Yogiji Maharaj’s Love for Devotees

This week, we look at Yogiji Maharaj's love for his devotees. On first glance, it might be harder to create excitement for this topic, it is definitely possible through maximizing our storytelling skills.

Step 1: Synthesize the simple statement. Feel free to brainstorm or use some of the ones taken from the syllabus.

• Yogiji Maharaj loved his devotees.
• Yogiji Maharaj's was a servant of servants (das na das).
• Yogiji Maharaj's love inspired others.

Step 2: Start with the shakeup. 

• Start off sabha by asking the audience to identify this kishore who we already know. Framing this prasang pre-emptively encourages the audience to pay attention in hopes of identifying the individual. If the majority of your audience may have already read this book, feel free to substitute this prasang with Pujya Viveksagar Swami & Pujya Doctor Swami from below.
• Mahant Swami Maharaj: An Epitome of Saintliness: In 1951, Yogiji Maharaj visited the home of one family. Their 18-year old son didn't find religion or sadhus appealing - to the point where he would run out of the house the moment he knew Yogiji Maharaj entered their home. Once as he was leaving the home, he encountered Yogiji Maharaj who lovingly held out his hand and asked affectionately, “Guru, where are you going? Come back upstairs.” He loving places a kanthi around his neck, but he immediately tears it off with the beads flying everywhere. We can only wonder what future this kishore will have in Satsang! A couple of days later, Yogiji Maharaj was departing. En route to the the railway station, he saw this kishore sitting on the parapet of the village pond with his friends. Yogiji Maharaj hailed him affectionately, so the kishore reluctantly came to Yogiji Maharaj, wondering what would he say now! However, to his surprise, Yogiji Maharaj humbly joined his palms and smilingly said, “Now I am going. Forgive me for my mistakes.” And so saying, Yogiji Maharaj blessed him with his signature pat and walked away hurriedly. 
• See if anyone can identify this kishore. We all know this kishore. He is our guru, Mahant Swami Maharaj.
• Through prasangs like these, we will learn about the power of Yogiji Maharaj's love.

Step 3: Support the simple statement with stories filled with details (concrete) and validity (concrete). Here, we took prasangs to support the simple statement, "Yogiji Maharaj loved his devotees."

• Kiritbhai: Yogiji Maharaj's love reminded Kiritbhai of his parents given the care and attention he took the smallest things.
• Natvarbhai Shukla of Jhadeshwar: Yogiji Maharaj loved his devotees enough to acknowledge the time they spent. 
• Theplas for Third Class [Nilkanth, March 2012]: One kishore in college in Mumbai decided to spend five days with Yogiji Maharaj in Atladra. Adhering to Yogiji Maharaj’s wishes, on his way to Atladra, he traveled in the 3rd class compartment on the train. However, his return ticket was booked for the 1st class compartment – in which there was air conditioning, food, & comfort. After the five days were complete, he went to Yogiji Maharaj and told him he was leaving. Yogiji Maharaj asked in which train he was going, but he tried to avoid the question. Yogiji Maharaj said that he couldn’t let him buy the ticket and that the Sanstha would pay for the ticket. Yogiji Maharaj told a haribhakt to buy a 3rd class ticket for him, as he was a student and probably didn’t have the money. Yogiji Maharaj also instructed that haribhakt to ensure he got dropped right onto the train to avoid getting lost. In private, this kishore told the haribhakt that there was no point buying the ticket because he had money and would buy it himself. The haribhakt then told him that it was Yogiji Maharaj’s agna, so he could not disregard it. The next morning, Yogiji Maharaj woke up at 4:00 am, made fresh theplas, and a package for him. He initially became embarrassed because he would have to carry the package onto the 1st class compartment of the train, where there would already be food. With this in mind, he decided that, on his way to the train station, he would give the package to some homeless person. Additionally, he decided that after getting into the cart and leaving the mandir, he would tell the haribhakt to step out. As the cart left the mandir, Yogiji Maharaj made sure the kishore got on to the cart. When the cart was about to make a final turn, the kishore looked back to get one last darshan of the gate of Atladra mandir, and his heart skipped a beat. He saw Yogiji Maharaj standing at the gate and watching the cart make its last turn. That moment changed everything. He decided that he would sit in the 3rd class compartment and eat the theplas that Yogiji Maharaj made. We all know this kishore as Pujya Viveksagar Swami, and the haribhakt as Pujya Doctor Swami. Both can personally recall how Yogiji Maharaj loved his devotees.

