Adi Da Up Close
Audio/Video Library

Danavira Mela, celebrated at Adi Da Samrajashram. A slideshow containing festive scenes from Qaravi, Lion's Lap, Picture Perfect, Cow Catcher, and the Inner Courtyard of the Matrix. The video clip ends with pictures of Beloved Adi Da granting Darshan while sitting in front of the window of His bedroom (which is decorated for the season).

The soundtrack includes holiday music, and devotee John Mackay's "There Is Only Light" (from the album, Danavira), which draws on the Qawwali tradition of Sufi devotional music, and resonates with the celebration of Light-In-Everybody.

Tags: Danavira Mela  
Comments: 5

Bhagavan Adi Da performs a decoration puja on the Spirit-Tree of Light in Is-Da-Happen, on Adi Da Samrajashram, on November 18, 2007, as part of the celebration of Danavira Mela.

Tags: Danavira Mela  
Comments: 2

From a presentation about the Silver Hall at Adi Da Samrajashram. Edited by Alan Corne.

Adi Da recites His "Five Reality-Teachings", as we watch scenes from Adi Da Samrajashram, followed by Darshan of Avatar Adi Da.

Notice this:

1. You are not the one who wakes, or dreams, or sleeps.

2. You Are the actionless and formless Mere Witness of the three common states — of waking, dreaming and sleeping — and of all the apparent contents and “experiences” associated with the three common states, of waking, and of dreaming, and of sleeping.

3. You are not the body, or the doer of action, or the doer of even any of the body’s actions or functions.

4. You are not the mind, or the thinker, or the doer of even any of the actions or functions of mind or of body-mind.

5. No matter what arises — whether as or in the state of waking, or of dreaming, or of sleeping — you Are the actionless, and formless, and thought-free Mere Witness of attention itself, and of every apparent “object” of attention, and of any and every state of “experience”, and of the entirety of whatever and all that arises.

Always intensively “consider” these Five Reality-Teachings.

Always intensively observe and notice every moment of your “experience” — whether waking, dreaming, or sleeping — and, thus and thereby, “consider” and test and directly prove these Five Reality-Teachings in the moment-to-moment of your every kind and state of “experience”.

Avatar Adi Da Samraj, pp. 559-561, The Gnosticon

Tags: Darshan  
Comments: 1

Darshan (Sacred Sighting) of His Divine Presence Adi Da Samraj on December 23, 2006, at Adi Da Samrajashram.

Tags: Darshan  

On Christmas Eve, 1978, dressed in holiday red ("I just happened to pick this out for tonight"), Adi Da Samraj gathered with devotees in Land Bridge Pavilion at the Mountain Of Attention Sanctuary, and gave what became known as "the Christmas Talk". (This video clip is an excerpt from that talk.) He discussed devotees' childhood religious beliefs about Jesus and and sang, with devotees, holiday songs and carols from the various religious traditions represented by devotees from around the world.

Comments: 1

An extraordinary, ecstatic talk given by Adi Da on February 4, 1994, at Adi Da Samrajashram, about the nature of the Guru-devotee relationship, when truly and fully lived and animated, as Adi Da Himself illustrates here.

The talk was first published in the book, Ishta.

Comments: 2

A report in June, 2016 on the state of Naitauba, three months after the devastating destruction wrought by Cyclone Winston on February 20, 2016.

Interviews with Michiel Vos (Samrajya Administrator), Grace Evans (retreatant from California), Carol Smith (resident), Susie Bagshaw (Taveuni Support and Fijian Advocacy), Naamleela Free Jones (daughter of Adi Da Samraj), Joy Harland (resident), Andrew Savio (retreatant from Melbourne, Australia), Nicholas Wagner (public guest from Cape Town, South Africa), Da-vid Forsythe (resident), Ruchiradama Nadikanta (Ruchira Sannyasin Order), Jeff Hughes (retreatant from Taveuni, Fiji), and Ryan Bass (retreatant from Cape Town, South Africa).

While much has been done to restore Naitauba since the damage of Cyclone Winston (some of it reported in this video), much more recovery and restoration work and work aimed at minimizing the damage from future cyclones is still needed. You can find out more here.

Tags: Naitauba  
Comments: 1

James Steinberg is interviewed on the podcast, Vajra Body Vajra Mind. Vajra Body Vajra Mind is a provocative podcast that explores the outer limits of spiritual practice and human development. James Steinberg is a longtime devotee of Adi Da, and the author of Divine Distraction and Love of the God-Man.

