Ananta Ripa Ajmera is Director of Program Development at Vedika Global, a non-profit foundation promoting the living wisdom of Ayurveda, Yoga and Vedanta, led by internationally recognized spiritual teacher and lineage bearer Acharya Shunya. She is also a Vedika Certified Ayurveda Health Practitioner and Yoga Instructor who has studied with Acharya Shunya since 2011. As Director of Program Development, Ananta oversees marketing, branding, advertising, social media and overall strategy for Vedika's various offerings in conjunction with each individual Program Director. She is responsible for positioning Vedika’s public communications in a way that bridges the ancient knowledge the organization offers for the needs of a modern 21st century global online community. She plays an integral role in ensuring that Acharya Shunya's teachings are archived and organized in a library for ongoing students and for posterity, and helps host an online community to support ongoing students in deepening their studentship. She also edits various publications for ongoing students, including an upcoming Introduction to Vedanta book by Acharya Shunya. 

 

Ananta is author of the bestselling book The Ayurveda Way: 108 Practices from the World’s Oldest Healing System for Better Sleep, Less Stress, Optimal Digestion and More (Storey Publishing). "The Ayurveda Way" received the Foreword INDIES 2017 Book of the Year Gold Award in the Body, Mind & Spirit category. It also received a Silver Nautilus Award (considered a major book award, conferred to the Dalai Lama, Desmund Tutu, Barbara Kingsolver, Deepak Chopra, Eckhart Tolle and more for books that make a difference and inspire) in the Health & Healing category. It has been an Amazon #1 bestseller in: Ayurvedic Medicine, Holistic Medicine and Alternative health. It has been featured on Fox News, as well as in The Cut - New York Magazine, Reader's Digest, Spirituality & Health Magazine, MindBodyGreen, Elephant Journal, Aloha Magazine, Global Glam Magazine, and Mother Earth News Magazine. The book has also been named an official curriculum text by San Francisco State University's Institute for Holistic Health Studies. Her Ayurveda articles are popular on MindBodyGreen, Elephant Journal and Huffington Post. Her blog was recognized as one of the Best Yoga Blogs of 2016 by DoYouYoga.com and as one of the Best 100 Health Coach Blogs of 2015 by the Institute for the Psychology of Eating.

​

Ananta has taught Ayurveda at Stanford University’s Health Improvement Program, Stanford Health Care, California Probation Departments, ABC News, the California Department of Public Health, UNICEF, New York Insight Meditation Society, Mindful NYU, Mother Earth News Fairs, ProMedica Health System, Focus for Health Foundation, NYU Health Promotion Network, the Toledo Clinic, Sedona Yoga Festival, San Francisco State University, and the invite-only Social Innovation Summit of Fortune 500 executives, government leaders and social entrepreneurs. She has spoken at the National Ayurvedic Medical Association (NAMA), the Health Technology Forum, UC Berkeley, NYU Stern Business School and Columbia Business School.

 

Ananta graduated from NYU Stern Business School, where she received an honors degree in marketing and was an inaugural Catherine B. Reynolds Scholar in Social Entrepreneurship.

 

She received the President’s Student Service Award from the White House for her volunteer work in high school. She won the San Francisco Bay Area Prize from the William James Socially Responsible Business Competition for her business plan to transform modern prisons with Yoga and Ayurveda. Ananta was also named a semifinalist for the prestigious Echoing Green Fellowship, and a semifinalist for the Global Social Venture Business Plan Competition, sponsored by University of California at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business for this same vision. 

 

Ananta loves introducing the healing power of Ayurveda and Yoga to those new to it, as nothing gives her greater joy than seeing others awaken to abiding health of body, mind and spirit with these ancient sciences. She is grateful for the opportunity to contribute to the continuation of this knowledge, that these sacred teachings may continue to spread far and wide, offering healing and hope to as many as possible.