I recently had the honor of sitting with Swami Veda Bharati at the Yoga Meditation Center in Minneapolis, where he has lived since 1967. Actually, he travels all over the world teaching and counseling students of hatha yoga, which involves the practice of asanas, or postures, as well as breathing exercises.

Sitting in the mansion that houses the Meditation Center, Swami Veda, 65, is a picture of relaxation and peace. He wears a saffron-colored robe and shawl, to remind us of the rising sun. His beard and hair nearly cover his face. His smile is constant, radiating the love he has for people and for his religion.

He was a student of the late Swami Rama, who founded the Yoga Meditation Center before moving to Chicago to begin a meditation center there and, later, to Pennsylvania, where he lived and taught during his last years.

Swami Rama was taught from an early age that someday he would be a swami, or religious teacher. His entire early years were spent with swamis in the Himalayan Mountains.

But Swami Veda came to his calling in a different way. During the 1960s, he was teaching Sanskrit at the University of Minnesota, a married man with four children, when he met Swami Rama. "Meeting him was a real kick," Swami Veda says with a smile.

He began studying at the Meditation Center and developed an interest in becoming a swami. Candidates, he explains, must meet arduous conditions, including a willingness to give up everything. All money, for example, must go to the mission. One must even make a vow renouncing wife and children.

"If there's a calling in you to become a monk, there are certain conditions," Swami Veda says. "Your love should have no degrees or barriers. You must have love for all ... I grant reassurance to all living things -- may no creature henceforth fear me."

The second requirement is no possessions. "I have bank accounts in my name, but everything is used for the mission," Swami Veda says. "I have a need for nothing. When I travel, people feed me. If my robes are worn out, somebody brings me new robes."

Another condition requires a swami to be celibate for the rest of his life. So Swami Veda had to "expand his love" and live apart from his wife and children. He still sees them on occasion, and legally he is still married to his wife. But the swami had to renounce any special bond toward them and promise to love all people equally.

"If I'm holding a grandchild of this body in one hand and a child of a disciple in this hand, there would be no partiality -- I would love them both the same. You never say, 'My son.' You say, 'The son of this body.' "

Swami Veda said the ultimate goal of yoga is to know God personally. God is inside a person's body, not outside. And yoga has certain methods of getting through the emotional and physical veils. Swamis penetrate the veils that hide the light of God.

"In divinity, there are no time divisions," Swami Veda says. "In meditation, there are times those time divisions disappear. But you have to cross a lot of barriers. But all paths lead to God. That is one of the reasons I am attracting so many different kinds of people."

And if one meditates successfully, there are certain benefits that should become obvious.

The mind becomes calmer, and a practitioner's health improves. Some people lose weight. The extreme emotional ups and downs of life begin to level off. The nervous system becomes calmer, and a person needs less sleep.

Swami Veda, for instance, spends 18 to 20 hours a day interpreting Sanskrit texts, often working through the night, when there are fewer interruptions. Then when the sun rises, he sleeps for four or five hours. This schedule, he says, has allowed him to learn 17 languages.

I asked Swami Veda if yoga teaches that miracles happen. He answers by talking of his teacher, the late Swami Rama.

"You would meet him in the hallway and he would say, 'How are you feeling? You haven't been feeling well.' Then he would slap you on the back of the head and say, 'You'll be OK.' And when you returned to your room, you would realize you were feeling better. We all experienced them, but he did not want us to talk about it. Miracles were used privately. Our tradition says, 'Never admit to having the powers.' "

Clark D. Morphew