Shuddhaanandaa Brahmachari

Shuddhaanandaa Brahmachari born May 10, 1949, is from Kolkata, India and is a motivational speaker specializing in stress reduction, mindfulness and meditation. He presents globally on issues of stress management and mindfulness to corporations and universities.

Early life and career

Shuddhaanandaa received his Master of Commerce degree from Andhra University, Visakhapatnam and taught Commerce at Andhra Vidyalaya College (affiliated to Osmania University) as a lecturer before leaving academia to become a monk.

Social advocate

He founded Lokenath Divine Life Mission in 1985 in Kolkata and West Bengal, India and currently serves as its mentor. The Mission serves the poor and impoverished with street schools in Kolkata, free medical service on mobile medical vans, and women’s self-help microcredit groups in the Sunderbans. "We work to awaken the commitment and potential within the poor to become self-sufficient," says Shuddhaanandaa, "The Mission forms a partnership with them. We offer them the training and foundational supports they need to work together, building a new and better future for their communities."

Core teachings

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One of Shuddhaanandaa’s Core Teachings is that you should try to make friends with your chaotic mind in meditation, not try to control it. “If you are seeking and searching for a true friend who would be by your side when you are in danger, a friend who will understand your true need, then know your mind which listens to you. Know your mind which is disciplined through yoga, meditation, prayer, and spiritual practice. Know that which allows your mind to be in Divine contemplation, to be anchored in the Divine. That kind of mind is your true friend. That kind of mind sustains you through the turbulence and vagaries of life. It doesn’t allow you to drop downward because you are suddenly faced with a dire situation.” Your Mind Your Best Friend

In The Incredible Life of a Himalayan Yogi, Shuddhaanandaa discusses the 18th-century saint from Bengal, Lokenath Brahmachari, who worked towards interfaith cooperation. “Baba points us toward the peace and harmony which is what all religion is about. Baba asks us to look to the higher realms, to the direct experience of the Divine, where all barriers and all divisions between religions disappear. He calls us to forget the differences at the lower levels of belief, form and ritual. It is only through ignorance of deeper truths and identification with external forms of ritual, that fanatics and fundamentalists fight to prove their religion over others...God is One, Oneness itself, inclusiveness itself, seeking the genuinely opened heart.”

In his book, Cleaning the Mirror of Mind, he recommends you clean the clutter from your home before you start to practice mindfulness and meditation. “All over the world, mindfulness and meditation have found due respect and adoration not only from those who are seekers of spiritual or religious panacea. They have also come to stay in the mainstream of life in all its facets. Meditation is essentially a cleansing process of our mind. It cleanses the mirror that reflects the world that we live in...I believe one of the important preludes to a successful meditative state of peace and tranquility is to take care of our external environment, particularly our home where we spend our personal time. It is a scientifically proven fact that a cluttered home has a low energy, most often leading to negative vibrations of family disruption and an agitated state of mind.”

Shuddhaanandaa teaches the need for a better work-life balance in organizations which can be attained through not just better stress management but also mindfulness-based practices. He says that – “The greatest challenge is to strike a work-life balance. So much is talked about it, so much is written, creating heaps of information, but the imbalance continues. The heart longs for the simplest life where it could be itself and enjoy the small delights of life like playing the piano or singing or just watching the golden ball of the morning sun rising, listening to the twittering birds, or just being without the mask!”

Shuddhaanandaa teaches that mindfulness can lead to holistic development of management education that will create better leaders for future. He says –“Management Schools are the training ground for the future leaders in every field of human endeavor. A true leader needs a holistic orientation of life. Mindfulness prepares the ground for the growth of consciousness that sharpens attention and expands awareness to be more inclusive and integrated in life. Each of the business schools should have regular mindfulness training sessions, where students can participate in the discussion and practice of mindful breathing and meditate together to anchor themselves to their inner, inexhaustible reservoir of energy and intelligence…The regular practice of mindfulness will calm them down and help them attain a better focus and clarity of mind. It will help them to be emotionally non-reactive, and develop the intuitive capacities of connecting to the higher forces in nature. Then they will become innovative leaders without suffering from the vanity and egocentric imbalance.”

Books

• The Incredible Life of a Himalayan Yogi: The Times, Teachings and Life of Living Shiva Baba Lokenath, 2014
• Your Mind, Your Best Friend in 2003  ;
• Cleaning the Mirror of Mind: Clutter Free Home, Clutter Free Mind, 2013
• He is a spotlight writer for Om Times e-zine.

Awards

Shuddhaanandaa Brahmachari (Baba) received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the S.T.A.R foundation at the House of Lords in the United Kingdom on July 21, 2015. He was presented the Award by The Rt Hon, Lord Hunt of Wirral MBE

External links

• http://www.courseinmindfulness.com/
• http://www.ldlm.info/
• http://www.feelinghearts.org/