In fact, we are working with these eleven-year-olds and fourteen-year-olds.

And because we understand, a lot of us have been groomed to adult age, even without being aware that we need to groom this power of awareness.

So we just give them a self-awareness chart. For the very first class they are taught they are just given a self-awareness chart, which is nothing but multiple squares every day. And the assignment is very simple to them. Just stick it on the wall and whenever you think you have been right in a situation, give yourself a tick mark. Whenever you think you have been wrong, just give yourself a cross mark. Let tick marks start from the top of the chart. Let cross marks begin from the bottom of the chart. And the challenge for every day, the child is told, “First of all, by giving the child the freedom to cross himself when he is wrong, I think you’re making a very profound statement to the child.”. We are not expecting human beings to be perfect.

There is an allowance for imperfection. You are human and there is an allowance to imperfection. There’s no point in selling certain ideals to people which they will not be able to live by, and you will throw them on a guilt trip for the rest of their life! When it’s a honest adult reality, as adults, we are not able to live up completely to our own expectation, expecting those little ones to always live up to our expectations is just running our adult trip on them. So we are giving them the allowance. We are not expecting you to be perfect. There will be imperfections. So whenever you catch yourself wrong, give yourself an into-mark right at the bottom. Whenever you catch yourself right, give yourself a tick mark and your challenge every day is, you have to ensure the number of tick marks are greater than the number of into-marks. Which means every day ensure you do more right than wrong. And the day you get yourself right, everywhere on the chart, please come and share it with us. We want to tell you how proud we are about you.

And the striving that child goes through and it’s so beautiful.

I got up from the bed and went and suddenly remembered I have not folded my bed sheet.

I know what so many of you are thinking, can adults also be given this chart? If you look into the content of eleven and fourteen-year-olds, I wish we can put all of you through that program first.

Very simple effort! And children have not yet learned to lie, at least to themselves. They can lie to you, a very innocent child, but they have not yet learned to lie to themselves. And this… And what are we doing? Doing nothing. There is no adult monitoring, nothing there. They have to just keep ticking themselves.

And they have to just… Building the power of awareness within them.

That’s all.

Now, it’s so complicated, this whole system of diet that we have created is one of the most complicated thing because, you don’t know whom to trust!

Because today you read an article that says you should eat potato. And tomorrow, you get another author writing to you saying that you should not eat potato and it’s not good. And then next day somebody says, ghee is very good because it goes and fuels the fire within you and as a result, your entire digestive process is better. And then day after tomorrow, somebody says that ghee should not be used.

It’s so confusing. So what do we do with children? When we cannot trust the dieticians, we trust God. Now, somehow in the scheme of creation itself, God has created us in such a way, everything has been so beautifully designed. One, in the Creation itself, everything that has been created has been so beautifully categorized into multiple colors. And red can-do certain things to your body, yellow can-do certain things to your body. Purple can do certain things to your body. So the design has already been done where, those various colors have already been incorporated. Also, the design of the Creator has been so immaculate, like if you see walnut, the shape of the walnut is the shape of your brain.

And walnut is good for brain. The almonds have been designed in such a way and almonds is good for the eyes. It’s been designed. If you see papaya, I don’t feel like saying, papaya is the shape of stomach, because very few stomachs is still in the shape of papaya. For most of us, it has taken the jackfruit size. But originally, when he planned, he did not expect this. Papaya is good. Grapes, good for the lungs. And that is how in the design itself, if you can look at how it is kept in nature, that directly relates to an organ in the body.

But the design has been done like this, so we give them a simple chart. Colour your diet. Today, you should have had something in red and tick, and it should not be Gems. M&M, Skittles, that is not allowed. Mentos… It has to be God-created.

And give a tick mark.

Today, you had something in yellow, give a tick mark. Ensure that today, you’ve had all the colors and all the nutrients that are required in a very balanced diet, already gone. Just awareness. And the idea is to groom these children in such a way that they realize, they can lift themselves by themselves through the strength of their own awareness. Yes, knowledge is required, yes, teachers are required, yes, reflections are required. Yes, we have to discuss the philosophies of life. But all this has any relevance to you, they are going to become living realities in you only through your awareness. Otherwise, they’ll just enhance your memory. You will become another scholar who understands Bhagavad Gita, but you will not be living by it. You will just become another very intelligent person who can quote philosophies.

Basically, you will be one of those who cannot walk your talk, but you will give a talk and take a walk. And that’s how you live your life.