Oftentimes, it takes just
one person to start a fire,
one word to start a movement,
one compassionate glance
to change the course of history.
VISION & MISSION
Swaminiji is a disciple of Pujya Sri Swami Dayanandaji Saraswati, an internationally renowned master and traditional teacher of Vedanta. Swaminiji is the Acharya of Arsha Vijnana Gurukulam and a founding member of the “Global Womens’ Peace Initiative”. An erudite scholar, Swaminiji addresses contemporary challenges facing the world, from global warming to religious/social unrest, in her unfolding of the spiritual texts of India, the Upanishads.
In the Hindu tradition, shakti, the feminine principle, is the manifest form of Īśvara, the creator. We understand shakti in three ways— as
icchāśakti, the power of desiring,
kriyāśakti, the power of creation, and
jnānaśakti, the power of knowledge.
This threefold shakti powers the entire creation. Sadly, over time, Shakti-worship, along with the awareness of and the ability to wield this power responsibly has receded in most places.
At the macrocosmic level, we find shakti being trampled and overtaken by unethical norms, which values conquest, colonization, and commitment to profit over collective well-being. At the level of the individual, even in cultures where Goddess worship is still prevalent, such as in the Hindu, Buddhist, or other native traditions, one is, for the most part, alienated from oneself, one’s glory, one’s connection to the whole.
We see the effects of this disconnect in the steady decline of dharma— ethical norms that govern interpersonal relations, in the growing chasm between the resourceful and the resourceless, in the ecological devastation brought about by harmful corporate practices and mindless lifestyles that we have cultivated, in the spiritual vacuum, where angst and restlessness reign in place of shanti and stillness, and finally in the increasing oppression and marginalization of women globally.
