Customer Reviews

How to Be Happy All the Time (Wisdom of Yogananda) (v. 1)

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

The author of Autobiography of a Yogi brings out pearls of wisdom on how to be happy in this small but priceless book. Most of the sayings here are not found in his other works. The advise given here is so simple yet so difficult to follow for ordinary mortals like us.

However, if one is able to follow the advise here, his/her life would be filled with so much bliss. The language used in this book is also easy to digest and understand and the reader would feel a sense of friendship and closeness with the author just by reading and applying the words of wisdom in every day living.

In conclusion, I would strongly recommend this book to everyone, especially those who are suffering from depression. The reader would be uplifted by the words being written here. A very engaging and powerful book.

How often have we heard that the quest for happiness is somehow selfish, hedonistic and unworthy? It seems bizarre that most therapists have seen countless people who have felt guilt because they wanted to be happy.

Yet the human drive to be happy is a fundamental need that was recognized by the Ancient Greeks, Taoists in China and Hindus in India, as well as contemporary "Positive" psychologists. It is sad to learn that according to a recent Gallup poll, only a minority of Americans describe themselves as "very happy." It's easy to say, "Well what should we expect? Just watch the news." But that misses the point: most of us have never been taught how to unlock the secrets of happiness, joy and inner peace. Secrets that can help sustain us in the face of adversity.

Yogananda's Autobiography of a Yogi has remained a firm favorite since my teens, and many of his other books and lectures have been inspirational. What is always so different about his work is that he clearly writes and speaks from personal experience, unlike so many who only recite what they have heard or read. I did not know just how much material remained unpublished.

This short but meaty book consists of material that has apparently never been released before. As with his other books, his approach is powerful, but his style could best be described as rather playful. In just 143 pages, excluding the index and other resources, Yogananda explains virtually everything that you need to know to lead a happier and more fulfilling life.

He covers a number of important topics including:
1. Looking for happiness in the wrong place
2. Happiness is a choice
3. Avoiding the happiness
4. Learn to behave
5. Simplicity is the key
6. Sharing your happiness with others
7. True success and prosperity
8. Inner freedom and joy
9. Finding God is the greatest happiness

This is one of those books that you could read in a couple of hours. But its fruits could stay with you for a lifetime. It gives you not just ideas, but practical skills, and there will likely be single passages on which you will want to meditate before moving on to anything else. It is a book that for many people can be life-changing.

Highly recommended.


Richard G. Petty, MD, author of Healing, Meaning and Purpose: The Magical Power of the Emerging Laws of Life

What a pleasure to read Yogananda's words after being edited by someone determined to preserve the master's personality and spirit. So many of the books available today on Yogananda's teachings have a stilted quality. But, while reading this book, one has the sense of the yoga master sitting at one's side--spontaneously sharing his insights on every aspect of how to find and maintain inner joy through all the ups and downs of life.

This little book is a pleasure to read, and is chock full of helpful information and advice. Many books have been written on this subject, but none that I have read had the well-rounded and in-depth perspective of this one. A treasure!

Richard Salva--author of Soul Journey from Lincoln to Lindbergh [UNABRIDGED]

"If you were stranded on a desert island and could have only one book, what would it be?" Well, actually, I'd ask for five - but this would be one of them. This is the best 'how to' book I've ever read. Yogananda's perspective on the human condition will turn your own perspective inside-out (or outside-in). His approach is deceptively simple, but you'll find yourself saying, "Ahhhh, that's why I have that problem." More importantly, he gives simple ways to get out of our ruts, moods, and personal quagmires. I know his hints work, because I've tried them.

The chapter titles will give you a good idea of the type of helpful how-to hints in this book:
1. Looking for Happiness in the Wrong Place
2. Happiness is a Choice
3. Avoiding the Happiness Thieves
4. Learn to Behave
5. Simplicity is the Key
6. Sharing Your Happiness With Others
7. True Success and Prosperity
8. Inner Freedom and Joy
9. Finding God is the Greatest Happiness

Here is an excerpt:

"Happiness consists in making the mightiest efforts to reduce your desires and needs, and in cultivating the ability to meet those needs at will, always trying to smile, both outwardly and inwardly, in spite of every predicament.

"Be silent and calm every night for at least ten minutes (longer if possible) before you retire, and again in the morning before rising. This will produce an undaunted, unbreakable inner habit of happiness that will make you able to meet all the trying situations of the everyday battle of life. With that unchangeable happiness within, go about seeking to fulfill the demands of your day.

