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Post by adiganga on Feb 19, 2022 19:48:56 GMT 1
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Post by cintamani on Feb 24, 2022 21:13:18 GMT 1
Great session Adi Ganga Prabhu! Below is my detailed feedback:
Some of the things that made this session a delight to listen to:
1. I loved the clear way you told them what was going to happen, and how you told them the benefit of reflection “When you hear your own thoughts reflected back in someone else’s words it helps you to crystalize your thinking.”
2. I love your smile. You are warm and encouraging, and obviously enjoying yourself. Which is good, because they will feel you enjoy doing this with them which makes it a better experience for them.
3. I loved the way you accommodated Prema bhakti having a different edition of Bg.
4. I loved the way you get them both involved, taking turns to lead something.
5. I love your expression of excitement about the discussion. “Then we can get to the exciting bit, the discussion of the paragraph.” Your enthusiasm is contagious and inspiring.
6. I love how gently you bring Renu back to just understanding, and while validating her questions ask her to bracket them for now.
7. Your reflections are great, as usual.
8. I love how you encouraged Renu NOT to bow out of reflecting back what Prema bhakti had said, and the reason you gave, “It’s good to hear it in your words, how you would say it, rather than how I say it.”
9. It was so nice how you shared that you also struggled to remember at first. You are not putting yourself above them, but letting them know it’s ok to struggle, that you also struggled as you learned.
10. The way you encourage Renu after she tried to understand Prema Bhakti was priceless. Your body language, your tone of voice, your words, “That was great! You picked up everything that was said. Wonderful reflection. Thank you.” You are giving her so much confidence and encouragement. We all need teachers who believe in us, and that shines through with you.
11. I love how when you did your understanding of ‘widely read’ you incorporated both their understandings, and took the opportunity to give Prema bhakti a little encouragement, “I agree with Prema bhakti mataji in that it is spread all over the world.”
12. I love how you validated Renu’s understanding of you. Lots of encouragement which is what we all need.
13. I love how you validate Prema Bhakti’s attempt to understand what you meant by ‘science’, and went into a clarification without discouraging her. Wonderful. Even though she still couldn’t pick up on your idea of ‘a process’ you decided not to push that. It seemed to me you made an executive decision that it was better not to discourage her by telling her to try again. Good call. Training means we’ve got to know in what order to help the devotees we are working with. Courage to try comes before skill. So you are really fanning their courage.
14. Nice that you asked them for their feedback about the process of understanding before you went into the responses.
15. Great you looked up in the dictionary what ‘theistic’ meant.
16. It was wonderful how you supported Renu in expressing her earlier doubts around KC being a a faith and science being facts, and then resolving that doubt.
17. I loved how encouraging you were with Prema bhakti when she tried to understand what Renu meant by ‘theistic science.’ “Thank you. You’ve done a good job there!”
18. You always modelled the process. When Renu asked is a belief a hypothesis, you didn’t just answer, but you reflected back the question and asked her if she has a light. Wonderful!
19. I loved how you coached Renu to thank Premabhakti. “I’ve just been taught to do that, so I’m passing it on.” A very humble and unassuming way of coaching her. Well done.
20. I loved the way you encouraged Renu to keep to short sound bites.
21. Good job you stopped Prema bhakti from analyzing/ judging Renu’s mind, and kept her to just understanding what she said.
22. I love how you express your delight in the discussions. “This is the beauty of scrutinisingly discussing it. You actually discover quite a lot.”
23. I love that you asked Renu for her feedback, and shared with her that initially you also found it hard to retain and reflect.
24. Your own feedback was priceless. It was wonderful how you expressed your deep appreciation for Renu’s insights into belief and hypothesis. The fact that you love doing what you are doing shines through and makes the whole experience delightful.
Suggestions:
1. Encourage them to recite the whole mangalacarna. Ask them to turn to the appropriate page in their Bhagavad-Gitas, and read it from there. If they are worried about pronunciation, you can say something like, “None of us know how to pronounce it at first, but we learn by trying. This is a great place to learn, as it is a small group, and there’s no judgement between us. We are just here to support and encourage each other to grow.”
If they still hesitate, you can say something like, “Ok, I’ll lead it for as many sessions as it takes for either of you to get your courage up. But please mute yourselves and say it with me for practice.” Then in each subsequent session encourage them to try. If they still hesitate, you do it again, until one of them says they’ll give it a go.
2. I suggest that initially you limit your group size to 4 people plus you (altogether 5). If need be to 3 plus you (altogether 4).
3. Until they get the hang of scrutinizing meaning in their own words, one thing you could do is breakdown the sentence for them. Tell them you are going to do that, then after one of them reads the sentence, ask them to put in their own words one phrase or word at a time. For example, “How would you put what SP means by ‘widely read’ in this context? How would you put what SP means by ‘theistic science’ in this context? How would you put what SP means by ‘summarised in the Gita Mahatmya’ in this context?”
4. When it comes time to reflect back, you could read from Useful Tip 4 first to prime them what you want them to do. Then tell them you will illustrate Useful Tip 4:
Tell the person who understood SP which word or phrase they are understanding, reflect back some of the words they used, then pause and see if you can put their meaning completely in your own words.
Once you’ve demonstrated, ask the other devotee to try. Guide them step by step: ‘What’s the word or phrase she unpacked?’ Pause for her to say, then ask ‘Can you remember what she said in her own words?’ Pause for her to say, then ask ‘How would you put that in your words?’
This will give you even more opportunities to validate and encourage. For example, Prema bhakti understood Renu’s ‘widely read’ as ‘a popular scripture’. Popularity is all about how many people like it, and by breaking the sentence down for them and guiding them to pause, you could have caught that and applauded Prema Bhakti’s reflection.
5. When you do your understanding of them, bring out their success. For example, Renu kept understanding ‘widely read’ as ‘widely read’, but once she said, ‘a lot of people are aware of it.’
So when you do your reflection pick up on that. ‘You understood widely read as a lot of people are aware of it. In my own words I understand you to mean by saying widely read SP is commenting on the large number of people who know about the Gita, whether or not they have read it.’
6. Prema bhakti’s understanding of ‘widely read’, she pointed out she has a different light to Renu. Her light was ‘read all over the world.’ What I think she is getting at is as well lots of people, those people come from many different nationalities and cultures. So for her widely read meant ‘variety of people’. By breaking the sentence down and guiding them to pause after each section, it would have been easier to catch that and applaud Prema bhakti.
I think praise really helps someone who has low confidence to learn more quickly.
7. Something else you could praise them both on is that they both stopped speaking when they had done their best to understand. Not everyone does that. I generally tell them, “I’m so impressed you both stopped when you had said everything you could on understanding, and didn’t carry on speaking just because you were invited to. That demonstrates self-discipline in speech. Not everyone can do that. Thank you.”
8. Because they struggle to retain, it may have been easier for them if you paused after you unpacked ‘theistic’ let them reflect that back, and then unpacked ‘science’ and let them reflect that back. Then you could unpack the two words together and let them reflect that back.
9. Like most people they struggle with both retention and comprehension. It’s hard to understand what we can’t retain. You may want to give them some exercises to help them with this.
I will make a video of the kind of exercise that might help them and share it with you.
10. You can suggest to Renu to use a pen and paper to jot down her thoughts so she doesn’t have to be anxious about forgetting.
11.
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