{"id":929,"date":"2022-09-10T20:02:57","date_gmt":"2022-09-10T20:02:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.yoganandafortheworld.com\/story\/?p=929"},"modified":"2022-11-05T15:23:47","modified_gmt":"2022-11-05T15:23:47","slug":"conversations-with-ananda-ch-9-nayaswami-padma-learning-to-serve-by-following-our-inner-guidance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.yoganandafortheworld.com\/story\/conversations-with-ananda-ch-9-nayaswami-padma-learning-to-serve-by-following-our-inner-guidance\/","title":{"rendered":"Conversations With Ananda — Ch. 9: Nayaswami Padma, Learning to Serve by Following Our Inner Guidance"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Padmi and Swamiji, Seattle, 2000<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Padma managed Crystal Clarity Publishers<\/strong>, the company that publishes books by Swami Kriyananda. Padma and her husband, Nayaswami Hriman, now serve as directors of the Ananda community and church in Seattle.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Can you tell us how you came on the spiritual path? Did you have a lifelong interest in spirituality, or did it come upon you suddenly?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> I had a lifelong interest, but I was searching for a better way. A friend gave me Autobiography of a Yogi<\/em> and told me there was a place in the mountains where a direct disciple of Yogananda had built a community that was based on his teachings.<\/p>\n

I visited Ananda Village, but I wasn\u2019t very interested in the community aspect \u2013 I thought the whole thing was a bit odd. But when I met Swami Kriyananda I immediately felt that he had something I wanted to experience for myself, and I came back to learn about it.<\/p>\n

I moved to Ananda Village in 1973, when I was twenty-two, and I immediately began helping with the general finances. I didn\u2019t get involved with a particular business until later, when Swamiji asked me to help him with some projects.<\/p>\n

At that time, he had bought some desktop publishing equipment, and he asked me to help publish his books.<\/p>\n

I knew absolutely nothing about publishing, so I had to figure it out as I went along. Just a few weeks before Swami asked me to take on that job, he had told me that my spiritual growth would no longer come through finance and business. He was going to put me in charge of Ananda\u2019s program for new members, but then he called and said, \u201cI know that\u2019s what I said, but I need help running my projects. Can you help?\u201d<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> No spiritual growth involved at all \u2013 right?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> [Laughs] Right!<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> What was the publishing company like in the beginning?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> We started it with a phone, a typewriter, and a filing cabinet. That was it. It was called JAPA, Joyful Arts Production Association. I remember how I kept going over to Swami\u2019s place and asking him, \u201cNow, what is this job about?\u201d [Laughs.] I would say, \u201cWhat am I supposed to be doing?\u201d And he\u2019d say, \u201cThis is the part of Ananda that takes the work out.\u201d And I\u2019d say, \u201cOkay.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"
Padma with Nayaswami Hriman<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So I\u2019d go back to my little room, and I still didn\u2019t know what he had in mind. I knew I needed to put a choir on the road, but whenever we went into the churches to give concerts, we couldn\u2019t even tell people who we were, because they weren\u2019t receptive to yoga. So I just didn\u2019t have a handle on it, and I must have asked him the same question six times in six weeks, and each time he would roll his eyes and repeat himself.<\/p>\n

So I began to try to figure it out on my own, and at first I organized some concerts at the hermitage. But as soon as the income would come in he\u2019d scoop it up for another project. He kept saying, \u201cYou\u2019ve got to go out.\u201d He didn\u2019t mind that I was organizing the events at Crystal Hermitage, but it clearly wasn\u2019t where I was supposed to be generating income, so he would use the money for other projects.<\/p>\n

Finally, he entered a phase where he was writing books again, and he began handing them to me to publish, and that\u2019s when I started to understand what to do.<\/p>\n

I organized a system where our sales people were going out on the road in a motor home. I\u00a0had heard Swami say that Rajarsi Janakananda\u2019s money had seeded the publishing of Yogananda\u2019s books, and that the monks in Yogananda\u2019s ashrams had gone on the road to place the books in bookstores. [Rajarsi Janakananda (James J. Lynn) was a Kansas City insurance millionaire who became Paramhansa Yogananda\u2019s most spiritually advanced disciple.]<\/p>\n

So we would rotate people out for a month at a time, and they would drive across the country in the motor home, placing books. We opened over two thousand accounts that way, so it was very, very successful, and we gradually honed it to a science. We knew exactly how many bookstores we had to visit each day, and I had someone in the office booking appointments and phoning them to the people on the road.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Did those accounts remain with you over the years?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> They did, at least through my years at Crystal Clarity. Probably two\u2011thirds of them were lost when we briefly entered into a publishing and distribution contract with Time\u2011Warner.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> What was it like working with Swami Kriyananda?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Whenever I tried to go along with the things he would tell me, it tended to work out, even though it might not seem reasonable. Sending people out to place books in stores, for example, wasn\u2019t considered reasonable in the eyes of the publishing world.<\/p>\n

