Sri Swami Sagwathananda, Ananda Kutir

Sri Swami Venkatesananda is a brilliant and dynamic young Yogi who was not content to remain long satisfied with worldly prosperity and honours, but was prompted by the divine will to resign a lucrative official career and to come to his mentally-chosen Master, the world-famous modern Yogi and great benefactor of humanity, to become the disciple of His Holiness Sri Swami Sivananda, in order to re-orientate the rest of his life and outlook and to seek the Master's guidance in his onward march towards Godhead.

Venkatesananda came to this Abode of Bliss in 1945, and has been practising constant self-analysis, discipline, prayer, study and selfless service. He spends all his energy in typing Sri Gurudev's manuscripts and other articles which go to relieve the sufferings of thousands in the world. His magnetic personality has drawn the friendship and brotherly affection of each and every individual residing in the Ashram, as well as of the passing visitors Sri Gurudev and others greatly appreciate his extra-ordinary talent in writing and understanding of things properly.

Never before do I remember to have seen a young man with so much devotion to God and Guru, so full of love for the fellow-aspirants and kindness to all other living beings of Gods creation. He is full of educative humour and he has got a peculiar way of winning the hearts of others, out of his outpouring love and kindness. One great quality I found in him is that he is very happy always. He first greets others by touching their feet with reverence and divine Bhav, without thinking of their rank, nationality, caste, creed or colour. He embraces everyone with full-hearted love and regard. He never cherishes ill-feeling towards anyone. If at all anybody shows any ill-feeling or hatred towards him, he simply goes and touches his feet and begins to pour out his humorous words, indirectly, before him, and makes the man laugh. He neither speaks ill of others nor pays heed if anybody speaks ill of a third person. He is very simple in his dress and food. He never seeks honour, name, fame and superiority. It is a natural tendency in him to glorify others and try to bring out their good name into the forefront.

Venkatesananda is the right hand of Sri Gurudev and his Divine Mission, and a pillar of the Divine Life Society and its network of institutions. He watches all the Ashram-activities as a silent witness, and goes on working untiringly day in and day out. He is a talented writer, an eloqueut speaker and a wise adviser for the Divine Work. He is the able editor of the Yoga-Vedanta Forest University Weekly. He worked single-handed and whole-heartedly to bring out the Commemoration Volume of the epochal All India-Ceylon Tour of our revered Master, Sri Swami Sivananda Maharaj. In brief, he is the champion of Sri Gurudev's Divine Life Mission.

Work is his constant companion; prayer is his bosom-friend, and seclusion is his supreme abode; and he is well contented with whatever circumstances he may be put in. It is very difficult to give an appropriate picture of the life of this most efficient dyramic young sanyasin.

Born and brought up in a respectable family of Vaishnava Brahmins, and having undergone the course of modern English education, he fitly combines in himself the lofty dignity of spiritual idealism and the social sense and understanding of human realism. When he beautifully blends together, in his life and writings, wisdom and love, spirituality and humanness, refinement and humour, dispassion and service, he really mirrors in them the life and precepts of his Master. Swami Venkatesananda is an interesting and entertaining humorist, who is unpretentious in his thoughts, words and deeds, who would not express more or less than what he thinks and feels, who lives what he is. He has a peculiar knack in grasping the spirit of the minds of people and in approaching human nature in a manner befitting it. He portrays in himself the aspirations that direct themselves to the practice of the Yoga of the Bhagavad Gita - 'Samatvam Yoga Uchyate' and 'Yogah Karmasu Kaushalam'.

Yoga is that great art of activity based on the consciousness of the harmony and evenness of existence. Equanimity is the foundation of the Yoga of action. To live in the world and yet be out of the world, to worship the God Eternal in the temple of this temporal tabernacle, to reflect the characteristics of the Infinite in the finite, to be a man of society and yet aim at union with the Godhead, is not easy. Hard indeed is the task of reconciling the relative with the Absolute and this it is that Swami Venkatesananda is attempting to achieve in his life. Indefatigable and intensely devout, the revered Swami is indeed a paragon of an aspirant in the field of spiritual activity. A kind heart and a clear head, a giving hand and sweet speech give meaning to the central person of Swami Venkatesananda, a philosopher, a religious contemplative a man of action and a centre of love, all in one. He is a friend of all creation; he conquers all things by love born of wisdom; and this love expresses itself as service.

May God grant him a long life with good health and enthusiasm to work for the welfare of the suffering millions, in which our revered Master is already engaged.