avidyāyām antare vartamānāḥ, svayaṁ dhīrāḥ paṇḍitam manyamānāḥ.
dandramyamāṇāḥ pariyanti mῡdhāḥ, andhenaiva nīyamānā yathāndhāḥ. (5)
The ignorant, who live in the midst of darkness but fancy themselves as wise and learned, go round and round deluded in many crooked ways, as blind people led by the blind. (I.2.5)
Looking back at what i am doing, this verse is what came to my mind...
Self Service
At this stage, i can't even imagine pouring milk, honey, gandha amongst other things over idol reciting specific mantras like my teacher says. I would rather feed someone with that. So decided, rather than pooja parihara, for my own planetary dosha nivarthi, why not serve folks afflicted with my problem to a greater degree like Barbara pijan suggests?
This is the true selfish reason behind my volunteering at an NGO. Initial enthusiasm in teaching visually challenged diminished, since, his availability clashed with my swimming timings and learnt to my dismay that i was not that disciplined to continue what i had started. Am good to go for one time adhoc activity, giving my best in bursts and spurts, but could not assure a long term steady availability of my hours.
A feeling of not having given enough
The NGO had organized a walkathon and could go only for the mock walk and not the actual one due to an out of station funeral and home trip on the same day. In spite of not attending walkathon, in spite of discontinuing teaching to a visually challenged BCom student, in spite of not arranging corporate sponsorship from company, in spite of not onboarding the Indian chapter to our official giving site, NGO invited couple of folks, including me to for thanking tea party. Apart from bus and auto fare on travelling, i contributed nothing from my own purse, it was only $150 per quarter twice, that the organization, I worked for, gave to the NGO's US chapter, since India chapter was not recognized. Was overwhelmed with tea party, two free T shirts (for me and my audio challenged friend), memento and speeches, that i volunteered to write exams for a visually challenged II PUC student.
Scribing for visually challenged
Realized that was the most painful, blunder mistake i ever did. The reason, i discontinued teaching the first visually challenged student, was because, i lacked patience to explain, the very fundamentals again and again. I can be extremely patient the first few times, after a while, a slow intellect frustrates me. The worst part was to realize that i competed not with myself but with others on certain aspects.
Unequal Competition
Typically in the examination hall, every second would count and i remember clutching the dear paper trying to write the last few points, as the invigilator would try to grab the paper and walk away after the exam duration got over. And for the last 3 days, i was here in the examination hall, after having recited sahanavavatu from school and having sung National Anthem after so many years. All visually challenged students had scribes, however, the guy behind me did not have one. The student i was scribing for knew no answer, nothing whatsoever about central tendency, leave alone mean median mode for economics exam. And i was actually teaching him in the hall, instead of scribing for him (not finals). It was so painful to know the answer, and not be able to write them to get marks, because, the student didn't know and could not speak one sentence in english.
The student behind me was simply sitting holding the paper, smiling once in a while like these people who can't see; he simply sat for more than an hour waiting for the scribe who didn't turn up. 30 minutes for him, (since another scribe finished the exam faster and scribed for him); while 1.5 hours for the rest of the people. The second day, the student didn't come for the exam. How can anyone expect a blind student to remember 25+ data points, do statistical calculations in that crunched time? Not everyone is a yogi with perfect concentration. If we were yogis as our culture had once indicated, then of course we would not need these external eyes. And our employers, filter candidates based on marks on that one day, the colleges give certificates based on that one day of exam! The third day, the student did not want to write the psychology exam, he had not revised and could not form sentences. Was equally upset, that i ended up eating mini meals in A2B inspite of having swimming session in another 1 hour.
It was extremely frustrating to think, what and all, specially challenged students have to memorize and write an exam and seek employment from a company, which cares two hoots about world history or australopithecus. How much and what should these kids learn to stand on their own leg, set up a business or be employable without depending on some charity? To wish for a world, without disabilities, old age or illness is like wishing for a waveless sea. Ok, whatever, this too shall pass.
Life and Microsoft Excel
Life is like excel at times. It takes hours to selectively delete rows based on certain criteria, while it takes seconds to copy rows we want. Guess, should not try to bother about perennial problems that have no apparent solution and rather, take aspects of life, which make life beautiful and meaningful and move on.
Great Souls Above
What i know is hardly 1%, there are so many advanced souls above, who would feel the same frustration for the souls below who make the same mistakes again and again and face so many physical disabilities or special challenges whatever over many lives! We have a poem where they talk about evolved teachers who sit disciplined achalam without interfering the natural evolution and individual learning! Greater still are living examples who spend tireless hours, like the sage who helped the scorpion, in spite of being bitten by it so many times.
