Talk on Children and Music Program (by Nirmal Sangeet Sarita). Sydney (Australia), 30 March 1991.

I am so very happy to be in Australia with you all. Australia is one of the major Sahaja Yoga center, and people are very nice and they are really doing very well here, no doubt about it. I was told there are hundred-and-fifty children today, so now you are prospering otherwise also! They’re all born-realized children and they are going to come up very soon, so that’s how Sahaja Yoga is really very deeply rooted in Australia; you can see that clearly.

But I feel that I should talk something about children very important it is, because it’s a responsibility for all of us that these children have taken their birth here. And they’re children of great intelligence and very great sweetness, because they’re born-realized. Still, you must know that, that you should not try to over-dote on them or to be over-strict with them: both things are wrong. One thing they must know, that you love them and respect them as Sahaja yogis, because they are Sahaja yogis. Instill this idea into them that “you are Sahaja yogis, and that’s why we all respect you.”

Please send all the children here in front, I think would be better idea, so that they are not cramped up. You can bring them from the sides here. Is there some room for children, or for the only big children are occupying all the rooms? . You can get a carpet from My room if you want. There’s one carpet if you can spread it, the children can sit on that all. Not very small ones; you don’t have to carry them. If you have to carry them, you’d better be seated! Yah, yah, that’s a good one. You put it here in this side. Yes please. Ah! Just get up now. Ask them. Not the mothers, should not come please. All right?

There’s one more coming. Can you move a little back, so that they can spread it properly for themselves. Don’t sit on the ground. There’s one more carpet coming. You sit there on the carpet. If you can remove this one they’ll be quite happy. Hello, Pavan. Pavan, if you can remove this one that side, this yah, this side, a little bit they’ll be quite happy because, you see, the children have to move. They are bringing some more. I think if you can remove this one they can see Me, you see, that’s why they want to sit this side. No, no, no, no, I’m saying this flower, flower arrangement, yah. Yah. They could sit here, they could sit there. You can remove this flower arrangement also. They just want to see Me, that’s all. Some children can sit that side. Don’t sit on the ground. Are you sitting on the ground? It’s very cold. Why don’t you sit here? . You are adjusted. You are all right.

Sit down, sit down, sit down, sit down. You can see Me from there, can you? Please be seated. Sit down. Where is he going? He’s angry. All right. Mothers must go back, and only the children should sit in front. . Ah. You have got something, or you’re sitting on the ground? You are sitting on something? No. Just see the children here are sitting on something or they are on the ground? Put this one, I think; something else, if you have. There’s a shawl there. You can spread the shawl. You get up now. Don’t sit on the ground. There’s a shawl there. Come along. You all get up, those who are sitting on the ground. Just get up, please. Stand up now, just one minute, all right? Please stand up. Ah, very good. Stand up now. Still further, still come further. Yah, now sit on that. Yes, that’s why. Let it be now, it’s done. Yes, that’s good. Is done now, it’s done.

See, the tall children sit behind, and let the small children come front. You sit behind, then lots small children can come front. You, you you are taller. No, no, you are not tall. So sweet! You’re not tall. You will be tall, very soon, all right? So sweet they are, aren’t they? There are some children behind you who are small, just bring them in front. They are busy with them. She can go back hah, she, little bit. All right; slightly. They don’t want to move: great ladies, you see, talking about something some politics belief! Hah, now sit down. Sit down, sit down, sit down. All right? Very good. This one has come with the bottle. What happened? Now, so. This girl talks too much. Whose daughter is she? Ask her to sit this side this green, green thing tell her to sit this side.

Now, everybody is going to keep quiet, all right? And those who will not keep quiet, they’ll have to go back, absolutely at the back, hah? So everybody is going to see. Sit very quietly, all of you. Did you hear Me, all the children? Did you hear Me? You are all going to pay attention here, and you are going to listen to Me, all right? So I’m just going to say something to you. What I’m going to say to you is this, for all the children, that now you are all Sahaja yogis. All right, raise the hands who are Sahaja Yogis among you. Who are the Sahaja yogis? All the children who are Sahaja yogis? Who can feel the cool breeze? Let’s see. Raise your hands. All of you, who can Yah, just raise your hands. Hallo, raise your hand. You are a Sahaja yogi? You are all Sahaja Yogis? Raise your hands. All those who are Sahaja yogis raise your hand. Oh, everyone is a Sahaja Yogi, all right?

So, we have to give them first this idea that they are Sahaja Yogis, that they have to have a dignity of their own. And that they cannot try and misbehave at wrong points; because they are Sahaja yogis. We must have a rapport, we must talk to them, we must establish their responsibilities, that “you have to do great work, you have to give realization to people. When you’ll grow you have to do this, you have to do that. You’ll have to go to far-off countries, and you’ll have to know this, you’ll have to know that.” All that, once you tell the children, then they start developing their personality as Sahaja yogis, because they are born like that.

