Swami Chidananda has been a speaker, writer, and teacher of spiritual topics for nearly four decades. He is the founder, trustee and chief resource person of FOWAI FORUM, a non-government organisation (NGO) engaged in dialogues on human values, promotion of spiritual studies, and serving all life forms. Born in 1957 in Kundapura (Udupi District, Karnataka), he received B.E. from Mysore University in 1980) and M.Tech. from IIT Madras in 1982. He served at Hindustan Computers (HCL) in hardware R&D for two years and also taught at Bangalore Institute of Technology for three years. He knows English, Kannada, Hindi, and Sanskrit. At the young age of 23, he was inspired by the uplifting discourses of his mentor Swami Chinmayananda. He served at Chinmaya Mission for 18 years (1984-2002) and later was at Krishnamurti Foundation India, Varanasi for 10 years (2003 – 2013). His thought evolved through coming in contact with the works of several great thinkers, notable among them being Ramana Maharshi and Jiddu Krishnamurti.
I got in touch with Swami Chidananda many years ago at IIT Delhi when I was the coordinator of the Vivekananda Study Circle there, and have had many very interesting and inspiring discussions with him on many topics related to Indian philosophy. This blog is an edited transcript of one such online discussion held with him on July 07, 2023.