Yogiji Maharaj's love for all inspired the start of Sunday sabha, so let's make the most of our time in sabha this week.

Make the Kids Write - a new kind of unexpected.

Sahilbhai a first time presenter in Bal 1 and a very ardent Sabha-ologist came up with a unique unexpected (spoiler alert: it was not a video) to engage the Balaks. He wrote the following thoughtful analysis of his talk and how in the future he would improve. A great many good idea here for all of us to implement.

In preparing for my Bal 1 talk centered on the prasang of Shukanand Swami I came up with the following Simple / Unexpected / Story paradigm.

Simple

When we do seva our main goal should be to make Maharaj and Swami happy.I would have the kids repeat this several times to make sure they remembered it. This really worked as some of the kids were said this in their own words while they were eating dinner.

Unexpected

I had the balaks undergo a writing exercise in order to help them understand the difficulty of Shukanand Swami’s seva as Maharaj’s Secretary. Each balak had a blank piece of paper and a pencil. I would say five sentences and have them write it down word for word to the best of their ability. Then I would ask the balaks for feedback on they performed. There was only one balak who was able to get around 90% of what I said which was 40% higher than the second highest. I asked him why he did so well and he told me that he has a teacher who teaches at a fast pace. I related this to Shukanand Swami’s proficiency in his seva because before Shukanand Swami became a sadhu he was a merchant who handled the accounts of land and he was highly educated. Similar to the balak who performed well due to his experience with his teacher in school, Shukanand Swami was highly adept at writing long accounts due to his knowledge of linguistics he was able to handle the rigors of being Maharaj’s Secretary.

After receiving the feedback from the balaks, I immediately told them to flip over their paper and be ready for the second part of the exercise. Similar to the first part, I would say five sentences (different sentences) and have write them down word for word. After completing the exercise, I initiated another feedback interval to ask how they felt now compared to the first part. Many of the balaks improved from their performance on the first part because they kept a positive attitude even though they might have gotten less than 10% accuracy (accuracy is evaluated by how many words a balak was able write down which correlated with what I had spoken in the five sentences) on the first part. The balaks that had done worse than before or did not improve had a negative attitude which affected their performance. Because of the fact they were unable to get a 100% accuracy on the first try, they felt miserable. 

I used this data to inform the balaks on how this exercise resembles seva. When we do seva our main goal should be to make Maharaj and Swami happy. However, sometimes events happen that are out of our control. Those events must be seen as Maharaj’s ichchha (His doing) to test us. If we become depressed and quit we will never achieve the goal we set out which was to earn Maharaj and Swami’s happiness (rajipo). Therefore, if we remain sthitpragya (stable minded) we are able to analyze what happened (antardrishti) to help us persevere through the unsuccessful attempt in order to continue our goal to achieve Maharaj and Swami’s happiness.

Stories

I told the balaks about Shukanand Swami’s seva and the magnitude of difficulty he had to go through. I began with an overview of what it meant being Maharaj’s secretary. As the secretary, Shukanand Swami would create and maintain accounts of Maharaj’s discourses which were later compiled into major religious texts (Vachanamrut). Maharaj always tested his devotees in order for them to become ekantik (perfect devotee). The same was applied to Shukanand Swami by how he was pressured to write 14 page long accounts and end up having to revise them late into the night (this displayed the amount of meticulous perfection Shukanand Swami emphasized in doing seva). When he would submit his seva to Maharaj as a form of bhakti, Maharaj would test him being tearing up the papers and throwing them on the ground. Nityanand Swami asked Shukanand Swami if he experience a feeling of frustration and Shukanand Swami replied by saying “I had written it just to please Maharaj and Maharaj pleased himself by tearing up the pages”. This quote best illustrated how we should perform our seva which is to earn Maharaj and Swami’s happiness and remain stable minded like Shukanand Swami. As a result, Maharaj appreciated Shukanand Swami so much that he would refer to him during discourses on seva.