But if you do not channelize them in proper this thing, because of the atmosphere they might go into other directions. So we have a very good chance now to develop our children according to Sahaja Yoga principles, and imbibe those principles in them, so they do not . (Hallo, listen. This girl talks too much. Tell her also to be quiet. Ah, sit quietly. What’s this, her name? forgetting her name just tell her to keep quiet, sit down quietly. All right. You are a big girl, you sit.) Now, you have to always say that “You are grown up. You are better than other children, and you have to behave accordingly. You cannot behave in a manner that is not behoving a Sahaja Yogi.”

Now the parents have to be also good Sahaja Yogis. Their attention should be good. If their attention is not good, the children will pick up all the bad things and they will start behaving in a manner that they should not. (All right, now go and sit down. Nice girl, all right?) We should not try to control them on many things as we do in materialistic way, “Why did you spoil the carpet, why did you do that?”This is not important. But if they are not respectful to My photograph or if they are not all right for Sahaja Yoga, then what you have to do is to tell them that this is not proper, this you have to do. So the accent should be more on Sahaja Yoga than on something that is materialistic, or something that is wrong. And also good manners must be taught to children. They must be taught how to concentrate on work, and things like that.

At the same time you must know it’s, you are as a trust. You are not parents as normal people are, parents are, and possessive of your children. You shouldn’t spoil them. By any chance if you spoil them, you’ll be responsible for this all your life. You shouldn’t spoil them, you shouldn’t try to pamper them too much and tolerate their wrong things. If some Sahaja yogi tries to correct another child, should never get angry with that Sahaja yogi. On the contrary, should be happy that your child is being corrected. That’s one part of our family. We are one family, and in family if somebody thinks that your child has done something wrong, please try that child is corrected; and thank that man that he has pointed out. Sometimes parents, before parents the children behave very well, but then they start misbehaving. Do you understand? So you have to check your children: as others are telling you your child is doing like this, your child is doing like that, you have to check your children and tell them how to behave. But some people are extremely strict with their children. That’s very bad heartlessness.

You must look after their comfort, you must look after their foods. You must know that they like this or like that, why they like it, what is their health, how they are behaving towards others. All these things you can watch, but do not try to be strict with them. Best thing is, if they do anything wrong, tell them that “this time I forgive, next time you are not to do that.” But sometimes is it required or sometimes, very sometimes, if they are violent, nasty; because the other day there were two children I don’t know from where they learned they brought two knives to put into somebody’s stomach. Sahaja yogis were sleeping I mean, that’s horrific. Then I said, you can little bit slap them or something, or punish them in a way that children understand that this is wrong, this we should not do.

If you really try to pay attention to them, you’ll immediately know what are the problems of your child are. You because you are also Sahaja yogis. Immediately you’ll know the chakras. Try to improve the chakras, try to pay attention to them. At an early age it is very much required that you should look after your children. Till they are about sixteen years I think there should be a proper vigilant guidance to the children. But don’t spoil your children, because tomorrow you will come and say that “Mother, we don’t know how our children are spoilt.” I have had so many experiences like that. They must meditate every day, and they must get up at right time, sleep at right time. But be gentle with them. You have to be gentle, and they have to be gentle also. Also, I’ve found the children who came down Australian children I didn’t see much .

(Now, you go and sit. I’m talking. Hallo, hallo, come along. Now can you go down? Hallo, what is that? Now come along, you go down now. Can you go down now? May God bless you. Now you go down. No, no, it’s all right, don’t get angry! It’s all right, go down. What is there? There’s a wasp. They killed a wasp, you know really! They did! They killed a wasp, and sting is, it’s there you can remove it. Just see anyone can come up. Just see this one and take it out. There’s something there, still crawling up. Just they did some job, you see. You must understand what they were up to. Now this is the one yah, yah, I don’t know what is that.)
And also talk to them. But if they ask questions you must not answer all their questions, not necessary. If they ask questions once in a while it’s all right. But still try that they should listen more than ask, because also that’s a very bad habit of saying “why, why?” “You are not supposed to know just now, you are too young. If you ask any more you’d be a stupid person.” All kinds of things can be told to children to make them understand that they cannot be stupid, they cannot afford to be stupid.

And this is what I feel, all of you who have children now here, a hundred-and-fifty children, and all the parents have to understand it’s very important. Also the people who are not yet parents, or who are grown up, their children are grown up, must look after the children as their own, because ours is one family. Whether you are in Australia or in England or in America, anywhere you may be, we are one family, and all our children are our responsibility. So, all of us should look after them, and all of us should tell what’s wrong with them, how to get them to proper ways.

