sai_pranam

Swami always has said that, Education should be for life not for living. The Balvikas helps the children to develop their innate character and helps them to go inward to find their divinity and to see divinity in all. The Latin root for Education is ‘Educare’ means to Elicit- that is to bring out from within. The values are all within us. We just have to bring them out and put it to practice. Educare brings in the connection between the 5 values, 5 Senses and the 5 elements.

Educare has two aspects, worldly and the spiritual. Worldly education brings out the latent knowledge pertaining to the physical world. Spiritual education brings out the inherent divinity in man. Swami has given us educare to make us understand the divinity in all His creations. Bhagavan says," I created myself from myself to love myself." Bhagavan said that beginning of life is out of LOVE.

Educare is that which helps man to retain his innate divinity on a continual basis. Educare is also the art of ensuring a perfect constant balance of the five elements within, by managing the mind and the inputs from the five senses, so that the surge of the Divine energy from within flows uninterrupted. In other words, a harmony between thought, word and deed has to be achieved in such a manner that the physical world is perceived as an extension of the spiritual world.

It is through the senses that we are able to recognize and enjoy creation. But we have to use it in moderation in order to enjoy nature. We should set a limit to every act- seeing, hearing, talking, tasting, touching. It is this limit which is given through the five human values. There is an interdependence of all things in nature and the nature and the man are dependent on one another. All the time we constantly keep exchanging the 5 elements with the nature.

The man is made up of the 5 elements namely-space, air, fire, water and earth. The nature is also is made up of the same 5 elements. This human body of ours gets upset even if one element in its system is disturbed. For example- suppose the body temperature goes high, there is dehydration, breathing difficulty and body pain. Like wise when there is a disturbance in one element there is imbalance in the Nature.

We see the imbalance in the Nature in our today’s life. It is mainly because we have converted our needs into desires. Now our desires have become our need. We are, all the time trying to cope up to achieve them by any means—that is to say forgetting the values, the righteous way of leading life. We have forgotten morality. Swami says, “Money comes and goes morality comes and grows”.

Our children are our future. The time has come for us to realize that children through spiritual and moral education will finally provide the answer to our present conditions. We have seen that the practice of 5 values lead us to sense control. By controlling the senses one is able to have control over one’s mind. When the mind is in one’s control, it is easy to turn the mind inwards to understand the divinity within oneself and the divinity in all God’s creations. Through educare, Swami is teaching that we are divine. We all came from that one divine God. One became many. We have to trace our way back to the One.
(To be contd)

Quote:
Education must remove hatred between the pilgrims on the various roads to God. There is only one God, one Goal, one Law, one Truth, one Religion and one Reason.