Acharya Shunya

Acharya Shunya teaches Advaita Vedanta and the Goddess traditions of India as head of the Sarayu Parampara, a householder lineage from Ayodhya, and she is the first woman to hold that role. Her grandfather, Acharya Ayodhya Nath, began training her when she was nine, and she studied with him daily for fourteen years before carrying the teachings to the West. In 2007 she set up Vedika Global, a California nonprofit, and she has written three books for Sounds True, among them Sovereign Self, a guide to the Upanishads and the Gita, and Roar Like a Goddess, on the feminine archetypes of Hindu scripture.

From the San Francisco Bay Area she leads two online circles: the Inner Mandala, built around Sunday satsangs on the four yogas of devotion, action, meditation and Self-knowledge, and the Goddess Unbound Circle for women and nonbinary students. A monthly Veda Sangha is open to anyone on a donation basis, and her podcast Shadow to Self carries longer talks. She has taught at Kripalu, Omega and Stanford, and her students now come from more than twenty countries. Her style is scholarly but warm, grounded in scripture, mantra and contemplation rather than technique.