Swami Vishwananda -
Disciple of Mahavatar Babaji
A friend of mine told me that Swami Vishwananda is a direct disciple of the Mahavatar Babaji and coming to London to give darshan, did I want to come? There was no way I could refuse.
Swami Vishwananda built a Narasimha statue to remove the negativity of part of the city. There were pictures of him doing a milk abhishek to the statue. Just looking at the pictures and thinking of the statue brought me feelings of peace and relief.
Swami Vishwananda
Looking at the photos of the statue and Swami Vishwananda on this website got me interested. Who is this person? And he is a disciple of Babaji, so he must be a supernatural person. I looked at his picture and my thoughts were that he is equal to Paramahansa Yogananda. Like Yogananda he teaches a version of Kriya Yoga, given directly by the immortal Mahavatar Babaji, and he even looks like Yogananda! I wondered what type of person he is. Maybe he is strict, or friendly, someone who speaks a lot or someone who is quiet? I did not know what to expect. But I was very interested to meet Him. I knew he would be amazing because he is a direct disciple of Babaji!
So I was travelling by train to London from Rochester on the way to the free darshan with Swami Vishwananda. A friend of mine was going to be helping out organising the event. On the train there was lots of lively people. I assumed it was a German school trip as it was full of lots of lively kids, and I was sitting next to one of them. I was thinking about spirituality and practices such as Kriya Yoga. I looked at the person sitting next to me as an example and thought, "what would happen if this person practised Kriya Yoga? What would be the effects?"
When I got to the temple where the event was to be held I greeted my friend who was helping out, and then went into the temple to sit down. I sat in on a festival that was going on with the locals before the event started. It was Hanuman day (Jayanti), which was quite interesting.
It was the full moon on the first month of the Hindu calendar. The people there were reciting the Hanuman Chelisa. There were lots of brilliant high energy spiritual people walking around outside, some from America, Germany and many London and Indian people. After the event finished the temple began to fill up with lots of people and lots of children. People had come from all over the world to be there with their children to get darshan of Swami Vishwananda. Darshan also included a healing and shaktipat from Swami Vishwananda directly.
The energy began to pick up and bharjans were playing. The bharjans were very lively and I was reading something about how Swami likes to head the bharjan singing and gets people to dance. It made me smile as I was imagining my own Swami doing the same :) He said that Jesus used to dance. It turned out that all those crazy people on the train were ALL there to see Swami Vishwananda as well - the whole train that I was on.
After the event I even saw the person that was sitting next to me on the train. He was dressed now in white Indian spiritual clothes. We recognised each other, smiled and said hi. It was very ironic. You have to assume that everybody is spiritual :)
Anyway... it started to get crowded. I was on the edge of a row. We were all sitting down on the floor and it was getting uncomfortable. I was listening in to many conversations with his beautiful students about Swami, their relationship with him and how they first became hooked by his love.
It was very interesting. His students are such loving pure bhakti people, really melting in God's energy through the high energy music- such devotion and falling in love with God.
I noticed that a lot of the songs and music was devoted to Krishna. There was high Krishna-Vishnu energy going on. I thought maybe this is a Vaishnava tradition. Vishnu's yantra is a "U" and you sometimes see this on people's third-eyes in that tradition.
Suddenly the bharjan singing got really loud and there was great clapping. Swami Vishwananda was in the room and coming down my isle and I struggled to get a glimpse of this amazing person.
He appeared like the full moon as he strode by right past me very lively almost in a kind of jog. He was happy and smiling at the energy and reception of the people. I had never seen such a divine aura. He was out of this world. With the frayed ends of his long dark hair he appeared like a swift black cloud travelling past me, like a manifestation or a ball of smoke - not of this world. I was awe struck. Who is this divine being?
I knew from my previous experience with sanskrit mantras that the word Vishwananda simply means in sanskrit, Universal Bliss. I had never seen such as happy and blissful person before. He really is the embodiment of divine bliss! It is said that each great saint embodies a particular aspect of God. For instance Jesus embodies Love. Shirdi Sai Baba embodies Truth. Sri Kaleshwar's character is Dharma, and Vishwananda is obviously Bliss. However where there is one aspect of God- all the others aspects exist simultaneously.
Disciple of Mahavatar Babaji
Swami Vishwananda looks like an older looking version of the Mahavatar Babaji. You can see it in his smile. His smile looks divine and radiant like that of Babaji. When he puts his hands together to greet someone, sometimes he looks up in a sweet and childlike way, looking like Babaji.
A lot of disciples tend to embody the energy of their master. In the past it has been noted that a lot of Babaji's disciples actually look like Him, such as Lihiri Mayasaya was said to have very similar features to Him. Paramahansa Nityananda also looks a bit like Babaji sometimes when he is sitting down and talking.
