On the Siddha Yoga path, the month of July is typically associated with the celebration of Gurupurnima. I say “typically” because Gurupurnima is a lunar holiday, occurring on the full moon in the month of Ashadha in the Indian calendar, and this often corresponds to July in the Western calendar. This year, in 2026, Gurupurnima will take place on July 29.

You can read the story here of how Gurupurnima, a celebration with deep roots in Indian culture, came into being. For now, I’ll give a brief synopsis. Gurupurnima is a celebration that was initiated millennia ago by the disciples of the great sage Veda Vyasa. They expressed to their Guru their wish to honor him, to convey their enormous gratitude. Taking compassion on his disciples, the sage told them that they could dedicate one day of the year specifically for this purpose. The disciples promptly chose the full-moon day in Ashadha, and the occasion became known as Gurupurnima, the “full moon of the Guru.”

For Siddha Yogis and new seekers, Gurupurnima—the day and, in fact, the whole month surrounding it—is a time to honor the Gurus of the Siddha Yoga lineage: Gurumayi Chidvilasananda, Baba Muktananda, and Bhagavan Nityananda. To better understand how we can honor the Gurus, we can, as ever, look to the Siddha Yoga path website.

A good place to start (though, truly speaking, anywhere you click on the homepage of the Siddha Yoga path website would constitute a “good place to start”) is the invitation to offer Gurupurnima dakshina from Lilavati Stewart Sutcliffe. While we have an array of practices that we can select from when celebrating the Siddha Yoga holidays—and that, to me, is part of what makes them so fun, so joyful—sometimes there’s a practice that we give special attention to on a particular holiday. For Gurupurnima, that would be the offering of dakshina. (If you wish to learn more about dakshina, or to refresh your understanding of this practice, you will find resources on the website to support you in doing so—an exposition by a Siddha Yoga scholar, for example, and questions and answers about dakshina with a Siddha Yoga Swami.)

From there, we might bring our focus to Veneration of Shri Guru. Now, let me just say—I have been waiting eagerly to tell you about this new collection of words on the website. I am so glad the moment has arrived!

Here’s the story. A few weeks ago, in anticipation of Gurupurnima month, I met with a couple of my seva colleagues. We all love words, and my colleagues are scholars of Indian languages like Sanskrit. As an offering to Gurumayi, we decided to prepare a collection of Sanskrit terms relating to the Guru, along with their corresponding English translations. Many of these terms come from the scriptures of India. Some of them describe the nature of the Guru, or a specific aspect of the Guru. Some of them detail what the Guru bestows upon the disciple. And some explain the attitude that a disciple holds toward the Guru, the actions the disciple takes, the practices they participate in.

Time and again, I have observed that whenever anyone gives a gift to Gurumayi, she thinks of how that gift can be shared with the Siddha Yoga sangham. You might recall my telling you before that this is how I first began writing for the Siddha Yoga path website, nearly ten years ago. I had been writing letters to Gurumayi about my experiences in sadhana, my insights, and she asked that I share my thoughts with all of you!

Coming back to Gurupurnima, then—when Gurumayi received the offering of Sanskrit words that my colleagues and I had prepared, she very graciously acknowledged us for the work we had done, noting how each word we had chosen was profound and significant for what it illustrates about the Guru, the disciple, and the Guru-disciple relationship. Gurumayi then spoke about how beneficial it would be if all Siddha Yogis and new seekers could learn about these terms. Therefore, each day throughout July, one of these terms will be featured on the Siddha Yoga path website.

As will soon become evident, all of the words begin with Guru (or to be more precise, Shri Guru, when we include the honorific Shri). These are compound words, meaning that they are made up of stand-alone words that have been combined—and the first part of each compound refers to the Guru. When my colleagues and I were working on this collection, I was reminded of an iconic analogy that Gurumayi and Baba Muktananda have given in satsang. Gurumayi and Baba would explain that everything in a person’s life can be thought of as a “zero.” The person might have many things, but that only means that they have amassed many zeroes! When they meet the Guru, however, and are awakened to the knowledge of the Self, it is akin to putting the number “1” in front of all those zeroes. The zeroes acquire real and greater value. 

This, then, is a snapshot—just a couple of highlights—of what you will find on the Siddha Yoga path website during Gurupurnima month. In all honesty, I’ve barely touched upon the wealth of material that is available for your study—the teachings, essays, stories, hymns, photographs, and more. I encourage you to explore all of this for yourself throughout July, by clicking through the pages that have been especially curated for the celebration of Gurupurnima.

The benefits of doing so are manifold. I could dedicate a separate essay to enumerating them! Once again, though, I’ll focus on some highlights. I see our active engagement with the teachings on the Siddha Yoga path website as a means of participating in Guru-shishya parampara—that is, in the tradition of Guru and disciple that has persisted since time immemorial. The continuation of this tradition relies on the Guru’s imparting of knowledge to the disciple, as well as the disciple’s acceptance and application of that knowledge. Each day, Gurumayi is imparting her teachings through the website. And each day, we can make the choice to study these teachings, to practice them, to assimilate and implement them in our lives. When we do this, we uphold our responsibility as disciples and students of the Guru. We see to it that the Guru’s wisdom, the Guru’s light, proliferate in our world.

I also find that my own study of the website—and the consequent deepening of my knowledge and experience of the Guru-disciple relationship—supports me in yet another one of the essential practices of the Siddha Yoga path. Darshan.

Receiving darshan of the Guru is a practice that I engage in daily. I am grateful that at this time in my life, I have the opportunity to live and offer seva where my Guru resides. Receiving darshan of Gurumayi in her physical form is of the utmost importance to me—and I pay heed to the guidance Gurumayi has given about how we can receive the Guru’s darshan in a myriad of ways.

The experience of darshan takes place within. I know that many Siddha Yogis and new seekers experience darshan when they remember the Guru’s glance—when they picture, and feel, what it is to be seen the way the Guru sees us. They experience darshan when they sink into the Guru’s silence, synonymous as it is with the silence of their own soul, or when they call forth the Guru’s wisdom. They experience darshan when they envision the Guru before them—and when they connect with the Guru’s presence, subtle yet so perceptible, in their hearts. Gurumayi has said, “The practice of darshan is a scripture in itself.”

I’d like to conclude—or perhaps begin, as that’s what we are doing as we embark upon our monthlong celebration of Gurupurnima—by recalling a verse from Shri Guru Gita. I chose this verse because it feels apropos of what I have been speaking of here.

In the verse, Lord Shiva—the Adi Guru, the primordial Guru—says to the goddess Parvati:

mantrarājam idaṁ devi gurur ityakṣaradvayam |
smṛtivedārthavākyena guruḥ sākṣāt paraṁ padam ||

This word Guru, composed of two letters (gu and ru), is the king of mantras.
According to the teachings of the Vedas and Smritis,
the Guru is the highest reality itself.¹