Teaching Children Vedanta
Below, and in the next blog, I am writing about children and youth in the transmission of Vedanta and the Yogas. It has taken SRV about 15 years to finally have a small but consistent group of children and teens to work with. The Vedic tradition of the four stages of life (student, householder, retired, and sanyasin) is a well-articulated system by which to gauge the health of a society. In the U.S. the virtues that should be developed in the student phase are not being acquired. Why? Because the parents and grandparents/older relatives and community members are lacking them. The trend of family life is toward seeking entertainment (pleasure) and mere survival. The elders of families rarely spend their retirement in spiritual pursuits, but rather are bent on enjoying themselves until their senses give out. Eshanatrayam, the triple bondage of mate, progeny and wealth as the goal of life is the primary ideal held up in society. The term eshanatrayam carries with it the sense of materialism, selfishness, and slavishness to a constricted life of the senses.
I know we all see this, but looking at it in terms of the four stages of life provides some insight into what is missing and what needs to be put into place. When the ideal of a society (or individual) is ultimate Peace, Truth, or union with God, then earthly pursuits and pleasures are kept in perspective; they are subordinate to the higher Ideal. The elders of the community acquire wisdom and pass it on. They are respected and revered for coming close to the ideal. Children and youth want to emulate the elders and thus become acquainted with discrimination, detachment and cultivate forbearance and other ingredients of the sadhanachatushtaya (Four Qualifications), as well as the yamas and niyamas of Yoga. This makes them fit parents for raising children of noble character or candidates for early entry into sanyas, the fourth stage of life – that of mature renunciation leading to ultimate liberation. To spiritually fit parents are born great souls, or souls seeking to continue “the thread of Yoga.” Each stage of life is essential in society and works in a harmonious circle. This circle is broken and needs repair.
><><
Last week we held our 12th (at least) annual summer retreat at the American River in Northern California, USA. For the last five years we have usually had 3 to 4 young children who have their own meditation and class each morning while the adults attend class with Babaji Bob Kindler. But this year was different. Some of those youngsters graduated to the adult classes and special teen sessions, and the only child in attendance was an eight-year old girl.
I have the privilege of teaching the children’s classes, which are fun and challenging, but I was not sure how this would go over with only one child. The synergism of a group of children is part of the charm and the learning process, but with one child, how would this happen? Would she get bored? A couple days before the retreat, and as I was completing the lesson plan for five days, I experienced a reversal of my concerns and started seeing this as an amazing opportunity for both of us….and it was.
The object of these children’s and teen’s classes is several-fold. The first is to instill basic Vedantic and Yogic principles and precepts in a natural way, which for the under 13 years set consists of combining story, art, philosophy, contemplations, and a major project tailored to their abilities. The next objective is to create an opportunity for the youth to bond with each other in this unique environment that we attempt to make similar to the legendary days of the forest ashramas of India.
One of the most difficult situations we face in providing spiritually for our children is that children want to fit in with their peers, most of whom are not being raised with any spiritual teachings and only believe in a material reality. (Babaji has lately been describing this “matter only” view as analogous to driving down the freeway/expressway in a car that has only first gear. The young ones need to be raised in the awareness that we have at least 4 gears available to us – the Four States of Consciousness.) Then again, their friends who are raised in religion are sometimes antagonistic to Eastern perspectives. Thus, helping to create a community of peers who are also encountering Vedanta’s universal and transcendental teachings is pivotal.
As a third objective, we want parents to have the opportunity to focus completely on their own retreat by our taking responsibility, as much as possible, for the children. The children learn by witnessing their parents’ seriousness, their respect for the teachings, the path and the teacher.
One-on-one with “Z”
Our first day together was most memorable. The conch was blown at 6:45am and our solo Shakti child immediately hiked up the hill from her family’s tent to join me in the “Salute to the Sun” stretching exercises to fully wake up before meditation. We greeted the sun, Surya, who represents the Light of Consciousness in the gross universe.
Afterwards, we hiked down to the bridge spanning a seasonal creek and chanted “Svasti vah paraya tamasah parastat, Godspeed to you in crossing over to the farther shore beyond all darkness!” and then walked across and into the teaching tent, nestled amidst enormous pine cones, fir needles, and, yes, the ubiquitous poison oak. Like maya, we have to learn to recognize this plant or suffering ensues. Bowing before the little shrine we performed arati and chanted four famous slokas from the Vedas and Gita in both Sanskrit and English. Over succeeding days Z created a little arati book to keep in her family’s meditation room so she could join her parents and sister in reciting these verses.
With the mood thus set we sat for our first meditation of 5 minutes. It was full of wiggles.
“What do you do when you meditate?” I asked.
“I let my mind go blank,” she replied.
“Oh, did it get quiet in there?” I probed.
“No,” she replied.
