{"id":945,"date":"2022-10-29T17:18:17","date_gmt":"2022-10-29T17:18:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.yoganandafortheworld.com\/story\/?p=945"},"modified":"2022-11-14T04:29:28","modified_gmt":"2022-11-14T04:29:28","slug":"conversations-with-ananda-ch-12-nayaswami-vidura-part-3-starting-and-running-cooperative-communities-for-simple-living-and-high-thinking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.yoganandafortheworld.com\/story\/conversations-with-ananda-ch-12-nayaswami-vidura-part-3-starting-and-running-cooperative-communities-for-simple-living-and-high-thinking\/","title":{"rendered":"Conversations With Ananda — Ch. 12, Nayaswami Vidura, Part 3: Starting and Running Cooperative Communities for “Simple Living and High Thinking”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> The prerequisite for starting a spiritual cooperative community<\/strong> such as Ananda seems to be that a group of people must share high ideals. It therefore seems unlikely that the average urban neighborhood could become a successful community, because if there\u2019s a single characteristic that stands out in modern life, it\u2019s everybody\u2019s willingness to argue about anything with everyone else.<\/p>\n

Vidura:<\/strong> Yes, it has to be built on respect, and if there are no commonly held values, no system however carefully planned will work.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s why Swami has often said, \u201cWhere are all the communities that were started in the 1960s?\u201d The cooperative communities that have thrived throughout history have all had a spiritual basis, whether it was the Mennonites, the Mormons, the Quakers, or Ananda.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Watching the news, I\u2019ve notice that whenever a social experiment works exceptionally well, you generally find high principles behind it. PBS did a documentary series on successful alternative schools. In each case the successful schools were based on expansive principles, such as teaching the children respect for one another, or for nature, or even for honest ways of doing business. Another common factor was that the teachers were allowed a generous measure of independent control, so that they were able to respond creatively to the changing needs of each child, instead of always looking over their shoulders to see what the principal or the school board or the state might be thinking.<\/p>\n

Vidura:<\/strong> Thomas Jefferson and the other founders had very high principles. They were righteous, dharmic people who were trying to set a new system in place that would free people to think independently and exercise their initiative.<\/p>\n

In a previous conversation, I talked about how the general manager works under the guidance of the spiritual director at Ananda. That\u2019s because in our system here, the spiritual always<\/em> has priority over the practical.<\/p>\n

Depending on the situation, we might apply that principle in various ways, but we keep it firmly in place. The spiritual director always has the option to step in and say, \u201cWe need to change the way the game\u2019s being played \u2013 let\u2019s step back and pick it up again by the relevant spiritual principles.\u201d<\/p>\n

We need a spiritual directorship, because we\u2019ve got to dig into our jobs in a way that is principled. You need to pay the bills and keep things running, but the spiritual director has to be free of the day\u2011to\u2011day pressures, because they might otherwise influence him to stray from keeping spiritual principles uppermost.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Swami Kriyananda appointed you and Jyotish as the general manager and spiritual director respectively. The spiritual and the un\u2011spiritual directors?<\/p>\n

Vidura:<\/strong> [Laughs.] Yeah, I sort of got branded that way. But Swami was very clear with us that although the positions were needed to run the community, we had to be careful not to attach them to our personalities. It\u2019s important that we have a general manager, but it\u2019s not important that Vidura is the general manager.<\/p>\n

Swami made it clear that he wanted us to view our jobs as a service, and as temporary. Not temporary in the sense that you don\u2019t give it your full energy, but that it may be beneficial for your own spiritual development now, but at some future point you might be spiritually better served by doing some other service.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Are you saying that he wants people to look to what God wants them to do, rather than be personally identified with a particular position?<\/p>\n

Vidura:<\/strong> Yes. Watching Swami over the years I\u2019ve seen that he\u2019ll give people freedom to take the ball and run with it. He has affirmed, over and over, that people need to be free to make their own mistakes, and that the organization shouldn\u2019t always be stepping in to prevent them.<\/p>\n

