Yogi Calisthenics 153
social or spiritual— into success can fit in with the busy and worried life
of the American Rajas and Maharajahs, the American millionaires and
billionaires.^67Elsewhere, Yogananda refers to yoga as “a middle path between com-
plete renunciation and complete worldliness.”^68 He must have realized that
calls to renunciation would not go far amidst his American audiences, who
were accustomed to New Thought rhetoric of material well- being as a sign
of cosmic attunement. Instead, he agreed that health and wealth could very
well be compatible with spiritual advancement if viewed in the correct light.
Relying on a metaphysical version of the prosperity gospel, Yogananda taught
that “business life need not be a material life. Business ambition can be spiri-
tualized. Business is nothing but serving others materially in the best pos-
sible way.”^69 Capitalistic productivity had to be balanced with a spiritual
mindfulness.
It is exactly in this spirit that Yogananda, in an issue of East- West, lauded
Henry Ford for inaugurating “a new era in spiritualizing business life by propos-
ing a five day work week.”^70 Given a two- day weekend, allowing for both leisure
and spiritual development, the American businessman could effectively become
a spiritual superman. The goal in short was to bridge the gap between the lofty
promises of enlightenment and superpowers with the interests and exigencies of
modern living. Neoliberal self- determination easily translated into metaphysi-
cal self- realization. Yogananda thus promised a spiritual practice that not only
acknowledged the modern secular context of consumer capitalism but sought to
maximize the individual’s success within it. His vision, springing from the New
Thought- inflected prosperity metaphysics of the Progressive Era, prefigured the
spiritual consumerism of the New Age movement apart from which modern yoga
culture cannot be understood.
From this perspective, Yogananda’s Autobiography is a marked departure
from the larger body of his work. Rather than dealing with the practical goals
of stress management, weight loss, and even the subtler energetics of the
Yogoda system, the Autobiography sets its sights much higher. It locates itself
quite firmly in India, the land of Yogis, miraculous powers, and enlightenment.
Its narrative understandably reflects a different trajectory of Yogananda’s life
than is revealed by other sources. However, it also offers a much more exten-
sive elaboration of Yogananda’s metaphysics than had previously been available
in his earlier body of work discussed thus far in this study. In this sense, the
Autobiography offers the second half of the equation representing Yogananda’s
reinterpretation of traditional yogic metaphysics just as it provides the second
half of his life’s narrative.