Ashṭāvakra
Ashtavakra is a sage mentioned in Hindu scriptures. He is described as one born with eight different deformities of the body. In Sanskrit, Aṣṭāvakra means "one having eight bends".
He is traditionally regarded as the author of one of the greatest cornerstone works of Advaita Vedanta - the Ashtavakra Gita, a philosophical/metaphysical dialogue between King Janaka of Mithila and Ashtavakra himself.
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Ramakrishna
Ramakrishna Paramahansa, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay, was a famous mystic of 19th-century India. His religious school of thought led to the formation of the Ramakrishna Mission by his chief disciple Swami Vivekananda. both were influential figures in the Bengali Renaissance as well as the Hindu renaissance during the 19th and 20th centuries.
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Adi Shankaracharya
Adi Shankara(788 CE - 820 CE), also known as Śaṅkara Bhagavatpādācārya and Ādi Śaṅkarācārya was an Indian guru from Kalady of present day Kerala who consolidated the doctrine of advaita vedānta. His teachings are based on the unity of the ātman and brahman— non-dual brahman, in which brahman is viewed as nirguna brahman, brahman without attributes.
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Shankara travelled across India and other parts of South Asia to propagate his philosophy through discourses and debates with other thinkers. He is reputed to have founded four mathas ("monasteries"), which helped in the historical development, revival and spread of Advaita Vedanta. Adi Shankara is believed to be the organizer of the Dashanami monastic order and the founder of the Shanmata traditi -
Master Pallavi
Meditation Expert who loves to teach meditation and share wisdom to uplift the spiritual growth.
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Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson was born in Boston in 1803. Educated at Harvard and the Cambridge Divinity School, he became a Unitarian minister in 1826 at the Second Church Unitarian. The congregation, with Christian overtones, issued communion, something Emerson refused to do. "Really, it is beyond my comprehension," Emerson once said, when asked by a seminary professor whether he believed in God. (Quoted in 2,000 Years of Freethought edited by Jim Haught.) By 1832, after the untimely death of his first wife, Emerson cut loose from Unitarianism. During a year-long trip to Europe, Emerson became acquainted with such intelligentsia as British writer Thomas Carlyle, and poets Wordsworth and Coleridge. He returned to the United States in 1833, to a life
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Paramahansa Yogananda
Paramahansa Yogananda (Bengali: পরমহংস যোগানন্দ Pôromohôngsho Joganondo, Sanskrit: परमहंस योगानंद Paramahaṃsa Yogānaṃda), born Mukunda Lal Ghosh (Bengali: মুকুন্দ লাল ঘোষ Mukundo Lal Ghosh), was an Indian yogi and guru who introduced many westerners to the teachings of meditation and Kriya Yoga through his book, Autobiography of a Yogi .
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Richard Bach
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Since Jonathan Livingston Seagull - which dominated the #1 spot on the New York Times Bestseller List for two consecutive years - Richard Bach has touched millions of people through his humor, wisdom and insight.
With over 60 million copies of his books sold, Richard Bach remains one of the world's most beloved authors. A former USAF fighter pilot, Air Force captain and latter-day barnstorming pilot, Bach continues to be an avid aviator-author, exploring and chronicling the joys and freedom of flying, reporting his findings to readers.
His most recent works include Travels with Puff, which recounts Bach's journey from Florida to Washington state in his small seaplane, Puff, and Illusions II: The Adventures of a Reluctant S -
Joseph Campbell
Joseph Campbell was an American author and teacher best known for his work in the field of comparative mythology. He was born in New York City in 1904, and from early childhood he became interested in mythology. He loved to read books about American Indian cultures, and frequently visited the American Museum of Natural History in New York, where he was fascinated by the museum's collection of totem poles.
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Campbell was educated at Columbia University, where he specialized in medieval literature, and continued his studies at universities in Paris and Munich. While abroad he was influenced by the art of Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, the novels of James Joyce and Thomas Mann, and the psychological studies of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. Thes -
Chögyam Trungpa
Vidyadhara Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche (Tibetan: ཆོས་ རྒྱམ་ དྲུང་པ་ Wylie: Chos rgyam Drung pa; also known as Dorje Dradul of Mukpo, Surmang Trungpa, after his monastery, or Chökyi Gyatso, of which Chögyam is an abbreviation) was a Buddhist meditation master, scholar, teacher, poet, and artist. He was the 11th descendent in the line of Trungpa tulkus of the Kagyü school of Tibetan Buddhism. He was also trained in the Nyingma tradition, the oldest of the four schools, and was an adherent of the rimay or "non-sectarian" movement within Tibetan Buddhism, which aspired to bring together and make available all the valuable teachings of the different schools, free of sectarian rivalry.
