Hari Om Parents,
We had a great class today. Here is a recap of what we covered :
Opening Prayers: Om Sahana bhavatu, Guru Strotam followed by meditation and focus exercises.
Solka: Sri Rama Rama Rameti, Neelambhuja shyamala .
Ramayana recap in 5 min: We went over Ramayana we covered until now as each student contributed one sentence and re-told the main storyline until Dasaratha's conversation with Kaikeyi about two boons.
Ramayana: We continued the story from Kaikeyi convincing King Dasaratha to grant her 2 boons, She sends Sumatra to bring Rama. Rama graciously comes to see his father and was stunned to see him lay helplessly on the floor. Hearing king's order through Kaikeyi, Rama agrees immediately and goes to seek blessings of Queen Kausalya with Lakshmana. We had discussions around the story- character analysis of Lakshmana, Rama, Sita, Would Bharatha agree to this if he were around, and reactions of people of Ayodhya.
We also discussed the story of Dasaratha mistakenly killing a young kid of a blind couple and getting cursed in return to go through same misery. Rama accompanied by Sita and Lakshmana leaves Ayodhya and takes Guha's help to cross Ganga river. Finally, they part with Sumantra and reach Chitrakuta, They build a Kutiya with the help of wood and twigs and live peacefully.
Quote of the day: "Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live"
Kaikeyi's character was based on this quote and we had a great discussion about this towards the end of the class.
Following are some of the thoughts our students had:
Anish: Selfishness is like a virus. It kills so it could live. It puts down others so it could live. When a person gets infected with selfishness, it slowly eats away one's soul. It also eats away other people surrounding.
Aditya: I think this quote means that a selfish person wants people to lead their lives based on his/her wish but not how they want to lead their own life.
Sachit: I think this quote means that you should live the way you want to live and do not control and tell others how you want them to live. Don't be like Kaikeyi.
Pratyay: This quote means that selfishness is thinking more about how to change others than yourself.
Geeta Chanting: After reciting slokas with Swamyji, we recorded our students, reciting slokas from 41 to 50 for house team summary report.
Closing: We finished with aarti and pledge in the temple hall.
We will reach out to you about our class annual presentation this week.
Thank You,
Suma and Ruchi
