“Yogananda Raises Ideas And Thoughts That Are Mental Bombs”
Actor Rafael Álvarez El Brujo, captivated by the philosophy of the yogi Paramahansa Yogananda, offers his particular vision of “Autobiography of a yogi” on stage . Yogananda, one of the mystical references of India, was the promoter of Rāja yoga in the West.
The actor Rafael Álvarez, el Brujo, has broken the mold by bringing to the theater the book Autobiography of a Yogi (Editorial Self-Realization Fellowship), by the Hindu Paramahansa Yogananda (1893-1952).
From heart to heart, this Yogananda devotee, who practices his line of meditation and “talks” to the guru every day, has opted for a work that, translated into 50 languages, has changed many lives.
He will perform it at the Cofidis Alcázar Theater, in Madrid, until November 12.
Rafael Álvarez el Brujo plays Yogananda
– What is for you Autobiography of a Yogi ?
–The text is a great gift for which I have been preparing, because it is connected with my personal commitment to Master Yogananda, whose autobiography has changed lives and opened doors and minds in many people.
– How has Yogananda changed you?
–Your book raises ideas and thoughts that are mental bombs. He came into my life as a force that breaks down walls and prejudices of the mind, and entrenched ways of seeing the world that you cling to. Its dimension of knowledge is a very powerful impact that opens you to suggestions to resume your life with incredible enthusiasm. I have had different mystical moments of crisis and, after them, a great light has entered and another landscape has been formed with other vegetation.
My evolutionary path is full of turning points that take you from one moment of your consciousness to others, richer, broader, more spiritual.
– “In the cosmic consciousness, the big and the small have the same weight,” says Yogananda.
– This sentence is very big and one of the ones that most caught my attention in your biography. He also says that everything is planned in a meticulous way, lest the universe fall somewhere because a pin is missing. So this interconnected vision gives value to everything. We are all protagonists, no matter how small we feel, and we are part of the unfolding of the immense energy of the universe.
“We are all protagonists, no matter how small we feel”
The difference between big and small only exists in the human mind but not in the divine dimension. This applied to psychology can restore self-esteem to those who believe that they have nothing to do in this life.
“Do we need a yogi in our lives?”
–We need the yogi that each one of us could be. But to awaken that inner strength that we all carry requires a process and an orientation, like that of the guru, who is what awakens it when one is not yet convinced of their own power.
– Is it by chance that today spirituality is sought?
– Nothing is accidental. Chance is the way of saying that you don’t understand the connections, the events. Everything is subjected to a force that has originated another and so on. There are many variables connecting and that produces a result, but they are concatenations of causes.
“Everything is subjected to a force that has originated another and so on”
–You practice the meditation technique of kriya yoga.
–Yogananda says in his writings that this powerful breathing technique had been designed by Babaji in a vision and encounter with Christ to offer it to the world and that the souls who seek the way back to the source will find in it a quick way to go towards God. Then Babaji initiated his disciple Lahiri Mahasaya in it and commissioned him to spread it in the 20th century to get humanity out of its complexities.
“Why would you argue with Yogananda?”
–I talk to him always and he always gives me an answer and generally I almost know what he is going to answer me. I am stubborn and sometimes I rebel and raise inconsistencies and then he explains to me the root of that evil, because sometimes you want to hear something else, a balm, not where the root is.
