden.\u201d He said, \u201cFine.\u201d So that\u2019s how it was between the two of us in those early years.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> How did you support yourself?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> This was the very beginning of Ananda Village, in 1970, and there was only the guest retreat. The farm didn\u2019t exist, and I spent the first summer working in the retreat kitchen, then I basically went into seclusion for the winter while everyone else, including Swami, went out and worked. In the winter of 1970, sometime around February, I began working with Haanel Cassidy as his assistant in the garden at the new farm property, and we basically created the garden. Or rather, he did, because I just did what he said.<\/p>\n

I was working in the garden full time, but it quickly became apparent that the community needed to make more money. So I would work in the afternoon in the incense and oils business that Jyotish had started. It must have been in 1971, if not 1970, that we began making incense and oils.<\/p>\n

In the winter, there was more time to work in the incense business, because the garden was essentially asleep, so that\u2019s how I earned my living. Other businesses were being started, and we would rotate between working in Binay\u2019s jewelry business and Hariprasad\u2019s macrame business, for example. We had several of these little cottage industries, and I also started a candy business. I can\u2019t remember what I called it, but we made \u201cDeva Delights\u201d and \u201cBhakti Bars.\u201d I was enterprising, but I was always working in the garden, and the enterprises were more like moonlighting jobs. After eight years, I left the garden and became the director of Ananda Publications where I worked for four years, and that was a very<\/em> radical change.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> How did it go?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Well, it depends on your standard of measure. The company did grow and diversify during my tenure. Swami Kriyananda\u2019s book, The Path: Autobiography of an American Yogi<\/em>, had been published, and we mounted important promotional campaigns. We published Joseph Bharat Cornell\u2019s book, Sharing Nature With Children<\/em>, which eventually became an international bestseller in the field\u00a0of nature education.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Did you work more closely with Swamiji after you began managing the company that published his books?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Only to a very limited extent. When Swami offered me the job, I asked him what it entailed, and he said, \u201cSell my books.\u201d Just three words \u2013 that was the only direct advice he ever gave me in all those four years. On the other hand, there were new products that had to be developed, and I would meet with him to talk about those projects.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> What was it like to manage a business of which Swami Kriyananda was essentially the president?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Well, Swami\u2019s style is to be in the background but to provide inspiration and support, which are relatively invisible\u00a0factors. I found that my life was very much as it had been before, because I had complete freedom to develop and direct the business. But whenever I would ask for his advice, he would give it, and I would try to apply it. For example, he might suggest that we emphasize selling directly to the bookstores, or he might ask us to put energy into the mail order business.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Shivani with Swamiji in his later years<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It was a great education, because I got to see leadership as I had never experienced it. It was a kind of invisible leadership that worked on a vibrational level rather than by all-controlling top-down micro-management. In fact, Swami almost never even came to the Publications building. I could probably count the times on one hand. When he did, he was usually just passing by to say hello. or to invite somebody out for lunch. So it was a wonderful education in supportive leadership, and it has served me well in the other jobs I\u2019ve held since.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Was there a process of learning to be vibrationally in tune?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Oh, yes. Definitely. Swami\u2019s advice was often very indirect, or not stated very clearly. He would give a general direction, and I would work hard to understand the direction, and very often I wouldn\u2019t succeed, because I had no experience with that style of leadership, so I had a lot to learn.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> You\u2019re the third manager of the publishing company who has told me essentially the same thing.<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Well, my undergraduate degree was in business administration, so I didn\u2019t come to the job without some background. I had no experience, but I had a degree, and as part of my degree, of course, I had studied marketing, statistics, and accounting. I had always liked those courses, and I had a facility with numbers. When I took over the business, I found that there were no organized statistics \u2013 no one could tell me, for example, what percentage of our sales came from catalogs, distributors, and bookstores, and I had to pull that information from seven years\u2019 worth of sales ledger entries. I would work all day at Pubble and then I\u2019d stay on at night to work on the statistics. I had ledgers all over the place, and they were all hand-written, because there were no computers at the time.<\/p>\n

I was trying to find out what sold well and to whom, and I was finally able to pinpoint our best bookstores and distributors, and our best-selling books. But it took me months to become proactive to the point where I could give the business some new directions, and not merely keep it alive.<\/p>\n

