Hare Krishna dear Devotees
These days we see that kids are into so much of competition from materialistic perspective.
And most of the time they spent either in school or playing around and most of the time they are in materialistic environment.
And because of their small brain they are not able to understand all these spiritual philosophy and for them whatever they see is reality .
For example if I would say
"dear lets celebrate your next birthday in ISKCON temple in a different way, we always do party and cake cutting but lets do something different this time" then they would immediately reject saying everybody else give birthday parties.
Krishna prasad is a great way to start, but are there any other good ways to tackle with these little brains.
Hare Krishna.
Replies
Hari Bol Mataji, I have 4 children ranging in ages from 6 to 20 (2 boys and 2 girls) and we live in Ithaca, NY USA. Thank you for the topic as this is an excellent question and one I have prayed to Srila Prabhupada and Lord Krsna for guidance regarding. Somethings we do as a family is each one of sings the Maha Mantra (starting with the "baby of the family") each time we get in our car to go somewhere and then say Jai to Srila Prabhupada et al. It has become our family tradition. We also do Pooja in our house every Sunday (my one daughter is "Lord Krsna's little florist", followed by them chanting one round and then we read an excerpt from "Bhagvad Gita for Children; Our Most Dear Friend" published by ISKCON. We also follow the 4 regulative principles (not always a given in this country) and I "bribe" them with Krsna prasadama. Finally, I try everday to find something everyday that they share with me about their life and relate it to Krsna Consciousness eg one asked me about a person passing away, and I tried to tell them about the difference between the body (clothing) and the true us, jiva-atma. Of course, they are also learning by modelling, so we try to be good examples for our children. I tell them Srila Prabhupada and Lord Chaitanya make it easy for us, "just chant and be happy". Finally, my own realizations are that this is something my parents and grandparents did for me when I was growing up, which has literally saved my life,that exposing them to Krsna Consciousness is my foremost obligation as their lucky parent and my enthusiasm for participating in service to the Lord is magnified many times when I see our children participating. Jai Radhe
Hare Krishna Amit ji
Thank you for sharing your experience and thoughts.
Hare Krishna dear Alka Mataji, please accept my humble obeisances! All glories to Srila Prabhupada!
Yes, they are right we can cook very nice cake and other delicious bhoga for Krishna and offer to Him then to make a nice party for child's friends. It is a great preaching!
And in that party we can show them cartoons about Krishna and for sure they will love it.
Also child always copies his/her parents, when they are too small they will copy their mother.
When You show with Your actions that service to Krishna is very joyful and important in Your life they will copy You.
If Your child does not want celebrate it at the Temple then make Your own home a Temple.
But no need to force them, just to show them that we are happy doing it ourselves: chanting, visiting the Temple, reading books....and tell them stories about Krishna, teach them to play in karatals, mridangas, to singm to wear dhoti....to put Tilak....at least when You go to the Temple or at home.
Your servant,
haribol,
very nice advice Bhaktin Maral Mataji;
I can say since I start chanting more over the last year or so, do my offering my 4 yr daughter pay attention without forcing her, now if any give her anything she will ask "did you offer it to Krishna" . they do follow our example more than we think, so by our own practice they will gain love for Krishna
We are not that different from children, we needed a guru,all glories to srila Prabhpada, so in the spiritual realm we all children but at different level,
very nice question Alka Mataji
haribol
Hare Krishna Mataji
Thank you Mataji. I will try out things as you said.
Jai shree Gokulesh.