Feeding the homeless

Om Sharavanabhava 

Homelessness is a large concern in London, with the number of people sleeping on the streets rising exponentially every year. With this in mind, to honour Swami’s birthday the youth wing wanted to aid those who are homeless, as they are often some of the most vulnerable and marginalised people in our society. 

Swami often says, Annadhanam (distributing food) is one of the most highest forms of seva hence we decided to participate in a feeding programme for the homeless. We chose to volunteer with a charity called, AMURT UK, a grassroots community development and disaster relief organisation, who work with local communities to help alleviate their immediate suffering and relieve poverty.

From the beginning of November for four consecutive Thursday’s, members of the youth volunteered with this charity to both help cook and distribute food for the homeless. A team of youth members would arrive in the afternoon at AMURT’s base to help assist members of the AMURT organisation to prepare and cook a delicious meal of vegetable curry and rice accompanied with a fresh salad. 

                                         

Youth members helping to prepare food

Later in the evening, another cohort of volunteers would arrive at Lincoln’s Inn Fields, in Central London to assist the charity to serve the food. A queue of homeless people often will be waiting for the food to arrive, with some people having walked long distances to have a hot meal. When serving the food, we were able to witness and appreciate by listening to these people how this one meal makes a world of difference to their lives and without it they would have slept hungry in the cold. 

Youth members serving food

Participating in the programme was a truly rewarding and eye-opening experience, allowing us to acknowledge the difference one meal can make and recognise how many of us often take food for granted in today’s day and age. We would like to show our gratitude to AMURT UK for welcoming us with open arms to participate in their incredible, charitable homeless feeding programme. We are eager to work with them again in the future. 

Om Sharavanabhava 

Toys and Books collection

Om Sharavanabhava 

In honour of our beloved Swami’s birthday, in the month of October, the youth wing wished to celebrate his birthday by conducting seva activities in the UK. The first seva project we organised was to collect toys and books for children who are currently in a hospice due to a debilitating or terminal illness. 

During Swami’s visit to the UK, in the months of September and October, we kindly asked for donations of gifts for this worthy cause and devotees generously donated a wide range of gifts for ill children between the ages of 0 to 16. The gifts included: arts and craft sets, board games, musical boxes and fiction books. 

Collection of gifts for the children

These gifts were donated to Richard House Hospice, the capital’s first children hospice based in East London, which currently supports over 300 families by providing direct care to seriously ill children. 

Once all the donations had been gathered, a few youth members went to Richard House Hospice to deliver the donations, where the gifts were received with a warm welcome and much appreciation. 

Youth members handing over gifts to staff members at Richard House Hospice 

We would like to heartfully thank each and every person who helped us bring a smile to these children’s faces during their time of hardship, by donating gifts.

Om Sharavanabhava 

October Meeting 2017

With Swami’s birthday being on the 11th of October, we dedicated our October meeting to celebrate our beloved Satguru’s birthday. At the beginning of the meeting, we were given a presentation by some of the youth members on Swami’s life story, and the mission which he has devoted his life to. We learnt about the progression of Swami’s global mission, which is established on the four pillars of providing: food for the needy, medicine for the poor, clothes for the destitute and books for the under privileged children. 

Youth members delivering their presentation

We also explored and analysed a number of Swami’s quotes, which are included below. In various groups we then portrayed the main concepts of these quotes through the means of role play.  The role plays highlighted the various perceptions of one quote by youth members and sparked many original ideas. 

Quotes by Swami

Respecting others is true devotion.

You are related to all souls in this world.

Only when you delve within will you find purity. 

Do not become a prisoner to experiences. 

Accept everything equally and perceive the world through your inner eye. 

Dharma is God's temple. 

The true essence of life is service. 

Where there is satsang, there is peace. 

A Guru is the director, producer and actor. 

Even something sweet when consumed in excess becomes bitter. 

God knows a flower needs both darkness and light, likewise God knows what we need. 

Amid the meeting, we also cut a splendid, hand crafted cake, made by one of the youth members,in honour to celebrate Swami’s birthday.

Youth members cutting Swami's cake

Sponsored Walk 2017

On 9^th September, members of the youth wing participated in the annual Charity Walk for the Blind. 

In 2015 and 2016, the Om Sharavanabhava Seva Trust raised over £30 000 to aid young and partially sighted victims of the civil war in Sri Lanka. 

This year, we are hoping to do something similar by raising funds to deliver free valuable educational materials for under-privileged children in Sri Lanka. This will provide them better opportunities in education and in work. This is something that we take for granted in our country- we all automatically follow through in a system beginning from nursery, right through to university. We often forget that this is a rare occurrence for some children who born into poor families affected by many years of civil war. 

