Stories from the youth of Mukunda Lal Ghosh, later known to the world under his monastic name of Paramhansa Yogananda, author of the bestselling spiritual classic Autobiography of a Yogi. Even in his youth the greatness of this master of yoga was revealed. Complements beautifully Yogananda's own autobiography. The author, Swami Kriyananda, a direct and close disciple of Yogananda, writes: "In this book I have tried to depict Yogananda's spirit; a spirit ardent with love for God, tender with sympathy for all men, forgiving, kindly, humorous, yet resolute and forceful when strength was needed." From the preface: "Paramhansa Yogananda was born in India in the last decade of the nineteenth century. His father, a high official in the Bengal-Nagpur railway, was in a position to offer his children worldly security and success. Mukunda's heart, however, was set on another kind of security and another, higher, kind of success: final victory over ignorance through loving union with God. Spurning earthly comforts, he sought rigorous training under one of India's greatest living gurus, Swami Sri Yukteswar, of Serampore, Bengal. "People often make the mistake of equating the spiritual life with dullness and prudery. These stories should help to dispel that illusion. Mukunda's keen sense of humor and love of pranks often startled his more sedate neighbors out of their mental ruts. The personality that emerges from these episodes is joyous, compassionate, childlike yet fiercely determined, loyal, deeply in love with God, and capable of standing alone in his convictions against the very world. "These stories have been written from true episodes in the master's life from approximately the ages of six to seventeen. Some of the accounts were related to me by his relatives; others, by childhood friends. But the greater number were told me by the master himself. I have taken no liberties with those accounts beyond adding superficial details for poetic emphasis, an occasionally combining separate episodes (too brief to stand alone) into a single story."
About the Author: Swami Kriyananda was a direct disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda, trained by the great Indian master to spread the life-transforming teachings of Kriya Yoga around the globe. He is widely considered one of the world's foremost experts on meditation, yoga, and spiritual practice, having authored over 140 books on these subjects including The New Path: My Life with Paramhansa Yogananda and Paramhansa Yogananda: A Biography with Personal Reflections and Reminiscences. Kriyananda was the founder of Ananda Sangha, a worldwide organization committed to the dissemination of Yogananda's teachings. In 1968 he founded Ananda World Brotherhood Village, the first spiritual cooperative community based on Yogananda's vision of "world brotherhood colonies." Today Ananda includes nine spiritual communities in the U.S., Europe, and India, and over 100 meditation groups worldwide.