Nam Nidhan Kaur (Chile) – is the founder of the International Mujer De Luz Foundation (Woman of Light) and a pioneer in combining social intervention with the teachings of Kundalini Yoga, to support government programs for Women’s Development. She has been dedicated to teaching women around the world for nearly 25 years, and in 2014 was recognized by KRI as an outstanding teacher for her service and purity in delivering the teachings.

Since 1995 Nam Nidhan has dedicated her life to inspiring, healing and uplifting people through the teachings of Kundalini Yoga and her own experience as a yogini. She was a pioneer in teaching Kundalini Yoga in the Andean countries and inspired the creation of the first communities of teachers. Much of her creative work has been teaching women through her work with Mujer de Luz. She has traveled to all continents in service to raising consciousness, especially of women. She has trained teachers on 4 continents, especially in recent years her work has focused on China.

More than two decades ago, in Santiago, Chile, Nam Nidhan Kaur also founded the Narayan International School of Human Science and Kundalini Yoga.   This organization is inspired by the personal experience of Nam Nidhan Kaur, who recognizes her life mission to share this powerful tool of Kundalini Yoga. Since then, with their honest dedication and vocation for service, she and her team have built a projection and professionalism that stands out internationally. Along with a tireless sense of mission, they have shared this technology with thousands of people in Chile and in more than 25 countries around the world, through conferences, seminars and retreats.

Nam Nidhan Khalsa | Facebook
NARAYAN – Ciencia Humana y Kundalini Yoga | Facebook

The following story about Sardarni Sahiba Nam Nidhan Kaur Khalsa was originally shared in the book “Women of Grace and Power” by Singh Sahib Guru Fatha Singh Khalsa.

Alejandra was born in the land called “Chile,” between the blue Pacific Ocean and the heavenly Andes Mountains.  Her mother had come from the desert land of Jordan and her father from the land of Jesus nearby, called “Palestine.”

Alejandra’s mother had wanted to study at a university, but her father told her, “We already have one baby boy and now another baby is coming.  We need you to stay home and look after them.”  Alejandra was the coming baby.

Baby Alejandra grew up with a brother, a little older than her. Then, a baby brother came, so there were three of them and a big family of aunts and uncles and cousins. Everybody came together each weekend to play and eat and have fun with one another.

Alejandra’s father loved to work with people. He was a businessman. He made quite a lot of money by selling things from Chile and other countries to buyers in China.

Alejandra loved her father, his big thinking, his having people around him all the time. As she grew into a teenager, Alejandra spent most of her time studying books and learning also how to speak and how to listen. In her heart, she hoped one day to travel and see the world beyond Chile.

One year, the value of the money changed.  It meant that overnight everything became too expensive for the Chinese to buy.  Alejandra’s father could not sell anything to his biggest customers, and he owed a lot of money to his suppliers.

Her father became very, very sad.  To everyone’s surprise, one day, he shot and killed himself.

Alejandra was sixteen years old.  She always received the best marks in her class.  Even with all her smarts, she could not understand how her father would do what he did.

Alejandra felt lonely.  She missed her father.  She missed their happy times together. She became very angry and very curious.  “Why do people do the strange things they do?” Alejandra asked herself.

When Alejandra was old enough, she did what her mother had not been able to do.  She went to study at university.  This made her mother happy inside.  Alejandra studied anthropology, which is supposed to teach how people live.  She learned some good things, but not everything.

Alejandra was still lonely and angry when she met a young man at the university.  He seemed nice and he liked her, so they married.  The two of them had three baby girls, who were great.  But there was a problem.

Alejandra’s husband, the father of her babies was unkind.  Again and again, he did and said mean things that hurt Alejandra and the girls.  She told him many times to stop, but finally, one day Alejandra took her three young daughters and moved out, moved to where she knew they would be safe.  They moved to her mother’s house and were happy there.

Time passed.  One day, Alejandra’s mother invited a yoga teacher to come to their house to give some classes.  Alejandra had heard about yoga.  “Yoga is for old ladies,” she thought.

