Hari Om everyone,
This week, we started out with meditation followed by Gita chanting. We have learned Chapter 2 till verse 22 now.
Our Kyun Kyun - (QQ - Quirky Question) for the day: We said the smartest answer gets brag rights :) - "Do you know what starts with 'w' and ends with 't'". Our smart students zeroed in on the answer easily! They said, "I already knew that!" ('coz 'WhaT' starts with w and ends in t 😃)
We continued our review of Chapter 2. Last class, we had asked them to share one expectation they have of themselves. Students said that they wanted good grades, they wanted to make a lot of money, to be successful, etc. We then discussed the difference between goals and expectations. It is okay to have goals for our actions. But we have to start training ourselves to refrain from having expectations or insistence on the results.
Arjuna asks Shri Krishna, "How can one prioritize his actions?" Krishna answered, "Prioritization comes easily with clarity of thought" For us, we can do it by setting goals, documenting them, and reflecting on our priorities, we can practice developing the clarity to efficiently allocate our time, efforts, and resources.
The students were asked to reflect on how they can align their short-term goals and transactional success to contribute to a long-term vision (Shreyas) by focusing on unconditional success. They were encouraged to use a planner (preferably a physical one) to organize their activities and action items. This would help with prioritizing their commitments and visualizing their goals better!
We then discussed how we define success and who we consider successful. Most of the responses listed famous people, or those with power and money. Is it making more money? Being more famous? Who really is rich? We asked how they defined success, really? How come no one mentioned their own parents or themselves as successful?
It is said, 'he is not rich who has the most but he who needs the least!' We need to contemplate this sentence. It is our confusion between needs and wants that makes us feel we don't have enough! The lesser we need, the happier we are. The happier we are, the more successful we are! Success really is defined by how happy we are!!
Be it good or bad actions, we discussed how the ego is at work. We are constantly tying our actions to the outcomes and defining our success (and ourselves) based on that. That is exactly what Krishna advised Arjuna NOT to do. Our focus should be on doing the deed in the best possible manner and not fretting about the results.
We define ourselves as those outcomes. I am NOT the event. Hence I am different from the outcome. We have to identify this.
We gloat when we are successful and we grieve at our failures. Our ego is at play constantly! But the moment we see it, it disappears. It is like that monster in the closet that vanishes upon turning the light on! The moment we shift the attention from the outcome to ourselves, both pleasure and pain melt away.
Here, Krishna spoke about 'sthitaprajna', a person who is equipoised in both pleasure and pain. Such a person is happy and contented, no matter what happens outside! The crux of all Knowledge of vedaanta was given in this chapter of the Bhagavadgeeta! But just like us, Arjuna had many questions and doubts. The rest of the chapters address these for us under the pretext of Arjuna.
The RAW (reflection adventure of the week) is to catch our ego red-handed in its act! Identify an event that was driven by ego and upon catching it, it disappeared.
We will leave you with these thoughts.
Reminder: No Bala Vihar this Sunday due to the Vrindavan Surabhi event on Saturday. See you next week.
Regards,
Rashmi and Ananya.