"Seek happiness more in your mind and less in the acquisition of things. Be so happy in your mind that nothing that comes can possibly make you unhappy. Then, you can get along without things you have been accustomed to. Be happy knowing you have acquired the power not to be negative. Know, too, that you will never again become so materially minded that you forget your inner happiness, even if you become a millionaire."

Even though Yogananda's photograph is on the front cover, you are going to be disappointed if you think this book was written by Yogananda or published by his organization:

Let us have a little exercise in guided imagery here. You are to become a great spiritual figure of our time and are told that it is your destiny to travel to a foreign land, establish a world-wide organization, write many books, and help countless people.

In time, you arrive in America, start your organization and spend many long hours authoring books - one which ultimately becomes a best seller and is used in hundreds of university comparative religion classes. This autobiography of yours is a jewel and eventually becomes a classic! In it, you write personal things about your family history, the long and extensive training you've had with your spiritual teacher, the great saints and historical figures you've met, and your experiences in America. You also spend countless hours creating, composing, and disseminating a very lengthy series of lessons to help others on their path, and you hand pick board members to carry on the work of your organization when you are gone. The road traveled has not always been easy, money has at times been lacking....but ultimately forthcoming. There have been a few betrayals. However, you are very determined and very devoted to God.

You accept a man into your organization from Romania, by the name of J. Donald Walters, and he spends only three years with you before you die.

After your death, Walters travels to India and does stuff that almost gets your whole organization expelled from the country. He also goes against rules (already established involving the proper conduct of your members) because.....well, he just can't keep his pants zipped and continually breaks his monastic vows. Your board is left with having to tell this guy to take a hike. However, he doesn't just leave, but has absconded your extensive writings, pictures, songs, etc., taking MUCH with him when he goes. He starts his own church and publishing company and begins to make money off of YOUR autobiography (calls it the `original') and continues to sell your works, and the LESSONS that you learned and formulated from your training and which your official organization still publishes to this day! Your singularly authored `to be published' tomes? Yep, he has gotten a jump on `em! Although, they're never as good as the one's published by your organization. A tiny consolation, though.

You, Dear Reader: Meet Swami Kriyananda founder of Ananda, The Expanding Light, Crystal Clarity Publishers, and Ananda Sangha Publications. To make matters worse, he touts himself as your 'direct disciple' from the three years spent on and off with you in order to give some weight to YOUR writings that he is selling! He continues to live off of your good name and has members constantly trashing your organization all over the internet.

To conclude this little visual exercise, I don't know how you would feel if all this happened to you, but if it did.....personally speaking, I think the guy would have one hell of a nerve to put your photo on any of his Crystal Clarity books, his website, or anywhere else for that matter!

Self-Realization Fellowship and Yogoda Satsanga Society are the ONLY organizations Paramahansa Yogananda founded and worked tirelessly for and are the ONLY publishers of his writings.

Do not waste your money on this book.

I've read I believe all of Paramahansa's books. Of all of them, this one feels, in a word, "edited". It feels to me like a lot of the passages come more from the mind rather than from the heart. I think a lot of the words came from people other than Paramahansa. There is still a lot of wisdom in the book and a lot of words that touch the heart that seem to come directly from Paramahansa. But of all the Paramahansa books out there I would recommned this one the least.

They even use less preferred spelling of his name Paramhansa rather than Paramahansa.

If you really want to get fired up for God read Paramahansa's "Man's Eternal Quest"..especially the second half of book.

The most important condition for happiness is even-mindedness, and here the author of AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A YOGI brings some of this sense to a treatise on how to be happy under virtually any condition. From identifying habits, thoughts, and practices which steal from happiness to understanding simplicity is the key and sharing happiness with others, HOW TO BE HAPPY ALL THE TIME: THE WISDOM OF YOGANANDA, V. 1 is a fine starting point for reaching contentment.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

This book is filled with pearls of wisdom. As always, Yogananda's advice is profound and practical at the same time. I love the passage where he says:

"Just remember to start being happy now, and every moment say, 'I am happy now! If you can continously do that, then when you look back you can say, 'I have been very happy.' When you look at yourself now, you will say, 'I am happy,' and when you look ahead you will say, "I know I shall be happy.' All your future happiness depends upon how happy you are now, so start being happy NOW."

I read a little bit to start each day and can honestly say I am happy to have found this book!

A very inspirational book! Teachings of Parahansa Yogananda to live a happy life within yourself and sharing that happines with other people.

This is a book that I will keep around and reread many times. If you're struggling for peace and contentment, these teachings will give you a great place to start the process.