from “Who & What is Swami Kriyananda?”

by Swami Kriyananda

Didn’t Yogananda Give the SRF Directors a “Blueprint”?

“Isn’t it true that Master gave the board of directors the ‘blueprint’ for the future of the work?”

Swami Kriyananda answers:

He gave a few hints and suggestions, true. A carefully drawn blueprint, however? No. What Master said many times was, “The blueprint is in the ether.” His way in training us was to indicate directions, but then to leave it to us to discover the way. Only thus would we deepen our attunement with him.

For example, when he put me in charge of the monks he forced me to tune into his guidance inwardly, rather than go to him constantly for advice. He approved of what I was doing, but in the way he answered whatever questions I put to him he showed that he wanted me to deepen my own understanding by inner attunement with him. The disciple’s job is to bring the “blueprint” of his guru’s mission down from “the ether” into outward manifestation.

From Chapter 30

A Place Called Ananda

by Swami Kriyananda

A word that is frequently used by SRF is “the blueprint”—as if Yogananda had sat the directors down and dictated to them his exact wishes for the work. He did nothing of the kind! “The blueprint,” he used to say, “is in the ether.” The pattern “ordained by God” (as he expressed it to Dr. Lewis) remained for his disciples to work out. Even in the responsibilities he gave me personally, which were considerable, he left it mostly to me to tune in to his will and apply it according to my own ability to perceive. If I needed help, he supplied it, but his way with his disciples was to help them develop their own intuition. The so-called “blueprint,” then, is simply an organizational ploy for exercising control.