Luminary: Saniel Bonder

Luminary: Saniel Bonder

Saniel Bonder Saniel Bonder is the founder of Waking Down in Mutuality, a holistic process of personal transformation with roots in Eastern mysticism, Western psychology and social activism. The Waking Down work melds the awakening of consciousness with deep psycho-emotional healing and a call to find and express one’s own greatest potential in service to others and the world.

Saniel’s own journey began with activism at Harvard in the late 60s. However, by 1970 his efforts for social transformation were yielding to a disturbing insight: “that everyone, on every side of every social or political issue, was so preoccupied with self-concerns, it was as if we were each encased at all times in a cage of inward-facing mirrors. �? He saw himself looking into those same mirrors. This recognition led to a religious opening and, eventually, a search for complete personal transformation.

His quest led from the Beat poets and Ken Kesey to Martin Buber, and then into seeking for transcendental enlightenment. His primary Eastern influences included Neem Karoli Baba, and the great sage Ramana Maharshi. He then spent nearly twenty years as a devotee of the controversial American-born guru Adi Da (formerly Da Free John).

It was only when he left his guru and community that Saniel entered the culminating stages of his quest, resulting in profound shifts in his own awareness. In early 1993 he began teaching in Marin County. Over the dozen-plus years since, he has helped hundreds of people clarify key spiritual insights and simultaneously take increasing responsibility for their ordinary human lives, problems, issues, and obligations. During that time the core teachings of Waking Down in Mutuality emerged.

Saniel is married to Linda Groves-Bonder, his true partner in the spiritual leadership of their work. He is the author of Healing the Spirit/Matter Split, Great Relief, The Conscious Principle, While Jesus Weeps, and The White-Hot Yoga of the Heart. He and Linda make their personal services available through a private company, Extraordinary Empowerments, and remain active in the growing Waking Down in Mutuality community around the U.S. and abroad. They are also founding members of both Ken Wilber’s Integral Institute, where they are featured on www.integralnaked.org, the newly created Integral Spiritual Center (http://www.integralspiritualcenter.org).

Selected Books and Audio by Saniel Bonder include:

■ Waking Down: Beyond Hypermasculine Dharmas—a Breakthrough Way of Self-Realization in the Sanctuary of Mutuality;

■ While Jesus Weeps: Conversations in the Garden of Gethsemane;

■ The Conscious Principle: Talks on Recognition Yoga and Mutual Conscious Embodiment;

■ An Unexpected Dance, And What it Means to Take an Honest Swing (E-book);

■ The Tantra of Trust: Skilled and Superlative Intimate Sexual Partnership for 21st Century Woman and Man (with Linda Groves-Bonder);

■ The Fire of the Onlyness of Conscious Life (Audiotape)