Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev and the Path to Enlightenment

Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev, or Sadhguru as he is popularly known, is a yogi and mystic from South India who is the founder of Isha Foundation and Isha Yoga.

Sadhguru is an internationally sought after spiritual leader and public speaker who is known throughout the world for imparting his inner science of transformation through yoga. Public sathsangs with Sadhguru commonly attract crowds numbering in the thousands. He is the inspiration behind Isha Foundation’s numerous humanitarian projects such as Action For Rural Rejuvenation, project Green Hands, Isha Vidhya, and Isha Home School. Sadhguru is the only participant to have been invited to the World Economic Forum for three years in a row. He is a member of the Millennium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders, and has spoken at a variety of public forums such as the United Nations, the Tallberg Forum in Sweden, the Alliance For a New Humanity, and the Australian Leadership Retreat.

At the age of 25, he had a profound experience of the self which transcended all limitations and led him into a state of boundlessness and bliss. Sadhguru describes in the book Mystic’s Musings how he went to a place in India called Chamundi Hill and sat on a rock one afternoon:

“I had my eyes open, not even closed. I thought it was about ten minutes, but something began to happen to me. All my life, I had thought this is me (pointing at himself). Suddenly I did not know which is me and which is not me. The air that I am breathing, the rock on which I’m sitting, the atmosphere around me, everything had become me…What is me has become so enormous, it is everywhere…I was fully aware, but what I had considered as myself until that moment had just disappeared.”

He describes how after this experience, every time he sat down he would be in this state, sometimes for up to 13 days at a time. Everything about him changed and transformed and after six weeks, it became a living reality for him.

After his transformation, Sadhguru became aware of his Gurus’ will and dream and set about on his mission to create the Dhyanlinga Temple.

The Dhyanalinga is a living energy form embodying the essence of a living Guru with all seven chakras fully activated. The first of its kind in over 2000 years, its purpose is to serve as a catalyst to initiate the spiritual process within each individual who sits in its presence, allowing all to become meditative. The Dhyanalinga and the atmosphere within the temple is a powerful space overflowing with divine energy to help lead each seeker to spiritual enlightenment. Click here for more in-depth information about the Dhyanalinga Temple.

After 15 years of preparation which also saw the birth of Isha Foundation and the Isha Yoga Center in Coimbatore India, Sadhguru consecrated the Temple in 1999. The Center has since become well known throughout India and the world as a wellspring of spiritual pursuit, a watering hole for the thirsty.

All these facts are fine and describe in summary the life and outer persona of a remarkable person. But who really is Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev?

He is described in so many ways: passionate, ruthless, flamboyant, gentle, wise, reckless. The person or persona that he is seems to be ever-changing. Ancient looking with a crazy grey beard yet no wrinkles in sight, his outward appearance belies the youthful twinkle in his eyes and an obvious vitality and vigor. One minute in jeans playing Frisbee with his disciples; the next, in a robe and turban sitting before thousands chanting a mantra that brings everyone in the audience to tears or to their knees… At once accessible and out of reach.

Sadhguru’s presence is a completely different story. Overwhelming and intense, he fills up the room wherever he is. To be in it and to be near him is something that can only be experienced, not described. He has the ability to open up dimensions of life and perception that are usually inaccessible to most seekers.

He is a being so rare perhaps not because he is essentially “different” from the rest of us – but because he has dared to go where most of us never dare to go: to know life itself in all its wonder and multifaceted dimensions.

Sadhguru’s wish for the world is for people to know themselves. In his words “This life for me is an endeavor to help people experience and express their divinity”. If we truly want to know the answer to the question “who is Sadhguru?” we must look within ourselves. Only there will we find the answers we seek.

To learn more about Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev, please visit ishafoundation.org.

Sadhguru quotes:

--"I want you to know the power, the liberation of another kind of science, the inner science, the yogic science, through which you can become the master of your own destiny."

--"Yoga is about reaching your higher nature."

--"So the process of what you call as yoga, is not just about living better. It is about exploring the very source of life."

--"With proper practice of yoga, you are creating the right kind of chemistry where you are naturally peaceful, naturally joyous, naturally loving within you."

--"Liberation means becoming free from the very process of life, birth and death. Liberation means becoming free form the basic structures of body and mind. For all these, the karmic structure is the string which holds them together."

--"Peace is not the ultimate attainment of life, but the very foundation of life, the birthright of all human beings."

--"The path is the destination and the destination is hidden in the path as the creator is hidden in the creation."

--"It doesn't matter who you are right now, how miserable you are right now, how disturbed you are right now. If you pay enough attention to your interiority, being blissful is a possibility for every human being."

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