Nature says, in the most colorful way,
Flow through the day
Expressing yourself uniquely along the way!
Savvy Raj
Tag Archives: # appreciation #nature
On Giving:Part 3
Giving is the movement where the heart speaks without hesitation and in the flow through deeds and words.There is a moment of decision before the giving and it is in that moment that the life can be propelled to evolve along with the patterns of thought.
There is a lot of lovely words focussed on Giving and most are essentially on the’ Give before the Take.’
However, I also have something to share here …
Every giving may have its own reasons…
Some may be in an instinctive reaction like warming up of the heart due to mutual understanding either being in the wavelength of a resonance at that moment.
Or it may be because it is in goodwill as you genuinely care to show your appreciation.
Another would be because of your own good nature where you cannot leave without a positive act of appreciation in response…. there may be so many million and more reasons for giving which is wonderful for the world at large.
Now the reasons for not giving may be personal and unique as well.
Like for instance when you feel you are being used for a purpose that is self-serving.
Often there is a certain energy, in the very act of giving and that is what leaves an imprint on us and decides our future course of action.
Like at times a particular person’s energy may overwhelm and exhaust you or may be too much to handle that giving more thought or attention to it would feel counterproductive.
Like when you feel stressed and overburdened in the complexities of life and living that you simply may have overlooked the fact that the giving action is truly way beyond the gift itself.
Like when you fail to understand the reasons for giving or think the giver has ulterior motives for that matter…you may just appreciate it out of politeness but steer clear of receiving further as its truly not in your best interest to receive such a gift.
But whatever it is, Giving nurtures and nourishes the soul of both the giver and the receiver when the intention is positive.
Go Give More of Yourself
Cos You come from Abundance
Receive with thankfulness
For that fills your own being with Grace.
Savvy
A splash of Colors!!
Let colors carry the message of love, brotherhood, and truth.
Let the colors of Holi brighten your spirit and spread the message of peace and joy and goodwill without discriminations.
Happy Holi to one and all!
Savvy
#savvyarts
Who is your life partner?
Mom..?
Dad..?
Husband /wife…?
Best friend..?
Son..?
Daughter…??
Or someone else… ????
Your real life partner
is Your *Body*
You and your body
stay together from
the beginning of your
life till your last
breath.
You enjoy each
relationship in this
world that you feel
is good for you..
But you also play an
important role with
your body.
What you do to your
body is your
responsibility and
that will come back
to You.
The more you care
for your body, the
more your body will
care for You.
What you eat,
What you do for being fit,
How u deal with
stress (physical/mental/emotional),
How much rest you
give to it..
Will decide how your body gonna respond
in your day to day
life.
Remember your
body is the only
permanent address
where You live.
What your body
wants is…,
Love
Care
Respect
Politeness
Honesty
Your body is your
responsibility.
Because…
You are Your real
life partner.
Sharing this above message as they certainly are words to remember!
The Body has always been at the receiving end.
Then there are always issues with the body we have , too thin too fat too muscular too lean too angular too buffed to wiry … sad for we are what we feed ourselves .
Instead of gratitude for the gift of life that gives us our body we focus on actual nonissues, without being able to be content and add to our stress levels ourselves.
Nurture your body.Value the residing space of our living spirit.
Respect the body
Our body is not a machine it needs more than regular fuel in the form of food .
Because we are a web of interconnected cells we thrive in the integration and interdependence of the body mind and spirit .
We need to think well to feel well
We need to eat well to be well
We need to choose well to live well
We need to behave well to thrive in wellness
This is the strength of the interdependence that keeps us going.
Feed the body with love:
Take care to eat right and respect its state of being
Be polite and honest in your ways. Every body can be listening . You are responsible for you can be influencing the apace around you. You are emitting your intentions and thoughts outwards subconsciously
You must remember to rest and care for your body whenever needed.
For whatever way and however you can, it is certainly like turning back the clock into a more productive you!
Savvy
On Learning Spaces
My reflections after a chance visit to Swadhaa A Waldorf School in Pune.