In order to continue my emphasis on when we do seva our main goal should be to make Maharaj and Swami happy as well as the mahima of Maharaj's ichchha in our seva, I used the London Mandir prasang. It was Yogi Bapa's agna to have a Mandir in every continent. So to fulfill this agna, there was an area of land originally permitted by the urban planners in the city to be used in the construction of the Mandir in London.  Unfortunately, some problems occurred and the land was no longer permitted for construction. The devotees did their best to win a case for permission to construct the Mandir but there was no success in obtaining the land. Due the lost efforts, the devotees lost hope in the cause and quit. However, Pramukh Swami Maharaj had the sthitaprajna to remain focused on fulfilling Yogi Bapa’s agna and inspired the devotees to remain focused on the cause as well. As a result, a new area of land was found to construct the Mandir. Today there is a beautiful Mandir in London which can be seen as a symbol of seva that was done to earn the happiness of Maharaj and Swami. 

What went well:

• The exercise was something challenging and forced the balaks to think better than they would've if I showed them a video.

• I made them say my simple in order for it to stick in their head. I would say “what should we think when we do seva” and then they would reply “to make Maharaj and Swami happy”. I did the same thing with how being stable minded is important.

• When I talked I didn't use any advanced Satsang vocabulary rather I utilized the words happiness, stable minded, and desire. This helped them remain interested because they knew what I was saying.

• I used a lot of gestures (shout out to Aksharbhai) when I spoke to make them interested.
• Because it was my first time, I made them feel comfortable talking to me by joking around before sabha (I did the “lawn mower” backwards and deliberately fell to make them laugh and a bunch of other goofy stuff). I believe this is a great thing to do if someone is presenting for the first time in front of balaks (especially if your height is intimidating to them).



What I could improve:

• Don’t forget to do Jai Naad (shaking my head in disappointment as I type this).

• I should have paced myself because there were other things that I planned to do during my presentation but failed to do so because mentally I was going too fast. As a result, there were some flaws in conveying the exercise's relationship to Shukanand Swami’s seva (I should’ve talked to a balak privately telling them I’ll tear up his paper as part of the exercise).

• I wasn’t able to successfully transition into my story which made some of the balaks bored listening to it. As a result, some of them might forget the name Shukanand Swami. This is a major problem for me which is storytelling. I should’ve told them to imagine the scenario by describing what it was like during Maharaj's time (no microphone, cramped fingers from writing, no pencils so no eraser, revisions that could keep Shukanand Swami awake late into the night without anything but a candle, end up having the papers torn up, going straight into another long discourse while being sleep deprived, and much more to help the balaks see the story more clearly). Shout out to Tusharbhai for the storytelling advice.

• Next time no pencils so they cannot erase (Shukanand Swami did not have an eraser).

• Tell the balaks before the exercise to try their best and not stop to ask questions (which ended up consuming time).

•  Have more than enough materials to prevent wasting time in search of spare pencils, paper, etc. 


Case Study: 100-Year Thought Experiment

Last week, kishore/kishori mandal kicked off 2012 with their first priority sabha with the intent to practice preparing and planning for an excellent sabha, a model for the other sabhas throughout the rest of the year.

A fellow Sabhaologist sent us an example of one way in which they made their topic, “Analyzing their Relationship with the Satpurush,” resonate with the audience without using any of the activities. We have nothing against activities, but this example demonstrates merely how matter elevates a presentation from mundane to memorable.

The presenter started off with his shakeup: Intertwine your arms such that one hand rests on the other. Depending on your handedness (left vs. right), different outcomes were to be expected. The presenter then asked for everyone to switch hands much to the discomfort of the audience members.

"In the first orientation, our body was in sync whereas in the latter it was not."

Then, he dropped his simple statement: We want to be in sync with the Satpurush.

Following up, he presented an example of Pramukh Swami Maharaj and his morning puja. He asked, “What does Swamishri do before his puja?”