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Trungpa was a significant figure in the dissemination of Tibetan -
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Coleman Barks
Coleman Barks is an American poet. Despite the fact that he admittedly speaks no Persian, he is world-renowned as a translator of Rumi and other mystic poets of Persia. Barks taught literature at the University of Georgia for three decades. He makes frequent international appearances and is well-known throughout the Middle East. Barks's work has contributed to an extremely strong following of Rumi in the English-speaking world. Due to his work, the ideas of Sufism have crossed many cultural boundaries over the past few decades. Coleman Barks received an honorary doctorate from Tehran University in 2006.
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C.G. Jung
Carl Gustav Jung (/jʊŋ/; German: [ˈkarl ˈɡʊstaf jʊŋ]), often referred to as C. G. Jung, was a Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist who founded analytical psychology. Jung proposed and developed the concepts of extraversion and introversion; archetypes, and the collective unconscious. His work has been influential in psychiatry and in the study of religion, philosophy, archeology, anthropology, literature, and related fields. He was a prolific writer, many of whose works were not published until after his death.
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The central concept of analytical psychology is individuation—the psychological process of integrating the opposites, including the conscious with the unconscious, while still maintaining their relative autonomy. Jung considered ind -
A.C. Bhaktivedanta
His Divine Grace Abhay Charanaravinda Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada (अभय चरणारविन्द भक्तिवेदान्त स्वामी प्रभुपाद)was born as Abhay Charan De on 1 September 1896 in Calcutta, India.
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He first met his spiritual master, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Gosvami, in Calcutta in 1922. Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati, a prominent devotional scholar and the founder of sixty-four branches of Gaudiya Mathas (Vedic institutes), liked this educated young man and convinced him to dedicate his life to teaching Vedic knowledge in the Western world. Srila Prabhupada became his student, and eleven years later (1933) at Allahabad, he became his formally initiated disciple.
At their first meeting, in 1922, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura requested Srila Prabh -
Shunryu Suzuki
Suzuki Roshi was a Sōtō Zen monk and teacher who helped popularize Zen Buddhism in the United States, and is renowned for founding the first Buddhist monastery outside Asia (Tassajara Zen Mountain Center). Suzuki founded San Francisco Zen Center, which along with its affiliate temples, comprises one of the most influential Zen organizations in the United States. A book of his teachings, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, is one of the most popular books on Zen and Buddhism in the West
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Nikhilananda
Swami Nikhilananda (1895–1973), born Dinesh Chandra Das Gupta was a direct disciple of Sri Sarada Devi. In 1933, he founded the Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Center of New York, a branch of Ramakrishna Mission, and remained its head until his death in 1973. An accomplished writer and thinker, Nikhilananda's greatest contribution was the translation of Sri Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita from Bengali into English, published under the title The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna (1942).
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Patañjali
Patañjali (Devanāgarī पतञ्जलि) (fl. 150 BCE or 2nd c. BCE) is the compiler of the Yoga Sutras, an important collection of aphorisms on Yoga practice, and also the author of the Mahābhāṣya, a major commentary on Pāṇini's Ashtadhyayi. However, it is unlikely that these two works are that of the same author.
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In recent decades the Yoga Sutra has become quite popular worldwide for the precepts regarding practice of Raja Yoga and its philosophical basis. "Yoga" in traditional Hinduism involves inner contemplation, a rigorous system of meditation practice, ethics, metaphysics, and devotion to Brahman. At the same time, his Mahābhāṣya, which first foregrounded the notion of meaning as referring to categorization, remains an important treatise in San -
Vivekananda
"Arise Awake and Stop not til the goal is reached"
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Vivekananda left a body of philosophical works (see Vivekananda's complete works). His books (compiled from lectures given around the world) on the four Yogas (Raja Yoga, Karma Yoga, Bhakti Yoga and Jnana Yoga) are very influential and still seen as fundamental texts for anyone interested in the Hindu practice of Yoga. His letters are of great literary and spiritual value. He was also considered a very good singer and a poet.By the time of his death, He had composed many songs including his favorite Kali the Mother. He used humor for his teachings and was also an excellent cook. His language is very free flowing. His own Bengali writings stand testimony to the fact that he believed that word -
Ramana Maharshi
Bhagavan Sri Ramaṇa Mahārṣi (Tamil: ரமண மஹரிஷி) born Venkataraman Iyer, was probably the most famous Indian sage of the twentieth century, he was born on December 30, 1879 in a village called Tirucculi about 30 miles south of Madurai in southern India. His middle-class parents named him Venkataraman. His father died when he was twelve, and he went to live with his uncle in Madurai, where he attended American Mission High School.
