Advocating for the incorporation of spiritual education in academic curricula can be based on several profound rationales aimed at addressing the holistic development of students and rectifying the perceived shortcomings of contemporary education systems. Here’s a comprehensive rationale:
Advocating for the incorporation of spiritual education in academic curricula can be based on several profound rationales aimed at addressing the holistic development of students and rectifying the perceived shortcomings of contemporary education systems. Here’s a comprehensive rationale:
1. Holistic Development
- Mind-Body-Soul Integration: Traditional education focuses predominantly on intellectual and physical aspects, often neglecting the spiritual dimension. Spiritual education promotes a balanced development of mind, body, and soul, fostering a more well-rounded individual.
- Inner Peace and Emotional Well-being: Spiritual practices such as meditation, mindfulness, and reflection can significantly enhance emotional stability, reduce stress, and promote inner peace, contributing to overall well-being.
2. Identity and Self-Realization
- True Self Awareness: Many education systems emphasize external achievements and material success, often neglecting the exploration of one’s inner self. Spiritual education encourages students to discover their true nature, which is often described as the soul, providing a deeper sense of purpose and identity beyond physical and mental capabilities.
- Empowerment through Self-Knowledge: Understanding oneself as a spiritual being can be profoundly empowering. It can lead to greater self-confidence, resilience, and a sense of belonging, as students recognize their intrinsic value independent of external validations.
3. Moral and Ethical Foundation
- Values and Ethics: Spiritual education often emphasizes universal values such as compassion, empathy, honesty, and integrity. Integrating these into the curriculum can foster a more ethically aware and morally responsible generation.
- Social Harmony: By promoting values of unity, respect for diversity, and interconnectedness, spiritual education can help reduce conflicts and promote social harmony.
4. Enhanced Cognitive and Creative Abilities
- Heightened Awareness and Focus: Practices like meditation and mindfulness, integral to many spiritual traditions, have been shown to improve concentration, cognitive functions, and creativity. This can enhance academic performance and innovative thinking.
- Critical Thinking and Wisdom: Spiritual education encourages deep questioning and reflective thinking, helping students develop critical thinking skills and wisdom that go beyond rote learning.
5. Coping with Life’s Challenges
- Resilience and Coping Mechanisms: Spiritual education can provide students with tools to cope with life’s challenges and adversities. Understanding the transient nature of difficulties and cultivating a broader perspective can enhance resilience.
- Hope and Optimism: Spiritual teachings often emphasize hope and optimism, which can be crucial for mental health, particularly in a world where students face increasing pressures and uncertainties.
6. Connection to Greater Purpose
- Transcendence and Meaning: Spiritual education helps students connect to something greater than themselves, which can provide profound meaning and direction in life. This sense of transcendence can motivate and inspire students to pursue their goals with greater zeal and dedication.
- Service and Contribution: Understanding one’s spiritual nature often comes with a sense of duty to contribute positively to society. This can foster a spirit of service and altruism, encouraging students to use their talents and education for the greater good.
7. Cultural and Historical Awareness
- Richness of Spiritual Traditions: Incorporating spiritual education can enrich students’ understanding of various cultural and historical contexts, as many cultures have deep spiritual roots. This can enhance cultural literacy and appreciation.
- Interconnected Wisdom: Exploring different spiritual traditions can reveal common threads of wisdom and values, promoting a global perspective and interconnected worldview.
Conclusion
Incorporating spiritual education into academic curricula is not about promoting any specific religion but rather about nurturing the spiritual dimension of students, which encompasses self-awareness, ethical living, emotional well-being, and a sense of interconnectedness. This holistic approach can empower students to realize their true potential, fostering a more compassionate, resilient, and purpose-driven society. By recognizing that their true self is the soul, not merely the body and mind, students can lead more fulfilling and balanced lives, grounded in a deeper understanding of themselves and their place in the world.
Introduction to Soul (The Creative Intelligence)
The Soul is a creative intelligence connected to its source “the absolute omniscience.” It is immanent throughout the expanding universe, beyond the physical and natural level of the universe where time and material do not exist. Many a sage and spiritual guru has elucidated the nexus or interface, if you like, with the body.
Saint Rajinder Singh ji says, “We, as soul, are a light brighter than 16 outer suns, yet it is not a scorching, burning light. It is a light that is soothing and loving. We vibrate with a celestial harmony that cannot be heard with our physical ears.”
Attention is present throughout our body. It is the soul that gives life to our body like electricity that gives light to the bulb.
A body devoid of a soul is like a corpse because billions of dying cells are not replaced, which happens when the soul departs from the body when the latter becomes unfit to live in. It means keep your body healthy and divine.
