1. Children and Conscious Childraising
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Adi
Da Samraj has given extensive instruction about child development, the process
of human growth, and conscious childraising based on the principles of non-separation,
prior unity, and truly sacred culture. Adults in the Adidam community have studied,
practiced, and learned many lessons about the serious responsibility of raising
children.
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| Big Wisdom Free
School San Rafael, CA |
Many devotees choose not
to have children because they understand the profound obligations of parenting
and decide to dedicate their time to the inherent demands of spiritual practice.
But for children who live in the community of devotees, we have provided excellent
education programs ranging from preschool to high school level. Big Wisdom Free
School (in San Rafael, California) and the Garden of Lions (in upstate New York)
are examples of Adidam schools that successfully served the education of young
people during the 1980's and 1990's.
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Big Wisdom Free School San Rafael,
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This section includes
stories about the children and young people in Adidam, and their experiences growing
up in the Adidam community. We also will be adding personal accounts from the
adults who learned how to serve children, and from the young people who made the
choice to practice the Way of Adidam when they reached adulthood.
Please also visit the website published by our community organization
dedicated to serving children and educating others about Adi Da
Samraj's Instruction on children: The
Vision of Mulund Institute.
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Children boating on Mother's
Bed
at The Mountain Of Attention
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1.1. Excepts from Adi Da's Teaching on Children and Childraising
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Three Talks by Avatar Adi Da Samraj
about the love of children and Spiritual practice.
Adi Da: "I Love men, women, children, walls, and frogs with the same profound intensity. I simply have a different kind of relationship with every being. I am in Love with children! I mean deeply in Love with them. I have a profound love relationship with them." |
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"We feel the Mystery and even breathe
it. We are more than what we look like.
We don't know what anything IS. We ARE the Mystery. IT is all
one feeling."
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1.2. Stories and Insights on Children and
Childraising
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The
Peach — Adi Da reads the mind and heart of one young
devotee with a strong desire. |
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"My
Self Is In My Heart" — The story of a young boy's
remarkable relationship with Avatar Adi Da over the
course of several years, as told by his father.
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Loss
of Intimacy and Inappropriate Behavior — Frank Marrero
tells the story of a lesson he learned as a teacher
at Adidam's Big Wisdom Free School, about using Adi
Da's wisdom about relationships and intimacy to address
children's inappropriate behavior. |
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© Nara Wood
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1.3. Videos about Young People and their Relationship to Adi Da
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You must understand the limits you yourself are imposing upon Enlightenment. That sobers your very being. It must,
and only that sobering is the beginning of the Way. All beings are enthusiastic. Look at children. They would like to enforce their own
vital happiness forever, and have it Realize the Divine. At some point, they must understand — they must be sobered by Reality.
Avatar Adi Da Samraj, at a gathering with devotees in July, 1987 |
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1.4. Related Books, DVDs, and CDs
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The First Three Stages Of Life: Serving the
Right, True, and Free Development of Children and
Young People and Completing the Human Work of Individuation,
Socialization, and Integration for Adults.
Presenting Instructions Given By His Divine Presence,
Avatar Adi Da Samraj
Compiled by Meg Fortune McDonnell, for The
Vision Of Mulund Institute
An Adidam Practical Wisdom Guidebook
August 2011 edition
order
here
Table
Of Contents
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Remember About Being Happy: Instructions
to and about Children
Given By His Divine Presence, Avatar Adi Da Samraj
CD: August 2011
order
here
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What, Where, When, How, Why, and Who To
Remember To Be Happy
by Avatar Adi Da Samraj
February 2000 hardcover edition
order
here
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Vegetable Surrender or Happiness Is Not Blue
by Heart-Master Da and two little girls
September 1998 edition
order
here
A
humorous and instructive story written by Adi Da Samraj
for young children. Onion One-Yin and his vegetable
friends embark on a search for someone who can help
them solve their problems — and discover the secret
of how to be happy, right now! Illustrated with black
and white line drawings.
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The Scale of the Very Small: Establishing
Yogic Responsibility for Your Reproductive Potential
(Including Regenerative Sexuality and Orgasm, Birth
Control, Conscious Conception, Pregnancy, Birth, and
Infant Care)
by the Ruchira Buddha, Avatar Adi Da Samraj
1997 edition
order
here
Avatar
Adi Da’s Instruction on how and why we incarnate,
death and reincarnation, conscious conception and
birth control, Spiritually sensitive pregnancy and
infant care.
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The Lesson Of Life: A Consideration with Young
Practioners of the Way of Adidam
Vol 6, The 20th Anniversary Series
DVD
order
here
Avatar Adi Da responds to a gathering of His young
devotees who were on retreat at Adi Da Samrajashram
(Avatar Adi Da's principal Hermitage, in Fiji) in
1991.
