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There is the Jiva and there is his Jivana - in and through the pleasures and pains of his life, he pines for an ideal, an anchor. Ready for a forty step journey that takes you to unimaginable heights? Each milestone helps you checkout where you have reached and what you should do next. Between the test and rest, you are guided for the glide. Bhagavan Sankaracharya's precision coupled with Swami Chinmayananda's elaborations give you illuminations.

The first section of this book contains talks by the author in 1969 on Mother’s Four Austerities and Four Liberations. The second part consists of talks given between 1985-1988 on the Mother’s affirmative approach to life and various specific themes illustrating this approach. Topics covered include Fourfold Perfection, Affirmative Spirituality, The Human Potential, Sadhana in the Integral Yoga, Personal Development, Sleep and Dream and many more insights into following a spiritual path while embracing an active life in the world.

None else could have made a better presentation on the practice side of Hindu religion, with its underlining concepts of Hindu faith, than Dr. Nalini Kanta Brahma. His classic work, Philosophy of Hindu Sadhana, is now being relaunched in the Eastern Economy Edition for the benefit of students, researchers, and all those who have an abiding interest in philosophy and religion. The author stresses those characteristics of Hindu religion that bring out its kinship with the higher religious thoughts of the world so that the reader can discern a common fabric of organic unity of higher religions. The text brings to fore the correlation between theory and practice of different Hindu philosophical systems. Sadhana, the instrument to attain perfection as propounded in Hindu Philosophy—being a means to a better end—has been discussed in the text in its various forms as followed by different religious systems of the Hindus. Part I of the book deals with the function and characteristics of Hindu Sadhana in general. Part II elucidates the specific forms of Hindu Sadhana that includes Karma, the path of prescribed actions, Jnana, the path of higher intellect, and Bhakti, the path of devotional worship. The book also deals with Yoga, the form of Sadhana as propounded by Patanjali. Finally, it emphasizes the importance and value of discipline and devotion that are inherent in the good practice of Hindu religion.

This book is an endeavor to represent the mind of a musician seeking the ideal. In the process there has been a journey into the past and a peep into the future to arrive at a balance for an ideal present. Dr. Pantula Rama has been bestowed with the greatest of boons in form of her family background of music and her Guru Sri Ivaturi Vijayeswara Rao, who created an insight required for this work. Rama, chose to interview 13 maestors of the field who are the bridging brigade for the past and the present. Their valuable views have been presented in this research work.