One hand shot up: “He wishes everyone gathered with folded hands, 'Jai Swaminarayan.'"

Bingo: We notice such details when we are sync with the Satpurush.

Example #2: Nearly two centuries ago, cultural notions saw nothing evil with slavery, utilizing the labors of others without necessarily paying them. That same idea does not stand firm nearly two hundred years later, but a few days ago, one collector decided to auction off seemingly mundane items collected from the Titanic. The value pegged at these items numbered in the millions, but why?

Why do people value items from the Titanic?

And on each kishores’ face appeared the puzzled look reflective of deep thought – an indicator of a well-designed question.

1. One kishore ventured to answer, “Well, the Titanic was seemingly unsinkable, but it still sunk.”
2. Another responded, “Anything historical sells.”
3. A third chimed, “It’s history, so yeah, it’s worth a lot.”

The first kishore hit the mark, but now the presenter threw the mother of all monkey wrenches:

"Even though we look back 200 years ago and wonder how and why people can profit of others’ misfortune with slavery, here we are in 2012 doing the very same thing."

"Perhaps items from the Titanic may be of value even if had not sunk, but the fact that it did sink made it a legend and an object worthy of study in the century following its demise."

But the greatest strategy of the presenter was where he went from this point by helping the hero.

“Now, let’s turn our attention to 100 years into the future – 2112. What new cultural thought will shift? Will it be a constitutional amendment outlawing eating meat? Perhaps society will see the harm of consuming onion and garlic? It can be any one of the other niyams prescribed by Shriji Maharaj in the Shikshapatri, but it’s also where we enter the picture.”

“Let’s think about it. There are 20-25 kishores in this sabha, and with about 50 other mandals in North America, we can estimate total 1,000 kishores who are hearing this message today. Of course, if each of us talks to even 5 people during the week about our beliefs, we hit 5,000, and when we factor in the 8 years we are in kishore mandal, the math really takes off. “

“Shaping cultural acceptance is not as far-fetched as we think, and we can achieve it when we strive to be in sync with our guru. How cool would it to be a part of a movement that has an impact long after our lives? It's all possible when we are in sync with the Satpurush.”

Case Study: Maharaj's Legacy

A fellow Sabhaologist shot this ensemble over to us as an example of utilizing Prezi as a presentation modality for a presentation in this week's kishore-kishori sabha entitled, "Maharaj's Legacy." As we mentioned before, Prezi serves as an interesting alternative to Powerpoint with its dizzying turns and intricate angles.

Note his shakeup as he started off with a reference to TIME's recently published issue in which they named the Person of the Year and then followed up by drawing comparisons to Shriji Maharaj's legacy in three areas: societal change, structure, and successorship.

Given the stories provided in the syllabus, this Sabhaologist concocted a winning combo. 

Sant Samagam: Our Metrics

Let's start sabha off this week with a quick quiz. Imagine our job lay in measuring the world around us. How would we measure...

...how bad these socks smell?

Answer: Hobo Power - According to radio personality Adam Carolla, it's the unit of measure for how bad something smells. On a scale of 0-100, anything scored zero hobo would not stink, and anything scored 100 hobos would smell so bad that it would kill us - stay away!


...the smallest distance a computer mouse can move?

Answer: Mickey - Inspired by the Disney character Mickey Mouse, one mickey is equal to about 0.1 millimeter. Imagine that!


...the spiciness of these peppers?

Answer: Scoville - Chemist Wilbur Scoville came up with this unit for the "hotness" of any food. A bell pepper has a Scoville rating of zero while Naga Jolokia has a rating of 1.05 million Scoville; needless to say, it's the spiciest pepper known to man!

Basically, we as humans seek meaning through measuring everything and anything - smell, spice, smallest movement of the computer mouse. So how do we measure our decisions in life? Sant samagam, this week's topic.

The eight years we spend in kishore mandal, from freshman year in high school to the senior year in college, can really shape where we end up in life. Now, more than ever, we need to be oriented in the right direction. Let's take a look at this infographic (click for larger view). It breaks down FBI's 2008 report for crimes using children. Basically, each child represents the likelihood that they will commit those crimes when they enter the world as adults.

