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Introduction

On a beautiful Friday afternoon, I landed in Goa and soon checked into a beautiful and luxurious resort next to the beach. I was here to conduct a two day spiritual retreat program based on the teaching of The Bhagavad Gita.

After settling down from a long journey I thought of checking the resort and the venue that was set up for the spiritual program. The resort was vibrating with positive energy and guests were having a gala time some were with families, some newly married couples, some were in a group and some were all by themselves. I also met the yoga trainer, coordinator and co-host of this program. After having dinner at the resort’s fine dining restaurant, I sat in the lobby for some time, as that was the only place where I could get free access to Wi-Fi. The lobby was connected to two fine dining restaurants and a lounge.

Soon my eyes landed on a beautiful woman sitting in the lounge. She was looking beautiful, stunning and gorgeous wearing a short black dress. She seemed to be alone and was drinking like there is no tomorrow. I noticed she was also smoking and could make out that she was taking drugs too. Soon a guy came up to her talked to her for some time, wrote some number on a tissue paper and disappeared. After some time, the woman got up, falling wobbling walked out of the lounge towards the rooms. I don’t know why, but I thought of following her thinking she might need some help. She then stopped in front of room no. 102 and rang the bell. It was clear that she didn’t go to her room but to the room of the guy who wrote his room number on the tissue paper. The girl entered the room and anyone can guess what could have happened inside that room that night. I went back to my room waiting for the spiritual session to begin tomorrow.

I woke up at 6.30 am and went on the beach for a morning walk. As I went a little ahead on the beach I saw the same woman wearing the same black dress she wore last night sitting and crying profusely on the beach. Her face was swollen and her kajal was spread all over her face. I stopped by her and asked what happened. She was reluctant to even face me and cried non-stop. I sat next to her trying to pacify her. I introduced myself thinking she might stop crying and would try to talk to me. She did stop crying, looked at me but didn’t utter a word. I asked her name and she said, “Shikha”. I told her, “Listen I am here to conduct a two day spiritual program why don’t you join in. I am a complete stranger to you, but just join in for your own good if you don’t like it you are free to leave anytime. There is a yoga session happening for all the participants of our program. If you wish to join you can else just change and come here after an hour to join me for a fun session on the beach.”

She did turn up on the beach exactly at 8am. “Good morning everyone, I welcome you all to this very special spiritual retreat in Ggggggoooooaaaaaaa.” “I am going to pass this ball to each one of you, just tell us your name where you have come from and what made you join this spiritual program.” There were 25 participants, everyone introduced himself or herself, so did Shikha.

The fun session begins. “Everyone come close and listen up carefully. Each of you need to pick up one dirty coal basket, run collect water and pour it into this bucket kept here on the sands in front of the shack. Whoever fills the bucket close to the red line in 5 minutes will be the winner of this game. Note even though this is not a group game this is your game, do what it takes to win and your time starts now.” Everyone started running and were enjoying, playing, falling, laughing during this fun game. The moment they used to fill the coal basket and run towards the bucket, the water would leak from the basket. Some used different strategies formed a team, placed their hands below to stop the water from leaking and could manage filling the bucket with some water. The game came to an end. I informed them, “The winners of this game will be announced in the beginning of the spiritual program. Please carry your coal baskets and hand it over to me at the training room. You can go back to your rooms, get ready, have breakfast at the resort restaurant and we shall all meet at seminar hall 02 on the 1^st floor at 10 am sharp.”

It was 10 am and everyone was assembled in the seminar hall. I was again happy to see Shikha join in. “I again welcome you all to this spiritual retreat program which is based on the teaching of The Bhagavad Gita. Before we begin let me set some ground rules of this program.

1. I request everyone to keep your mobile phones on silent mode. Will give you all 15 sec to do so.

2. You are not allowed to move in and out of the training room. You can do so when we take a short break after 2 hours or at the time of games or activities.

3. You can make a note of any question coming to your mind and ask me by raising your hand or at the end of each session.

