“The temple God loves most is the temple of His devotee’s inner silence and peace. Whenever you enter His temple leave restlessness and worries behind. If you do not let go of them God will not be able to come to you.First establish in yourself a temple of beauty and peace. There you will find Him, on the altar of your soul.” Paramhansa Yogananda

Come with us on a journey into the teachings of the great sage and ‘father of Yoga’, Patanjali, called Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras. The word sutra which refers to aphorisms, or rules, means to “string or thread or weave”, just as the English word suture means “to stitch together.” Patanjali’s goal was to show us the way to live in Yoga, or unified with all that is. Our retreat will be about integration and memory, or Smriti, remembering our true nature as one with the Divine.

Through the different eight-fold steps of Patanjali we will gradually go deeper into the experience of our true Self, with tools and techniques that can be used and practiced in daily life and in every breath.

During our time together we will strive to:
• Learn/experience, through words, song, and movement, about Patanjali’s Eight-fold Path
• Learn to live a more spiritually disciplined/centered life.
• Practice techniques that lead us to knowing who we really are & what our true purpose is.
• Still the mind with the help of specific Pranayama
• Have longer periods of meditation – merging into Oneness with the Divine – BLISS

This weekend will be led by Nayaswami Bhajana and Dr. Shanti Rubenstone, with other guest teachers/leaders/musicians.

Nayaswami Bhajana is a native of Austria. Since 2002, she has been sharing the teachings of Paramhansa Yogananda in Italy, India, Austria, the UAE, and in the United States.

Speaking with enthusiasm and inspiration, she teaches seminars and classes on a wide variety of spiritual topics, guides silent retreats, and co-leads Ananda pilgrimages to India and Italy. In India, she started the Ananda Yoga School of India and taught several Ananda Yoga Teacher Training Level 1 courses (200 hours each), training 41 Ananda Yoga instructors from Gurgaon, Delhi, Pune and Italy. While in Italy, she co-teaches in the Raja Yoga Teacher Training course with Nayaswami Shivani Lucki.

Nayaswami Bhajana is an experienced teacher of:

  • Ananda Yoga
  • The Power of Pranayamas for Spiritual Progress
  • Meditation and the Art of Living
  • The Art and Science of Kriya Yoga
  • Patanjali – The Eight-Fold Path to Enlightenment
  • Guided semi-seclusion meditation retreats
  • And many more topics

Dr. Shanti Rubenstone is a Board certified internist who received her medical degree from Stanford University in 1983. After finishing her medical training and a chief medical residency she began what soon became one of the largest general internal medical practices in the country, always with the intention of caring for the whole person.

She currently has a practice called “Transformational Medicine”, working with people as they move through any major life transition, whether it is of the body, the mind, or the soul. Her goal is to help people turn all seeming obstacles in life into opportunities for personal growth.

Shanti is also a minister with the Ananda Church of Self Realization in Palo Alto, CA.

Ananda is a global movement founded in 1968 by Swami Kriyananda and is based on the teachings of Paramhansa Yogananda, author of Autobiography of a Yogi, who showed how all can realize God in their daily lives as a tangible, loving reality.

The emphasis is on the individual quest for Self-Realization, the unifying reality behind all spiritual traditions.