Ananda Marga Wellness Center: The Path of Blissful Being

CEBU, Philippines - September is “A Personal Awareness Month”. It’s a personal celebration that encourages the individual to live, love and take charge of his/her life. It is about satisfying all the components of wellness—emotional, social, mental, occupational and spiritual health.

Finding a place to satisfy one’s wellness desire is never difficult. Located in a humble village of Pagsabungan, Mandaue City Cebu, Ananda Marga (AM) Wellness Center is a perfect oasis for rest and relaxation of mind and body. It is the country’s first affordable stay-in alternative healing center that practices holistic healing and natural therapy to overcome disease and achieve total health and well-being.

At their center, you are considered as a student, not a patient. Because of this approach, you will go home equipped with the experience and know-how of an all-around completely healthy lifestyle.

Ananda Marga Wellness Center in Cebu is a non-stock, non-profit project of Ananda Marga which is the biggest yoga organization in the world. “Ananda Marga” means Path of Blissful Being. It is a global spiritual and social service organization founded in 1955 by Shrii Shrii Anandamurti (Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar).

Founded by maverick Yoga master, Dada Dharmavedananda, the center was formed out from his vision—to help people obtain self-realization and as a service to humanity (collective welfare): the fulfillment of the physical, mental and spiritual needs of all people.

The 59 year-old Dada Dharmavedananda has been teaching yoga and natural therapy for nearly 40 years in over 50 countries. He was a missionary of Ananda Marga who was assigned here in Cebu. Before setting-up the center, he already had a clinic in Korea and Thailand.

In Cebu, the Wellness Center has been operating for six years. And one of the primary aims of establishing the AM Wellness Center is to enable low-income families or individuals who cannot afford expensive medical treatment to receive treatment that is natural, effective and tailored to their means. They also provide other services that reach out to the disadvantaged public in and near Cebu City. These services are: kindergarten classes, children’s activities, catastrophe relief and medical missions.

Operations Manager, Cecille Villarente, also known as “Ms. Savitri” (a Sanskrit name which means a ray of light and also means a woman who conquered death) said, “This year, we decided that the detoxification method is all ready and soon we will be called a Training Center, since the methods we use are already proven and tested.”

Treatment

The detoxification method is using a Natural Therapy Method which is based on the five elements – Fasting, Exercise, Water Drinking, Assimilation Treatment and Meditation.

Fasting is eating a nutritious and delicious diet of alkaline foods namely, fruits, vegetables and other light vegetarian food. Ms. “Savitri” added that Ananda Marga is vegetarianism, so no meat, no garlic and no onion, just fruits and vegetables.

Moreover, fasting helps in freeing the digestive system from its normal burdens so the body can naturally heal itself. The process will last for several days.

When asked about the prohibition of eating garlic and onion, she explained, “Garlic and onion excrete heat that could disrupt the meditation process. Fruits and vegetables refresh the mind and body, thus, they are very much helpful.”

Since stress is just created in the mind, the perfect way to relieve stress is through meditation. Meditation is deep relaxation and visualization that covert stress into calm positivism.

The backyard of AM Wellness Center provides a place for exercise, like walking and mild games.

For the Water Drinking System, the average requirement is three to four liters of water every day. “For unhealthy people, we advise them to drink five to six liters of water daily to cleanse the toxins out of their body,” Ms. “Savitri” said.

The Assimilation Treatment is done by putting Mud Pack. It’s a hygienic mud applied to specific areas in need, or in some cases, on the whole body for both absorbing toxins and attracting healing blood.

The naturopathy treatment courses run between two days and four weeks or more, and include juice fasting detoxification, raw food and other cleansing diets, herbal colonic cleansing, mud/water/sun therapies, water cleansing, alternative medicines, and exercise. These are complemented by music, art classes, outings and games.

Uniquely Natural

What made the AM Wellness Center stand out from the rest is that it provides spiritual retreat that lets you experience internal revolution. “We don’t accessorize like other wellness center, like putting petals in the foot bath. Here in Ananda Marga, it’s direct healing,” said Ms. Savitri.

Though Ananda Marga has limited staff, still they were so blessed with their dedicated employees who are mostly serving the center since the year it was established. “We are not mechanical, we don’t treat each other as staff but we treat them as family members,” said Ms. Savitri.

AM Wellness Center is not just purely business. They are a Non-Governmental Organization which aims to equip you with the knowledge that will allow you to live a long, happy and healthy life.

“We discouraged our students to go back in our center because it only shows that they still don’t change their lifestyle,” said Ms. Savitri. ?