4. I would encourage everyone to write notes during the training session.

5. Keep smiling always and let’s start with full josh and positive energy.

I asked everyone, “How many of you have read The Bhagavad Gita?” Very few hands were up. “How many of you know a bit about The Bhagavad Gita?” Many more hands showed up. “Can everyone tell me something about The Bhagavad Gita?” One participant said, “It is an ancient holy book of Hindu dharma. The Gita has eighteen (18) chapters and a total of only 700 verses.”

I continued saying, “Okay let me tell you about The Bhagavad Gita in short. The Bhagavad Gita is a spiritual and sacred talk between the Supreme Lord Krishna and His devotee friend Arjuna, which occurs not in a temple, nor in a lonely forest, or on a mountaintop, but on a battlefield on the eve of a war.

There are 4 main Characters in the Bhagavad Gita:

1. Lord Krishna: He is the Principle Character of the Bhagavad Gita. Krishna is one of the human forms or avatars of Lord Vishnu.

2. Arjuna: He is one of the Pandava brothers and an expert archer. He represents the first method and is the direct receiver of the teachings of the Gita. First method means to have stood face-to-face with God and conversed with Him. Arjuna was a blessed soul who was given the rare honor and privilege by Lord Krishna.

3. Sanjaya: He was the Blind King Dhritarashtra’s charioteer and secretary. He represents the second method. He was a man of immense spiritual strength who had mastered his body and mind to such an extent that they became perfect vehicles to receive the divine knowledge. He was student of sage Vyasa, and by his mercy, Sanjaya received spiritual vision because of which he was able to envision the Battlefield of Kurukshetra even while he was in the room of Dhritarashtra.

4. Dhritarashtra: The Blind King and the father of the wicked Kaurava brothers. He receives knowledge through the word of Sanjay. Dhritarashtra received the knowledge through the third and the most common method from another person from Sanjaya.

“The Bhagavad Gita is part of the epic Mahabharata. Would anyone like to share the story of Mahabharata in short?” One participant got up and narrated the story,

“The Mahabharata:

In ancient times there was a King who had two sons, Dhritarashtra and Pandu. The former was born blind; therefore, Pandu inherited the kingdom. Pandu had five sons. They were called the Pandavas. Dhritarashtra had one hundred sons and 1 daughter. They were called the Kauravas. Duryodhana was the eldest of the Kauravas.

After the death of King Pandu, his eldest son, Yudhisthira, became the lawful King. Duryodhana was very jealous. He also wanted the kingdom. The kingdom was divided into two halves between the Pandavas and the Kauravas. Duryodhana was not satisfied with his share. He wanted the entire kingdom for himself. He tried several evil plots to kill the Pandavas and take away their kingdom. Somehow, he took over the entire kingdom of the Pandavas and refused to give it back without a war. All peace talks by Lord Krishna who was maternal cousin of the Pandavas and others failed, so the big war of Mahabharata could not be avoided.

The Pandavas didn’t want to fight, but they had only two choices: fight for their right because it was their duty or run away from war and accept defeat for the sake of peace and nonviolence. Arjuna, one of the five Pandava brothers, faced this choice on the battlefield.

He had to choose between fighting the war and killing his most esteemed guru, grandfather, who was on the other side, his very dear friends, close relatives, and many innocent warriors; or running away from the battlefield to be peaceful and nonviolent. The entire eighteen chapters of the Gita are the talk between confused Arjuna and his best friend, mentor and cousin, Lord Krishna --- an incarnation of God --- on the battlefield of Kurukshetra near New Delhi, India, about 5,100 years ago. This conversation was reported to the blind King, Dhritarashtra, by his charioteer, Sanjay. It is recorded in the great epic, Mahabharata.”

“Now let’s hear some opinions from all of you regarding The Bhagavad Gita”. One participant said, “I find it difficult to read.” The other said, “It’s quite boring. One cannot understand it much.” Another said, “I cannot connect it in today’s times.”

“Okay. By now I am sure you all are keen to know about me. Let me tell you my story and what inspired me to write the Bhagavad Gita.

One day God was very upset He was moving from one corner to the other, so His assistant asked Him, “God what happened, why are you so disturbed?” God said, “My dearest loving angel is going to earth and I’m going to miss her.” Well, that’s what my friends say about me that I’m a very caring, loving and a happy-go-lucky angel.

