Sadhana Guidelines: Create your Daily Spiritual Practice

Sadhana brings us into an intimate alignment with the reality of who we are: as a creature of the Creator and as a human being. First published in 1974, Kundalini Yoga Sadhana Guidelines has become the best-selling Kundalini Yoga manual of all time. Within these pages, you'll find the inspiration to keep returning breath-by-breath to your true Self and to your practice.

Sadhana is everything we do on a daily basis as our self-discipline and our commitment to our higher self. It is a spiritual practice in which we confront the tendencies of our mind and ego and, out of love, we invite in the dimensions of our soul, spirit, and intuition. In its essence, it is a process of refinement, development, and mastery.

As we learned from eastern traditions, a sadhu is a being who has disciplined himself. Likewise, the definition of a yogi is a person who has totally leaned on the supreme consciousness, which is God. The purpose of sadhana is to arrive at the place where we go beyond our ego and its limitations. Morning sadhana-done before the sunrise-is a special time when we sit before the altar of our own consciousness and have the opportunity to clean up our inner world before we engage in the outer world-our jobs, our families, our responsibilities.

This manual exists to serve you and to help you uplift yourself and others. It is designed for both the new and the experienced student. It focuses on the essential practice of Kundalini Yoga. A material that offers lectures, essays, insights, and a series of exercises that one can experience and improve one's own personal practice.

Gurucharan Singh Khalsa, Ph.D. is an expert in the practical application of meditation and psychology for personal growth. A premier trainer for kundalini meditation and yoga teachers since 1969, he developed several global training programs. Gurucharan is an accomplished author and affiliated scholar at Chapman University in Orange, California. There he collaborates with their Institute for Quantum Studies on projects for leading-edge applications of quantum foundations to the nature of consciousness and our capacity as human beings. He has worked with Chapman's Fish Interfaith Center since 2013 and contributes to original research in meditation, breath, and wellness.

Yogi Bhajan was declared a Master of Kundalini Yoga at the age of 16. He came to the United States in 1969 and openly taught this transformative technology for the next 35 years, until his last breath in Aug 2004. In the turbulent drug culture of the 70s, Yogi Bhajan first reached out to the youth. He recognized that their experimentation with drugs and "altered states of consciousness" expressed a desire to experience themselves and a longing for family, for connection to their soul and their community. In response to this innate longing, he created a family known as 3HO (Healthy, Happy, Holy Organization). Soon, 3HO ashrams began springing up across the United States and throughout the world. He sparked a movement whose tendrils have woven their way into numerous aspects of our culture. Yoga and meditation have gained widespread acceptance in the West and the holistic health movement he introduced through diet, herbs, and lifestyle technologies. Born Harbhajan Singh in what is now Pakistan to a family of healers and community leaders, Yogi Bhajan studied comparative religion and Vedic philosophy in his undergraduate years and received his Masters in Economics with honors from Punjab University. Years later, he earned his Ph.D. in communications psychology from the University of Humanistic Studies in San Francisco. Yogi Bhajan emerged as a religious, community, and business leader with a distinguished reputation as a man of peace, world vision, wisdom, and compassion. He founded several food companies that manufacture and distribute natural products based on these teachings. He fostered economic development in communities around the world. He is also the author of several books on yoga philosophy, business, and communication during his lifetime. The Kundalini Research Institute continues his legacy through The Yogi Bhajan Library of Teachings, the International Teacher Training in Kundalini Yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan(R), and the publications of lectures and kriyas to serve the community of teachers, students, and practitioners around the world. See www.kundaliniresearchinstitute.org to learn how you can help keep the legacy alive!