The soul’s fundamental attributes are love, kindness, forgiveness, conscience, patience, modesty, alertness, humility, selflessness, fearlessness, [the ability to plan and execute the whole best], the ability to live in every situation, (your feelings may be sweet), (be the one who keeps Ram), the new behaviour and many more which are discussed later.
You are playing an extremely long road involving 8.4 million life cycles during the course of which you keep changing millions of symbolic vehicles referring to the physical body.
Introduction to Mind (Information)
The mind is nothing but time-based information of past experiences and events and pre-calculation of the future with fears and worries. The two examples prove that the mind is information-based as a child taught Sanskrit or the Russian language will only know that.
Mind is a material and information-related database, which is connected to the Universal Mind, as the primary source of the mind. The material is the floating celestial bodies in the form of galaxies, stars, planets, comets and satellites including all living entities (extant and extinct).
The UM, as explained before, is created by time which is embedded with a time-related information database (archives or libraries). In turn, this information or data is regulated by the inherent laws of nature – high tide and low tide. The human body consisting of 75 per-cent of water corresponding to the earth’s water content that has an influence on the various sectors of our brain.
This triggers a series of responses, which manifest in actions and reactions. This goes to illustrate the third scientific law that states: Every action has an equal and opposite reaction (or as the common man understand ‘As You Sow So Shall You Reap’ or ‘Jaissi Karni Waissi Bharni’ or ‘Ped Boya Babul Ka To Aam Kahan Se Khaye’ or the Karma Theory.
Due to ignorance the mind is incapable to perceive the presence of divinity as another available capable force within. The mind also governs and usurps the divine attention to fulfil its own legitimate or illegitimate needs and also of the body.
One’s lifetime of experience of events are determined by limited information and exposure to the environment.
The mind is not informed that it has divine wisdom conducive to itself and to the body to enable it to live in peace and harmony.
The soul can use its state of art planning ability with divine attributes to sort out the day to day problems (on the basis of survival instincts the ability to face reality).
The mind thus, deals with qualities including all negative qualities including lust, anger, greed, ego, attachments, deceit, fears, vengence and worries etc that are temporary and unsustainable.
Introduction to Body (Material)
Did you know that your bodies are 13.7 billion years old made up of particles of stardust. Scientists argue that it is ‘totally 100 percent true: nearly all the elements in the human body were made in a star and many have come through several supernovas.’ A supernova, the biggest explosion, is the extremely bright, super-powerful explosion of a star.
Furthermore, you are made of the basic elements as proven by the periodic tables. These elements are made of a number of permutations and combinations which are manifested in the mass of the nucleus and extra nuclear part, in the form of well-known electrons, protons and neutrons.
These are made of tiny particles that are ever-increasing day by day. However, the latest study by a group of Switzerland-based scientists shows that the mass in the nucleus and extranuclear part is due to what they call the Higgs boson particle which is referred to as the God Damn particle. This particle has the innate ability to attract and create mass. How has the material universe come up after the Big Bang?
The created human material body comprises of compounds of elements as proteins as well as the laws of nature in the form of the mind. These have been synthesised by light and sound which is a form of latent life.
Let’s trace the origin of material from non-material and also origin of life from a single cell to the ‘crown of creation’ of the human body. The latter considered itself only as a physical body behaved accordingly in the sense that physical might is right. Hence, the needs such as hunger, clothes, housing, and vanities of the world, sex and sleep tend to override the Attention due to sheer ignorance of the mind.
The first element came up as hydrogen and Higgs boson which had the ability to attract. So, it fused two hydrogen atoms to create helium and fused hydrogen and helium to create the first galaxy of suns. As per the Vedas, the first knowledge was given to the sun god.
Don’t Sell Your Soul For The World
You can’t practically sell yourself but metaphorically speaking if you do any misdeeds it will vitiate your soul. This means doing something unethical. Let’s take an example spiritual alignment for doctors or surgeons is indispensable to ensure they are conscientiously providing a service to mankind. Without their conscience it is not easy for medical practitioners to relate to their patients heart to heart. Public interest demands high ethical standard from people of any calling including judges, lawyers,teachers, school principals, engineers and nurses.
Public office holders are expected to deliver satisfaction underlined with fairness, justice and honesty but the reality is contrary to spiritual precept. So effectively, moral rectitude is a must for every child to enable him/her to cherish humanity at heart. The suggestion that candidates seeking jobs should be quizzed on their morality, spirituality and human values when interviewed seems plausible.
Morality emerges as an essential value when society is facing grave challenges in the world today “such as human rights norms, weapons of mass destruction, transnational ecological threats and the global integration of markets and communication networks” (Thompson 2010).
It is expected of leaders to adhere to the principles of morality and integrity as key determinants of an accomplished life. The COVID-19-related pandemic has been a testing ground for people of such temperament, dispositions and moral underpinning.