Yoga is a life of self-discipline. Yoga balances, harmonizes, purifies and strengthens the body, mind and soul. It shows the way to perfect health, perfect mind control and perfect peace with one's own Self, the world, nature and God.

- Swami Vishnu-devananda

Swami Vishnu-devananda was sent to the West by his master Swami Sivananda with the instruction to spread the teachings of yoga and Vedanta. In 1957 he founded the International Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centers which now offers more than thirty centers and ashrams worldwide. We are a non-profit organization whose purpose is to propagate the teachings of yoga and vedanta as a means of achieving physical, mental and spiritual well being and Self-realization.


Swami Vishnu-devananda was the first in the West to develop a training program for yoga teachers. He did this not only with the vision to develop yoga professionals, but also to give sincere aspirants the skills of personal discipline and to develop messengers of peace. The Course is a profound, personal experience, based on the ancient gurukula teaching system, integrating the student's daily life into the yoga training. By the end of the intensive four-week course the student will possess a firm foundation for teaching others, in addition to strengthening his or her own yoga practice with self-discipline and awareness of the nature of body, mind and spirit. Upon graduation from the course, students receive a certificate of qualification. The program has seen the graduation of more than eleven thousand students over the last thirty years. Men and women come from all around the world take part in the training, which is given in English with simultaneous translation into European languages, as well as Hebrew, Japanese, Hindi, Tamil and Malayalam.


The spiritual strength behind the Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centers. Swami Sivananda's teachings are a synthesis of all formal doctrines of Yoga. Author of more than three hundred books on Yoga and health, Swami Sivananda was a medical doctor before renouncing worldly life for the spiritual path. His main message: serve, love give, purify, meditate, realize.


Sent to the West in 1957 by his Master Swami Sivananda to spread the teachings of Yoga and Vedanta, Swami Vishnu-devananda is a world authority on Hatha Yoga and Raja Yoga. Founder of the International Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centers, he worked tirelessly to spread his message of world peace. He is the author of the bestsellers The Complete Illustrated Book of Yoga and Meditation and Mantras.