This year we were fortunate enough to be led around Richmond Park by Swami himself. The walk began at Sheen gate at 10am; Swami led the large group of about 200 devotees around the park, happily chanting ‘Haro Hara’ and singing bhajans right till the end! 

The walk took about an hour and a half from start to finish – everyone walked at their own pace, trying to keep up with Swami who sprinted on three occasions! His infectious energy made the walk possible for even those who normally had mobility issues. 

Members of the youth were involved in crowd control as it was important to ensure the health and safety of participants. We helped with registering participants at the beginning, selling hats and setting up the food stall. 

The walk was a huge success – although the weather forecast was looking grim, there miraculously was no rain right until the end as Swami’s darshan was finishing. 

Events such as this allow the younger generation to reflect upon the facilities and opportunities that have become part of our everyday living, and how a small effort such as organising a charity event like this can go to great lengths to completely revolutionise a child’s future. 

If you feel inspired to help these young children to experience a better future as well, we would be most grateful for any donations towards this worthy cause by visiting our justgiving link below. 

https://www.justgiving.com/campaigns/charity/osb-trust/charitywalk2017

Swami encouraging everyone to chant

Swami leading the sponsored walk 

Swami boosting everyone's morale

Onam 2017

Every year Onam is enthusiastically celebrated across the world, particularly in Kerala to mark the sacrifice of King Mahabali, who offered his own life in order to uphold his vow to Vamana (the fifth incarnation of Lord Vishnu). 

This year, on the 3rd of September, we were able to celebrate this beautiful festival in Swami’s presence with a large number of devotees. Traditional Kerala drummers and Kerala dancers brought a vibrant atmosphere to the Onam festivities and Swami’s presence made the day a unique experience. 

Kerala drummers

Kerala dancing performance

We would like to share with you Swami’s stirring Onam message. 

Om Sharavanabhava 

On the auspicious festival of Onam may the Almighty shower His blessings to His children all over the world. 

By paying due respect to our parents, reverence to our Guru and praising the glory of the omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient God, may we realise the supreme truth. 

May we attain dharma and protect dharma by upholding the truth in each sphere of action. 

May we experience the bliss of prosperity and success by leading a life of unity and love. 

May we develop and maintain a healthy environment by eradicating unwanted thoughts and matters from within and without and maintain harmony with nature. 

May we overcome all the impediments on our paths for obtaining divine blessing. May He Guide us to choose the right path enabling us to take a noble birth, live gloriously and find success and salvation in our lives. 

The concept of each festival is to spread a message to the future generations to uphold and strengthen the virtues and values in life moulded by our ancestors by their everlasting tapas for the welfare of the world. 

The purpose of celebrating each festival is to make us understand that the goal of life is to repel all vices and attract virtues which bring prosperity and bliss. With this understanding, we will be able to transform earth to heaven. Understanding these principles, if we lead a life of righteousness, upholding the values of life and surrendering ourselves completely to the Lord, we will also be able to attain the highest abode of eternal bliss as the emperor Mahabali was placed by the Lord Himself. 

On this festive day of Thiruvonam may I wish you all, that your lives will also be elevated to the highest level filled with prosperity and happiness throughout your lives. 

In prayers and regard, 

Satguru Sri Sharavanababa  

Om Sharavanabhava 

Guru Poornima 2017

Om Sharavanabhava

This year Guru Poornima, a day dedicated to Gurus, fell on the 9th of July and members of the OSBM youth wing participated in the Guru Poornima programme in Swami’s ashram by delivering a speech, which we would like to share with you below:

On this auspicious day of Guru Poornima, we, the OSBM youth wing would like to show our gratitude and reverence to our beloved Satguru, Swami by talking about the importance of a Guru for the youth today. 

In one of Swami’s satsangs, Swami stated, ’ A Guru means dispeller of darkness, removing the ignorance within you and leading you towards light. Surrender to your Guru, who will enable you to experience your inner self’. In this beautiful teaching Swami highlights the importance of a Guru in our spiritual journey to direct and guide us to help us realise the divinity within each and every one of us. 

In today’s world the youth are surrounded by maya, illusion, and our lives often orientate around materialistic gains and at times we often only think about our individuals selves. However, Swami has taught and shown us the importance of being selfless whether it be by encouraging us to assist those in need or by encouraging us to participate in prayers for world peace and harmony. 

Swami also continues to remind the youth of the sacrifices our parents have made for us at every point throughout our lives therefore it is our responsibility to respect our parents and appreciate them and through Swami we have been able to show this through events such as Maathru pooja. 