The publishing industry says that you\u2019ve got to work with publisher\u2019s reps and distributors because you cannot afford to take time to make personal connections with the stores. But by doing it our way, making personal connections with the store owners, it meant that they would remember us. And, also, it was good work for us spiritually.<\/p>\n

Most publishers don\u2019t have a community behind them, and the other small publishers soon became jealous of us, because they didn\u2019t have people with the commitment to rotate in and out for a month at a time to perform this service. So that was an important factor, and as it became increasingly successful, I began taking on the regular publishing industry distributors and reps. But those outside sales people never really understood us, and they couldn\u2019t sell our books very well. They were representing lots of publishers, and when they talked with the store owners our books often wouldn\u2019t even make it out of the bag.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> It needed Ananda\u2019s people to sell Ananda\u2019s books?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Exactly, people who had their hearts in it, because our books don\u2019t sell in huge numbers, and that\u2019s why the reps wouldn\u2019t take much time with them. So the only way we could get them into the stores was to do it ourselves.<\/p>\n

I think the most important thing we were doing was making the right connections spiritually. Our hearts were in it, and people could feel it. Later, I found that the principle of making personal connections extends to foreign rights, which I still handle. We have over 180 contracts for publishing Swamiji\u2019s books in 22 languages, and it\u2019s continuing to grow.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Did domestic sales grow, too?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> They grew for a long time. As we learned more, our sales continued to expand, and before long our books were being featured in mail\u2011order catalogs. We had 28 distributors, we had international sales, and we began selling in gift stores, chain bookstores, and department stores. About a third of our sales came through Ananda\u2019s own bookstores and churches, and from our mailing list.<\/p>\n

Mainly, I would read the trade journals and attend the trade shows, and I\u2019d keep my eyes open, not just for sales but for product development \u2013 how things should look, what sizes and shapes sold best, and what the trends were. Mostly, though, I kept my eyes and ears open to Swami, and to what he wanted to express spiritually. For example, I would try to understand what he wanted to express through the book covers, and the audience he was writing for, and how he felt we could best reach that audience. I would then use whatever I\u2019d learned about the industry to support that, rather than the other way around.<\/p>\n

Instead of telling Swami, \u201cLeadership is hot \u2013 you\u2019d better write a book about leadership,\u201d he would always write what he felt inspired by God and Yogananda to write, and then I would go out and try to find the audience for it, which is totally backwards as far as the publishing industry is concerned. But it\u2019s what you have to do, if you\u2019re working with divine inspiration. And we had to do it all on a shoestring.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> How did it work out over the years?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> It worked very well, but it was always tight, and we were always ten steps behind, what with Swami constantly writing new books. The dilemma was that we always had unskilled people on the staff who needed to be trained. No one ever came to us who knew all about publishing. And also, very often Swamiji would want to help someone spiritually, so he would involve them in his publishing projects, and I would have to figure out how to make it work for them.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> You were playing catch\u2011up lots of the time?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Yes, I always felt that I was being pulled in four directions \u2013 Swami\u2019s direction, the industry\u2019s direction, the community\u2019s needs, and the staff\u2019s needs. So it was quite a balancing act. But we never lost money. We would begin each new project with a donation, so we would get our capital free and clear, and I always honored those donations. I would say, \u201cIf you make a gift, we will keep this book in print,\u201d and we did. We had a large reprint fund, plus at least a 1% margin, and that\u2019s how we made it work.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Did being on the spiritual path help you deal with always feeling stretched?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Oh, absolutely! It wouldn\u2019t have made sense any other way. [Laughs.] In fact, that was a running battle I had with the guys on the staff, because we would go head to head whenever they would try to go the industry\u2019s way, which would usually fly in the face of the way Swami works.<\/p>\n

I still work this way. If Swami gives me his input, I\u2019ll say yes and put my heart into it. I\u2019ll try my best to work the way he suggests, and if it isn\u2019t working out, I\u2019ll give him feedback and he\u2019ll accept it, because he knows I\u2019ve tried, and then we\u2019ll try something else. But most of the time it would work out, so I came to trust it.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Padma and Hriman officiate at the wedding of Gita and Badri Matlock, 2012<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For me, the creative challenge was \u201cFor my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.\u201d [Isaiah 55:8] The creative challenge was always to use the rules of the industry to do it God\u2019s way, rather than to be creative for creativity\u2019s sake. I would learn about publishing so that I could find the loopholes that would allow us to run things the way we needed to, rather than try to run a generic publishing house, which just wouldn\u2019t have worked at Ananda.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Because Ananda isn\u2019t a linear process?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> It\u2019s not linear.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Do you think there might be benefits for other business managers in trying to do things intuitively, rather than always relying on logic and tradition? Or is Crystal Clarity Publishers so far off the map as far as the ordinary business models are concerned, that the lessons simply wouldn\u2019t apply?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Spiritualizing business practices will never be \u201coff the map.\u201d It can apply to all of our Ananda businesses.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> I don\u2019t want to give the wrong impression. The people I\u2019ve interviewed have told me many stories of how they relied on prayer and received intuitive guidance that pulled them through.<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Well, the issues that come up in business usually have to do with people. And the principle that \u201cpeople are more important than things\u201d is one that Swami always kept hammering on, sometimes to the extent that I had to let people take things in the directions they wanted, even though I could see that it wouldn\u2019t work out.<\/p>\n

