Joy of Giving - Card 17 - Abhilash

Young Abhilash has written about his experience with the Joy of Giving Card 17. It is so heartening to read a teenager taking the effort to follow the cards, even as his Board exams are round the corner!

Abhilash, I don't want your folks to give me a lashing. So buddy, please study hard and get back to the cards once you're done with your duty as a student! All the bestest!!!!

An experience i haven't had in a while- Coorg.

Once again, the title says it all. I had been to coorg last week( bunked school!) with my relatives. Needless to say, adventure was on my mind. Misty hills, cool streams, forests teeming with wildlife filled my mind. So, i set out last Sunday with my family to a two-day sojourn across the "Scotland of India". the journey was pretty much as i had expected-without the wildlife, which really left me in the dumps. However,remembering my friend Ritu aunty's post,the joy of giving-card 17, we headed out to the Buddhist temple not very far from coorg while coming back to Bangalore. Once inside the compound, i drew away from my family and went inside the temple on my own.there were awesome paintings all over the place.And once i went inside the temple,the sight of Buddha took me by storm. The peace and silence in the temple really calmed my mind! needless to say, this is one place i have to go to on my own, again!(Finally reading the joy of giving properly.) i will upload the pictures soon....

Joy of Giving - Card 17 - Rahmath

Rahmath who has been following the Joy of Giving wrote this on her blog for Card 17:

The card that Ritu posted on 2.1.2012 was "Visit a place of worship other than your own".

I think I will pass this one. Why?

I have visited my fair share of churches, temples,mosques and recently I visited a Gurudwara. I would like to visit a Budhdhist temple someday though I don't know of any nearby. I feel I have already completed the purpose of the card. The best prayer which arose in my heart was in the foot hills of the himalayas, where there was no shrine of any religion, at sight. Personally I am on my way of rejecting organised religion of any form. Recently I declared to a perfect stranger who was trying to persuade me to do something religious that I did not beleive in any religion.

She said " Oh that's bad"

I said "Oh no, its good .I am secular."

I cannot tell you how liberated I felt . I have never done that before. Don't get me wrong. I am a theist; maybe, even a die hard one. But I no longer beleive in any kind of man made boundaries. But again, I am not against Atheism.

This Rambling reminded me of a post I wrote for fun when I was thinking about the impact of religion in our lives. If you liked what I wrote in the previous paragraphs maybe you will like to read that post too. Maybe you will enjoy it.

Rahmath, you're not alone. My husband and I desist from filling up the 'Religion' column on all sorts of forms (the only one we couldn't avoid was the Passport application). But in the admission forms of schools, even in my own college application, for the MA I pursued after my marriage, I refused to fill the religion column. When compelled, I write Indian. 

I am proud that after years of conditioning my daughter has also begun responding to the Religion questions with an 'I am Indian' refrain. 

Not because we don't take pride in being Hindus. But our Nation, the Motherland comes before our religion for us. SO I understand your sentiment and believe that each of us, especially Indians, were to adopt the 'I am an Indian First" stance (without compromising our religions or personal equations with the Maker), we'd make the world a better place!

Joy of Giving - Card 17 experience

Just Someone - as I have mentioned time and again - has been a fervent supporter of this blog right from its inception in 2003. He is now a Joy of Giving partner with me! He has no presence any where in the virtual world and when he writes his experiences, I take his permission and reproduce them here...

His Joy of Giving Card 17 experience -
Hi - After a long break from gym, I was finding excuses every evening - not to go back to the gym and fermented the excuses in my mind to make them compelling....

This has been going on for quite a few days... Two days back, I had found another reason to postpone the gym session to 'tomorrow' and then I read your blog... Your blog made me realise what I was running away from... packed my gym bag and went... and then felt very good about it... Thank you for the push...

Joy of Giving - Week 17 - Card 17

Welcome to the Joy of Giving in 2012 - a glorious New Year for us to make new beginnings, leave the baggage of the past behind and get a fresh perspective on life!

There is something about the act of picking a card at random from the deck of 52. Somehow, the cards that spring out are full of surprises and suitable for the week coming ahead.

In this New Year, what better card can we have, than the following one?

In this world of increasing intolerance and religious fanaticism, this should serve as a reminder of how all faiths are ultimately aimed at the same thing - to make us better humans, inspire us to follow the path of humanity, tolerance, love and brotherhood.

Hope we actually follow this card and write our experiences.

New to the Joy of Giving? Here's what you can do:

Go to the page titled Joy Of Giving where I have posted all the cards selected so far. Those of you who'd like to start this exercise from the beginning, do check it out, choose the card you like, and follow the instructions!

OR

To join the Joy of Giving right away just follow the cards every week and post your experiences in a public forum - your own blog, note on FaceBook - or leave your story in the comment section of this blog.

To know how it started click here.

To track the Joy of Giving through the past fifteen weeks, click here

DO spread the message of this unique movement. Encourage your friends to start following the cards and spreading joy... Do remember to tag me in your posts...