Not being an old lady, being just twenty-seven years old, Alejandra thought she and the girls would keep busy somehow while her mother and her friends did yoga.

That is not what happened.

The teacher came dressed in pure white.  He was unlike anyone Alejandra had ever met before.  His name was Amrit Singh.  He offered Alejandra that she could join the class – and she did.

The yoga was nothing like what Alejandra thought.  It was hard.  It was fun.  It made Alejandra feel how strong she could be.  It also made her cry and cry.  Alejandra felt like all the pain of her father’s dying and her husband’s cruelty was lifting away.  It made her feel light and happy.

By the second class, Alejandra understood that Kundalini Yoga, the yoga taught by her teacher, was not just for old ladies.  Her mother loved seeing what it was doing for her.  Alejandra felt that the yoga and meditation Amrit Singh brought into their house was what she had always wanted and needed in her life.  It was very special, and she would do whatever it took to make it her own.  That night, Alejandra settled into a calm and peaceful sleep.

Very early in the morning, at the time when the saints rise for their meditation, Alejandra had a vision.  It was not a dream.  She felt two men beside her bed.  They were sending her waves of love and telling her that her life would change.

Alejandra rose up and made her way to her mother’s bedroom to tell her.  Her biggest daughter, five-year-old Laura, was also up.  Laura said to her mother, “Two shining men came.”

On hearing the news from her daughter and granddaughter, grandma proclaimed, “Look, the angels came!  Now things will change, and you will live your perfect life.”  And that is what happened.

The course with Amrit Singh went on for four weeks, three classes every week.  Afterwards, Alejandra felt light and bright and strong like never before.

She asked her teacher where she could go to learn more about this great yoga.  He told her to find Hari Nam Kaur.  She would teach people to be teachers of Kundalini Yoga in a course in a few months in the capital city of Santiago.

For nine months, Alejandra went to Santiago for three days every four weeks and took classes with Hari Nam Kaur.  Like Amrit Singh, she dressed all in white, with a crowning turban on her head.  At night, Alejandra and all the seven other students slept on the floor of the teaching rooms.

After three months, Alejandra was waking up early every morning for a cold shower, exercise and meditation.  But that was not all.  Alejandra decided that she wanted everything that her teacher had – and more.

She wanted to be a Sikh.  She also wanted to go to the United States and meet the great Sikh Yogi who had come from India to teach.

After Alejandra finished her course, she began to give Kundalini Yoga classes at the university where she had studied, la Universidad Austral de Chile in Valdiva, near her hometown.  She also made a big plan to fly to America.

Alejandra knew that every December, there was a camp of a few hundred Sikh Yogis near Lake Wales, Florida.  They came from around the world.  Alejandra bought tickets to go and join them.

Alejandra was amazed at all the love and wisdom she found in the people at the yoga camp.  They were real saints and yogis.  Very early in morning, musicians would walk around the camp, singing to wake everyone up.

Then, at four o’clock, they would join together in a big tent to read Guru Nanak’s beautiful Jap Jee, then exercise, then chant, then have a wonderful Gurdwara.  About that time, the sun would be just coming up.

Alejandra was even more sure that this was what she wanted for the rest of her life.  After a few blissful days, she joined a few others in front of Guru Granth Sahib.

Together, they promised to live as Sikhs from that day on.  Alejandra and the others promised to wake up early each morning to meditate, to keep their hair, to take no alcohol or drugs, to eat no animals, to live gracefully, and to help other people.

After that, Alejandra met her teachers’ teacher.  He was called the “Siri Singh Sahib,” Great Beautiful Lion.  He was also called “Yogi Bhajan.”  He was one with everyone, which made him a yogi.

Alejandra listened whenever the Siri Singh Sahib spoke.  He said the great God lives in everyone and not in churches or temples.  The Siri Singh Sahib explained how people should eat and think and live to be healthy, happy and holy.

