The First Step
The first step is to write to Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami (see email below) and share with him your spiritual experiences and intentions and a little about yourself. After Satguru Bodhinatha receives your email, one of the swamis will connect with you to arrange a first visit to the monastery. Please do not make plans to come until approval is given. You will be asked to fill out a “Getting to Know You” application and complete a simple at-home study course. You will also be asked to be celibate and have refrained from taking any illegal substances for at least six months before visiting. During your days on the island, we will provide accommodations nearby and meals, and you will enter the monastery each day to serve alongside the monks, worship in our temple and meditate. After this initial visit, you would return home and think over the experience.
If you decide to pursue monastic life, and meet the qualifications, you would return to the monastery and take a simple premonastic pledge for six months at a time for the first year or two. After that, renewable two-year vows of celibacy, obedience, humility and confidence are given.
If you are not a Hindu, you will be guided to go through the full conversion steps to Hinduism before returning to the Aadheenam. Our book How to Become a Hindu provides the details on this process.
As a way to learn about our spiritual lineage, you may find it helpful to read the detailed history of our Nandinatha lineage in our book, The Guru Chronicles.
Our small monastic order accepts men only, Women interested in Hindu monastic life are encouraged to google other orders or ashrams that are for or include women, such as Mata Amritanandamayi centers, the Sarada Convent in southern California, and the Svami Gitananda Ashram in Italy.
Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami
Email: bodhi@hindu.org
See this page for further details