Whatever you focus on and fills your aura, you become like that. The guru is "everything" to a disciple. With a true guru, there is no difference between guru and God for a disciple. Thus Swami Vishwananda looks like a slightly older looking version of Babaji. He has a similar lustrous aura.
Swami Vishwananda sat down absorbing the energy and smiling before heading the bharjan singing. As he headed the bharjan singing it almost turned into a kind of spiritual rave, with the music really going fast and everybody really melted in the enjoyment of the energy. How wonderful. Most people only rave when they are intoxicated with alcohol. I had never heard of such a spiritual rave before - that high bhakti energy- melting in God and Love. Apparently Jesus used to dance :) Such a brilliant feeling.
Part of darshan with Swami included a healing/shaktipat from Him. I was touched at how he managed to do this for everybody- that he had so much time and love for everybody - to give a wonderful shaktipat healing. As he was giving the shaktipat, so much love, bliss, compassion and happiness manifested through his smile, and his face looked so happy and blissful, it was amazing.
The personal healing really took care of all my problems and gave me so much relief and peace. After giving my sincere thanks to Him I took the items he gave me such as a sweet and vibuti. When I sat down with these items, I did not know what was going on. The items in my hand were burning and giving out intense energy. The healing was still taking place as I was sitting down. I was really enjoying the energy of whatever was in my hands. After carefully examining the items to find out what was emitting this energy, it turned out (and I remembered him doing it, but did not think much of it) that Swami had took a strand of his hair and put it among the items. It was in my hands giving off intense energy. The healing continued to take place as I was sitting down.
I wrapped the long strand of hair around my hands and continued to meditate. Because I was enjoying the healing so much during the shaktipat session, he made it continue through this strand of hair. This single long strand of hair was like a power object. On the way back on the train I showed it to my friend and she also said, "Oh my God it gives out intense heat". I thought wow, what a power object! I said, maybe it was by accident a hair dropped in there? She said, nothing is an accident with Swami Vishwananda. She showed me the beautiful dazzling ring that he had manifested for her.
I still have that strand of hair. I just keep it in my room along with pictures of my favourite saints, power objects, vibhuti and sandalwood paste. One time shortly after the event I tried meditating with it again outside the full moon period but I felt it was wrong to do that- as before it was a special occasion on the full moon and he was channelling divine energy. It was not his own energy -it was God's energy. It would be wrong to decharge with that hair.
My friend asked me if I knew who Paramahansa Yogananda was? I said yes. "Well, that's Him - that's Paramahansa Yogananda", she said. "Swami Vishwananda is Paramahansa Yogananda." The moment I saw his picture I knew he was equal to Paramahansa Yogananda and this seemed to confirm it. I do not want to exceed my limits by saying for sure that he is. But whether he is or not, I feel in my heart that he is someone equal to Paramahansa Yogananda, and like Jesus in his love. I felt happy to have met one of my favourite saints of all time.
Most of the bharjans were dedicated to Krishna. There was a whole Krishna thing going on that day. The whole atmosphere was very surreal. The temple felt like that palace that was manifested by Babaji for Lihiri Mayasaya.
There is also a Babaji-Krishna connection. It is believed by a lot of followers of Paramahansa Yogananda that Babaji actually is Krishna. Babaji was Krishna in his previous lifetime. It all makes sense. The Mahavatar Babaji is Krishna. If you think about it... it is the same character. Krishna is often depicted as a 15 year old kid playing the flute- and Babaji has the form of a 15 year old. Read about my Mahavatar Babaji experience. In the Autobiography of a Yogi Paramahansa Yogananda even referred to Babaji by singing to him, "Babaji-Krishna!."
It is often talked about how Krishna is hard to win and barely accessible sometimes. But once you have won Him, all the blessing are there. Another amazing thing you will see is the following set of photos of a Mahavatar Babaji murti in a cave created by Swami Vishwananda's and His students, which confirms my experience of Babaji in a cave. The interior such as the walls of the cave is very realistic. It gives you an idea of His divinity of where he meditates and takes care of the creation. Although Babaji does not look as ugly and as old as depicted in the statue- in real life he looks like a normal healthy 15 year old kid.
Swami Vishwananda also has a special bond with Jesus too. Funnily enough Swami Vishwananda is also a great devotee of Shirdi Sai Baba. Many of my spiritual friends saw Him in Shirdi during one Shivaratre, and he was giving shatipat to everyone. Vishwananda has also created a Shirdi Sai Baba temple. This goes to show that all gurus and spiritual traditions are one. Swami Vishwananda has also given darshans of Mother Divine and Mother Mary and produced/manifested and birthed amazing powerful Shiva lingams.