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Look at the Sunlight on the Water: Educating
Children for a Life of Self-Transcending Love and
Happiness
by Da Free John
1983 edition
out
of print
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Jingle Baba: The Happiest Camel
by Rita Siglain Gordon
November 2018 edition
order
here
In
2008, Beloved Bhagavan Adi Da said that He would like
to see more children's books written in Adidam and
that He wanted to write more as well. Now, after many
years, with the help of many devotees, there is a
children's book about Bhagavan and His first camel
Jingle Baba — with 55 awesome color photographs, many
of which have never been seen before. Jingle Baba:
the Happiest Camel is a heart-warming story about
the love between a camel from the London Zoo and the
Unique Spiritual Master and World-Teacher Adi Da Samraj.
more
info
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Love, Wisdom, and Happiness in the First Three
Stages of Life: Booklet 1 of the Conscious Childrearing
Series
compiled and edited by The
Vision Of Mulund Institute
Based on Instructions Given by Sri Sri Bhagwan Adi
Da, The Da Avatar
1995 edition
order
here
Detailed,
practical instruction and Wisdom on the first three
stages of life: individuation (1-7 years); socialization
(8-14 years); and discrimination and integration (15-21
years). Includes Talks and Essays by Avatar Adi Da
on conscious child-rearing.
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The Practice of Ecstasy with Children: Booklet
3 of The Conscious Childrearing Series
compiled and edited by The
Vision Of Mulund Institute
Based on Instructions Given by Sri Sri Bhagwan Adi
Da, The Da Avatar
1995 edition
To order call 1-877-770-0772
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Four Primary Principles of Conscious Childrearing
Based on the Teaching of Da Free John
Prepared by the Education Department of The Johannine
Daist Communion
1985 edition
out of print
- Intimacy is the Healing Principle
- The Principle of Attraction
- Discipline is an Act of Love within the Culture
of Expectation
- Transcending Sexual Neurosis in Childhood
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God Games
Games created to ground children in feeling the Mystery.
Based on the Wisdom and Instruction of Adi Da Samraj.
order
here
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2. Adolescence as a Spiritual Opportunity
Four young devotees in a puja acknowledging
the transition to the third stage of life
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Many (perhaps most) adolescents tend to allow their adolescence
to be used up by what Adi Da characterizes as a struggle between
dependence and independence. At a certain point, they "leave
the nest", and settle into the patterns of conventional "adulthood"
(defined primarily by family, friends, and job) for the long run,
through the end of their lives.
But adolescence can serve a greater purpose than just this transitional
struggle. It is a time when one has the free energy and attention (along with
the motivation) to ask deep questions like: Why are we here? and: What is the
purpose of life? Almost all of us do at least briefly consider questions such
as these when we are adolescents, but then the responsibilities of adulthood impinge
greatly on our time and energy, and these questions usually go "underground".
(They sometimes emerge explosively, decades later, in the not altogether conscious
form of a mid-life crisis. But doing things to make oneself feel "young" —
like buying sports cars or having affairs with younger people — doesn't
actually effectively address the deeper question of one's mortality: "What's
the point of it all if we're going to die in the end, anyway?")
The
usual life sequence is described in the Hindu tradition in four stages: brahmacharya:
the young person and student; grihastha: the householder, married with
children; vanaprastha: the retiree (a transitional period); and
sannyasa: the renunciate, whose life is focused on Spiritual Realization.
(In our contemporary materialistic society, the final, spiritually oriented "renunciate"
stage has been eliminated, and "retirement" is mostly devoted to materialistic
preoccupations.) The householder phase is presumed to be generally unavoidable — something one must experience oneself for a few decades — to get it out of one's system . . . to the degree where one is ready and willing to take up renunciate practice (in a non-idealistic fashion).
However, a fortunate few adolescents engage in a fuller
consideration of deep questions than most, and allow that consideration to move
their life in a profound direction, one that bypasses the usual life sequence.
(Perhaps they are being assisted by spiritual understanding carried over from
past lives. And perhaps they are also receiving the wisdom and spiritual blessing of a great Spiritual Master like Adi Da.) Their life has the possibility of proceeding straight from brahmacharya
to sannyasa, giving them a far greater opportunity than most for Spiritual
Realization (regardless of whether they go on to have intimate partners, children,
jobs, etc. — as is the case within life-positive traditions like Adidam,
where renunciation is not defined by ascetic dissociation from ordinary life,
but by one's complete focus on the Divine in the midst of — and transforming
one's relationship with — everything else).
The stories below are
about adolescents who are engaging their adolescence and early adulthood as just
such a spiritual opportunity. For example, Neeshee Pandit lived for a couple of years in the Hermitage Sanctuary of Adi Da Samrajashram, serving in the Editorial Department. And Max Rykov lived for several years at The Mountain of Attention Sanctuary, serving in the Adidam Library.
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An
Ecstatic Falling into Him
— Nicole tells the story of how she discovered Bhagavan Adi
Da. While doing so, she recounts two remarkable dreams. In the first, the whole
human condition is revealed to her in a kind of metaphor. In the second dream,
Adi Da appears to her, and connects with her directly and personally, correcting
a false, cultic view of Him that she had previously held.
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Never
Has God Revealed Himself So Fully — Maksim Igorevich Rykov (20,
at the time): "My interest in God became dormant, and did not re-emerge until
later in high school, when I became heavily interested in philosophy. I intuitively
felt that there was something greater in life; that all the answers were available,
but I had no idea how to access them.
. . . I yearned for God, but all I got from books was knowledge, not the
Divine Itself." | |
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Painting by Lynne
Wagner
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