Pujya Gurudev Swami Chinmayananda Saraswati (born Balakrishna Menon (Balan), 8 May 1916 – 3 August 1993), was a Hindu spiritual leader and a teacher.

Here I share a small but interesting anecdote about the early life of Swami Chinmayananda, who as a young lad joined the Divine Life Society and stayed in the ashram to live and learn in the presence of Swami Sivananda Saraswati, its Founder.

One evening, the performance of one short drama on the life of Gautama Buddha brought more than its share of joy and wisdom in the ashram. Balan was selected to play the role of the distraught mother. With a scarf draped around his head and a cloth-bundle baby cuddled in his arms, he made such a caricature of the dejected mother, and elaborated such a display of weeping and wailing, that the whole audience exploded into laughter.

Swami Sivananda was delighted with the performance. “The best I’ve seen,” he declared, wiping away tears from his eyes. Some days later, when a special guest had come to the ashram, he asked for a repeat performance with Balan in the same role. Once again, he roared with laughter until tears flowed from his eyes. “I have derived the greatest joy from this repeat performance,” he announced. And every so often, Swami Sivananda would continue to say to Balan, “God blessed you with such intelligence, why don’t you use it for Him? You can join us — become a swami like us! Keep this idea in mind, even when you continue with your life in the world.”

Balan was originally a journalist and participated in the Indian independence movement. Under the tutelage of Swami Sivananda and later Tapovanji Maharaj, he began studying Vedanta and received the the vows of Sanyasa from Swami Sivananda Saraswati and was named Chinmayananda.