My Sai & I

Keeping in touch with our SSE family from across the region through a community blog!

If you are interested in submitting any form of writing, art or photography, please fill out this form!

April 19, 2024

Sairam! Adwetha Joshi of Rochester Sai Center tells us about her journies with Swami throughout her life. As well as how they have changed over time from her high school days, to her current state.

April 7, 2024

Sairam! Venkat Govindarajan of Chicago Metro Sai Center tells us about his journey with Swami, as well as many experiences he had with his growth as a person, showing us how Swami is always here for us. 

Feb 11, 2024

Sairam! In this month's publication of Sai Blossoms, we have the pleasure of hearing from Phalguna Siddapureddy of Detroit Metro Sai Center. In her article, she recounts many experiences she had with her family and in her life as a whole, showing us how Swami is everywhere and accessible. 

Oct 29, 2022

Sairam! This month we have been blessed with the opportunity to hear from Kavita Prasad from the Rochester Sai Center. In this blog post, she reflects on and discusses her experiences with Swami during her younger days, the time she physically met Swami, and her work with the underserved and homeless in Rochester.

April 24, 2022

Sairam! In honor of Aradhana Day, we have been blessed with the opportunity to hear from Phalguna Siddapureddy. She is an SSE teacher from the Ann Arbor Sai Center and is also a YA parent. In this blog post, she reflects on her experiences and some of the most valuable lessons she has learned from Swami.   

July 24, 2021

Sairam! This month, we have been blessed with the opportunity to hear from Shalini Krishnan, an SSE teacher from the Columbus Sai Center and one of our region's Student Council Advisors. In this blog post, she reflects on her experiences as one of the first students in Swami's primary school and on how she has felt Swami's omnipresence in recent years.

April 2, 2021

Sairam! This month, we have been blessed with the opportunity to hear from our Region's Service Coordinator Saichellappa Mandiramoorthy. In this blog post, he describes how Swami's omnipresence provided him the opportunity to teach human values in his community. 

August 9, 2020

My Journey To Swami (As told by an Anantapur alum)

I must have been about 10 years old and very new to Swami. Some random person pulled us children for SSE-1 classes a year ago and my mother started learning about swami from me and my SSE Guru. One summer day, my mother and I embarked on our 1st journey to the abode of peace -Prashanthi Nilayam. We didn’t know what to expect and how Swami will be. It was a good 17 hours journey by bus from my hometown (Chennai) and it was regular practice for devotees to sing bhajans through the bus journey. Well, I knew very few bhajans, and was confident singing only Gopala Radha Lola. When my turn came, I sang Gopala and for some reason, the bus driver loved my song. So, every few hours, he would ask me to sit beside him and sing the bhajan repeatedly. It was my first experience of how Bhajans can give a person bliss. We had some hurdles like a flat tire etc which delayed our arrival time and some people worried about being late for the morning darshan and not being able to see swami. When we reached the Darshan grounds, swami was still there, as though waiting for us. It was the early 90’s and there was no Kulwant hall. It was called Darshan grounds were crowds sat in the sand and swami walked around. I was awe struck, with the way swami glided  in with  the darshan music, his beautiful face gleaming with love. My 10-year-old restless mind became calm and peaceful. When swami came near our area, I was excited by a sudden candy shower. 2 or 3 found their way into my lap. I felt welcomed and loved, and a sense of belonging surrounded me.

        Fast forward 10 years, I was sitting for darshan in Brindavan as a student in swami’s Anantapur college. I was angry and mad because swami had called us 15 days early from our vacation to attend summer course in Indian Culture and Spirituality. Home was very attractive, and I thought Swami could have waited another 15 days. Darshan music played and as swami walked in, I was crying uncontrollably looking at the embodiment of love, our beautiful Bhagawan. As he walked past me, I told him, I am sorry Swami, I love you. My angry, agitated teenage mind became calm and peaceful. I felt welcomed, loved and a sense of belonging surrounded me all over again. Next two years, I never went home for short breaks because I was already at Home.

Sandhya Viswanathan, Milwaukee Sai Center

July 25, 2020

Sairam! My name is Sankirtana Ravichandran. This year, I have been given the privilege to lead the Region 5 Student Council. We usually plan the SSE activities for the Labor Day Regional Retreat. But unfortunately, the retreat was cancelled this year because of the COVID-19 Pandemic. I was really disappointed when I found out the retreat was cancelled. The retreat is always my favorite weekend of the year because I get to see my friends from across the region! But I was reminded by a few of my fellow student council members that this wasn’t such a bad thing overall. They told me that now that it was online, more people would be able to come. I realized they were right and then began to see how many benefits there were to conducting the retreat online. 

