Talk of profundity in brevity. So much can be said in a few words. Came across this very brief but thought provoking read and felt like sharing . Have interspersed them with a few relevant pictures.
8 micro short stories, with deep meanings!
(1) Those who had coins, enjoyed in the rain. Those who had notes, were busy looking for shelter.
(2) Man and God both met somewhere. Both exclaimed, “My creator.”
(3) He asked, are you a Hindu or Muslim? The response came, “I am hungry”!
(4) The fool didn’t know it was impossible. So he did it.
(5) “Wrong number,” Said a familiar voice.
(6) What if God asks you after you die, “So how was heaven?”
(7) They told me that to make her fall in love I had to make her laugh. But every time she laughs, I am the one who falls in love.”
(8) We don’t make friends anymore…. We Add them nowadays..
In continuation to my earlier post on Holistic education. I came across this poignant post and I heartfully share this wonderful initiative and reflections.
ATTENTION ALL TEACHERS AND PARENTS
Every Friday afternoon Chase’s teacher asks her students to take out a piece of paper and write down the names of four children with whom they’d like to sit the following week. The children know that these requests may or may not be honored. She also asks the students to nominate one student whom they believe has been an exceptional classroom citizen that week. All ballots are privately submitted to her.
And every single Friday afternoon, after the students go home, Chase’s teacher takes out those slips of paper, places them in front of her and studies them. She looks for patterns.
Who is not getting requested by anyone else? Who doesn’t even know who to request? Who never gets noticed enough to be nominated? Who had a million friends last week and none this week?
You see, Chase’s teacher is not looking for a new seating chart or “exceptional citizens.” Chase’s teacher is looking for lonely children. She’s looking for children who are struggling to connect with other children. She’s identifying the little ones who are falling through the cracks of the class’s social life. She is discovering whose gifts are going unnoticed by their peers. And she’s pinning down- right away- who’s being bullied and who is doing the bullying.
As a teacher, parent, and lover of all children – I think that this is the most brilliant Love Ninja strategy I have ever encountered. It’s like taking an X-ray of a classroom to see beneath the surface of things and into the hearts of students. It is like mining for gold – the gold being those little ones who need a little help – who need adults to step in and TEACH them how to make friends, how to ask others to play, how to join a group, or how to share their gifts with others. And it’s a bully deterrent because every teacher knows that bullying usually happens outside of her eyeshot – and that often kids being bullied are too intimidated to share. But as she said – the truth comes out on those safe, private, little sheets of paper.
As Chase’s teacher explained this simple, ingenious idea – I stared at her with my mouth hanging open. “How long have you been using this system?” I said. Ever since Columbine, she said. Every single Friday afternoon since Columbine.
Good Lord.
This brilliant woman watched Columbine knowing that ALL VIOLENCE BEGINS WITH DISCONNECTION. All outward violence begins as inner loneliness. She watched that tragedy KNOWING that children who aren’t being noticed will eventually resort to being noticed by any means necessary.
And so she decided to start fighting violence early and often, and with the world within her reach. What Chase’s teacher is doing when she sits in her empty classroom studying those lists written with shaky 11 year old hands – is SAVING LIVES. I am convinced of it. She is saving lives.
And what this mathematician has learned while using this system is something she really already knew: that everything – even love, even belonging – has a pattern to it. And she finds those patterns through those lists – she breaks the codes of disconnection. And then she gets lonely kids the help they need. It’s math to her. It’s MATH.
All is love- even math. Amazing.
Chase’s teacher retires this year – after decades of saving lives. What a way to spend a life: looking for patterns of love and loneliness. Stepping in, every single day- and altering the trajectory of our world.
TEACH ON, WARRIORS. You are the first responders, the front line, the disconnection detectives, and the best and ONLY hope we’ve got for a better world. What you do in those classrooms when no one is watching- it’s our best hope. http://momastery.com/blog/2014/01/30/share-schools/
Stardust that we are made of
Sparkles from our soul
Sometimes through words or deeds
Emanating from the source codes.
We are mystical manifestations
Flowing waves in the light of consciousness
Sometimes discreet and subtle
Sometimes blatantly conspicuous
And at times moderate and refined
Deeply woven circles of life and living
All illuminating the projections of purpose
Creator has endowed within us.
Born of intentions in the intersections.
We are magical spectaclar light.
Radiant and luminescent spirits
Converging in such an emergence
Our soul speaks without words
Our deeds come together
To make a mark in this circle of life
For life finds a way unto itself
To flow along the rapids
Or wait it out in patience
All for an expression of our souls’ callings.
If you ask for peace in and around you,
Make sure to co-create the conditions for peace.
Let go the dramas that may arise in time
Every one has a battle we know nothing of.
If you want to help make a difference
Make sure … to move from your soul
Speak from the heart
And connect in the spirit of benevolence.
Care genuinely, be truly concerned
Make sure to ask about another’s wellbeing
Not for the sake of asking
But from the place of love and empathy.
Then sit back watch your world
Transform itself in front of you
Encourage Appreciate and be Grateful
Respect, believe and keep the faith
How much are we what we write about
Our thoughts are simply quite complex
Sometimes we are a bundle of contradictions
We may begin to write on a whim
As fancy may catch us sometimes
But we are steered by the thoughts that we think
Sometimes remembered reflections
Sometimes in propulsion of passions
Sometimes aimless fired by default
Sometimes in self awareness
Combining experiences in the life and living.
Within set standards in conformity or in whimsical sentimentality
Where is the turning point?
Where we assemble our thoughts
Amidst the jumble of arising waves
What distinguishes our thoughts
That flow from us in words
To arrange itself in this self arranging life.
In our fractality there is fragility
As much as rigourousness of rigidity
Raising righteousness in morality
Of conscientiousness in the wake of integrity.
And there is no denying the dedication
In single minded focus
In pursuing a thought home
Manifesting through words
Conveyed with a purpose.
In feelings and factuality
Peeling through the layers
There is much of us in what we write
And yet so much a figment of pure imagination
The words may carry our thoughts
But take on a form of their own…
Shaping up as stories
Letting there be a mystery
For all to read and fathom
Of how much is true
And what is fictional?🙂
Savvy
Keep smiling keep living
Savvy Raj 
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