Wisdom of the Sages

1832: Adapting Ancient Wisdom Without Losing It / Q&A Vol. 302

How does an ancient wisdom tradition survive for thousands of years? It needs teachers who hand it down unchanged, and yet each generation has to hear it in a new way. In

1831: Living Bhakti Among People Who Don't Share It / Q&A Vol. 301

There's a sticky note in Ashley's refrigerator that reads "meat section." She's the only devotee in her home, and between a loving family that doesn't share her path and

1830: Bhakti Doesn't Grow in a Hard Heart / Q&A Vol. 300

Someone on the street asks you for money, and you're fairly sure where it will go, and it's not good. Can walking past be compassion, or is it quietly hardening your hear

1829: A Field Guide to Your Inner Demons | Bhaktivinoda Thakur Decodes Krishna's Pastimes

In the 19th century, British colonial scholars dismissed the pastimes of Krishna as primitive and immoral, and a generation of educated Indians began to believe them. The

1828: We Never Learned the Power of Our Thoughts | You Become What You Think About

Be good. Behave. Behave yourself. Growing up, most of us heard plenty about our actions and almost nothing about the thoughts that produce them. In this episode Raghunath

1827: The Emptiness of Peace and the Fullness of Love | Meditation Beyond Stillness

Most of us long for a quiet mind. But what fills it once the noise is gone? On a solo bike ride across upstate New York, Raghunath finds that solitude alone doesn't bring

1826: Why the Comment Thread Is Killing Your Soul | Speaking Truth to Power

When something is wrong and we say nothing, our own inner light begins to fade. But speaking up only heals when it comes from a place of love. Raghunath and Kaustubha dra

1825: Our Labels Are Warping Our Vision | The Many Ways We Respond to Krishna

I'm a man. I'm a woman. I'm American. I'm this, I'm that. Every label we carry colors how we see the world, ourselves and God. Yoga starts from a bold premise: our percep

1824: You're Not in Control | The Placebo Illusion and the Bhakti Reality

Our sense of security is based on illusion — confirmed by both modern science and the sages of the Bhakti Yoga tradition. A landmark psychiatric study reveals something s

1823: Life Is Sacred and Life Is Everywhere | The Earth Personified in Krishna's Pastimes

In the form of a beautiful teenager God enters a new city, meets a hunchback girl in the street, transforms her body and enters a romance with her. On the surface it soun

1822: Grace in Your Face | Human Nature's Resistance to Unconditional Love

Are we all like wounded animals caught in a fence, biting the hand of the person trying to help? Is spiritual grace something exceptionally rare — and most of us the unfo

1821: Krishna Doesn't Need Your Zucchini Bread | But He Wants Your Love

The Bhagavad-gītā sings of Krishna as the Absolute Truth — complete in himself, independent and lacking nothing. He doesn't need anything we can offer him. And yet — he w

1820: They Took Him Into Their Hearts Through Their Eyes | Krishna Enters Mathurā

When Krishna and Balarāma entered Mathurā, the women climbed to the rooftops and showered them with flowers. They took him into their hearts through their eyes — embraced

1819: Daring to Fly Higher | Jonathan Livingston Seagull and the Ascent to Bhakti

In the 1970s the book Jonathan Livingston Seagull became a bestseller. A parable about a gull who refuses to follow the flock and discovers that his true nature is limitl

1818: Why Nothing in This World Satisfies Us

Voltaire — the greatest writer of the French Enlightenment wrote that there is a dim flame burning in every heart — an intuition that somewhere there is a home, a happine

1817: All Rivers Flow to the Sea | Beyond Exclusivism and Hyper-Inclusivism

Westerners who take interest in Eastern Spirituality may be reacting to elements of exclusivism found in Western religion (we're right and everyone else is wrong). The sw

1816: Krishna, Vishnu and the Mystery of the Avatars

Most Vedic literature speaks from a perspective within this universe. But some reveal that this universe is just a tiny bubble among countless others — and invite us to v

1815: Watch Until the Dust Settles | Krishna's Love Never Leaves Vrindavan

It is said that Krishna never takes one step out of Vrindavan. But it appears that he does leave, and breaks the hearts of the Gopis. In this episode Raghunath and Kaustu

1814: We Crash | God's Opulences and Our Limitations

What happens when an individual soul thinks the gifts they have are their own? Why do we see so many celebrities struggle, even though they have achieved so much success?

1813: The Philosopher vs the Mystic | Understanding the Passion of the Gopīs

To the philosopher, the weeping of Krishna's lovers looks like ordinary suffering. To the mystics it's the culmination of the highest knowledge. Evelyn Underhill — first