"Know that your true nature is bliss." — Amma

If you're a yogi in NYC and you're drawn to practice for even remotely spiritual reasons, you've probably heard about Ammachi, or Amma, or Sri Mata Amritanandamayi's visit to the Manhattan Center last week. For the uninitiated, she’s a Hindu guru and humanitarian known as the "hugging saint" who has raised kajillions in funds for the myriad hospitals, schools, and charities she's helped create. Many say Amma is the human incarnation of the Divine Mother; she may be the ultimate living karma yogi.

She's done most of this work by hugging people, which she does by the thousand. Her basic message is: help others. And many who have felt her embrace are filled with the compassion necessary to do so. Call it shakti (energy), call it magic, call it wishful thinking, but even from the fat program from last week’s events, it's clear she’s touched many in the NYC yoga community and beyond. Ads fill the program from companies as diverse as the DMV ("Not all journeys take us down the road to enlightenment. Sometimes we just need to renew our driver’s license.") and Integral Yoga Institute—and many of them thank "mother" in moving testimony.

I waited six hours for my hug, surrounded by fellow yogis, business people, hipsters. When she finally pressed my head to her billowy, sari'd bosom and whispered "ma, ma, ma" into my ear, I felt something soft and sweet in me, and it wasn't just her spittle. It was a tiny sip of an ocean of love we could all use a little more of here. It's something I'll try and remember the next time I hit a rush hour yoga class with more mats than space.

If you missed her this time, you can take classes in her meditation technique: AmmaNY.org.