I would suggest that you should have a committee for discussing about small children. And every month you can meet, the committee can meet, and in a ashram if they are, or if there are no ashrams then some people can meet and discuss about children what’s the matter, what can we do about it. If there’s any problem you let Me know. Now I have, I think, instructed some things about children but it’s not yet been sort of circulated so much: for very small children who are born, for the women who are pregnant, and how it all should work out. So, carrying the children too much is also not very good, and also putting them all the time on a perambulator is also not a very good thing. You see, if they are grown up children they should learn to walk and they should be more sort of working with their limbs, than sitting in a perambulator or something like that, and also the buggies. I’ve seen the children who are just used to buggies never walk.

So, if you are taking them out, if they are too small is all right, otherwise don’t take them out too long a distances. Take them for shorter distances. They must learn how to walk; otherwise later on you’ll find it’s impossible for them to take to this.

Then another thing, Indian children as they know from very childhood that they have to squat. So from childhood if you teach them how to squat, and how to be quiet, they will learn. I have a feeling that when the child is born, the kind of massaging and all that is done to them is very little. That’s why the children become so violent and so disturbed. If you start massaging them just after the birth of the child, gradually till they are five, six years of age if you massage their body every night before sleeping and then with a little powder you wipe it out, or before bath, I’m sure the children will not develop this nervous temperament and this kind of a situation where they just become absolutely out of hands. Moreover, it is better that when the child is very small, the mother should not work. Or else now I hope you start some sort of “creche”, somewhere where there are Sahaja Yoginis looking after the children and where the children are kept in a proper shape, that they are looked after.

You see now, I would say that this is the training: whatever you give helps the child to become what you want them to be. If you do not give them the training, children can never be all right, they can never behave themselves, and they can never be good children. You’ll have problems, problems, problems. Of course, we’ve started a school with very great jittery conditions, anyway. The teachers had really become like pantomimes, I think, because these teachers had never seen such horrible children, to begin with. And they used to beat them, spit at them, bite them, and within one month’s time all the teachers wanted to run away. They said, “We can’t manage these horrible children. I don’t know from where they have come.” Moreover, the education was so poor. They didn’t know how to write even ABC these are the big boys while in India at the age of five years children can read very well, do this. Despite that, you see, all this was happening and also there’s such a pressure of all the teachers, on the teachers by the parents. The parents came down there, stayed there, the mothers stayed there, tried to correct this, do that. I mean, nowhere in the world in any school this interference is allowed.

So, the teachers were so fed up. And the person who became really hard on them was a boy from abroad. He started hitting them, because he said these children cannot be all right unless and until you hit them. So we told them that this is not the way it is be done. But we had to use a plastic rule just to show them, that ruler, that if you misbehave you’ll have this; because they were very disobedient. They would climb up any tree, fall from there, they would like to jump everywhere. And impossible to control these children in a place like Dharamshala, which is hills and dales and all kinds of trees there. So they got a fright, and they said that “Now we’d like these children to go away. We don’t want to have a school.” I mean, they’d paid so much money to start the school. And it came on them suddenly because there was no school; but such interference of parents and things and something too special. Now if they are sitting in a puja, if the food has to be served at eight o’clock they’ll get up from the puja and go away, as if it’s very important to eat. Doesn’t matter once in a while if they are delayed to eat. All these ideas are very regimental type of things. And then children become really like military people, who come after war and become horrible: it’s that’s exactly what happens with them.

So, the way they are looked after now I must tell you these children who came as just ignoramus things, absolutely good for nothing, have now started reading, writing, calculating. Not only that but they also write Hindi language, which they did not do. They have changed so much in this such a short time, it’s hardly I think one year’s time that they have been there. And we have looked after them in a way because My attention was there. But they got fed up with the mothers who went down. And it is demeaning for the teachers also, to go and correct the teachers in the presence of this thing. Also I must say I was sorry to see that somebody was sent from Australia to find out about the schools. When the school was here, nobody bothered. When there was a school in Austria, nobody bothered. Nobody bothered about the school which was in Rome or Milano, but when it was in India they sent somebody to find out and get photographs and everything. It’s something very demeaning. And the Indians refused to have a school there, and they said “we will not have this kind of a thing anymore.”

