Dharmacharya Gurudas Sunyatananda was born, Frederick Robert Salvato, amidst auspicious signs in the Metropolitan Pittsburgh area, on 16th February 1963, to Francis & Cecilia Salvato.

During her final months of pregnancy, his mother experienced recurring dreams and doctors had to literally sew her womb shut, to prevent the future lama's early entry into the world.

Even given these precautions, the child entered this world a full month early, and his spiritual journey began almost immediately. His parents were devout Catholics, and consecrated their firstborn to Our Lady of Grace, an emanation of the Mother of All Compassion.

As a youngster, Khenpo (as his students now call him) subjected his earthly body to extreme physical pains, including febrile convusions, for which doctors could find no apparent cause. As he grew, he continued to subject himself to both physical and emotional obstacles, pain and ridicule. No form of suffering would be foreign to the young man, resulting in the development of a genuine compassion, born out of empathy, for those who are marginalised, sick, suffering or oppressed.

When he was seven, a visiting Benedictine monk, Fr. Henri LeSaux, recognising the natural devotion and inner wisdom the seven year-old Khenpo possessed, began to instruct him in the non-dualistic philosophy of the Advaita path. Fr. LeSaux had the distinction of being both a Catholic priest and an Advaita sanyassin and Dharma teacher. Fr. Le Saux's spiritual name was Swami Abishektananda, and upon receiving the Refuge Vows of the young Khenpo, he gave him the spiritual name Little Sunyatananda -- meaning "the bliss of emptiness" -- a reflection of the young boy's desire to become empty, to "decrease, so that compassion expressing itself as me can increase," he would write Swami Abishiktenanda one morning, while waiting to accompany the priest for the celebration of Liturgy.

According to the perspective of other monks and Dharma teachers, from the time of his early childhood, the powerful imprints of a previous incarnation as a Bodhisattva were clearly manifested in all that Little Sunyatananda did. He was naturally drawn to a more distinctively Japanese form of prayer and meditation, and at the age of nine, went on to earn his first-degree black belt in the Japanese martial art of Aikido, from Robert Danza Sensei, one of the personal students of the art's founder, Morehei Ueshiba (O'Sensei). He continued to study Japanese spirituality, and excelled as a master of Ki.

During his early teen years, this natural devotion to Buddhist Masters and Catholic Mystics continued, with the young Sunyatananda secretly spending many nights with little or no sleep, chanting and meditating, in a state of still, silent spiritual ecstasy.