Reading Paramahansa Yogananda’s “Autobiography of a Yogi”. Again.

I finally finished Autobiography of a Yogi. It was my second — or maybe third — attempt, and it took me over a year (I read a lot of other stuff, too). I’m a bit surprised that it took me so long to read this spiritual treasure, a book that inspired the likes of George Harrison and Steve Jobs (the latter had five hundred copies distributed at his funeral).

For those who haven’t read it, the book is a series of events in the life of Yogananda, each written more or less as a free-standing vignette, following in chronological order on the prior event. A good portion of the book is devoted to his return trip to India in the 1930s, after he established the Self Realization Fellowship in the United States. The book is written with humor and Yogananda’s personality certainly comes through.

The book is full of remarkable incidents, from synchronistic meetings to outright miracles. Yogananda meets no less than three people who eat either very little or nothing (ironically, on their way to meet a woman who has eaten nothing in five decades, Yogananda and his travelling companions are delayed by a feast of mangoes that have fallen from a tree by the side of the road). Most extraordinary of these events is the meeting with his guru, Sri Yukteswar, sometime after his guru’s death when he appears in corporeal form.

There is surprisingly little philosophy or spiritual teaching in the book itself — nowhere near as much as in Yogananda’s other books. It is in the final chapter that the author lays out some thoughts on the spiritual path in the greatest detail. Before that, Sri Yukteswar’s teaching on the afterlife is probably the most detailed and extended spiritual message.

What does appear numerous times throughout the book is Yogananda’s attempt to reconcile East and West, the spiritual and material perspectives. He refers to both approaches as scientific, correctly pointing out that the spiritual practices of meditation have been investigated from a truly scientific perspective — if you understand science to mean ‘do this, and see what the result is’ and not merely restricted to material concerns.

Yogananda also frequently references Christianity, citing passages from the New Testament to support the universality of spiritual truths. Thus he ties together Eastern (Hindu) spirituality with both Western science and religion.

The author’s emphasis on the practice of Kriya Yoga is central to the book. While there may be many paths up the mountain, Yogananda clearly feels that Kriya Yoga is the most efficacious, if not simply the best, method. A key part of that assessment is that the method is not especially difficult, and ordinary folks can make progress in relatively short amounts of time: a strong enticement for those of us slogging along in the slow lane.

Why did it take me so long to read the book?

For one thing, I don’t think that the seventy-plus years since the book was written helped. No doubt it would have been almost shocking within the context of the the 1950s, but it is less so now.

It’s not my way to be skeptical of the many extraordinary experiences that the author had, nor his verbatim memory of extended conversations that took place long ago. I’m quite sure that such remarkable occurrences happen, although I assume they are rare even among advanced yogis.

The thing is, these were his experiences, and after a while one begins to compare his miraculous life with one’s more mundane existence. Sure, he’s a yogi and dedicated to god, while I’m… well, I’m not quite sure what I am, but I’m not a yogi and my devotion is clearly less than total. Yogananda’s dedication doesn’t seem to be swayed by glimpses of enticing thighs or the promise of a really good cabernet (although he does talk about food quite a bit!).

Maybe the thing that slowed down my reading was that there are only a few places in the book where we get a glimpse into the author’s own spiritual progress. He’s pretty advanced right from the get-go, and he takes the wildest happenings in stride — a contrast to the reports of Westerners who have had extraordinary experiences, such as near-death and out-of-body experiences, or who have various kinds of encounters with beings on other planes.

For that reason, the book was inspiring in the sense that we might all get to Yogananda’s level someday, but it is less accessible from where I am today.

Of course, I should look into Kriya Yoga, which the SRF offers in courses online, at least for beginners.