Dad kept my name Sheetal Khurana. Sheetal means cool and Khurana means that I come from a Punjabi family. I am born and bought up in Pune. I did my schooling from ICSE board then moved to SSC board. Further I went on to complete engineering from Pune. You see I was amongst those students who were not eligible for placements, little did I know that right after one year of college I will start my own recruitment consultancy firm with the help of a very senior experienced retired trainer as my partner. Unfortunately, he expired after 3 years. But I still remember his teachings: keep reading books, keep learning and I kept reading and continued my journey as an HR consultant for 14 years.

My family includes my father, my brother, my sister-in-law and my nephew. About my mother, I want to share an incident that changed my life forever. When I was 19 years old, my mom met with an accident, she suffered spinal cord injury and became paraplegic for life. My entire family was devastated; especially my mom when she came to know that she will be on wheelchair for the rest of her life.

One day a saint came to my house to see my mom. I asked him, “Why did this thing happen to us? What wrong did we do? Why did God do this? Is God really there?” But he could not answer. I was angry and didn’t understand what to do. Then suddenly, one day a book landed in my hands. It was The Bhagavad Gita. By looking at the book it was saying to me, the answers to your questions are right here. Now reading the Bhagavad Gita was a very big challenge for me. I thought why not start reading just 1 page or 1-2 Shlokas translated in English everyday like a prayer. It’s been 15 years till date of consistent reading and my life has changed completely. I have become more calm, wise, happy, fearless and intelligent. You all must be wondering what happened to my mother, she passed away after suffering for 4 years. Didn’t I get angry with God? Well, the answer is no, I just thanked God for relieving her from the sufferings and may God bless her soul.

One day, I asked myself, what is it that I really wanted to do before I die? Yes, I wanted to write the Bhagavad Gita. I had no idea how I will write, but somehow I started writing and slowly it transformed into a bold, simple and beautiful book. Every page just tells me that its teachings can change lives and help people in today’s times. This book “The Gita Happiness Retreat” is truly a gift to mankind. Here comes the first life lesson.

**Lesson No: 1 Do whatever your heart tells you to do, just do it consistently and see miracles unfold.

As we all now know a bit about The Bhagavad Gita. Let’s move on to Chapter 1 of The Bhagavad Gita. Immediately one participant raised his hand, got up and asked, “Madam who is the winner of the coal basket and bucket game which we all played in the morning.” I smiled and said, “Each and everyone of you is the winner.” All the participants were perplexed and they all looked at each other. One participant got up and said, “How is it possible, madam. Many of them couldn’t fill the bucket with water, few of us together joined hands tried to fill the bucket to some extent.” I smiled again and said, “Let me share a story with all of you.

Become Pure By Reading The Bhagavad Gita

On a Sunday early evening a family of four grandfather, grandson, father and mother went on a beach to have a barbeque dinner. They carried their own barbeque set along with coal required to cook. The grandfather had gifted his grandson The Bhagavad Gita on his birthday that happened few months ago. The grandson came up to him and said, “Grandpa I try to read The Bhagavad Gita just like you but I don’t understand it much. And whatever little I understand, I forget it very soon. What is the use of reading this book?”

Grandfather quietly went near the barbeque set and returned with a coal basket and said, “Take this coal basket go down to the beach and bring me back a basket of water.”

The young boy did as he was told, but all the water leaked out before he got back. The grandfather asked him to try again and again. But every single time, the water leaked out of the basket before he got back. Finally he got exhausted and said, “See grandpa, it’s useless!”

“So you think it’s useless?” The grandfather said, “Look at the basket.” The boy looked at the basket and for the first time realized that the basket had been transformed from a dirty coal basket to a new clean one, inside and out.

“Son, that’s what happens when you read a book like the Bhagavad Gita. You might not understand or remember everything, but when you read it again and again, you will realize the benefit one day. It will help you become pure from the inside and outside, just like this coal basket.”

All the participants looked at their clean coal basket, smiled and gave a big applaud. I said, “Everyone is a winner and what did you all win?” Another life lesson.

**Lesson No: 2 Read this beautiful sacred book The Bhagavad Gita consistently. Try to understand its teachings and do your own research. The sacred texts have a purpose that will help you find your true purpose in life and also help you find solutions to your problems.