In my spare time as a hobby, I enjoy visiting offbeat places and interacting with people from all walks of life to broaden my perspectives. To envision the world through the eyes of another is always an insightful experience.
When I visited Auroville in Pondicherry last year amongst the many inspirational insights I came across a bit about how Waldorf Schools started by Rudolf Steiner who was inspired by Sir Aurobindo, stands for holistic education that speaks to the soul and strives for human goodwill and integrity and instilling a sense of creativity and wonder through its unconventional schooling methods.
Besides that, I also had come across words of praise for her schooling and education received from the well-known actress Jennifer Anniston an alumnus of a Waldorf School herself.
Jennifer Aniston, Actress, former Waldorf student:
“I was always fascinated by acting, but my experience at Rudolf Steiner [school] encouraged me to pursue it as a career.” “Steiner was a free-spirited school that encouraged creativity and individualism.”
As a dance educator myself I have always felt schooling at conventional schools can be rather stifling for it focuses more on procedure and protocol than allowing freedom to explore. The root of our individuality and personal expression is often stubbed in the process of conforming to the norms and practices unless it is balanced out when there is a gateway to open communication and positive support on the homefront.
Recently having shifted my residence in Pune City and in my foray into understanding what my area had on offer as a creative educator myself, I came across. SWADHA Learning Centre. My interest was piqued that it was based on the principles of a Waldorf school.
I decided to experience the place on my own. Luckily for me the day I visited the school it turned out to be their Annual Day and there were elaborate festivities planned out for the entire day by the school for one and all.
There were workshops galore… I attended a few out of curiosity and came away heartened by the immense enthusiasm and support from the parents and children alike for this schools annual activity. I took my time to interact with some of the parents.
What I was immediately drawn to was the amount of openness that was there reflected in so many ways from children who were learning life skills experientially to how parents were so beautifully integrated into the educational activities of the children.
The pictures speak for themselves I must say!
In an era of grades and marks that decides destinies of children as future adults,
the learning concepts observed here come as a breath of fresh air. Like the lack of grading systems and adding only an individual assessment by the educator annually to ensure that each child is addressed and understood for their unique potential. And the breakdown of hierarchy which makes everyone an involved collaborator working towards positive transformations. And I believe they also help and guide a child gradually, who wants to integrate into conventional schooling system if they wish or need to for whatever reasons. The question is would we want to?
Perhaps the varied schools under the Waldorf umbrella are as unique as the people collectively managing them, but the fact remains that there is a happier learning space we can co-create for our future children if we have the willingness to come together and contribute our time and resources.
” A space that’s open yet bounded with a focus can be conducive to learning as when the process of exploration begins it is helped by a structured approach. But while boundaries may be reminding of a journey having a destination, it is the openness that reflects the never-ending source of creative possibilities.”
Savvy
An excerpt from my reflections on Learning spaces…. (read more )
What choice would you make?
Be a lamp or a lifeboat or a ladder
Help someone’s soul heal
Walk out of your house like a shepherd
Rumi
Precious words from Rumi which are empowering, to say the least, awakening in us to respect the innate potential we all possess to reach out to help another …
To help is to empower the mind body and spirit of another.
Empowerment is a powerful factor in building lives. Given the choice of transforming lives with the abilities, you own…if you are ready to help another…
What would you choose to be?
Being a Lamp :
A lamp lights up itself to light the way for another It is selfless and expansive . The light of a lamp lets you envision the strengths within the self as much as the others For to enable sight is to allow the envisionment. Being a light enables and empowers, as it throws light without fear or favour.
It is simply the quality of light to shine graciously!
Being a lifeboat:
It is the very purpose of a lifeboat to help save lives to allow another to hold on, to never fail in protecting from drowning in the voyage of life.
The lifeboat is a survival tool and is built to weather the storms without giving way. It floats on relentlessly without giving up to reach to safety.
Being a life boat in an emergency is like a godsend!. To save a life is to value its preciousness of the being.
