• by Diane Hope • In the heart of spiritual longing, we often feel that the Divine is distant—far beyond the reach of our daily struggles and worldly burdens. Yet Paramahansa Yogananda, a spiritual master who brought the teachings of yoga and meditation to the West, offers us a powerful reframe: “You do not have to struggle to reach God, but you do have to struggle to tear away the self-created veil that hides Him from you.”
This quote pierces the illusion that the Divine lies in some remote heaven, only accessible through monumental effort or religious rituals. Yogananda gently reminds us that God—or divine consciousness, truth, peace, or however we name the Infinite—is already here. The separation is not real. It is self-created. What is this veil he speaks of? It’s made of the mental and emotional clutter we accumulate: attachments, ego-driven desires, fears, regrets, and distractions. It’s the inner noise of constant thought, the restlessness of our modern lives, and the stories we tell ourselves about who we are and what we need to be whole.
Struggling to “reach God” implies the Divine is somewhere else. But Yogananda says it’s not about chasing—it’s about removing. The spiritual path, then, becomes less of a ladder to climb and more of a curtain to pull aside. This isn’t always easy. The “struggle” Yogananda refers to isn’t against God—it’s against our own inertia, illusions, and resistance to stillness. The path is inward. It may involve meditation, prayer, self-inquiry, or even just moments of quiet honesty with oneself.
But the promise is beautiful: we’re not chasing a mystery—we’re revealing a truth that has always been with us. In practice, this means we stop looking outward for fulfillment and instead start paying attention to the quiet whisper within. We pause. We reflect. We breathe. And slowly, the veil begins to thin.
Try asking yourself: What mental habits or beliefs are keeping me from feeling connected today? What might I gently let go of, even for a moment, to glimpse what lies beneath?
Yogananda’s message is not just for monks or mystics. It’s a universal call to wake up. The Divine isn’t absent—it’s obscured. Our task is not to search endlessly in the distance, but to come home to what is already ours, hidden only by the veils we’ve woven.
The struggle is real—but it is also worth it. Because behind the veil is the peace we’ve always longed for. The true feeling of unconditional love.