Obviously, this picture will be too much for the entire audience to take in at once, but here are the highlights worthy of mentioning.

• Total crimes in the picture = about 14 million committed in 2008
• Drugs & Drinking (Drug Abuse + DUI + Liquor Laws + Drunkenness + Disorderly Conduct) = about 4.5 million (31.63%)
• Theft (Larceny + Burglary + Embezzlement + Stolen Property + Robbery + Car Theft + Counterfeiting/Forgery) = 2.2 million (14.70%)
• Aggression (On Family/Children + Assault + Arson + Murder) = 575,468 (4.19%)
• Sex crimes (Rape + Sex offenses + Prostitution) = 177,502 (1.27%)
• Runaway = 109,225 (0.78%)
• Gambling = 9,811 (0.07%)

While we could categorize the remaining crimes, these will do for now since they are the most relevant to our age. Again, these numbers represent how many kids in 2008 will grow up and commit the following crimes.

Now, what does the Satpurush say with regards to all of these? 

Drugs & Drinking

On February 19, 1993, in Calcutta, India, a few members of India's under 19 cricket team had come to our temple for Swamishri's blessings. Pankaj Thakur, an outstanding young cricketer, was part of this group. Swamishri asked him, "Do you know the meaning of Pankaj?"

"Yes, it means 'kamal' (lotus flower)." replied Pankaj.

"That's right," said Swamishri.

"A lotus remains totally dry despite the fact that it grows in water. In the same way, we should remain untouched by bad influence despite being in the limelight of world cricket."

It is a well-known fact that a young and promising star is often forced into intriguing situations before he reaches his full potential. More often than not, this ruins his life and career. Swamishri took the opportunity to warn the young man.

"We should not be influenced into harmful habits such as meat eating, drinking, and other such addictions. The glamour of cricket will offer many temptations on its way but don't be lured into bad ways. Remain untouched like a lotus."

The young cricketer felt blessed and vowed to stay away from bad influence.

Theft

In 1983 Swamishri came to Nadiad from Dabhan. Dinner was arranged at the house of Champaksinh Gohil (the then president of the district). Champaksinh did pujan of Swamishri and made a donation of 100 rupees. At the time, I didn't see who took the money. So, the next day I reminded the area coordinator of Nadiad, Shri Navneet Panchal, "We have to send a receipt of 100 rupees to Champakbhai's house, but I can't seem to find the money anywhere."

"I don't know who took the money either," confessed Navneetbhai.

We asked everyone, but no one knew where it had gone. However, ten days later, I received a letter from a youth, called Suresh, from a village near Vadodara. In it he said, "Last night Pramukh Swami Maharaj appeared before me in a dream and told me, 'You have stolen 100 rupees from God. You've also stolen other amounts of money which the devotees had given to the sadhus, and you've spent it on your house. But you will never be happy. So return all the money to Janmangal Swami. Otherwise he'll suspect someone else of stealing the money. Then you'll have to bear the sin for that as well. So be sure to return the money."

This youth, Suresh, had left the letter on Tyagvallabh Swami's desk in Bochasan. He even wrote, "If I had written my address, then you'd catch me, so I've left that space empty."

From this incident I realised Swamishri's divine intuition to know what is happening, even when he's not present.

Aggression (Anger)

Once a devotee asked Swamishri, "I believe that sadhus can achieve at will. That's why I've come. I've long been a slave to my anger and ego and I want to be free of them."

Swamishri replied, "Anger stems from ego. In fact ego is the root of all bad instincts. If one has self pride and someone labels him as good or bad, he is emotionally carried away. But remember, we are neither very good nor very bad. We do not become so upon someone saying so. But we should not look bad in front of God. Remember Shriji Maharaj and then slowly try to remove these instincts. If one can realize that 'I am atma and I am pure', then there is no place for ego. We have to uproot it with such knowledge. Also, if we can think that 'everyone understands; only I don't understand,' then who will we get angry upon? There's no doubt about it, we have to eradicate our ego. It is because of our self-pride that conflicts arise. So forget our self being; whatever has been achieved, it is due to God.