Being a ladder:
Allowing the self to be utilized for another is the very nature of a ladder. In fact to be a ladder is to allow another to reach and aim higher to develop and evolve further.
A ladder is constructive in its very core essence, to build up another towards a goal.
Being a builder of another’s dreams and helping propel another to a cause greater than the self is the sign and strength of being a ladder. Being unmindful of the treading over of another in their attempt to reach their aspirations is a tall order indeed. The ladder provides the way without any personal gain.
Here are 3 beautiful sayings worth remembering always…
HANDS THAT HELP ARE HOLIER THAN LIPS THAT PRAY!
HELP EVER HURT NEVER.
ACTION SPEAKS LOUDER THAN WORDS!
Self-empowerment &healing :
To help transform lives is to empower from the heart and make a difference!
However, it is about healing the self-first enough to let light in that helps others to see!
A friend in need is a friend indeed! ;
Whatever is your way to reach out and help, what is truly significant is the one who helps in time and need. For such a help is a hand of God in divine grace.
So make a choice to reach out to the world in your own unique way for it needs all the help it can get!
Energy Matters!
Feed the Soul with love
Fire the Spirit with enthusiasm
For the body never lies!
Savvy
Taken For Granted!
The worlds thermostat is changing by the day
Global warming is the danger on the way
Although we may not have intended
Aren’t we taking our world for granted?
There is pollution every where
Misuse and appropriation unfair
There is greed and hoarding
Afforestation and land reclaiming
Without any consideration
For the future generation
Aren’t we taking our world for granted?
Hope is always there I know
But there is avarice and corruption in tow
‘Take it slow don’t destroy me… ‘hear the world implore
‘Else there will be nothing left of me as before …’
From the air that we breathe , to the home that we own
Aren’t we taking our World for granted?
To share our thoughts is to know we care
To make a difference is to dare
Trust and hope, all will do the same
Better than just playing the blame game…
Cos we really haven’t got any place else to go
So take the world for granted no more!
Savvy Raj
Priceless Soul!
Oh! Priceless soul!
Let there be more within for you to share
Let your words be measured in equanimity
Leave a bit of yourself in you for your sanity!
A little mystery of you to seek and solve.
A little meaning in you to find and evolve.
Your lifes sense of being,
It resides to make you, you
It arrives and departs as it wishes
But exposes your you-ness to you!
It knows what makes you tick
It knows itself and its ways around you
For it is yours to keep and own
Trust it to show you the truth in your path
Have faith in its enthralling ways
And you will sense the sheer miracle of You!
Allow yourself to safegaurd your very being.
For this is a world, that gets weary soon enough
Of every fanciful thing in time.
Let your soul be yours to keep
Sell it not for any price in the world,
For priceless is the spirit in your soul!
Savvy
This poem is a dedication to the creative soul that rests and flows within each of us that sometimes has the propensity to gets burdened by its own intensity.
Sense its infinite potential but value the need to center this soulspace. Pause to rest and recover, to reflect and revere its divinity. For it is in the stillness of such unassuming moments the creative soul is replenished to flow boundlessly in the river of time. .Savvy
Life is to Live!
On Nurturing :4
After writing a series of posts on the topic of Nurturing I found a lot of ideas floating out on Parenting and thus I am drawn to deciphder and draw the parellels in the the two…
I tossed the topic out to my mother who is currently visiting my brother and his family Besides the members of the family , it is home to two cats and a dog as pets. Life is certainly different there for her than with me here . My brother, a passionate animal lover is also an actively involved with Blue Cross of India. Rescue operations happen just about anytime and often at the middle of the night. And some hurt and disabled animals and birds eventually have known to have landed up at home as pets.
Nurturing comes naturally to him especially so for those hapless animals and birds . I have personally seen the amount of care and concern he and the volunteers at Blue Cross give without any expectation in return . Just a week back there was an adoption drive for more than a 100 puppies and by the end of the day all the puppies found a home .The contentment in those volunteers hearts must have been uncontained for sure.