In this episode of Vajra Body Vajra Mind, we discuss James' life with Adi Da. We talk about the practice of Guru Yoga, challenges in reading Adi Da's Teaching, anti-Guru sentiment in contemporary culture, sexuality in spirituality, the importance of discipline in the Way of Adidam, the unique Transmission of Adi Da's Revelation and Presence (through photographs, videos, Image-Art, etc), resistance to the Guru by the ego, positive disillusionment (aka "the Lesson of Life"), and more.

Comments: 2

Excerpt from the Florence Dance Company's performance of the multimedia dance event, Orpheus Ascending, with Adi Da's Image-Art in the background. The music is Ray Lynch's "Passion Song", from his album, Nothing Above My Shoulders but the Evening.

Orpheus Ascending was a highlight of the October 8, 2015 Finissage Event for The Ascent of Orpheus, the exhibition of Adi Da's art at the Bargello Museum in Florence that ran from July 9 to October 11, 2015.

Choreography: Keith Ferrone
Artistic direction: Marga Nativo
Featured dancers:
Daniel Sandwiches (Orpheus)
Ylenia Mendolicchio (Eurydice)
Emilia Giubasso (chorus)
Virginia Montel Brains (chorus)
Jane Llaha (chorus)
Elisa Torrigiani (chorus)

The video clip is from a longer Toscana TV News clip with noted journalist Fabrizio Borghini reporting on the Finissage Event.

Tags: Florence Dance Company   Image-Art  

Scenes of the devastation created by the Valley Fire in September, 2015, in the areas near and at The Mountain Of Attention Sanctuary in Northern California.

For more on the Valley Fire at The Mountain Of Attention, click here.

This is an excerpt from a much longer video tour available on the Lake County Magazine YouTube channel.

Tags: Mountain Of Attention  

In this excerpt from the double CD, The Grace of Turning to Me, Adi Da describes how "turning to Him" — the moment-to-moment turning of the faculties of the body-mind to Him — must be based on the Graceful recognition of Him as the Divine and response to Him based on that recognition.

On this double CD, Adi Da uses every Compassionate Means in His Manner — sometimes Humorous, sometimes Fiery — to Call His devotees, again and again, to be sensitive to the Grace-Given and spontaneous heart-Attraction to Him, and thereby turn to Him, the Divine in human Form — rather than to the endless content of the body-mind, which only reinforces egoic bondage and the illusion of separateness. In this way, Avatar Adi Da Masterfully Reveals the secret of True Liberation in His Avataric Divine Company.

The talks on this double CD were drawn from Avataric Discourses that took place in 2004.

Tags: avataric discourse   CD  

An excerpt from the video, Reality, Truth, and Conscious Light. Includes a video clip (starting at 1:38) from a formal Darshan occasion on Adi Da Samrajashram that took place on August 6, 2008.

To watch the complete video, and talk with longtime devotees of Adi Da, we invite you to attend one of our Reality, Truth, and Conscious Light introductory events held in Adidam regions around the world each month.

Narrator: Nick Elias

Tags: Darshan  

Devotee James Steinberg is interviewed about Adi Da and Adidam on 3WBC 94.1 FM, Melbourne, Australia on October 16, 2014, for the program, "Jazz and Spiritual", hosted by Bill Livingston, Minister at Unity of Melbourne. Australian devotee Jan Bucknell also joins in the conversation every now and then.

The program ends (at 47:14) with a recording of Adi Da reciting from The Spiritual Gospel of Jesus of Galilee, Adi Da's rendition of "The New Testament" (available on CD).

Music (during breaks) from Naamleela Free Jones' CD, In The Time Of Light; and from What To Remember To Be Happy (reciter: Jonah Strauss, piano: Ray Lynch).

Tags: interview   radio   CD   James Steinberg  
Comments: 1

Adi Da visiting The Mountain of Attention Sanctuary, Northern California, in the summer of 2005.

To receive the physical touch of one's Master is an extraordinary gift. Many of the devotees in this clip have testified that, when they received His touch, Bhagavan Adi Da knew the deepest longings of their heart.

From 7:49 to end of clip: Adi Da grants devotees Darshan as He sits in front of Ordeal Bath Lodge.

Background music is Ray Lynch's "The Temple", from his album, The Sky Of Mind.

Tags: Darshan   Mountain Of Attention  
Comments: 5

Adi Da: "Nothing in [the devotee] is one with God. So the Divine Activity is generated to make that person one with God. The Divine does the Yoga. The Divine Assumes His Oneness with the devotee. He does not create means, methods to be generated in dilemma, experiential paths by which to realize that Oneness — He simply Establishes It."

"The way for such a devotee, then, is simply to be a devotee: to simply live that relationship as the Principle and Condition of his life. And if he does that, then the conscious and formal Qualities that are native to the Divine Condition are generated spontaneously and intelligently within him."

Comments: 1