The land comprising Yasodhara Ashram is a sacred trust, both a thriving natural community and a flourishing spiritual community. The yogic teachings offered at Yasodhara aim to develop awareness and bring quality to the lives of all who come here.

This includes developing an expanded awareness of our relationship to the land, and bringing our highest ideals into that relationship.

Set on 115 acres of land in the Purcell mountain range of southwestern BC, Yasodhara Ashram is located on the shores of Kootenay Lake. Kootenay Lake is a widening of the Kootenay River and is one of the largest natural lakes in British Columbia. Wildlife is abundant. Bear, deer, elk, moose, coyote, cougar, streams, wildflowers, mosses, mature and old-growth forests are just some of the diverse living elements of this land.

As a community, we are asking, How can this land serve the teachings that were the purpose for the Ashram coming here? How can the land itself be served?

While we garden organically and function as a carbon neutral community, we are also placing importance on increasing our conscious knowledge of the land we occupy. We are currently creating a detailed land-map and recording all flora and fauna that we share our home with.

In our role as caretakers for this land, the Ashram is committed to exploring questions such as: How can we contribute to biodiversity protection? Minimize destruction and fragmentation of our forests? Protect and preserve healthy soils? Reduce water use at the Ashram and prepare for climate change?

We look to offer a viable model of living harmoniously with the land, demonstrating how humans can live with the natural environment in ways that support all parts of the system: people, plants, animals, water, soil and air.

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Yasodhara Ashram Land Ethic

Yasodhara Ashram is comprised of 115 acres on the east shore of Kootenay Lake, in the interior rain forest of the Purcell Mountains of British Columbia.

Our Commitment

We commit to honour the sacred unity of life and to live in relationship with the natural world through this land, in a spirit of reverence and joy.

The Yasodhara Context

The land of Yasodhara Ashram is a sacred trust. The teachings offered here develop awareness and bring quality to life, which includes expanding awareness of our relationship with the land and bringing quality into that relationship.

Purpose of Our Land Ethic

Our land ethic is a reminder that:

• we agree to take responsibility for our actions on the basis of consciously chosen guidelines
• we recognize our membership in a community of interdependent parts, human and non-human
• we acknowledge the intrinsic right to life and being of all components of that community
• we recognize the earth as a complex interacting living ecosystem whose inhabitants co-evolve together in a web of relationships

What We Offer

• A viable model: Healthy land becomes a good model in the same way that healthy people living purposeful lives model a different way to live.
• Connection: We want to demonstrate how humans can live with the natural environment in ways that support all parts of the system—people, plants, animals, water, soil and air.
• Happy Listening: We offer the opportunity to commune and to listen deeply, to hear the still small voice within and the subtle voice of the natural world.
• Wholeness: In tending to the work and to our relationship with the land in reverence and gratitude, we serve the essential unity and sacredness of all life.

Ideals that Guide Our Action

• Reverence/Respect for life; Ahimsa – non-injury.We honour the intrinsic right to life of all beings and respect the integrity of all aspects of the land community—the animals, water, soil and air.
• Service – Karma Yoga – Yasodhara Ashram is a Karma Yoga ashram where the efforts of our work are based on giving our best without consideration of reward. We are exploring how our service to the land can expand, while also recognizing how the land serves us.
• Gratitude – We understand our role as stewards of these teachings and of the land. We are grateful for the privilege of living in this beautiful refuge.

Ideals in Action

• Learning: We recognize that our relationship with the land is a process of learning. We want to keep making wiser decisions. We are committed to reflecting on our actions, learning from them and engaging in a cycle of action-reflection-response.
• Relationship: Knowledge and understanding of the land is acquired through a long period of observation and interaction. We are committed to striving toward a more mature understanding.
• Heart and Mind: We acknowledge the need for knowledge based on experience and understanding of both heart and mind. The practices offered at the Ashram contribute to bringing awareness and quality to life, which includes building our capacity to respond to the land with both intuition and reason.
• Choices: Putting ideals into action requires us to make conscious choices to:
  • Use what supports health of land, air, water, soil; avoid what does not. We garden organically using agriculture that is sustainable for the ecosystem and for human communities. We use cleaning products that are ecologically sustainable.
  • Reduce waste. We compost, recycle, re-use and restrain from consuming products with excess packaging. We hold to an ideal of zero waste and work towards this.
  • Practice energy sustainability. The Ashram is now carbon neutral! We are working toward zero net use by replacing fossil fuel vehicles with electric ones and seeking ways to supplement energy use with wind, turbine and other sustainable sources. Geothermal and solar energy are well established.
• Education: We create and offer ongoing programs that educate others in the power of choice. Through active involvement, participants also experience how sustainable practices can be applied and lived.