Better to let someone make a few mistakes and learn from them, so long as they aren\u2019t endangering the whole endeavor. Even if it\u2019s clear that a project doesn\u2019t have much potential, as long as they\u2019re growing and feeling inspired, Swami is inclined to let them go ahead.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Can you talk about balancing the needs of the individual versus the needs of the community?<\/p>\n

Vidura:<\/strong> I\u2019ll talk about a specific case, without naming names. Being the financial director of Ananda is a very difficult job, because our accounting procedures are extremely complex. That\u2019s because we\u2019re very multifaceted, with nonprofit businesses, for\u2011profit businesses, retail and wholesale businesses, schools, a local church, and colonies located hundreds of miles away. And beyond that, we have to cope with many internal departments, each with its own accounting needs, and at the same time we\u2019re part of a monastic system.<\/p>\n

So we\u2019re an extremely complex outfit, but we don\u2019t put our bean counters on a pedestal. We want to be able to do creative\u00a0projects, and we\u2019ll go ahead and then get these financial guys to come in the backdoor and straighten out the numbers and fix it for us. I\u2019m overstating it, but there\u2019s an attitude that we shouldn\u2019t let the financial details get in the way of an idea for a worthy project. In my position, I need to massage the bean counters, because they are devotees, too. They\u2019re doing an extremely difficult job, and nobody wants to be labeled as not being expansive or as having \u201ccomptroller energy.\u201d<\/p>\n

The accounting department requires a tremendous amount of expertise, and at one point we had to hire people who didn\u2019t necessarily have the skills to do the job, just so we could handle the load. But it put a lot of pressure on the people who did have the skills. And how are we going to continue to affirm that \u201cPeople are more important than projects,\u201d which is our guiding principle?<\/p>\n

A couple of people will probably have to leave the department. We\u2019ve explained that it isn\u2019t working for them, and we\u2019ve started to help them find other jobs. To my mind, that\u2019s putting people first. Because you can\u2019t just keep oiling the squeaking wheel \u2013 that\u2019s not putting people first. Putting people first has to be done in a way that gives everybody a fair shake.<\/p>\n

To what extent should we take responsibility for people\u2019s lives? If we try someone out in two or three jobs, and each time we end up having to move them, I think there\u2019s a certain consciousness that develops. The person might start to think \u201cI\u2019ve come here to give my life to God, and the community owes it to me to give me a job. As long as I don\u2019t phone my friends too often or come in late, they have to keep me employed.\u201d<\/p>\n

I see that attitude more now than in the old days, and I think maybe we\u2019ve swung the pendulum too far toward nurturing people, because we\u2019ve placed people ahead of projects. I think we may need to swing back toward tough love for awhile. \u201cYou didn\u2019t work out in these jobs, and you\u2019ll have to find another spot, but we\u2019ll help you.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the outside world, they\u2019d be fired and out the door, but we pick them up, pat them on the back, carry them over to the next employer, tell them what a great employee they\u2019ll make, fluff them up, and send them to counseling. We go a long way, and I\u2019m not sure we don\u2019t need to back away a bit, but always with care, and let people stand on their own feet a little more.<\/p>\n

I think the best thing we have going for us is our flexibility. If we ever start getting too set in our ways, it\u2019ll be curtains for us. One of the greatest things about Ananda is that there are so many opportunities to do something that breaks new ground. It\u2019s an exciting environment to work in.<\/p>\n

The community has to run full bore to keep up with Swami\u2019s tremendous energy, which doesn\u2019t give us a chance to do much permanent backfilling. I always feel I\u2019m about to lose contact with Swami, because if I move two steps in one direction, he\u2019ll suddenly be way over there, ten steps ahead. I always have that feeling. I don\u2019t think there\u2019s much interest or time at Ananda for always keeping things the way they used to be.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Do you see people learning to be flexible and identify less with their outward roles?<\/p>\n