2017 Feb Update:
Lucky are souls are who are guided and pious from birth. Took me years to realize. Hari is sarvottam vayu is jeevottam, and now nothing pleases me more than seva to Hari, dvija and go.
dandramyamāṇāḥ pariyanti mῡdhāḥ, andhenaiva nīyamānā yathāndhāḥ. (5)
The ignorant, who live in the midst of darkness but fancy themselves as wise and learned, go round and round deluded in many crooked ways, as blind people led by the blind. (I.2.5)
Looking back at what i am doing, this verse is what came to my mind...
Self Service
At this stage, i can't even imagine pouring milk, honey, gandha amongst other things over idol reciting specific mantras like my teacher says. I would rather feed someone with that. So decided, rather than pooja parihara, for my own planetary dosha nivarthi, why not serve folks afflicted with my problem to a greater degree like Barbara pijan suggests?
This is the true selfish reason behind my volunteering at an NGO. Initial enthusiasm in teaching visually challenged diminished, since, his availability clashed with my swimming timings and learnt to my dismay that i was not that disciplined to continue what i had started. Am good to go for one time adhoc activity, giving my best in bursts and spurts, but could not assure a long term steady availability of my hours.
A feeling of not having given enough
The NGO had organized a walkathon and could go only for the mock walk and not the actual one due to an out of station funeral and home trip on the same day. In spite of not attending walkathon, in spite of discontinuing teaching to a visually challenged BCom student, in spite of not arranging corporate sponsorship from company, in spite of not onboarding the Indian chapter to our official giving site, NGO invited couple of folks, including me to for thanking tea party. Apart from bus and auto fare on travelling, i contributed nothing from my own purse, it was only $150 per quarter twice, that the organization, I worked for, gave to the NGO's US chapter, since India chapter was not recognized. Was overwhelmed with tea party, two free T shirts (for me and my audio challenged friend), memento and speeches, that i volunteered to write exams for a visually challenged II PUC student.
Scribing for visually challenged
Realized that was the most painful, blunder mistake i ever did. The reason, i discontinued teaching the first visually challenged student, was because, i lacked patience to explain, the very fundamentals again and again. I can be extremely patient the first few times, after a while, a slow intellect frustrates me. The worst part was to realize that i competed not with myself but with others on certain aspects.
Unequal Competition
Typically in the examination hall, every second would count and i remember clutching the dear paper trying to write the last few points, as the invigilator would try to grab the paper and walk away after the exam duration got over. And for the last 3 days, i was here in the examination hall, after having recited sahanavavatu from school and having sung National Anthem after so many years. All visually challenged students had scribes, however, the guy behind me did not have one. The student i was scribing for knew no answer, nothing whatsoever about central tendency, leave alone mean median mode for economics exam. And i was actually teaching him in the hall, instead of scribing for him (not finals). It was so painful to know the answer, and not be able to write them to get marks, because, the student didn't know and could not speak one sentence in english.
The student behind me was simply sitting holding the paper, smiling once in a while like these people who can't see; he simply sat for more than an hour waiting for the scribe who didn't turn up. 30 minutes for him, (since another scribe finished the exam faster and scribed for him); while 1.5 hours for the rest of the people. The second day, the student didn't come for the exam. How can anyone expect a blind student to remember 25+ data points, do statistical calculations in that crunched time? Not everyone is a yogi with perfect concentration. If we were yogis as our culture had once indicated, then of course we would not need these external eyes. And our employers, filter candidates based on marks on that one day, the colleges give certificates based on that one day of exam! The third day, the student did not want to write the psychology exam, he had not revised and could not form sentences. Was equally upset, that i ended up eating mini meals in A2B inspite of having swimming session in another 1 hour.
It was extremely frustrating to think, what and all, specially challenged students have to memorize and write an exam and seek employment from a company, which cares two hoots about world history or australopithecus. How much and what should these kids learn to stand on their own leg, set up a business or be employable without depending on some charity? To wish for a world, without disabilities, old age or illness is like wishing for a waveless sea. Ok, whatever, this too shall pass.
Life and Microsoft Excel
Life is like excel at times. It takes hours to selectively delete rows based on certain criteria, while it takes seconds to copy rows we want. Guess, should not try to bother about perennial problems that have no apparent solution and rather, take aspects of life, which make life beautiful and meaningful and move on.
Great Souls Above
What i know is hardly 1%, there are so many advanced souls above, who would feel the same frustration for the souls below who make the same mistakes again and again and face so many physical disabilities or special challenges whatever over many lives! We have a poem where they talk about evolved teachers who sit disciplined achalam without interfering the natural evolution and individual learning! Greater still are living examples who spend tireless hours, like the sage who helped the scorpion, in spite of being bitten by it so many times.
2017 Feb Update:
Lucky are souls are who are guided and pious from birth. Took me years to realize. Hari is sarvottam vayu is jeevottam, and now nothing pleases me more than seva to Hari, dvija and go.
No comments:
Post a Comment