Everything was done by hand then, so there were lots of people to deal with, and that was another new area for me, although I had dealt with people in the garden.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> You had your hands full, and you had to run the business by your own wits, as well as by your inner guidance. You must have had a strong spiritual practice to be able to hold it together.<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> I was married by then, but\u00a0I had spent several years as a nun in the monastery, where we had a really good sadhana. During those years Swamiji gave satsangs regularly, and while I was at the monastery we would go over to his house once or twice a week for satsang. He also held weekly meetings with a core group of the managers. He never called the group anything in particular; we would just meet on Wednesday evening at his house and meditate together and discuss the directions of the community.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Do you recall any highlights from those meetings?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Only that it was the most important part of my spiritual development. They weren\u2019t \u201cmeetings\u201d really, because they weren\u2019t formal. We would have a nice meditation together, and I remember the meditations lasting at least a half hour to forty-five minutes, then we would eat, and while we ate we would discuss various issues informally.<\/p>\n

Swami would ask how different aspects of the community were going, and he would give directions for the community and talk about Master and his way\u00a0of doing things. I think he was ultimately creating a magnetism on a purely spiritual level through those gatherings. He has always said how important it is to work with people with whom you feel an inner attunement, and to create a magnetism together.<\/p>\n

That group continued for quite a number of years, probably from 1978 to 1984. The tone at the meetings was natural and friendly \u2013 it was just disciples being together with their spiritual guide, and it was obvious to all of us that we were there to absorb, and to try to get in tune and develop our intuition.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Have you found your intuition developing over the years?<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Yes. I didn\u2019t think it ever would, and it certainly took time, but through being in situations like that, and through observing Swamiji in his dealings with groups and with individuals, I\u2019ve found that whenever I need guidance, whether for writing, creating, or counseling someone, I\u2019m nearly always able to remember a similar situation that I witnessed in his presence. I\u2019ll recall the feeling of it, and I think I\u2019ve come to understand the process better, with a distance of time and with growing maturity.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> It\u2019s interesting that you said the guidance comes as a feeling.<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> Oh, it does. And, of course, feelings are not very explainable. I\u2019ll remember the feeling of how Swami would approach problems. I can remember the feeling I would have inside at the time, and also a feeling of how completely outside my normal parameters of experience and conception his solutions and directions would always be.<\/p>\n

It was a feeling of awe. He would take big leaps, and they\u00a0didn\u2019t always seem to follow logically anything that had come before. I remember feeling, \u201cWow! That<\/em> is far out!\u201d Now, whenever I\u2019m looking for guidance, and especially when I\u2019m talking to people individually, I\u2019ll try to tune in and see what God\u2019s will is, and I\u2019ll get the same feeling, \u201cWow, this is something that\u2019s completely outside my regular parameters.\u201d But there it is. It could be an idea, a direction, a word, but I\u2019ll have the same feeling of awe. I don\u2019t know if that explains it.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> It would probably explain it for someone who\u2019s had similar experiences. I don\u2019t know if it would explain it for someone who\u2019s simply doing business and doesn\u2019t feel attuned to any particular spiritual path.<\/p>\n

Shivani:<\/strong> You get in touch, for a moment, with superconsciousness, even if it\u2019s at some lower level, and you recognize that you\u2019re in a different dimension, and that you\u2019re drawing guidance. Because it has nothing to do with solving problems, rather it has to do with drawing guidance.<\/p>\n

We\u2019d be sitting there, and Swami would be giving his guidance, and I remember feeling two things. He would express a direction, and I could feel the rightness and brilliance of it. I would think \u201cWow, that\u2019s brilliant!\u201d Or \u201cGee, that\u2019s weird!\u201d But I could always feel that it was coming from a different level, and that it was right.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shivani came to Ananda in the early years of the community. A whirlwind of energy, she naturally assumed positions of responsibility, first in the Ananda Village biodynamic organic garden, then as director of Ananda Publications, and finally in the outreach programs of the Ananda Europa community in Assisi, Italy. Q: Tell us about your life … 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-909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nConversations With Ananda — Ch. 6: Nayaswami Shivani, Learning to Trust an Inner Flow of Intuitive Guidance - Swami Kriyananda: Lightbearer<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A disciple of P. 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