Hari OM Everyone,
Nov 22nd class the kids had a wonderful opportunity for storytime with our visiting Swami Prakashanandaji. They enjoyed it thoroughly and it was a very interactive session. Swamiji told them a very interesting story and then asked everyone to share what they thought the moral was. Swamiji finally got them to see that the story shows how we are all interconnected and if we think where any of the materials that we use come from we will realize that none of us can ever take pride that we made anything from scratch! We are all dependent on others and ultimately on God who created the 5 elements.
We started the class of Dec 6th with our Daily prayers - we then practiced verse 3 and 4 of the Geeta - we only had time to record verse 3! We will practice more and record verse 4 this week. If you can help them practice at home that will be great. Recordings are available at - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVaQ1AsTFVEK4MvW4zOX3dd7ct-7nFwWC
We started learning the Guru Stotram and the Dashavatara Stotram as well this week. After a very quick review of all the previous stories we learned this year starting from King Parikshit and Kali, we moved on to the story of Dhruva! We had already learned about the daughters of Manu and Satarupa in the earlier stories. King Uttanapada was the son of Manu and Satarupa. He had two wives Suneeti and Suruchi and was extremely attached to Queen Suruchi who was very possessive. Once when Suneeti's son Dhruva wants to sit on his father's lap just like Suruchi's son Uttama, Suruchi taunts him that he has to do tapas to Lord Narayana to be born as her son to get that privileged position! Insulted and hurt, Dhruva runs to his mom Suneeti who consoles him and tells him that even in her insult there was some good advice - praying to Lord Narayana can grant us all our wishes.
So Dhruva leaves the palace to do Tapas and meets Narada Muni who has been sent by the Lord to help his devotee. Narada Muni tries to dissuade him but Dhruva is very firm in his decision - so Narada Muni advises him to go to Madhuvan and teaches him the mantra 'Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya'. We all learned and chanted the Mantra too in class for a few times. Narada Muni describes the form of the Lord - children were excited when they heard names that they recognized like Kaustubh (someone's cousin ) and Sudarshan Chakra (We have a Sudarshan in class - he was very happy to realize Vishnu had him in His hand!). We tried to close our eyes and visualize the form of the Lord like Dhruva but not very successful - it is tough to keep our eyes closed when so many things are going on outside - we will get there 🙂 !
Dhruva visualizes the form of the Lord in his heart and then practices rigorous tapas, chanting the mantra with so much focus and eating just fruits and berries initially and later on just living on air and after that even stops breathing! When he stops breathing the whole world is suffocated and can't breathe! Earth tilts to one side when he is meditating standing on his big toe! Lord Vishnu soon comes to bless his devotee and Dhruva doesn't even open his eyes. Bhagavan then makes his own form inside Dhruva's mind disappear and Dhruva opens his eyes to find the Lord standing in front of him. Bhagavan gives him the boon that he will rule his kingdom for 36,000 years and then attain the special position of the Dhruva Nakshatra in the sky!
Some of the kids started recognizing the story after a while and were very excited. Everyone missed their classmate 'Dhruv' who was absent that day! We tried standing on one toe like Dhruva and chanting the mantra! Since everyone wanted to share their version of the story we are thinking we will have a storytelling session by the kids during the Dec 20th class. Please ask them to prepare one of the stories that we have learned so far in the Bala Bhagavatam. You can use these blog posts to help them remember and they will have the stories in their Bala Bhagavatam book as well. They all seemed to think it was a good idea as it would be good preparation for the storytelling contest as well! Please ask them to rehearse at home with you so they will be able to share it fluently within 2-3 minutes in class.
We will also have a jeopardy/quiz covering all the topics we have learned so far in next week's class. Looking forward to seeing them all this evening.
Thanks & Regards
Jayashree & Suja
Jayashree & Suja