This was useful information. Meditation when the mind is rajasic is not possible. We talked about how to make the mind one-pointed. Z was familiar with the concept of sattva, rajas, and tamas from earlier classes and also from her parents. I asked her to draw someone meditating in tamas, in rajas, and in sattva. We also discussed “beyond sattva.” Using a special book made of clear plastic sheets, she drew “Southpark” style people sitting in meditation. The tamasic person had his eyes closed and a bubble full of “zzzzzz’s” coming out. The rajasic person had his eyes wide open, as if he would explode, with nearly a dozen bubbles full of symbols coming out from his head. The sattvic meditator had her eyes closed and a single bubble coming from her head with a few symbols in it. Z was expressing how a rajasic mind is scattered and how a sattvic mind becomes one-pointed. Then she drew (to my surprise) a fourth meditator, with eyes serenely closed and no bubbles at all.
The next five days introduced different kinds of contemplations all associated with the lessons. One of the teachings we learn early on in SRV is called The Three Stages of the Mind’s Evolution and consists of Brooding Mind, Thinking Mind, and Illumined Mind. Brooding Mind is of the nature of rajas and tamas and corresponds with mudha and kshipta in Yoga. Thinking Mind spans higher rajas and into sattva and takes one to ekagra in Yoga. Illumined Mind is sattva and beyond. One of the implications of this simple teaching is that the mind/chitta must be charged up before attempting meditation. This comes via concentration and contemplation. We should learn from an early age to concentrate on something that inspires and calms the mind before attempting to stop the vibrations/thoughts of the mind. This avoids the pitfall of a mind that is void but dull – where the intellect does not reflect the radiance of the Self. It also develops the skill of making the mind concentrate at will, something that is extremely important as our youngsters enter adolescence.
On this first morning, we closed with one more very short contemplation for which I gave her something to focus on in her heart center. Z took her seat and remained still and poised for several minutes. The poise remained with her throughout our silent breakfast.
The lessons
All five lessons during this retreat were based upon verse II.ii.6 of the Mundako Upanisad.
Om – Ara iva rathanabhau samhata yatra nadyah
sa esho’ntashcharate bahudha jayamanah
omityevam dhyayatha atmanah
svasti vah paraya tamasah parastat
Om – There, within the heart, where all the subtle nerves meet like the spokes of a chariot wheel at the hub — there the Atman abides, unmoving yet assuming many forms. Meditate on that Self with the help of Om, and Godspeed to you in crossing over to the farthest shore beyond all darkness.
The last line in Sanskrit, “Svasti vah….,” was selected a few years back to be one of our secret passphrases required for anyone to cross over the bridge that leads to the kids’ teaching tent in the woods. The children have to learn it in Sanskrit and English, and they take delight in teaching it to the adults who want to see their classroom. This year, the entire verse was taught by dividing it into five lessons:
Day 1 – There within the heart
Day 2 – Where all the subtle nerves meet like the spokes of chariot wheel at the hub —
Day 3 – There the Atman abides, unmoving yet assuming many forms
Day 4 – Meditate on that Self with the help of AUM
Day 5 – Godspeed to you in crossing over to the farthest shore beyond all darkness.
Each lesson provided word for word translation of most of the Sanskrit “words of the day” and Z loved matching the Sanskrit to the English in the full translation. Then there were discussion questions followed by a riddle, a story, contemplation and then art activities. The “big” art/craft project this year was a quilt made of depictions of each day’s lessons using dye crayons on fabric. I’ll try to post some pictures later.
After the first two days, a particular thread emerged based upon Z’s capacity and needs that turned out to be the teaching on gross, subtle, and causal bodies, and their connection to the waking, dream, and sleep states. Of course, Atman, as our true Self beyond all those was consistently brought forward, but getting a handle on the distinction between the gross and subtle bodies and how we use and confuse them with each other and with the Atman became the underlying focus.
By the end of the retreat, whenever Z would make an “I” statement, I would ask her, “which body does that I refer to?” And she would generally answer correctly. Then I would remind her that her real I was watching that body. On the last day, during one of these exchanges, she said, “I don’t have to say “my subtle body wants ice cream” out loud do I?! “No,” I replied, “but I want you to think it to yourself and then remember that your true I is the Atman looking on. This teaching relates especially to lesson 3, during which we discussed various things in our gross universe that never change or move, yet seem to, like the waxing and waning moon, or a screen with movies playing across it, or the sun above reflected in the ripples of a lake. We also used the book of plastic sheets to make layered pictures/depictions of the three bodies, and then peeled them away via discrimination (and turning the pages) until only the Atman was left, but noticing that the Atman was always shining through those bodies.
The riddle part of each lesson was Z’s favorite and she reasoned out one of the more difficult ones:
If you lined up all the nerves in the human body end to end, they would reach 45 miles. That’s about the distance from Portland to Salem, or Sacramento to Stockton. If you placed all your blood vessels together they would go around the Earth 2.5 times! But if you were to put all your subtle nerves together, where would they reach?
I’ll close here for now and see if anyone can guess her answer or another good answer. Next week or so I will write about our teens during the retreat. Om Shanti!
