Sahaja Yoga & Social Construction:- There is story in Sahaja Yoga of a man, living in the middle of an African desert, who was initiated by a travelling Sahaja Yoga. The travelling Yogi then continued on his way. Months later, however, he thought of this man alone in the desert & decided to write to him. To his surprise, the manreplied & described ‘Sahaja Yoga-like’ experiences & insights, about both the guru & himself, gained solely through meditation & not through any contact with other members of the religion. The moral of this story, for those who tell it, is that the truths of Sahaja Yoga which are told to most newcomers when joining can be validated through self-discovery by anyone who has received their ‘realisation’. For Sahaja Yoga, the tale is evidence that the physical experiences & spiritual insights to which their religious affiliation & practices give rise are entirely independent of cultural context or society. Notwithstanding this story, I pay particular attention to exploring the significance of social interaction in Sahaja Yoga in the pages which follow. Specifically, I investigate those interactions involved in the construction & maintenance of membership of this movement. These, I argue, lead to the creation of a sense of a common identity, through contact with other members of a particular social ‘world’, but also allow for a variety of viewpoints to emerge. A Sahaja Yogi, in other words, will always recognise common ground with another devotee from the movement. However, their understandings of ‘what is going on’ will differ. One factor contributing to the variations between the ‘world vewes’ of different members of any NRM is differences in the social contexts in which these ‘world views’ are produced. Another is the predispositions of different members, their personal histories, and previous socializations (Barker 1984). Additionally, “… creative skepticism & limits to the socialization process itself may act to limit or reverse entry . . . The possibility of resistance, misunderstanding, nihilation always exists” (Wentworth 1980, 85). My approach, therefore, is one in which social interaction plays a formative role in the construction of world views (Blumer 1969). Introducing Sahaja Yoga:- Sahaja Yoga is a movement with teachings & practices which often sound very unfamiliar, and even alien, to most Western ears. It is necessary, therefore, before examining the socializing processes of this NRM, to give prelimminary details of what it is that socialization, at least in part, conveys and, to some degree, contextualise the movement in a broader setting. Consequently I give a brief history of Sahaja Yoga and its teaching, starting with an account of the life of the guru, Sri Mataji Nirmala Devi. It is important to point out that much of what will be said about her history, & about the organisation created around her, is hagiographical in flavour. The first section of this chapter is not set out as a definitive version of events, & should not be treated as such. Instead, it is a meahing together of various commentaries & perspectives. The account draws, in particular, from a book written by a longstanding follower, de Kalbermatten, and from one written by two devoted but not so experienced followers, Rajasekharan & Venkatesan. It also, of course, draws heavily on the commentaries of Sri Mataji herself.