Our Labor Day Retreat became multi-regional, so our SSE team decided to conduct a mini retreat devoted to SSE. It was really amazing to see how our ideas for the regional retreat transferred to the online mini retreat. The Student Council was responsible for leading the Eco-Friendly Arts & Crafts session. My team in particular led the ‘Making Dog Toys from T-shirts’ craft. I had so much fun testing out different methods to make the dog toys and learning how to make all the other crafts! The Student Council was also responsible for planning the speaker sessions. We had two teams, each dedicated to one of the speakers. As we were planning the sessions, we were given the opportunity to speak to the speakers ahead of time. This was a unique opportunity because we not only heard their experiences, but also got to know them as people. Based on our conversations with speakers, we were able to shape the questions for the interview. I was blessed with the opportunity to interview Aparna aunty. She is honestly one of the kindest and most humble people I’ve ever met. I am ever grateful to have been a part of this planning process. 

After so much effort behind the scenes, the mini retreat was an amazing experience. I even learned so much about the resilience of our SSE team. We had some technical difficulties in our final session, but our team was so quick to make the necessary changes. They stayed calm under pressure and I learned so much from their calm demeanor during the state of crisis. It was so fulfilling to see all the sessions come to life and to see the smiles on all the childrens’ faces.  I am ever grateful to Swami for giving me this opportunity to help plan the retreat. He guided me to embrace every opportunity to spread positivity and love. I hope you all enjoyed the mini retreat and much as I did! Sairam!

Sankirtana Ravichandran, Chicago Metro Sai Center

July 18, 2020

My SSE Journey (As told by graduated SSE students)

When I first joined SSE in ninth grade, I didn’t know anything about SSE, Swami, or what the classes were even about. On my first day, we went to a church and served food to the homeless. I remember marvelling at how much love, compassion, and selflessness was shown in this one service activity by the teachers, parents, and students alike, how the project was done dedicatedly and consistently every month. I immediately identified with the values present during this one class: service, love, and duty. That one class soon morphed into four years of great experiences, lessons, and teachings that will follow me throughout the rest of my journey. 

I never grew up learning about Swami, so when I joined as a group III student, where all those in my class were comfortable with the teachings, I felt they were hard to conceptualize, abstract and incomprehensible. Also unlike my peers, I did not know many mantras or vedas and felt insecure about my devotional practices. Could I not still pray to God without knowing many prayers? Thankfully, my SSE teacher welcomed such questions. We would have debates that rocked the foundation of our preexisting notions and that which SSE was built upon, such as whether God really existed or whether we should show kindness towards “bad” people. I began to understand that prayer wasn’t the only form of worship, but so was service and the simple act of showing love and compassion to those around us. I also found a greater appreciation for chanting vedams after being encouraged to learn the meanings behind the Sanskrit words and feeling the vibrations produced. I soon went on to join bhajan sessions after class, feeling happy in the devotional spirit produced. 

Therefore, even though I haven’t been involved in SSE for a long time, I feel I have grown into a mature teenager armed with good values, teachings, and mentors to help guide me. Spiritual practices, such as meditation, which I often used to think of as obscure, have started to align more with my thinking. I now actively try to implement them in my life. My confidence now comes from recognizing my inner divinity, the God within, and I am learning to see this same divinity in others. Perhaps more than anything, SSE has helped me solidify my values, spiritual undertakings, and my faith in God. Sai Ram. 

Archita Bommena, Des Moines Sai Center

Sairam! My name is Swetha and I will be attending the University of Iowa this fall. I attended SSE for about 5 years. I found the classes to fun since they were always filled with laughs and friendly faces. The lessons that I learned help me stay positive and practice good habits. It’s great to know that these same lessons can be applied when I go to college. Whether it be meditation or anger management techniques, my SSE teachers and classes have prepared me well for my future. I know that I will have dilemmas and questions about what I learned in the future but it will always be nice to have a supportive base that I can come back to!

Swetha Tunuguntla, Des Moines Sai Center

July 11, 2020

Sairam everyone! This week, we decided to try a different kind of post: one where a YA, a former speaker at that, answered questions that he/she never managed to answer. This week in particular, we are pleased to welcome Sriram Sivakumar!

What was the transition from high school to college like? How was your faith affected by this transition?