Swami would often give people the space to play out their ideas, even if the company lost some ground along the way. That\u2019s what really spiritualizes it. And then sometimes you would find that they would actually succeed, and it made it very sweet for everyone.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Did Swami hold to that principle consistently?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Always. All the way through.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> He always gave priority to people\u2019s welfare?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Yes, and it\u2019s never crystal clear, where you can say \u201cOh, that\u2019s what he\u2019s doing!\u201d Because it\u2019s always right in your face, at the time when it makes the least sense and it\u2019s the most frustrating, and it\u2019s often with the person you\u2019re having the most trouble with.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Like taking bitter medicine?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> It often seemed that way. A person might be completely selfish or moody, and Swamiji would see that they needed even more compassion at the time, and you would have to play it out.<\/p>\n

We all go through these phases, and I learned, in time, to see it as an act of loyalty and friendship to do that for people, always seeing the highest in someone, and patiently holding to that deeper truth. I\u2019ve experienced Swamiji doing exactly that for me on many occasions, during my own moods, and it always evoked a deep sense of gratitude instead of frustration.<\/p>\n

In time, I discovered that those tests were actually great blessings. Sometimes people just aren\u2019t capable of thinking in a certain way, and no amount of talking is going to change them. But we never fired people. Instead, I would try to get them a job that would be more fulfilling for them.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Is that part of living in a community, that you don\u2019t just drop people?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Yes, you sort of massage it around and help them find a place where they can be fulfilled.<\/p>\n

Another thing I wanted to mention about working with Swami is that people would feel crunched by the deadlines, because in publishing you\u2019re always thinking ahead. You plan what you\u2019re going to publish a whole year in advance, and then you give yourself a year to produce and design and introduce the books properly. But Swami would feel inspired to write something, and he would want it out right away. It created incredible deadlines, and it crunched the designers and annoyed the publicist types, because it didn\u2019t dovetail with any of the accepted deadline dates and criteria for the market. I always tried to explain to them that Swami had seen many of Yogananda\u2019s writings being sat on for years and years, and to his mind, there was just no other way to do it.<\/p>\n

They would say \u201cWell, can\u2019t you talk him out of it?\u201d And I tried in the beginning, but I failed miserably. I saw pretty quickly that it just wasn\u2019t going to work, and that I might as well embrace it and do my best, and then it always went better.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Did you have a sense that divine grace was helping you find a way?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Yes, but it brought up challenges. It\u2019s not how you would run a regular business. It was often hard for the people working there to understand the process.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> \u201cStop doing this. Do this instead.\u201d That kind of thing?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Yes, but we were very<\/em> productive. [Laughs.]<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Do you have any further thoughts about Swami Kriyananda\u2019s way of doing business?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Well, he never really \u201cdoes business.\u201d Rather, he\u2019s always thinking of how to serve people. He continually has ideas for creating a new brochure, or getting a book out to college instructors, that sort of thing.<\/p>\n