Swami has advised the youth to focus on three qualities to perfect our behaviour. The first quality is to be strong (to have a strong mind through positive thoughts and to be active), secondly to be strict (to be disciplined and to have integrity) and thirdly be straight (to always be honest). 

We are incredibly fortunate and blessed to have Swami as our Satguru, to guide us along this path of righteousness and truth. Thank you Swami for being a role model to the youth so that we can be role models to others in society.

Om Sharavanabhava 

Swami's seva activities in Sri Lanka 2017

Om Sharavanabhava 

One of Swami’s recent seva projects took place during Swami’s visit to Sri Lanka where from the 1st of March to the 11th of March Swami travelled across remote areas of the country to provide aid to families most in need. 

A vast number of seva activities were carried out including: 

Distributing bicycles to deserving children who had to walk long distances to school on a daily basis

Distributing dry food provision bags

Providing braille typewriters for those who have lost their eyesight 

Hosting medical camps in 4 different areas

10 livelihood projects were conducted to assist those in grave hardship

Providing education materials, clothing and shoes for school children

Swami not only assisted these families by providing them with materials to help rebuild their lives but importantly, Swami’s presence, satsangs and dharshan gave these families strength, restored their hope and faith. Hopefully we will be able to contribute and conduct similar charitable activities in the near future. 

Om Sharavanabhava

Home-Start Gift Bags

Over the last few months members of the youth wing separated into groups to focus on different charity projects. Our group, Team Oneness’ charity project was to create gift bags for the charity Home- Start. 

Home-Start is a leading family support charity in the UK which aids families with young children deal with challenges they face. Volunteers from the charities support an array of families including families struggling with post-natal depression, physical health problems and bereavement. 

We felt this was a valuable charity to support as the charity helps build a stable, loving environment for children which is fundamental for their future. 

We decided to create gifts bags for the charity so they could distribute these to a number of families facing a difficult time in their lives. 

With a set budget and brief to create gift bags to brighten up someone’s day and help them relax, we began selecting items to include in our bag. Finally we decided on a variety of items such as herbal teas, mugs, candles and various toiletries such as bubble baths, which you can see in the picture below. 

We also decided to attach a leaflet to give the families a supportive message and to inform them about the youth wing and our mission. 

It was fun putting the bags together and working together for such a great cause. 

As a group, we thoroughly enjoyed making the gift bags and hope to do similar projects in the future. 

November 2016 Meeting

In this month’s meeting, the youth had begun with a very deep and insightful discussion about our personal views about the soul and the bodies that we live in. This allowed us to explore the idea of whether we see our bodies as souls or as souls, with a body.  It was an interesting discussion to see what everyone thought about these individual concepts and whether we see them as separate aspects of our existence.  

This lead to a further discussion about what we think happens to our bodies and our souls when we reach the time of death. Does our soul die with our body? Or, does it continue to live on? Again, it was amazing to listen to what people had to say about their views on this matter.  There was a great diversity in the ideas being shared, by all ages in the youth wing, which I think increased our awareness of how we truly feel about this topic. We all gained insight from one another. 

One of the views that strongly stood out to me, were from some of the younger youth members, who shared the idea that they thought that the soul resides in our hearts, and it is innately connected to the conscious/unconscious decisions that we make in our day to day lives. 

Some of the older youth members, like myself, shared the similar view that we are souls, with a body and the body is used as a vehicle to allow us to fulfil our individual Dharma’s.  A couple of us also thought that when we die, it is only our body that die, but our soul continues to live on as it is eternal. The soul will just disintegrate into small matter (that is all around us) and will find a new home in another life form. According to the Bhagavad Gita and ancient Vedic scriptures, that have deeply influenced my personal views on this matter, our souls are ‘reborn’ in to a new life form that it takes on, depending on our karmic energies and the level of consciousness that we attain in our human life form. This is the idea of ‘Oneness’ or being interconnected with all sentient beings. 

Following on from this discussion, the youth also had a debate about the “Impermanence” of life – exploring references from philosophical books such as ‘The Complete Conversations with God’. This group discussion allowed us to critically analyse quotations from this reference and think about how everything in this life is impermanent, but this concept of impermanence is in fact permanent. Everything in this life will continue to change, to elevate our consciousness or connection with the divine being. This is to allow us to fulfil our individual Dharma’s. Cross references were also made with the teachings of the Buddha, stating that we are here to accept what is and understand that in the permanence of impermanence, there is always something to be learned – by the object and the observer and this is our greatest teacher. Our experiences – good or bad.

Quotes on impermanence