Alejandra loved his talks.  It was also her luck that this was her thirtieth birthday.  Someone else had their birthday on that day too, so the Siri Singh Sahib asked everyone to sing them happy birthday.  Then, he prayed for them.

“Lord God, these two individuals are born this day.  We read their horoscope.  It doesn’t sound good…”

Everyone laughed.

“But you are very good, Lord.  Help them.  Serve them.  Be with them.  Be within them.  Give them all what they need from today onward unto Infinity.  Give them grace, pace and place, so they can always shine and be beautiful, bountiful and blissful.

“May thy hand, known and unknown, serve them and protect them wherever they are.  And all those who have come, bless them, bless their soul, give them and show them the path according to their own faith and let them relate to their own higher consciousness so they can live in peace, tranquility and grace.  Sat Naam.”

Birthday cookies were given to one and all.

When Alejandra returned home in the south of Chile, her mother met her with a big smile, “So now you are wearing a turban?”  And she was.

Alejandra continued giving her classes at the university, feeling it was a great privilege to guide and uplift her fellow south Chileans.  As happy as she was in Chile, her soul called her to return to America and visit the Yogi.

So it was that Alejandra flew to “Nuevo Mexico” and journeyed to the yearly mountainside gathering at Ram Das Puri.  This was a larger gathering than in Florida.

About 3,000 people made their homes in tents on the landscape strewn with gnarly pines, dry grass and flowering cacti.  Above everyone, the New Mexico sky glistened, while down to earth dust devils spun out their course.

There were Gurdwaras and chanting and hard meditation.  There was service and langar and sweet nightfall.  There were people of many nations, a family of a thousand generations.

This time, there were ten people in all from the north and south of Chile.  Among them, was one special man, Kartar Singh, who had caught Alejandra’s eyes and she his.  One day, they all met in the cabin of the Siri Singh Sahib.  Alejandra was right in the front with Kartar Singh, directly before the Master.

When Siri Singh Sahib heard that Alejandra and Kartar Singh had come for his blessing on their marriage, he looked powerfully at Alejandra and said to Kartar, “You do not know who she is.”  Five times, he said it.

He went on to explain to Alejandra, “He is a very young soul.  He was your student in a life before.”  And he warned her, “You will say ‘White’ and he will say ‘Black.’”

In the end, the Master blessed them to be married anyway.  And he renamed them “Nam Nidhan Kaur” and “Nam Nidhan Singh.”  When everyone stood up to leave, the Chilean princess stayed in place, her eyes closed in meditation at the powerful feet of the Siri Singh Sahib.

Naturally, Nam Nidhan Kaur’s daughters were happy at the news of a new man in the house.  Nam Nidhan Singh found a home for them in Santiago which they would make into an ashram.

Nam Nidhan Kaur went to the big university in Santiago and landed a job teaching Kundalini Yoga classes to students in the Departments of Social Science, Psychology, Philosophy and Art.  A couple of years later, students of law also joined her classes.

Fifty to eighty people would join in these classes.  Many students went on to become yoga teachers.  These important classes to some of the smartest young minds in Chile went on for five years, then Nam Nidhan Kaur gave the job to a student to take over.

People healed.  Sad people became happy.  Sick people became well.  Shy people became brave.  People with no power, found their power inside.

Word spread.  People inside and outside of Chile started to hear about the power of this amazing Yoga from the line of Guru Nanak.

Those classes, and others, brought Nam Nidhan Kaur much happiness.  At home, the Siri Singh Sahib’s warning came to fruit however.

Nam Nidhan Singh started to lose his way.  First, he stopped meditating with the Sangat.  Then he took off his royal turban.  Then he wrote the Master and stopped teaching.  After three years, the marriage of these two souls in the blessing light of the Guru was over.