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At age 16, he became spontaneously self-realized. Six weeks later he ran away to the holy hill of Arunachala where he would remain for the rest of his life. For several years he stopped talking and spent many hours each day in samadhi. When he began speaking again, people came to ask him questions, and he soon acquir -
J. Krishnamurti
Jiddu Krishnamurti was born on 11 May 1895 in Madanapalle, a small town in south India. He and his brother were adopted in their youth by Dr Annie Besant, then president of the Theosophical Society. Dr Besant and others proclaimed that Krishnamurti was to be a world teacher whose coming the Theosophists had predicted. To prepare the world for this coming, a world-wide organization called the Order of the Star in the East was formed and the young Krishnamurti was made its head.
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In 1929, however, Krishnamurti renounced the role that he was expected to play, dissolved the Order with its huge following, and returned all the money and property that had been donated for this work.
From then, for nearly sixty years until his death on 17 February 1 -
Adi Shankaracharya
Adi Shankara(788 CE - 820 CE), also known as Śaṅkara Bhagavatpādācārya and Ādi Śaṅkarācārya was an Indian guru from Kalady of present day Kerala who consolidated the doctrine of advaita vedānta. His teachings are based on the unity of the ātman and brahman— non-dual brahman, in which brahman is viewed as nirguna brahman, brahman without attributes.
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Shankara travelled across India and other parts of South Asia to propagate his philosophy through discourses and debates with other thinkers. He is reputed to have founded four mathas ("monasteries"), which helped in the historical development, revival and spread of Advaita Vedanta. Adi Shankara is believed to be the organizer of the Dashanami monastic order and the founder of the Shanmata traditi -
Ramakrishna
Ramakrishna Paramahansa, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay, was a famous mystic of 19th-century India. His religious school of thought led to the formation of the Ramakrishna Mission by his chief disciple Swami Vivekananda. both were influential figures in the Bengali Renaissance as well as the Hindu renaissance during the 19th and 20th centuries.
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Robert Adams
Robert Adams (January 21, 1928 – March 2, 1997) was an American Advaita teacher. In his late teens, he was a devotee of Sri Ramana Maharshi in Tiruvannamalai, India.[1] In later life Adams held satsang with a small group of devotees in California, US.[2] He mainly advocated the path of jñāna yoga[note 1] with an emphasis on the practice of self-enquiry.[3]
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Adams' teachings were not that well known in his lifetime, but have since been widely circulated amongst those investigating the philosophy of Advaita and the Western devotees of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi.[4][note 2] A book of his teachings, Silence of the Heart: Dialogues with Robert Adams, was published in 1999. -
Alan W. Watts
Alan Wilson Watts was a British philosopher, writer and speaker, who held both a Master's in Theology and a Doctorate of Divinity. Famous for his research on comparative religion, he was best known as an interpreter and popularizer of Asian philosophies for a Western audience. He wrote over 25 books and numerous articles on subjects such as personal identity, the true nature of reality, higher consciousness, the meaning of life, concepts and images of God and the non-material pursuit of happiness. In his books he relates his experience to scientific knowledge and to the teachings of Eastern and Western religion and philosophy.
