Below is a summary of what we did in our class today.
We started our class with 3 Oms followed by Sahana vavatu
OM saha nāvavatu
saha nau bhunaktu
saha vīryam karavāvahai
tejasvināvadhītamastu
mā vidviṣāvahai
OM śāntiḥ śāntiḥ śāntiḥ
and then also said the following 3 Chants listed below
Om Sri Ganeshaya namaha, Om Sri Saraswathye namaha, Om Sri Sat Gurubyoh namaha
Shlokas -- We continued to revise the shlokas we have learnt thus far.
Vakratunda Mahākāya
Vakratunda Mahaakaaya sooryakoti samaprabha
nirvighnam kurume deva sarva karyeshu sarvada
Saraswati Namastubhyam
Sarasvati namastubhyaṃ varade kāmarūpiṇi
vidyārambhaṃ kariṣyāmi siddhirbhavatu me sadā
Karāgre Vasate Lakṣmīh
Karāgre Vasate Lakṣmīh karamūle sarasvatī
karamadhye tu govindaḥ, prabhāte karadarśanam
Yoga -- We moved on to a few Yoga stretches and poses. We did all our favorite poses--- tree pose, a lion pose and our butterfly pose.
Meditation/Numbers and colors --- After yoga our kids asked for our meditation game! Our kids did an awesome job of closing their eyes and counting in their mind. We then revised telling the numbers from 1 to 10 in Sanskrit as well :
1. One (ekam) 2. Two (dve) 3.Three (treeni) 4. Four (chatvaari) 5. Five (pancha) 6. Six (shat)
7. Seven (sapta) 8. Eight (ashta) 9. Nine (nava) 10. Ten (dasha)
We also learnt how to say colors in Sanskrit including our house colors yellow/orange!
Red – Raktaha White - Shvetaha
Yellow – Peethaha Black - Krishnaha
Orange – Naarangaha
Gita -- Before we moved to story, we revised chanting the Bhagavad Gita : Chapter 2, Verse 39 from our handbook.
Story --- With Diwali coming up this week, our story continued to be on Goddess Lakshmi. The story goes like this -
There was a beautiful temple dedicated to Lord Jagannath. Lord Jagannath's wife is Lakshmi who also lived in this temple. Once long long ago, during Diwali it was the day of Lakshmi pooja. As it was her pooja day, she went out to see how people were praying. She walked and walked and enjoyed looking at all the beautiful decorations, lovely houses with thorans, flowers and lamps and lights. Many of the houses she saw were big and had lot of decorations and lots of sweets and families praying with devotion to Lakshmi. She went to each of the house to bless her devotees. As she continued walking she came to very small, very poor house. In that house there was a girl called Shreeya. Inspite of not having much, Shreeya had cleaned the house, cleaned the floor and put a simple rangoli design on the floor. She had decorated Lakshmi's image with lotus flowers and she was praying to Lakshmi with full devotion. Lakshmi heard Shreeya's honest prayers and blessed Shreeya with wealth and properity.When she came back, Lord Jagannath was waiting for her. He said "Why did you go to that poor girl's house? That was such a poor house. You are the Goddess of wealth and now you are all dirty. I dont want you to come in."Lakshmi said "Why? I go to the house of anybody who prays to me. It does not matter if they are poor. All that matters is that they have a good heart. Fine, if you dont want me to come, I will go away".So she left the Jagannath temple. She got a tiny house. It looked very simple outside but when she went in its insides were made of gold and it so beautiful, as beautiful as Lakshmi herself. Lakshmi went to live inside. Now - what happened when Lakshmi left the temple?........All the flowers, decoration in the temple started walking after her. Then the rice used for nevidayam in the temple, started walking after her. There was one bag of rice walking, and then another one and then another one, all walking one behind the other all in a row behind Lakshmi. Lord Jagannath was surprised!! He looked behind and what did he see, next all the water in the temple also started walking behind Lakshmi. A bucket of water and them a cup and then a jar of water, all walking behind the rice. All the rice and water in the temple also followed Lakshmi out of the temple. Jagannath had no food to eat ! Then all the puja items followed as well and went to the house where Goddess Lakshmi was. Now Lord Jagannath thought Lakshmi might come back but she did not. He realised that Lakshmi really loved whoever was devoted to her. It did not matter if they were rich or not rich. All that mattered was that they loved Lakshmi. He felt sorry, went looking and searched everywhere. Finally he came to the tiny poor looking hut where Lakshmi lived. He asked Lakshmi to forgive him and to come back to the temple with him. Lakshmi agreed to come back.
There is no class next week. Next class is on Sunday Nov 14th@ 9.15am. Zoom link is the same as our last class and we will send out a reminder via our class whatsapp ahead of the day. Attached is a link to our Bala Vihar handbook for this year.
Wishing everyone a Happy Diwali.
Pranams,
Vidya and Pramila