So, you have to trust. But I can tell you this much, that Indian culture is the best for your children. That will make them perfectly all right, and you’ll really enjoy them; because you see, Indian children now see, even now look at these children, how disturbed they are but if you go in India and see, the children are least disturbed. They are just there, they are obedient, they are giving type. Understand this, what is good for our children we should give them. So this is also not good, to interfere with the school. Now there’s another school we have started in Vashi where we’ll be getting children, all of them, because they have given up now: they have given up, the teachers have given up in Dharamshala. They just said, “We cannot manage these children,” because the place is so dangerously placed and they are, you cannot control them. They have no sense of caution, and they are jumping all over. It’s very difficult to manage. After all, this year they will continue but from next year they are saying we’ll send all the children to Vashi. For nine months they could be there, and the parents can bring the children to Dharamshala, and they can stay and they can look after them. It is so bad as that.

So, you must know, the quality of our children has to improve. They have to become peaceful, righteous, good children, and they are not to be troublesome and exacting; because they are Sahaja yogis. Otherwise, if you do not give them the proper guidance, I tell you, they’ll be all a waste. They are born to you because you are all Sahaja Yogis, and we have to give them that beauty. If you cannot give that beauty to them, they will not realize why they came on this Earth, how important it is today that Sahaja Yoga has started. It never happened, this kind of thing before; it never happened, such a great thing. And this has come here, and this has brought such greatness to all of you; and perhaps, I think, many people do not understand how great it is that’s what is very surprising. Now you have entered into Sahaja Yoga which has transformed your life, has given you everything that you wanted, it’s so beautiful. But understand the importance of it, and that how we have to develop and how we have to grow; because you will be held responsible in future if anything fails. So we have to go very deep into it, and we have to get to it in a big way.

Why is she crying? What’s the matter? She wants to go to Mummy, let her go. Whose child it is? Martin’s? Martin, you know your children. You are too much attached to them, I must say, too much attached. You really that’s what I was going to tell you, that they were very, very funny when I came there. They’re too much attached. She has improved a little bit but I think still You should keep them out, keep them out; don’t get attached to them. They’ll be such a headache to you, you won’t know. Before Sahaja Yoga people used to neglect their children, I’ve seen it; after Sahaja Yoga they are just stuck to them. Like the two extremes. Tell her not to cry. Otherwise, you tell her you’ll send her out if she cries any more. Now don’t cry, keep quiet. Sometimes you have to scold also. You have to. You shouldn’t tolerate their nonsense, otherwise you are responsible for these children, who are godly children who have come on this Earth. God has given you a gift: you have to look after them with care and understanding. I think it will all work out.

What’s it now? What does he want? What happened, what? Ask him, what is the matter? Everybody is laughing at you. Now, now, don’t cry. See, you want everyone to laugh at you? Sit down, sit down, ah. Now such a big boy like you, you shouldn’t cry. Now see, they are all laughing. Ah, sit down, sit down. What’s the matter? All right, take him out. He’ll cry more, he won’t listen. What’s the matter, what is he asking? All right, you take him out. Don’t cry, don’t beat him. You take him out, take him out, he’ll be all right. Take him out, outside the thing. Don’t beat him, and don’t get angry. That’s not the Take him outside.
All right. You know, you shouldn’t beat your children all the time, otherwise it has no value! You must make a big ritual of it, you see, before beating; make a big ritual, “Now, this is going to be bad.”

[Children singing]
Wonderful, thank you very much. Ah, which is the next one?
Oh, My God! Thank you very much. It’s beautiful, thank you. All right. Please, please. Yes. It’s nice they know everything by heart. It’s beautiful.
Thank you, thank you, believe Me.
[The teacher asks if Shri Mataji would like to see the preschool children do a stick dance.]
All right. When? We’ll see it after puja tomorrow? All right? Will be good. All right.
Now, all the children are going to keep quiet. We are going to have now music from Nagpur musicians. They have come all the way.
Now keep quiet. All the children have to be quiet. Do you think they want to sleep now, the children at this time? Have you to send them for sleeping? Hallo. Children, is their sleeping time now? Is it their sleeping time? They don’t sleep so early these ? So let them go, those who want to sleep. I think some of them are already feeling sleepy. What do you say? After one song they can go. Let them hear one song.
Want to go?Those who don’t want to go, need not go. Those who want to go can go, all right? Let’s keep it open. They are telling Me, no, we don’t want to go; they are telling Me.

No, this side. Martin, I said this side. It’s all right, that side is all right. There’s no other thing .
[Baba Mama speaks on behalf of the Nirmal Sangeet Sarita. He says how happy they are to be here, and how they have gone from one ocean of love to another ocean of love: that of the Sahaja yogis in India and in Australia. He says, why do we need a passport to go from one Sahaja center to another Sahaja center? And to pray to Shri Mataji for a day when no passports will be needed. And he says how “music is the shortest track to the Divine.” He then introduces the first song.]