707. Swamini Brahmaprajnananda Saraswati

Buddha at the Gas Pump

Rick Archer

Religion & Spirituality, Philosophy, Spirituality, Society & Culture

4.7 • 695 Ratings

🗓️ 31 May 2024

⏱️ 106 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Swamini Brahmaprajnananda Saraswati Ph. D has dedicated her life to serving the Vedic tradition by teaching Advaita Vedanta. A Hindu monk who currently lives in Mumbai (India) she is a teacher, podcaster, writer, creator who points to the suffix -er in all the roles as the abiding Atma in all beings. She offers regular Vedanta courses (online), Vedanta – the river of wisdom weekly podcast, insightful videos, workshops and retreats in India and abroad. Her teachings range from the depth and breadth of self-mastery to self-discovery. She is the author of ‘You matter – Insights from Vedanta.’ Swamini ji teaches three core courses at Hindu University of America. She has a Ph. D in Philosophy and her thesis on the Role of Ishvara in Advaita Vedanta is due to be published soon as a book. She is a direct disciple of Pujya Swami Dayananda Saraswati, having studied Vedanta, Sanskrit and Vedic chanting at Arsha Vidya Gurukulam in a residential, intensive three-year course in Coimbatore and Rishikesh, India. She studied with Swami Brahmavidananda for about twelve years while balancing her work commitments. Her last leadership role was as the Country Head (India) of an international organization which positively impacted the lives of 150,000 street children. She was formerly a psychologist. Website YouTube Channel Discussion of this interview in the BatGap Community Facebook Group Summary and transcript of this interview. Interview recorded May 21, 2024 YouTube Video Chapters:  00:00:00 - Introduction to Buddha at the Gas Pump  00:04:24 - Questioning Hinduism and Childhood Rebellion  00:08:21 - Becoming a Monk for Guru and Grace  00:12:20 - Neo-Advaita and Traditional Advaita  00:16:23 - The Importance of Traditional Teachings in Vedanta  00:20:16 - Contextualizing Vedic Literature and Manusmriti  00:24:03 - Vedanta: The Sixth Means of Knowledge  00:28:06 - Vedanta as a Means of Knowledge  00:31:58 - The Scientific Approach and Spiritual Development  00:35:52 - Science's Damage and Universal Values  00:40:00 - The Nature of Maya Shakti  00:43:44 - The Nature of Brahman and Self-Discovery  00:47:38 - The Strange Pursuit of Seeking and Harmony with the World  00:51:26 - The Nature of Consciousness and Seeking  00:55:09 - The Stages of a Seeker  00:58:59 - Transformation from Seeker to Knower  01:02:50 - The Process of Chipping Away and Shedding Ignorance  01:06:34 - Direct vs Progressive Approaches in Vedanta  01:10:15 - Direct and Progressive Understanding of Vedanta  01:14:09 - The Five Sets of Relationships  01:17:54 - The Meaning and Process of Puja  01:21:51 - Understanding the Law of Karma  01:26:03 - Karma and Free Will  01:29:36 - Expanding and narrowing our range of free will  01:33:24 - The Legacy of the Tradition and the Role of a Spokesperson  01:37:16 - The Importance of Dharma in Spiritual Growth  01:41:12 - Aligning with Dharma  01:45:07 - The Mirror of Dharma  01:48:56 - Maintaining Discernment in Spiritual Teachings  01:52:24 - The Power Within Us  01:56:08 - Recognizing our Sacred connection to God

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	The Welcome to Buddha at the Gas Pump.
0:27.6	My name is Rick Archer.
0:29.6	Buddha at the Gas Pump is an ongoing series of conversations with spiritually awakening people.
0:35.6	We've done over 700 of them now. And if this is new to you
0:39.2	and you'd like to check out previous ones, please go to batgap.com and look under the
0:44.4	interviews menu where you'll see the past ones organized in several different ways. This program
0:51.3	has made possible through the support of appreciative listeners and viewers.
0:55.0	So if you appreciate it and would like to help support it, there are PayPal buttons on every page of the website.
1:01.0	We have a team of volunteers who help with various things, like all of our interviews are being proofread so that we have accurate transcripts of them, both on the website and as subtitles on
1:13.9	YouTube. So if you'd like to help do that kind of thing, get in touch. And we have a AI chatbot
1:21.9	these days and is gaining greater wisdom as we feed it with useful information. In fact, we've just acquired a library of
1:29.7	1,700 spiritual books, both well-known ones since the Bible is like the Bible or the Upanishads or
1:37.3	whatever, and also very obscure and rare, hard-defined books, we'll be loading all those into the
1:43.1	data corpus of the chatbot.
1:45.8	So that should even make it better.
1:48.3	My guest today is Swamini Brahma Prajnananda Saraswati, PhD, who mercifully refers to herself as Swamini B.
1:58.2	She has dedicated her life to serving the Vedic tradition by teaching Advaita Vedanta.
2:03.1	She is a Hindu monk who currently lives in Mumbai, India. She's a teacher, podcaster, writer,
2:08.4	and creator. She offers regular Vedanta courses online, a weekly podcast, insightful videos,
2:14.9	workshops, and retreats in India and abroad.
2:21.8	Her teachings range from the depth and breadth of self-mastery to self-discovery.
2:25.2	She's the author of You Matter, Insights from Vedanta.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Rick Archer, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Rick Archer and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.