Few Thoughts Of Our Beloved Master On Child Nature And Care

Few thoughts of our Beloved Master on Child Nature and Care: 1. Up to the time a baby begins to speak or think , the suggestions of its parents and others affect the character that just begins to form , and the suggestions become part of young one's life. The child becomes the meaning of the suggestions. When he reaches the boyhood the suggestions of the parents and other persons continue to work a good deal. Since thinking starts from this age , he begins to form himself, and his surroundings also affect him at this stage. Further on , he becomes like a coiled- up rope ,of which the coil remains undisturbed, even if it is burnt. 2. It is like the wonder in the eyes of a child- anything it sees is wonderful. Is there wonder in everything that we see, or in the way in which we look at things? 3. Parents should have sufficient regard for this aspect of childhood life and should see that only what is right is spoken to the children. A baby can also take the impression of the words spoken by its parents, even though it has not developed thinking or understanding. As such, one must be very cautious in speaking even before babies. One must not utter any nonsense before children. 4. Children are wonderful agents for family harmony, peace and blessedness. Children bring light and laughter , two essential ingredients for happiness, into our lives. They represent the future, not merely of the family into which they are born , but of the human race as a whole. In contributing to their growth and development, we therefore participate in a very definite manner in moulding the future of the human race. 5. You see how perceptive children are. The most difficult on earth is to deceive a child. They know all about everything. You can deceive anybody else, but not a child. After the age of six they also follow our behaviour pattern and get into the rut of civilized hypocrisies. Till then they are fresh and you can't cheat them at all. It is then that they ask the most embarrassing questions, most troublesome questions , between the age of three and six, seven, eight…..That is the testing time for the parents .But then if you are true to your responsibilities, you can train children very well. Then there are no future problems. 6. The joint family system generated a great deal of care, love and well being. Children, especially , flourished and grew into wholesome adulthood under the love and care lavished upon them by all members of the family. Discipline was also there, for there were always minor transgressions of one sort or another, and someone was always waiting to correct the transgressor---but the discipline was immediately tempered with a great deal of love which made the discipline acceptable. There was little selfishness. The old received as much care and attention as the very young and the children were shared by all as a sort of common wealth, and a source of joy and happiness. 7. Children just grow up naturally; you don't have to raise them, they just grow up on their own. They are like plants and trees around here; they just grow. There are boundaries to be placed , but basically the children grow. 1

8. It seems between the age of eight and eighteen , nineteen, twenty, we are wiser than we think, and we are wiser than the older people think. In fact we are wiser than the older people too. Because in that age span , there is a freshness in the mind which we lose as we grow older, there is an instinct towards grasping something of the future ,there is an idealistic approach to life….There is a need to know the truth. 9. Modern life has deprived the younger generation of access to the fairy tales of yester years. They were entrancing beyond belief. But their greatest value lay not in their charm but in their ability to give children during their formative years a permanent foundation of value systems, which they absorbed without being aware of the fact that they were learning most profound values of life. And since such values are implanted deep into the child's inner core of the developing human being those values remained to be called upon later in life in the form of hidden reserves of strength and fortitude, when the now grown up adult faced temptations or trying situations in actual life. 10. A good teacher must create the most exciting environment in which a child or a youth must want to learn. 11. The word education comes from the Latin root ' educe: to lead; to draw out; to develop from a latent condition'. Teachers must therefore be able to draw out of their students the latent knowledge that is already in them. This is also the ancient vedic wisdom which says that the mind is like a mirror with dust on it. Education is only the process of removing the dust and then the mirror is able to reflect all that is put before it. 12. I think that children learn best when they are unaware of the fact that they are being taught. That is why play perhaps is so intimately intertwined with the teaching process. Children learn practically all they are ever going to learn within the first six or seven years of their lives. 13. Parents must regulate their minds. They have to be wise enough to know that " My child is mine; nevertheless it has its own existence. It has its own past samskaras. It has a tendency of growth and let me allow it grow." My Master used to say that the duty of a parent is that of a trustee. A child is entrusted to you by God. Deal with it as a trust , honorable job well done, with complete integrity to the work that has been entrusted to you. Don't interfere with the child. We have often seen children who cut the buds of roses from plants and want to open the flower by peeling off the petals and it is dead. You see unfolding of a mind is like a flowering of a bud , as delicate , as fragile, but as sure as that you see. Would we but trust Nature and let Nature take over and only provide an environment of love and warmth in which a bud can open .You would see the marvel and miracle of every child becoming a genius. What is a genius except complete expression of our inner potential? 14. Regarding children my Master used to say," That to give them the wrong system because the right system cannot yet be practised like giving the patient the wrong medicine because the right medicine is not available". 2

15. Observing the little children growing up around me , I have nothing but wonder and a sense of tremendous gratitude for the amazing rapidity with which they shed memories—of persons, places and things! 16. My faith for the future is with the young people. The children and the youth must work for the world , for the universe. 17. Education gives culture because we look to the inner values of things , not to superficial dresses and tikas that we put on our shoulders and foreheads. 18. In the process of education there are four stages—Knowledge which is taught, knowledge gained through intuition , knowledge gained through revelation and the ultimate knowledge which comes from within ourselves through meditation , through yogic practice. 19. A real teacher continues to learn all his life. A teacher who has stopped learning is unfit to continue to be a teacher. Students can stop learning, because often, we learn for a purpose. 20. A good teacher must recognize and attack the unwillingness, subdue it, entice the owner of that unwillingness out of his or her shell into which they have wrapped themselves. And the battle is won. 21. There can be no teaching without the condition of obedience being met. It is not only the student who obeys .It is the teacher, also, who obeys. The teacher obeys his sense of duty , his need to pass on his knowledge , his achievement , to somebody else. He is obeying his inner impulse to transmit. In short , it is an impulse of generosity, kindness , above all love for humanity , which compels him to do what he is doing.

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