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Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
Krishna Dvaipāyana Vyāsa, also known as Vyāsa or Veda-Vyāsa (वेदव्यास, the one who classified the Vedas into four parts) is a central and revered figure in most Hindu traditions. He is traditonally regarded as the author of the Mahābhārata, although it is also widely held that he only composed the core of the epic, the Bhārata. A significant portion of the epic later was only added in later centuries, which then came to be known as the Mahābhārata. The date of composition of this epic is not known - It was definitvely part of the traditions in Indian subcontinent at the time Gautam Buddha (~500 BCE) which would suggest it having been already around for atleast a few centuries. It was chiefy put down in the written form only somewhere betwee
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Lao Tzu
Lao Tzu (Chinese: 老子; pinyin: Lǎozǐ; Wade-Giles: Laosi; also Laozi, Lao Tse, Lao Tu, Lao-Tsu, Laotze, Laosi, Lao Zi, Laocius, Lao Ce, and other variations) was a mystic philosopher of ancient China, best known as the author of the Tao Te Ching (often simply referred to as Laozi). His association with the Tao Te Ching has led him to be traditionally considered the founder of Taoism (pronounced as "Daoism"). He is also revered as a deity in most religious forms of the Taoist religion, which often refers to Laozi as Taishang Laojun, or "One of the Three Pure Ones". Laozi translated literally from Chinese means "old master" or "old one", and is generally considered honorific.
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According to Chinese tradition, Laozi lived in the 6th century BCE. Hi -
Rupert Spira
From an early age Rupert Spira was deeply interested in the nature of reality. At the age of seventeen he learnt to meditate, and began a twenty-year period of study and practice in the classical Advaita Vedanta tradition under the guidance of Dr. Francis Roles and Shantananda Saraswati, the Shankaracharya of the north of India. During this time he immersed himself in the teachings of P. D. Ouspensky, Krishnamurti, Rumi, Ramana Maharshi, Nisargadatta and Robert Adams, until he met his teacher, Francis Lucille, in 1997. Francis introduced Rupert to the Direct Path teachings of Atmananda Krishna Menon, the Tantric tradition of Kashmir Shaivism (which he had received from his teacher, Jean Klein), and, more importantly, directly indicated to h
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Kahlil Gibran
Kahlil Gibran (Arabic: جبران خليل جبران ) was a Lebanese-American artist, poet, and writer.
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Born in the town of Bsharri in modern-day Lebanon (then part of Ottoman Mount Lebanon), as a young man he emigrated with his family to the United States where he studied art and began his literary career. In the Arab world, Gibran is regarded as a literary and political rebel. His romantic style was at the heart of a renaissance in modern Arabic literature, especially prose poetry, breaking away from the classical school. In Lebanon, he is still celebrated as a literary hero.
He is chiefly known in the English-speaking world for his 1923 book The Prophet, an early example of inspirational fiction including a series of philosophical essays written -
Shuddhaanandaa Brahmachari
About Author writing Living with My Himalayan Master: Sri Sri Bhajan Brahmachari - A Biography
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Shuddhaanandaa Brahmachari (Bodhi) was born on 10 May, 1949 in Calcutta, India. He left his job as a lecturer of Economics at a college in Andhra Pradesh at the young age of 26 to join his Guru’s ashram in Calcutta and embrace the life of a monastic at the feet of his beloved Master. Back in college, he was the most loved teacher who turned even the most notorious illiterate rogues of students into college toppers through the power of his love. Often during class, he would unconsciously start giving discourses of Vedanta, even as the students listened to him spell bound.
At his Guru’s ashram, he found himself in a situation which was like crocodil -
Vivekananda
"Arise Awake and Stop not til the goal is reached"
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Vivekananda left a body of philosophical works (see Vivekananda's complete works). His books (compiled from lectures given around the world) on the four Yogas (Raja Yoga, Karma Yoga, Bhakti Yoga and Jnana Yoga) are very influential and still seen as fundamental texts for anyone interested in the Hindu practice of Yoga. His letters are of great literary and spiritual value. He was also considered a very good singer and a poet.By the time of his death, He had composed many songs including his favorite Kali the Mother. He used humor for his teachings and was also an excellent cook. His language is very free flowing. His own Bengali writings stand testimony to the fact that he believed that word -
Prabhavananda
Swami Prabhavananda was an Indian philosopher, monk of the Ramakrishna Order, and religious teacher.
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Born in India, he joined the Ramakrishna Order after graduating from Calcutta university in 1914. He was initiated by Swami Brahmananda.
In 1923, he was sent to the United States of America. Initially he worked as an assistant minister of the Vedanta Society of San Francisco. After two years, he established the Vedanta Society of Portland. In December 1929, he moved to Los Angeles where he founded the Vedanta Society of Southern California in 1930.
Under his administration the Vedanta Society of Southern California grew over the years to become the largest Vedanta Society in the West, with monasteries in Hollywood and Trabuco Canyon and convent -