Runaways

During a special question answer dialogue in the Divya Sannidhi Camp with Swamishri on May 23,2001 in Sankari, a number of questions were first asked to the karyakars and then to Swamishri.

Q: What does Swamishri like?

Karyakars answered, "Cultivating the virtues Swamishri possesses. Harmony (Samp). Friendship (Suhradbhav). Unity (Ekta). Doing ghar sabha. Humility. Not watching television?"

Swamishri replied, "Everyone has given the answers to what I like - to do ghar sabha, not to be cynical about others, etc..."

Lesson: Spending time with family decreases the chances for it to break apart.

Sex Crimes
A few years ago, Swamishri was in London when a lady wrote a letter to him informing him that her husband was watching certain obscene videos online. Swamishri knew this yuvak, and so he kept this letter in his mind.

Once, after he had finished his meal and the yuvaks were coming up in a line to get his ashirvaad, he grabbed the yuvak’s hand and asked him if he watched such obscene videos or not. (Swamishri is
very sharp and extremely straightforward. So once he puts you on the spot, it is hard to get out of the situation.)

The yuvak replied that he did indeed watch those videos.

Hearing this, Swamishri became extremely upset and asked him, “Do you have no understanding? You are lucky that your wife is straightforward. What would have happened if she did such a thing? What would come to be of your wedding? What would your family go through? Do an upvãs, and if you can’t do the upvãs, then tell me and I will do it. Kaaran ke tu maaro kehvaay ne. Aapdaa be ni vachhe koike to Maharaj ne modhu bataadvu padshe ne. (You are mine after all. Between the two of us, someone will have to show their face to Shriji Maharaj.)”

Gambling

On June 11, 1999 in Mumbai, a devotee brought his friend before Swamishri and revealed, "Swami, he has developed a habit of betting on cricket matches."

Swamishri replied, "It is a form of gambling."

The devotee said, "Swami, he also drinks."

Swamishri again replied, "When you have one vice, then many more follow behind it. Do you know that because of gambling the Pandavas lost their kingdom and wife, Draupadi? It is a devastating habit, therefore give it up. You'll become a lot happier in life."

Swamishri's words appealed to the young man, and he pledged to give up his vices.

Bringing it Home

Now going back to our numbers, if we put all those number together, samagam with the Satpurush would have helped 7.6 million people. If we dug deeper and looked at the remaining crimes, the Satpurush's words could have helped them as well - bringing the grand total to 14 million! 

(Think 1 in 20 people! How big are your bal/balika mandals? Helping people think in these terms based on your center can help communicate the point but requires some estimates and/or quick research on your part. For instance, that would mean Akshar & Jagdish would grow up to be a convict - the cute adorable balaks that we play with every week etc.)

In recap, sometimes we forget how fortunate we are to have a yardstick to measure our decisions and lifestyle choices that could end us up in serious trouble. Those that end up as statistics do not. 

The United Negro College Fund's ads always sport the slogan, "A mind is a terrible thing to waste." It's what our gurus have been saying for time immemorial, so let's make it a point to remember them through thought (mansi, vichar), word (prasang varnan), and deed (puja, satsang reading). The more we stay in commune with him, the less we have to worry about falling into any of these societal shortfalls. 

In fact, we won't ever fall short when we sprint successfully. 

Bhakti Without Expectations: The Tale of the Seal

Sunday is just around the corner, and before the presentation panic mode activates, we have yet another example that we can perhaps squeeze into our presentations.

National Geographic photographer Paul Nicklen had an unusual encounter with a leopard seal while out photographing Antarctic wildlife. Watch him recount his story below.

The link? Just as the seal continued to try to feed Paul for four days, it did so without expectation. It was trying to provide for Paul regardless of receiving something in return. That principle encompasses the bhakti of Akshar, namely Gunatitanand Swami.

Another way this video could be used is in explaining the nurturing relationship of our guru and how relentless he is in taking care of us. I mean, the seal kept up its attempts for four days!

Talk about Mother Nature.