Hari om everyone,
As of today, we have completed learning all the assigned bhagavadgeeta verses for the year! That means, we have learnt 38 verses from chapter 2. We will continue to practice it for the rest of the year. Students are doing really well! We pick students randomly and they have to ready 2-3 verses all on their own. They are asked to practice at least a couple of times during the week (not sure if they do that :). No matter what, ALL of them have made tremendous progress from when we started and we are very impressed with their learning! They are able to make an effort and read the random verses they are required to read in class!!
We began our study of chapter 16 in which Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the divine qualities necessary for spiritual life as well as the demonic qualities that we need to work on rejecting/improving. We began our discussion with the divine qualities where we focused on three traits – fearlessness, purity of heart and steadfastness.
Fearlessness in this case does not mean recklessness in the face of danger and risk but rather represents freedom from ignorance or judgment. We often discussed that the value we assign to things often is in line with their public perception; a sports car will get you from point A to B as well as an ordinary and cheaper compact car but the sports car holds a greater prestige because of the adulation and envy it inspires in the people around us; the effect would not be the same if we had to choose a car to traverse a barren, unpopulated desert! The goal is to free ourselves from this environment of judgment and feeling of insecurity based on others' judgement about us.
The purity of heart as the underlying basis of our good actions. We need to cultivate this
To be steadfast is to be unwavering and consistent; it is meaningless if we manifest our saintly natures once in a while; a spiritual and fulfilling life requires consistency and perseverance in the face of the challenges we face.
We didn't have much time to discuss steadfastness as we attended a presentation on the Saints of India. We will continue our conversation on the divine qualities next week!
Regards,
Raghav and Rashmi.