It strengthened my faith in my values and staying true to character because I observed the mental degradation and disturbing physical and mental consequences of the many around me who acted without character and values (Basically those who follow vices). Unfortunately, most are not aware of the deeper disturbances and tendencies of their mind probed from their past, better ways to overcome them and how it harms them in the later future. It is very subtle but it slowly reduces their ability to discriminate and make good decisions and can be sad to see. But ignoring them, with conviction in your own right choices your connection with swami will strengthen. Always act on the right principle no matter the short term pain and you can live regret free. Personally, what I found is that many poor decisions that are made at the workplace are because of a lack of character and not necessarily a lack of education (The end of education is character).

Did other people’s opinions ever affect your faith, for better or for worse?

Yes, ISKON did for better on my part. They have a lot of ritualistic approaches and superstitious beliefs (e.g: a little weird belief “Saying 1 time Krishna is equivalent to saying Rama 5 times”). They also have a dislike for the concept of god as an undivided form of divine love (not to be confused with attachment). They think that the philosophy is that of a mayavadh and would often tell me to be wary of babas and siddhas. A ISKON devotee who was once a sai devotee and from a sai family once asked me to chant the name of krishna with him. I said sure, but that only swami comes to my mind when I do. He got agitated and told me to focus on the chanting of krishna. I told him that the name does not matter. It is the connection you have with the form that does. I explained it with an example of an amar chitha katha story of a man who dug 10 small wells with no success instead of 1 deep well for water. To clarify my doubt, I later sent an email to aravind balsubramanya just asking what swami says about namasmarna. He replied back to me with almost the same answer and coincidentally the EXACT same story analogy that I used a few days before(the well story that I had read as a kid). One form and one name is all you need, whatever it maybe. God unifies. Only humans divide. The story of Birbal, Akbar and Yakin Shah also talks about a similar concept.

Were there times when you felt that Swami wasn’t guiding you? How did you overcome that?

If there isn’t an answer, either I already know it and need to look deeper (my past lessons) or this is meant to be. As long as I follow my character and I do what I feel is right (by my conscience) without following others blindly, I do not have to have regrets and I haven’t had any so far :). One thing I like to do is remind myself of the secret of surrender that Aravind Balasubramanya talks about which essentially says that full time devotion is not necessarily going to a swami’s photo and saying a prayer but more that whatever happens to you, you accept with the conviction that it is for your own good. You may not see it today or tomorrow but one day you might. Until that day, faith is your best friend. Your karma is washing away. Avoid adding to it.

Have there been any situations in which you felt life was going well and you wonder if Swami is pulling strings for you?

Nope. Quite the opposite, I have been angry at swami for unnecessary and what I felt was unfair rigorous testing of me more than probably anyone else but like Zuko, I came to realize it was for my good later on :). Swami does not play favorites. Swami is like a live wire and most of us are like rusty old wires that cannot sometimes connect (too much resistance due to what's in our minds and our tendencies/habits). My life is dictated by my karma alone that can help correct me but my connection with swami can come from my efforts :). 

But how do you move on from those situations that feel entirely unfair?

Time, reading stories of other seekers who have gone through rough patches and faith that "this is for my good"- the prayer for surrender. I highly recommend watching the movie gandhi (1982). If you want to see practical spirituality and swami's message in the life of a human, gandhi's life (not just the independence fight) but his whole life is an example of it (from his marriage to his work). Realize how many trials even someone as good as him had to go through. 

Many of us have struggled to explain Swami to our friends outside the Sai fold, how have you done this?

In the past with americans, I have said the following: He is a man who says, if you're a muslim be a good muslim, if you're a hindu be a good hindu and if you're a christian, be a good christian. I usually don’t get questions after that.

Did you struggle to find a career path and what is your advice for those of us who are struggling with this?

I did not struggle but I explored a bit. Explore and inquire early in college (Freshman and sophomore years) and just focus on that. Use the ability you have to add and drop multiple courses in your first few weeks and figure your own way. Avoid trying to socialize too much and particularly avoid clogging your mind with unnecessary social media. You want to make the right choices with a clear mind so you do not have regrets later. And once you make a choice, it may change later but at some point, there is no perfect field/job. Make sure you have a good reason to change if you change after your sophomore year.

Before we conclude, do you have any words of wisdom for us?

Beyond school study, strive to understand the nature of your mind. Become self aware of your own impulses, character and desires and inquire into them without guilting yourself for asking questions but by searching for wisdom and understanding of what is within you. That way when swami gives you character tests in your life to refine you, you will have a better chance at passing them because he knows all your weak points that even you are unaware of :) .

Sriram Sivakumar, Indianapolis Sai Center