We are very happy to announce the publication of Immortal Words of Anandamayi Ma: Practical Guidance for Meditation, Devotion, and Daily Spiritual Life by Swami Nirmalananda Giri.
This new book gathers the luminous sayings of Anandamayi Ma and presents them with Swamiji’s clear, practical commentary for those who want not only to learn great spiritual truths, but to live them.
Immortal Words is available on Amazon and other online bookstores as an ebook and in paperback.
Who is Anandamayi Ma?
Anandamayi Ma was one of modern India’s most revered spiritual figures, regarded by countless devotees as a living embodiment of divine consciousness. Her words are often brief, simple, and direct, yet they open into the deepest truths of spiritual life. In this book, Swami Nirmalananda draws from her sayings and unfolds their meaning for seekers practicing meditation, devotion, self-discipline, and inner awakening.
Swami Nirmalananda tells how the book came about:
When I first learned that Anandamayi Ma, about whom I had read in Autobiography of a Yogi, was still alive in India, the only way to learn Her teachings was through the few issues available in America of the “Ananda Varta” magazine printed in India by the Anandamayi Sangha and this tiny book, Matri Vani (Mother’s Sayings). Somehow I got a copy and read it sporadically. Sometimes I read it while walking around my neighborhood, and one day I used this book as a divinatory tool to determine whether I should go to India and meet Ma. I will recount that in the relevant section of the text.
Being from a very dedicated religious family, I had been reading books on religion from very early on. The Bhagavad Gita utterly changed my spiritual perspectives and made me determined to become a yogi. To ensure I would get it right, I moved from the Midwest to Hollywood and lived next door to the Self-Realization Fellowship center on Sunset Boulevard. It was not long till Matri Vani came my way and, as I shall tell, directed me to India and Ma.
That was nearly sixty-five years ago when I began to come to life, a process that ended when I first saw Ma. I held out my hand and begged Her to touch me. With both Her hands She lightly touched my right hand on both sides. I have related the result in my autobiography An Eagle’s Flight.
Ma was Herself The Message From God–being Herself that God.
A Glimpse Inside the Book
Here is a brief excerpt from the book. The words in bold are Ma’s sayings
All this, which is His creation, is under His dispensation, is His presence and is He.
It is good to begin with what we want to end up with. And this is it: absolute non-duality. Ma presents these views of the world around us:
- It is the creation of God.
- It is under the absolute control or supervision of God.
- It IS God.
In a sense these three statements are the embodiment of dwaita, vishistadvaita and advaita: dualism, qualified non-dualism and absolute non-dualism. And they are all three true: the truth. To insist that any one of these is the sole truth or the “truest truth” is erroneous. If we look closer we see that they correspond to the three gunas or qualities of manifested creation: tamas, rajas and sattwa.
But to me the most important implications of Ma’s words is the fact that at every moment we are living in and by God: the Absolute Being that manifests as creation. We are ourselves gods living within God, our own ultimate being. Therefore non-duality is not just an intellectual concept, but the truth regarding the absolute and eternal reality. There is nothing but God in existence. Maya is the illusion or misperception that seemingly contradicts this.
The yogi seeks at every moment to See True: to both see and be the Reality that alone truly exists. Yoga alone can reveal God because it reveals our Self which is essentially the very Being of God. This is not intellectually graspable in the fullest sense, but that is the situation regarding just about everything in our common experience. To see God is to be God. Only the Self-realized experience this, but the yogi aspires to this realization since yoga puts it within his grasp. Ma’s words have no meaning without this perspective. This is why Ma consistently insisted on sadhana as the basis of intelligent, responsible life.
Immortal Words of Anandamayi Ma is available now in paperback and ebook editions. This a wonderful time to read, share, or gift the book to someone drawn to Ma’s wisdom and the path of practical spiritual awakening.
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