Sanskar Gurukul Weekly Update

Class Name: Nachiketa Week# 24 : Mar 23, 2014

General Assembly We started the GA with three Omkars followed by the Shanti Mantra and Prayer Before Studies.

Sridhar Uncle did a quick recap of the 9 ways to pray that Prahlada told his father when asked what he had learned under Guru Shukracharya.

We then continued with some more stories about Sage Narada....

We all know that Sage Narada used to travel the world and the different lokas spreading the word of Lord Vishnu. He used to meditate and pray to Lord Vishnu for extended periods of time. He started becoming proud of his abilities and Lord Indra, the King of the Gods started feeling threatened. So he asked Kamadeva, the God of Love for help. Kamadeva sent a beautiful dancer to Sage Narada to disturb his meditation. But she could not succeed in distracting him. This made Sage Narada even more proud as he felt he had conquered all emotions and had complete self-control. Looking at how much this had gotten into his head, Lord Shiva thought that he should teach Sage Narada a lesson. He told him NOT to tell Lord Vishnu that he had conquered his emotions.. Just as expected Narada went to Vaikunta and told Lord Vishnu that he was the best. Lord Vishnu thought that he will teach Narada a lesson at an opportune time. During one of his travels, Narada went to a kingdom and there he happened to see the very beautiful daughter of the king. Her name was Shrimati and the King was going to conduct a Swayamvar for her to pick a groom. Narada felt that he was the one most qualified to be her husband and asked Lord Vishnu if he could have the face of Hari (Lord Narayana) during the time of the Swayamvar, so that Shrimati would pick him as her husband. In Sanskrit, Hari also means monkey. So Lord Vishnu thought that this would be a good time to teach Narada a lesson on pride. Unbeknownst to Narada, he gave him the face of a monkey. During the Swayamvar, Narada became the laughing stock of all the people present.

The moral of the story is that don't ever let anything - your success, your achievements etc. get to your head. Be humble.

Another story.....

Narada asked the all the Gods what Maya meant. Lord Shiva told him to ask Lord Vishnu, who asked him to spend some time with him in Vaikunta. One day, Lord Vishnu took Narada on a walk in a forest on Earth with the plan of teaching Narada what Maya meant with a live demonstration. It was a hot afternoon and Lord Vishnu asked Narada if he could fetch some water to quench his thirst. Narada said he will go around the forest, find some water and be back in 30 minutes, while Lord Vishnu rested. Narada went around the forest and came upon a hut and knocked on the door. The door was opened by a beautiful woman and Narada was so struck by her beauty that he forgot the reason why he was there. Her dad came along and they offered Narada food. After all the hospitality, Narada asked for the woman's hand in marriage. Both father and daughter agreed and the marriage took place. They raised a family with three children and were leaving a good life. One day there was a huge storm and there was widespread flooding, which resulted in the woman and the three children being carried away by the raging waters. Narada wsa very distraught and asked Lord Vishnu for help. It was then that Lord Vishnu reminded him that the 30 minutes were up and that all what Narada thought he had experienced was his imagination running wild... all the things that happened were Maya.... they were just illusions and did not really exist.

The moral of the story is that we should not get get distracted. We should stay focused on our priorities in life and on the Lord.

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Then we all did a lead and follow of the Shishya Anushasanam.

Class

Viraj and Pallavi led the peer lessons on why we do not touch papers, books and people with their feet and why it is considered an act of misdemeanor. Kush completed the peer lesson on why do we do Aarti?

We reviewed the topics for history projects. Identified that students should try to focus on how the characters from history demonstrated some of values that we have studied.

After the class pictures, we went outside and conducted debate amongst the four teams. The topics picked during the rafffle were: 1. Negotiation is better than a direct military action 2. Live to eat or eat to live. Which philosphy do they subscribe to and why? 3. Steadfastness is a noble quality but unguided can become rashness or obstinacy? 4. Which one is better – giving to charity anonymously or not?

Homework

Announcements

Announcements: There will be no Gurukul for the next two weeks on account of Spring Break. We will resume on April 13th.

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