by Christopher Key Chapple, Maureen Shannon-Chapple and Glenn P. James
After teaching Yoga for several years in her home, Gurani Anjali and a group of devoted students found a thousand square foot hayloft that had been used as an artist’s studio on Merrick Road in Amityville on Long Island’s South Shore. They rehabilitated it to form the first dedicated Yoga space on Long Island. In the fall of 1972, Yoga Anand Ashram was born. A non-profit organization registered with the State of New York for philosophical, educational, scientific, and cultural endeavors, the Ashram continues to offer training in the practices of classical Yoga as found in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra.
The basic format of the Ashram remains the same: foundational Yoga training that emphasizes ethical disciplines and observances (yama and niyama), Yoga postures (asana), breathing exercises (pranayama) that lead to inwardness (pratyahara) and advanced forms of spirituality characterized by focused attention (dharana), meditation (dhyana), and moments of spiritual release (samadhi).
A group of people known as pillars dedicated themselves to building the Ashram and received special training, usually early on Sunday morning before the public meditation session. Gurani Anjali also initiated a group specifically for the education and spiritual support of women in the mid 1970s. Many of the members of the Ashram were students at the State University of New York at Stony Brook twenty five miles to the northeast. A branch of the Ashram was opened for a couple of years in a loft space above a Chinese restaurant in East Setauket, adjacent to the university.
During the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, Gurani Anjali composed scores of songs and published two books: Ways of Yoga, based on her discourses, and Rtu, a collection of meditational poems. Her recorded meditations and lectures continue to be transcribed for publication and her songs have spread and are enjoyed by Yoga students around the world. They are still performed by some of her dedicated students and musicians.
She arranged for the Ashram to honor, celebrate and support the sacredness of the profound movements and landmarks of life. She celebrated the four seasons with festivals to honor, in turn, the harvest, the dark and cold of winter, the coming of spring, and the warmth of summer. There were also sacred celebrations to honor the importance of teachers, the divine connection of the unmanifest and manifest (deva/devi) in our lives, as well as sanga gatherings to honor and commune with fellow travelers on the spiritual path. To honor the place of learning, puja was performed at the Ashram each morning and afternoon at sunrise and sunset, at which time the pujari would clean the havan (altar), freshen the flowers, and bless the havan and the four corners of the room with the Gayatri Mantra.
Opportunities for Karma Yoga sprouted from the Ashram in abundance: a Woman’s Tailoring Shop in a small roadside shed and the Shakti Sangam Store, which offered health food, books, and incense in the storefront directly below the Ashram, were the first such endeavors. In the late 1970s and early 1980s the Ashram’s women’s group, Shakti Sangam, established The Amityville Art Gallery, which mounted exhibits of local artists and taught classes in a variety of media. The restaurant, Santosha Vegetarian Dining, provided abundant opportunities for Ashram members to perform Karma Yoga and attracted the notice of the New York Times, Newsday, and a steady clientele attracted to the then-novel cuisine. Due to the demands of other endeavors the membership decided to close Santosha Vegetarian Dining in 2002.
In the early 1980s, the Ashram purchased a two-store building a few blocks away and opened Moksha Bookshop and Community Education Center. This was an important venue for many of the educational pursuits of the membership and local community by offering lectures, courses and seminars by both local and visiting educators. Professors Antonio T. de Nicolas and Ernest G. McClain both lectured at the bookstore, as did other scholars including Robert Neville, William Chittick, Thomas Berry, Anne Feldhaus, Raoul Birnbaum, and many others. Vajra Printing and Publishing was established in the back of the bookstore which was instrumental in the publishing of Ways of Yoga, Rtu Meditational Poems and the Moksha Journals. The Ashram has since combined the store fronts into one larger space for Yoga classes and meditation in Amityville, NY.