He recently sent me some copy that he\u2019d written for a brochure to convince store owners to play uplifting music for their customers \u2013 just regular stores, any store, to put people in a frame of mind to make better decisions and be better customers.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a good example of how he works. He isn\u2019t thinking of business, he\u2019s thinking of how to reach people who might be interested in our type of spiritual teachings; in this case, by getting the music played.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a treat for me to read the weekly newspaper at Ananda Village and hear about a mother and daughter who came all the way from Taiwan to visit our school after reading Swami\u2019s book Education for Life<\/em> in Chinese. [Laughs.] Or that a yogi from Japan visited Ananda after reading Ananda Yoga for Higher Awareness<\/em> in Japanese. Swami always said that Crystal Clarity Publishers was the \u201cwakeup bell\u201d; that we were publishing books to awaken people.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> I was present when someone asked Swami Kriyananda, \u201cWhat kind of people are we advertising to?\u201d He said, \u201cPeople like us.\u201d It occurred to me that he was saying there are a certain number of people who will be served by the ideas\u00a0he writes about, and that it\u2019s our mission to find them.<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Sometimes well\u2011intentioned people would say, \u201cWell, Swami, why don\u2019t you change this passage slightly, because I think people might not be able to hear it, the way you\u2019ve written it.\u201d And often he\u2019d say, \u201cI\u2019m writing for those who have ears to hear.\u201d In other words, he wasn\u2019t going to dilute it. He says it that way, and even if just one person is changed by it, it\u2019s worth it.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> He isn\u2019t interested in persuading people who aren\u2019t ready to be persuaded?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> That\u2019s right.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> He\u2019s serving people who might be interested\u00a0based on their own, inner feeling?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Yes, and that\u2019s where we sometimes trip up. Sometimes we want to serve people so much that we\u2019re tempted to water it down. I think Swami believes that our way is to feel inspired first, and then offer that inspiration, and be open for creative ways to share it, rather than think first about how to market it. We\u2019re saying \u201cWhat does God have to offer to people, and how can we offer it creatively?\u201d<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Like trying to get store owners to play his music?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Yes. We were told in the beginning that the store owners wouldn\u2019t even take time to meet with us, because they would rather buy from distributors. And a lot of them did respond that way. But we would say, \u201cJust give us a minute,\u201d and then they would talk to us, and they would end up buying.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> You\u2019d play the music for them?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Sure, we\u2019d bring demos. In fact, we discovered that we got a 1% response from mailings, perhaps 15% from phone calls, but when we went on the road and met the store owners we got an 80% response.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Was that because they could see someone standing in front of them?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Yes. You\u2019ve gone to the trouble to come see them, so they\u2019ll take time for you.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> You\u2019ve talked about being pulled in four directions at once, but you haven\u2019t said much about your spiritual life.<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> It\u2019s just a given. I couldn\u2019t imagine trying to do any of it otherwise. The pressures of doing business…how can I say it? Basically, there was a lot of sadhana [yoga practice] during my time at Crystal Clarity, but also there was lots of karma yoga. [Karma yoga: the path of achieving oneness with God by serving as His channel to help others]. And, of course, it was a continual practice of trying to remember God throughout the day. When you\u2019re working on Swami\u2019s projects, it\u2019s easier. [Laughs.] When you\u2019re around him, you can\u2019t be problem\u2011oriented. You have to be solution\u2011oriented, and that means you\u2019re always reaching for God\u2011remembrance.<\/p>\n

But it was the most difficult and testing period of my life. Now that I\u2019m doing ministerial work, there\u2019s more of a flow. Maybe I\u2019m reaping the rewards from the time when it was difficult and testing. Trying to combine business and the spiritual life made for lots of tests, and therefore a lot of growth. I feel a deepening now, and the tests are of a different nature.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Were there things that helped people hold it together? For example, did you meditate together at work?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> We meditated together, of course. Our meetings always began with a prayer and a short meditation, and we tried to do things throughout the day that would remind us of God. Also, in the kind of work we were doing, publishing Swami Kriyananda\u2019s books, it was easier to think of how it would help people, so it was easier to feel serviceful. But I really did burn the candle at both ends. I was not only managing a business that was very complicated, but I had a family.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> That\u2019s right, you had two children.<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> I had young children, I had babies, and trying to keep the balance with children, marriage, work, and business was a challenge. Looking back, maybe it wasn\u2019t just business and the spiritual life that made for so much growth, but raising a family at the same time.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> What kind of growth was that side of it?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> It helped me learn to put God more and more in charge, and to let go. I had strong ideas about the way to do things, and I was working with strong\u2011minded people in all four of these areas of responsibility, so I had to learn a certain detachment. I had to learn to let go, while still guiding it, and then just allow it to happen. I\u2019m sure I didn\u2019t get it all, but I did learn something along the way. [Laughs.]<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Are you happier now?<\/p>\n

Padma:<\/strong> Yes, I am, actually. I feel I\u2019ve learned a lot about letting go, and that it\u2019s made it easier for me to work with people, and that it\u2019s given me greater insight for trying to help people in the kind of ministerial work I\u2019m doing now.<\/p>\n

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

Padma managed Crystal Clarity Publishers, the company that publishes books by Swami Kriyananda. Padma and her husband, Nayaswami Hriman, now serve as directors of the Ananda community and church in Seattle. Q: Can you tell us how you came on the spiritual path? Did you have a lifelong interest in spirituality, or did it come … 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-929","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nConversations With Ananda — Ch. 9: Nayaswami Padma, Learning to Serve by Following Our Inner Guidance - Swami Kriyananda: Lightbearer<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda shares her experiences learning to follow inner guidance at work.\" \/>\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\/conversations-with-ananda-ch-9-nayaswami-padma-learning-to-serve-by-following-our-inner-guidance\/\" 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