Bhujangis in the Forest

The following was blogged by PenduPrincess at our sister blog – Kaurista.com

Stick a bunch of Punjabis in the forest and they won’t know what to do.  Mainly because there’s not a chula in the woods to make cha pakore.  Just kidding.  The truth is that urban culture and modernization has placed layers of materialistic stuff between us and the glory of Mother Nature.  However, this August 1^st – 10^th, the Jakara Movement’s Bhujangi Youth Academy ripped apart these layers and introduced a group of Sikh teen boys to the beauty of the ground we walk on.  And as hoped, by way of nature’s magnificence these boys were introduced to themselves.

Amidst the city’s chaos and noise it’s hard to get a teenage boy to believe in anything besides video games or girls.  And you can forget about convincing him to learn about his roots.  That’s why Bhujangi took place in the forest’s silence with no school teacher or parent lecturing a young person on the glories of Waheguru.  Instead it was Waheguru’s creation– the earth itself that spoke to them.  As the Bhujangi participants hiked, played games an[ recited Japji Sahib in the mornings, something special happened over the ten days.  The quiet of the woods suggested to the boys that maybe there’s more to this world than what their eyes can see.

A ten day program for youth can’t promise any miracles, but it can introduce a change in a young boy’s psyche so subtle that one day he may know the ONLY miracle that matters. Professor Puran Singh said it best when he wrote that a, “troupe of doves…their white wings fluttering like the little dawn-lit clouds by the joy of it all is the symbol of the Guru.”  And so it was in the woods of Central California that a group of Sikh teens saw the symbol and were introduced to the ultimate truth. The one that’s all around us everywhere we go.

For more information about the Bhujangi Youth Academy or to learn how you can make a donation to ensure the program’s continuance,  please email info@jakara.org

Keeping it real. PenduPrincess