A Day with Baba: Nashville, TN
In the face of the lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and with schools closing and children confined to their homes, the Sai Spiritual Education (SSE) teachers have been finding creative ways to keep their students spiritually engaged during this challenging period. The SSE teachers of the Sathya Sai Center of Nashville, TN, thought that, given the children had time on their hand, it would make sense to have students to turn their focus on spending time with Baba. The teachers decided to assign such a task to their students– asking them to imagine how they would spend “A Day with Baba.” Below are three delightful musings of the students.
“I was so happy. First, we got ready for the day. I picked up our bags. I took trail mix for snacks and two bottles of water. Then we went on a walk. ”We will see a lot of animals”, I said and Baba agreed. Baba noticed a lake for us to swim in and asked if I would like to swim. We ate salad and fruit for lunch. After lunch and some rest, we played basketball for 30 minutes. Then, it was nap time. When I woke up, I realized it was just a dream, a very good dream!”
“l was surprised because He was there. We ate pancakes and strawberries for breakfast. After that, we got ready for an awesome day. First, we packed our bags and got ready to do some hiking and canoeing. On the hike, we looked out for animals and interesting plants. Then we went down to the river to canoe. Wow! It was so much fun! We even dogged rocks! We came across the biggest waterfall l had ever seen. A lot of people were there. We decided to swim for half an hour. Lunch time! I asked Him what He wanted to do next and He suggested that we take a nap. When we woke up, we went to a park. We walked around and had fun on the playground. It was a great day because I got to spend my day with Baba!”
“As I thought and wrote about ‘A Day with Baba’ during these days we spend at home due to the COVID-19 crisis, the big question is, “Why did this happen?” I feel we did not take proper care of Mother Earth. We cut trees down, wasted natural resources, created lot of pollution and did not respect animals. The GOVIND virus, as some of us call it, has led to a few good things as well. Families get to spend more time together! People have realized the importance of small things in life. The world is united to save mankind and heal Mother Earth! If we continue our prayers and let Mother Earth heal herself, everything will settle down by Baba’s Grace! After we come out of this crisis, we should not forget what we have learned!”
The video below captures more of the SSE students’ reflections on what a day with Baba would be like.
*SSIO-USA Media Team thanks Kouwshigan Ramiah for use of his original artwork as the header image for this article.