Life in Yoga: Celebrating 8th International Day of Yoga

Gokulmuthu Narayanaswamy is a devotee and volunteer of Ramakrishna Math. He conducts classes on Bhagavad Gita, Swami Vivekananda, Spiritual Life, Leadership Development and Life Skills to students and professionals. He is a founder of Vivekananda Study Circle in IIT Madras. He is a mentor of Vivekananda Study Circle at IISc Bangalore. He is a regular contributor of articles and book reviews to Vedanta Kesari, a monthly magazine published by Ramakrishna Math, Chennai. His blog at www.practicalphilosophy.in has several of his articles. He is working as Director of Product Development at Itron India, Bangalore. He holds B.Tech in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from IIT Madras, M.Sc (Engg) in Computer Science from IISc Bangalore and M.A in Philosophy, Religion and Culture from Annamalai University. He is currently pursuing Ph.D in Biopsychology and Yoga at IIT Kharagpur. He took mantra diksha from Swami Gahananandaji of Ramakrishna Math. He learnt Vedanta from Swami Paramarthanandaji of Arsha Vidya Gurukulam. He learnt Yoga from Swami Swayambodhanandaji, disciple of Swami Satyananda Saraswati.

Swami Chidananda has been a Vedanta teacher and speaker on human values for more than three decades. After he served for 5 years as the resident Vedanta teacher in San Jose, California, in the mid-1990s, his work has been mostly in India and the USA. Since 2006, he heads FOWAI FORUM, a non-profit that disseminates philosophical and spiritual knowledge with special coverage of Indian ethos. Numerous talks by him are on YouTube at the FOWAI channel. The author of seven books, he is specially known for his presentations on Bhagavad Geeta and the Upanishads. Hailing from Udupi district in Karnataka, he has been living in Solan, Himachal Pradesh, since 2013. He had begun with a career in electronics engineering, with a BE from Mysore University and an MTech from IIT Madras. Then he served Chinmaya Mission, the organization of Swami Chinmayanandaji, for 18 years and the Foundation of Jiddu Krishnamurti for 10 years.

Dr. Vinayachandra Banavathy, is the Director of Centre for Indian Knowledge Systems, Chanakya University, Bangalore & also at Indica Yoga, a platform that offers authentic, immersive and transformative yoga experiences across the world. He holds a PhD on psychological insights in the Vedas from Pondicherry University, besides Masters’ in Sanskrit, English, Yogic Science and Applied Psychology. Vinayachandra is a dedicated teacher who travels across the world conducting courses, lectures and workshops on a unique blend of Yoga, Psychology and Sanskrit. He is a guest faculty/resource person at various Universities and Yoga Associations including Ghent University, Belgium; Zurich University of Applied Sciences, Switzerland; Vedanta Academy, Belgium; Irish Yoga Association, Ireland; Yoga Pramiti, Italy; School of Philosophy and Economic Science, Ireland; VYASA Singapore, etc. He has had the privilege of being a tutor at the European Union of Yoga Congress, Zinal, Switzerland for the years 2013, 2014 and was the Guest of Honour at the same event in the year 2017 along with Dr. Anuradha Choudry. His publications include a report on Standardization of Yoga Terminologies for WHO; a book co-edited with Dr. Anuradha Choudry titled ‘Perspectives on Indian Psychology’, published by Jain University Press, another book co-authored titled ‘Happiness: Indic Perspectives’, published by Development Foundation, besides a few articles, papers, booklets on Yoga, Indian Psychology, Culture and Spirituality. In addition to his academic interests, he is deeply passionate to work with children and youth and is involved with several cultural and service organizations in varied capacities.