In lieu with our topic nurturing I took the liberty of envisioning and including the perspectives of nurturing a pet as much as parenting a child by my sharing of the backstory of my brothers home which is always more like a zoo or a sanctuary to me. Just kidding bro😊
I am going to share my mothers perspective from such a backdrop… on Parenting and Nurturing .
Parenting and Nurturing.
Parenting and nurturing go hand in hand. Parenting needs more sternness while nurturing needs compassion and kindness.
Parent is a nature given blessed title and parenting is bliss and pain with growing responsibilities.
Whereas nurturing is the quality any one can develop on any living being. A plant well nurtured grows well. With kindness , compassion and love flowing from the heart one can nurture a plant to blossom into fruits, an animal in a healthy surrounding, helpless children and seniors to thrive in a dignified way .
Parenting is our duty towards our children . Nurturing them comes naturally. Parenting involves providing, caring, shaping their future with lot of disciplining. Parenting has a natural tendency to forgive their follies and wrong doings , will find an excuse for their wrong behavior and justify them.
Parenting cannot be done without nurturing whereas nurturing doesn’t need to be parenting. The reciprocation of parenting can be seen in the nurturing of parents by the children in their old age.
By nurturing one can increase other’s self worth, self value and increase their confidence level. It can bring joy to a miserable person . Nurturing is a divine quality any one can develop. It is the extension n expansion of parenting beyond self. It can best be selfless
Nurturing can be done in many levels. Physical nurturing is one thing, emotional n psychological nurturing also help a long way in sculpting better human beings.
Sometimes mere words of encouragement n appreciation of their deeds become vocal nurturing to perform better. Weaning away the weeds is also a part of good nurturing.
Nurturing can be time and place limited without possessiveness. Let going becomes easier whereas the feeling of parenting crosses these lines as the bond is life long till death do them part.
The name and nature may vary. But without parenting and nurturing qualities the world will not survive. They help the future generation to grow into better persons. The legacy will continue by all sometime, somewhere. They are the two sides of the same divine coin. Good parenting makes better human beings, good nurturing creates a better society and a better world.
Both will make the world smile.
What you nurture is important especially in your own nature.
Just remember in nurturing, what you choose to nurture, develops…
Choose wisely!
Savvy
Life and Living
The Circle of life
Plays on its game of being
Yin and yang hides and seeks
In perfect harmony
In perfect synchrony
In perfect balance.
Flowing with life and living
Yet as every being is endowed
A nature all its own
In a bid to discover the self
Man explores spaces and beyond
At times creates sometimes destroys
The very meaning of life itself
Yet manages to mark his time
Leaving soulprints in the sands of time.
Crossing many lunar and solar cycles
Having felt the extremes of nature
Of people and places.
Comes a call from within,to choose balance
And acknowledge the need to arrive
At an equilibrium of sorts
In life and living.
Having taken the world for granted
Both internal and external
Then wisened by experiences
With self and beyond
Man desire for balance is awakened
And resurrected in the passage
Of the night and day
Of life and living.
To live and learn
To sense and share
To dream and dare
To act and respond
To transform and transcend
Such is the nature of life and living …
Savvy
Love shows the way!
The path of knowledge is never complete. There is always something more to learn and know more.
The path of action is often difficult to sustain as none can always be in continuous movement. There will be doubts and confusion in the trial and tribulations.
Move from love, acknowledge it in your being, let it be your guiding light in your actions!
The path of love shows the way of being, it flows naturally through us if we can accept ourselves as we truly are.
Make the path of love your way, make it show the way as it reflects its light of being and in that light… all is selfless and all pervading and complete.
Savvy
A Share of Good Cheer!
This photo is doing the rounds on social media networks and I guess in the last two days have been receiving this many times over. I think it is rather cute and just so warm and cheerful considering the spirit of the season!
So here’s to all my friends and readers here specially…
May your days be full of warmth and good cheer
May peace and contentment reign in your hearts
Wishing you a fantastic weekend ahead…
Merry Christmas to you all and a Wonderful New year!
Savvy
Savvy Raj 
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