Vidura:<\/strong> It\u2019s easier for some than for others. We\u2019re pretty normal people in every respect. The fact that we\u2019re devotees is the difference, because it makes us more willing to change. You\u2019re going to get your buttons pushed, living in a cooperative community and trying to be part of a monastic order, because there\u2019s just no way you can stay out of your stuff.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> And people will see it.<\/p>\n

Vidura:<\/strong> They\u2019re going to see it. Swami is always holding high expectations for us, as souls. He\u2019s trying to make saints, and he talks to us as if we were already\u00a0. So when someone blows it big\u2011time, things that would go unnoticed elsewhere can become very obvious here.<\/p>\n

I was reading about a period of severe suffering and testing that Swami went through. At the time, four or five friends came to him separately and said, \u201cI feel such joy in your presence.\u201d And he thought, \u201cHow can that be? I\u2019m feeling the worst I\u2019ve ever felt, and these people are telling me they\u2019re feeling joy.\u201d But he realized that on the deepest level, he had been feeling a rightness and an inner peace, even though he was being tossed around by the storms of karma.<\/p>\n

That was very inspiring to me. When a person is intrinsically a devotee, you feel their calmness. You feel their peace. You feel these deeply spiritual qualities vibrationally more than outwardly. And that\u2019s what we\u2019re here to develop.<\/p>\n

You find people here who are living the teachings, yet they may be doing it behind the scenes. They aren\u2019t wheeling and dealing, yet they\u2019ll touch people. I\u2019ll be walking through the publishing company in my wheeler\u2011dealer mode, knowing I\u2019ll be confronting the managers in about thirty seconds, and suddenly I\u2019ll run into one of these people, and it\u2019s very refreshing.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Do you think it can happen more often in a spiritual community, where people are consciously inviting God to guide them?<\/p>\n

Vidura:<\/strong> Yes, the ones that get it. I\u2019ve seen people here who\u2019ve said \u201cI\u2019ve been here twenty years and I\u2019m not getting anywhere. My life is crap. My wife and I are getting a divorce. I\u2019ve never made any money.\u201d But even as they\u2019re saying it, you can see that in the midst of the shambles of their lives, and with a personality that is preventing them from holding a job or a relationship, that the ones who are sincerely devoted have something under the surface that is sustaining them. Even as they\u2019re saying it, you can feel that it\u2019s their mind that\u2019s doing the talking, and not their soul.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> I once went to Brother Dharmananda for counseling, and he said, with a blissful smile, \u201cNo matter how many times you fall, just get up, brush yourself off, and start over again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vidura:<\/strong> Yeah, you know, we need to take that counsel seriously. Because we\u2019re in a tough world, and there isn\u2019t one of us who won\u2019t get knocked down. But that\u2019s the issue, isn\u2019t it? Whether you keep getting back up.<\/p>\n

Q:<\/strong> Is it the people here who love God that make the community work?<\/p>\n

Vidura:<\/strong> Yes, and if you\u2019re trying to address how people would make this kind of organization work outside of a spiritual community, I think that high principles are the only thing they could possibly hope to hang it on. If you don\u2019t hang it all on truth in some form, and if the group doesn\u2019t have a sufficient focus to come together around some manifestation of truth, there isn\u2019t going to be a hope for them to make it. It isn\u2019t going to last. It can\u2019t work.<\/p>\n

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

Q: The prerequisite for starting a spiritual cooperative community such as Ananda seems to be that a group of people must share high ideals. It therefore seems unlikely that the average urban neighborhood could become a successful community, because if there\u2019s a single characteristic that stands out in modern life, it\u2019s everybody\u2019s willingness to argue … 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-945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nConversations With Ananda — Ch. 12, Nayaswami Vidura, Part 3: Starting and Running Cooperative Communities for “Simple Living and High Thinking” - Swami Kriyananda: Lightbearer<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A long-time manager of a Paramhansa Yogananda world brotherhood community shares his experiences.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, 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