Dear Readers,
As we convey warm greetings to all, we hope that the Aug 15, 2009 Darshan provided us with one more opportunity to renew our commitment to sincerely live the teachings of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother.
As we celebrate the first anniversary of the SACAR-IGNOU collaboration we find it appropriate to revisit our educational philosophy which states: “We are guided by the ideal that education is the means for facilitating individual transformation to prepare the humankind, one individual at a time, for a collective transformation. We hope to become a centre of ‘higher’ education and a dynamic ideal for the society through the very nature of our work in facilitating individual and collective evolution of consciousness.”
The present issue of New Race provides a living testimony to how this philosophy is put into practice through the various courses and study programmes SACAR offers. The variety of student voices represented in these pages gives readers a opportunity to witness how the rich and transformative learning experiences help facilitate students’ individual progress in both intellectual and spiritual realms.
We begin with an inspiring piece by Prof. Madhusudan Reddy which opens the way for the kind of future-oriented learning SACAR aims to provide for its students.
A compilation of online classroom exchanges on the topic of consciousness provides a peek into how such complex themes are explored through a process of collaborative learning between students and facilitators. Students at SACAR are also encouraged to creatively express what they are learning and reflecting upon. Biswajit’s one-act play to distinguish between materialistic and spiritual perspectives on consciousness is one such example.
In a message given on 4th July, 1969, the Mother has given a clear and simple formula for life-long learning:
“You came to earth to learn to know yourself.
Read Sri Aurobindo’s books and look carefully within yourself as deeply as you can.”
(CWM, vol 12, p. 204)
This advice provides the backdrop to the learning facilitation process employed by SACAR facilitators. Through the various experiential, introspective and self-observation exercises, we emphasize the value that it is important for learners to gradually become more and more conscious of their true swabhava and swadharma. The contributions by Menaka, Lakshmi and Siv amply demonstrate how students are encouraged to “look carefully within” and share with other learners and facilitators what they have learned through such reflective exercises.
We thank our student Humera Roshi who helped in editing and organizing the online classroom exchanges included in this issue. And we welcome Larry Seidlitz who has recently joined the editorial team of New Race.
We hope the present issue of New Race will inspire and motivate our readers. We also hope our readers will find in these pages a new kind of freshness and originality in how these young and enthusiastic seekers deeply imbibe and express what they are receiving by studying Sri Aurobindo’s and Mother’s works at SACAR.
Till next time.......
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