Those were hard days.  The Siri Singh Sahib gave Nam Nidhan Kaur words of courage as well as direction about how to meditate.  He said, “My job is to make you walk with your head in your palm and still complete the job.  Keep growing and achieve the deathlessness.  Know God made you an honorable woman and live it.  You will be the most powerful, wonderful, self-contained, bountiful, beautiful, blissful and prosperous human being…”

One day, Nam Nidhan Kaur was invited to come and teach in Bolivia, in the heartland of South America.  It is a country of high mountains, very rich and very poor.

As it happened, when she arrived in Bolivia, her host had already cancelled the course she was to give.  Her host had heard strange stories about Kundalini Yoga and felt it was best to not have the course.

Nam Nidhan stayed and visited the lady anyway.  They talked and as they talked, her host began to understand what Kundalini Yoga is and what it is not.  They planned for another course.  Soon, a yoga center was started in the city of La Paz and classes grew.

The next year, a student of Nam Nidhan Kaur, Lola Espee invited her to give classes for women in the neighboring country of Peru.  With Lola’s help, Nam Nidhan returned a number of times to give courses.

One time, Lola brought her guest teacher to a special women’s temple from the First Nations of that land at Pachacamac called “Mama Cuna.”

There were other invitations.  Nam Nidhan Kaur went to Ecuador and Argentina and Columbia, and again to Bolivia and Peru.

In 2009, she started to think especially about serving the needs of women and girls, to teach them to be everything they are born to be, to live in their strengths and not their weaknesses, in their brightness and not their depression.

After years of meditation, Nam Nidhan Kaur started to understand something important.  For most of her life, she had not loved herself.  She had not felt she was lovely, desirable, beautiful.  For this reason, she had felt empty.  For this reason, she had looked outside, wanting the love of others.

After years of pain, Nam Nidhan Kaur started to love herself, no matter what men said or didn’t say to her, no matter what they did or didn’t do to her.  With the Friendship of God and Guru, she learned to be completely happy and free.

In 2015, Nam Nidhan Kaur went on the biggest adventure of her life.  Angad Kaur, who had been giving classes in Shanghai since 2004, invited her to come on a teaching tour of China.  Joined by Gurubachan Singh of New Mexico, the three of them set out on a six-week tour of fifteen cities.

In her travels, Nam Nidhan Kaur experienced a sense of home coming.  She felt as though she had lived in China many lifetimes before.  Nam Nidhan loved the hundreds of Chinese women she met.  She enjoyed their way of meditatively drinking tea: their tea ceremony.  She appreciated their quiet modesty, their graceful way of dress.

Nam Nidhan Kaur and her companions traveled over most of the country, from Qingdao on the Yellow Sea to Chengdu in the mountains of Sechuan, from Xi’an in the desert of Shaanxi province to tropical Xiamen by the China Sea. They also went to Beijing and its Forbidden City.

After her first visit, Nam Nidhan Kaur returned to China to learn and to teach and love her new students, every year.  Nam Nidhan saw much variety in how Chinese women lived.  Mosuo women in the Yunnan valley had families but never married.  Most women now worked in busy cities away from their parents and extended families.

Nam Nidhan Kaur also took in the weight of the past on Chinese women today.  The loneliness and purposelessness of a wife of the emperor, locked away with thousands of co-wives in Beijing’s Forbidden City.  The helpless anger of the millions of wives whose husbands took up mistresses.  But also, the courage of the Communist sisters who marched side-by-side with their revolutionary Chinese brothers to make their country free of warlords and foreign armies.

Nam Nidhan Kaur was treated with great respect.  Doors were opened, wherever she went.  In Xi’an, Nam Nidhan was invited to give a class for staff at a large prison.  In Shanghai, she presented at the Chinese National Association for Women.

Over time, Nam Nidhan Kaur came to see that Chinese women and girls suffered behind closed doors, like women everywhere.  Everywhere, her teaching and her calm presence were medicine for ailing hearts and spirits.

Whether in South America or China or Spain, Nam Nidhan Kaur prays and works each day so womankind everywhere may feel and know their strength, grace and happiness in this life.