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In August 2016, a devotee in Singapore wondered how one can change people or ignore them due to their habits:
Because I don’t think like you, I am still here trying to change people. If I thought like you, I would ignore them and walk away. Habits are like this: if you remove the ‘H’, ‘abit’ remains. If you remove the ‘a’, ‘bit’ remains; even you remove the ‘b’, ‘it’ remains. In the case of habits that you have developed over many years, it will also take a few years to change them – but it is possible to change. If it were not possible to change, why would I even want to talk about it? You have to be more patient.
Purity – to want to change, Patience – to wait for the results to happen and Perseverance – to keep up the effort until you achieve. If you want water from the earth, you don’t just dig a few feet. Do you give up if you don’t get water? If you did not have water, you would die of thirst, so you would dig more until you reached the water. That is the only way you would be able to quench your thirst and live, as you would otherwise die for lack of effort.
Take one habit at a time and work on it; if you dig in ten places, a little here and a little there, you are not going to get water. If you dig deep in one place, you will attain results. Take one habit at a time and, very slowly, get rid of it. Once you have gotten rid of one, you will develop enough will-power to get rid of the others and, slowly, you can overcome them all. You cannot do it all in one day; what you have developed over years, you will lose over a period of years.
There was a schoolteacher who had a very bad habit of inhaling snuff and was unable to rid himself of the habit. He went to a guru and asked for advice on some way of getting rid of his problem.
The guru asked the teacher whether he used chalk in the classroom and he replied that he did. The guru advised him to take a fresh stick of chalk and not to throw it away after the first day, but to go on using the same chalk the second and third day and so on. Then the guru said, “Every day, you should take the same amount of snuff as the length of chalk that is left in your hand. On the first day, you will have more but, as the days go by, your consumption should reduce, too.” The teacher followed his advice and, as the days went by, his consumption of snuff was greatly reduced until, eventually, he overcame his habit.
Take one habit, work on it and get rid of it. That habit will change and then tackle another and slowly change until you get rid of all the old habits. It can be done.
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Mr. Thuraiayah Rajasingam and his daughter Saima Rajasingam from United Kingdom (UK) were chosen by Swami to lead the inauguration of the new children programme, which commenced in Germany in October 2017. It was a beautiful event with tuition, interactive session between children, teachers and parents, presentation and lectures. There was singing, food and celebration.
While performing the first tuition class with children age 8-12, what became apparent, was that not only the children were learning about the values Love, Peace, Truth, Right Conduct, Nonviolence, Justice and Harmony, but also the teachers were benefiting from their “teaching”.
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During an interview in April 2017, Swami specifically guided some youth from the Netherlands on what type of
Seva
activities in which devotees in their country should actively partake. He said, “serve the elderly and inspire the youth”. Ever since, several of the youth have been actively looking for
Seva
opportunities in elderly homes. Several times they were turned down, simply because in the country we live in, these homes are financially well-off and can cater to the basic needs (food, shelter and medical attention). But the youth persisted and had faith that if Swami has pointed it out, there must be opportunities which would help improve the lives of these elderly. A few weeks after the interview, via a personal acquaintance, there was a contact made at an elderly home in a neighbouring city.
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On Wednesday, November 8, 2017 the youth had the privilege of having fifteen senior employees from Microsoft at Nectar of Love. Leaving their busy offices, the employees came for the purpose of taking part in cooking and distributing food to the homeless scattered around the port of Piraeus, to poor families in the area of Agios Loannis Renti, to a local Church and to a soup kitchen in the area of Gazi in Athens.
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Young people living in Rome, had the opportunity to participate in the organisation of the National Youth Meet event and in all related activities. In Rome, some members of the youth provided hospitality to young people coming from other cities and some other members put their cars at their disposal, in order to spend more time together, such as during breakfast and also during short transfers from one place to another. In this way, everybody had the chance to be together, not only for the event, but all day long as well.
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A Life-Changing Experience
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The first time that I took part in a Seva activity was last Christmas.
“
Selflessness” – unfortunately, a word unknown to the majority of people. We live in times where people have locked themselves in the prison of the ego, thrown away the keys and ensured a lifetime sentence for themselves.
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I am very grateful for the opportunity to have experienced these things, which has truly been beneficial to myself and everyone else. Such experiences remind us that there is hope for people to wake up and take part in humanitarian initiatives.
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