Children's Corner
Story for children: Greed and contentment
Once upon a time, there lived a monkey called Raja. One day he heard from some people passing by that on a particular day, a load of peanuts was going to arrive in the town where Raja and some other monkeys were residing. The greedy monkey was so excited upon hearing this that he kept the news to himself, thinking that he would eat the peanuts all by himself rather than sharing them with the other monkeys.
The day arrived for the peanut load to come into town. Raja was desperately waiting for the peanuts. No sooner had the load of peanuts arrived, than he jumped on the heap.
Now, Raja wanted to carry as many peanuts as he could, so he stuffed his mouth and both hands with peanuts, and proceeded to a tree, where he very often stayed. While he was putting the peanuts in a safe place on the tree, one fell from his hand. Angrily, the monkey said, "Oh, no!" As soon as he had opened his mouth to say this, all the peanuts fell from it as well!
Leaving the other peanuts on the tree, Raja hurriedly climbed down to gather the fallen peanuts. But he could not find any of them! His fellow monkeys, who were watching him from a distance, had quickly come around and picked up all the fallen peanuts even before Raja could reach them.
Now that he couldn't succeed in recovering the fallen peanuts, Raja decided to return to the tree thinking that he would relish at least the peanuts left there. While he was climbing the tree, however, he noticed another group of monkeys feasting on the peanuts left aside on the tree. Thus, Raja ended up without having a single peanut.
Moral: Dear children, from this story we can see that if we are greedy and selfish, as Raja was, we will wind up unhappy, as we feel we don’t have enough. If we try to get more, eventually we might lose all that we already have. Therefore, we should try to be content with what we have.
Spiritual experience of a child seeker
Removal of obstacles in seva caused by son
One Saturday, I was late in proofreading the Sanatan organization’s Weekly Online and needed a couple more hours to finish it to my satisfaction. It was getting close to my two-year-old son’s naptime, and he usually cries a lot before falling asleep. I prayed to His Holiness (H.H.) Dr. Jayant Athavale to remove this obstacle so that I could continue with the proofreading. I was amazed to see that as I continued the seva, my son fell asleep within a few moments, without crying much. This had never happened before and I was grateful for His constant grace on His seekers.
-- A seeker, Atlanta, USA.
[Dear Readers, when we engage in spiritual practice, such as chanting*, seva and so on, not only do we get purified from within, but our surroundings also get purified, thus positively affecting those around us. This is evidenced by the above experience, wherein the purification of the surroundings resulted in a normally raucous child sleeping without incident.
-Editor.]
* Chanting means constantly remembering or repeating God’s Name according to our religion. Young children should also chant 'Om Gan Ganapataye namaha' (Lord Ganesh's chant) for at least 15-30 minutes daily for divine protection. Older children, who have been doing spiritual practice for some time, can determine their exact chant from the experiment in Issue 124, Message to Seekers section. Parents should repeat (chant) The Lord's Name for children too young to do so themselves.