love expressunderstanding of the meaning of “being ourselves” and the meaning of “unity”...

Love Express 11th January 1

Love Express SSO Zone 6 Youth Wing Year 2, Issue 10: November – December 2008

Dear Sai Family,

Trust you all had a blissful time during these festivities;

a particular time of the year made for peaceful

reflection and the lovely company of the closest

souls, inspiring each other and starting the new year

softly and sweetly.

The first issue of this year will start with a short review of

2008, continued by a very motivating story on faith,

followed by the leadership reflections and more

details on the SSLTP and many more news from our

brothers and sisters in Sai.

Wishing you all a bright and blissful 2009, enjoy!

REVIEW 2008

Usually the end or the beginning of the

year is a good time to have a look

back and see what has been

achieved so far. What has the Zone 6

Youth done in 2008? For sure we did

many activities.

The year started on well, after many

months of patience, surrender and

prayers for inspiration, we finally

named our newsletter, Love Express,

making us travel all over the place in

an instant.

In Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, we

joined the adults on the 12th of January

to discuss together the past and future

service youth activities, practiced the

LASA songs in Madrid with the adults

and meet every Tuesday, as usual, in

Slovenia for study circles on the

following topics: self-inquiry and

positive thinking.

We organised a blood donation

service activity in different Swiss

regions, Zurich and Lugano, making us

realise the need of this seva in this

particular time of the year and

continued our seva activities helping

out Ana in Slovenia, the older lady, by

providing her with briquettes for the

winter season, and visiting and caring

for the elderly people in Tenerife.

On the 19th January we had a Youth

Meeting in Zagreb, Croatia, a beautiful

opportunity for a productive


brainstorming on: LASA, the Youth

Retreat, the Zonal Ladies Retreat in

Greece, the presentation of the

exhibition during the WYC ´07, Sai

Vision, Sai Theather and the national

newsletter.

We had the opportunity for a better

understanding of the meaning of

“being ourselves” and the meaning of

“unity” through Ivan’s, Dr. Goldstein’s

and Alida´s inspiring speeches, during

the National Retreat held in Pescara,

Italy on the 16-17 February, and it was

also a special occasion to perform in

loving unity the LASA songs in front of a

mixed audience.

We started a workshop for March and

April, in Slovenia, on “Divine

Magnetism”, underlining the

importance of our thoughts and

feelings about ourselves and the world,

since they shape our destiny. And we

spoke about how to increase the unity

and the Sai activities, on the 15th of

March in Zurich, finding out each

others qualities. We celebrated

Shivaratri in Athens by an all night

bhajans session and performed a play

to teach the Human Values to the

poor children. The youth service for

the elders and the children on Tenerife

continued and another youth activity

has been started: caring for the elderly

ladies at the old age-home in Puerto

de la Cruz.

The Ladies and Boys Retreat took

place on mount Mosor, in Croatia, end

of March beginning of April, showering

us with special moments spent

together to unify the group for the

future activities. We had another Youth

Retreat, this time in Lenk, Switzerland,

25-27 April, focusing on “Unity in

Diversity” and we enjoyed the

company of a special guest, Phyllis

Krystal, which made those days

unforgettable.

End of April we rehearsed for the first

public performance of LASA in Croatia

and performed “The Story of Marty”,

an EHV project in Vrujci, Serbia, during

the Regional Retreat, 1-4 May, for

which we have been working very

hard to present this play and we

discussed the future steps for LASA and

other youth activities.

The first public performance of the

LASA project came to its splendour on

the 24th of May in Dubrovnik, Croatia;

people passing by could feel the

message of love coming out of our

hearts and stopped to sing along with

us.

On the 3rd of June we were blessed by

the visit of Arthur and Poppy Hillcoat to

Croatia, getting inspired on the true

understanding of life; and we did a

Ceiling on Desire Program in Slovenia

during the months of May and June,

giving everyone the change to

prepare a study circle: an amazing

opportunity for all of us.

We met again on the 7th of June, in

Faenza, Italy, this time for the Youth

Meeting, spending a great time

together in harmony and love, doing

study circles, presenting the LASA


songs to the regional devotees and

cooking for 68 guests.

On the 22nd June we organised a Mini

Euro Cup on Canary Islands, with the

aim to unify the community and to

work on the vision of integrity. We

organised different workshops

together with our pre-youth group for

the children during the first hour to

prepare the event and a song for the

opening ceremony. We improved our

seva activities at the old age home

and carried out a Narayan Seva by

cooking and preparing many different

menus for homeless people.

“Natura Docet”, a holiday for

disabled youth and their families, took

place in Divignano, 13-20 July, giving

us the opportunity to work in the

kitchen and get to know the youth’s

awareness, touching our souls with

such strong feelings, making us realise

ourselves.

The Ladies Retreat in Sai Prema,

Markopoulo, Attica, Greece from the

6-13 of July, unified many countries

together for a joyful and blissful spiritual

holiday. We did study circles on

Swami’s NYC discourses and we spoke

about communication, oneness, truth,

spirituality with insights on the Ancient

Greek, and many more interesting

topics.

The World Education Conference on

the 20-22 July in Prashanti NIlayam has

been joined many of us, despite the

heat and the humidity, enjoying the

presence of Our Beloved Bhagawan

and the peaceful and loving

atmosphere of the place.

We received a better insight on

understanding and compassion,

thanks to Ivan’s inspiring article: “our

understanding and love should be

unconditional and independent from

circumstances”. A new section in our

newsletter, called “On LeaderShip”,

has been created as a preparation of

the “Sathya Sai Leadership Training

Program”, asking and discussing some

key definitions.

Other 2 Youth Meetings took place in

Zurich during the months of September

and October. We organised our teams

for LASA and the Seva Network project

and we started to practice the LASA

songs, feeling the love and bliss that

came out of our hearts.

We had a brainstorming on the LASA

project in Serbia, which was very

efficient since it gave us so many

ideas, we could perfom a few times on

different aspects of the project.

Sai Vision took place on Murter Island,

Croatia, 3-5 October, where we

improved our talents as song writers,

instrument players, vocalists and

singers and discussed the further steps

to take for the youth activities. The

time for Avila came on the 11-13

October, where we have been

inspired on practical surrounded,

eating habits, leadership and

discussed the Zonal projects. The 18-19

of October we met in Divignano

again, where the energy tripled thanks

to the bhajans, and we had

presentations on LASA, a study circles

on Isaac Tigret and we welcomed our


guests from different voluntary

associations and we delighted them

by performing the LASA songs.

We had study circles on patience and

youth on the spiritual path in Slovenia,

where we continued our seva for Ana,

the older lady we are looking for and

we dedicated a whole day to help her

on the 18th October.

In November we added a new section

in Love Express called “Sharing

Grace”, where we can share our

personal experiences with Swami and

our brothers and sisters.

We did a great job all over the place,

sharing our joy and love with each

other and increasing our unity. Thank

you all for being so productive and

inspiring.

Saja Svilar

SHARING GRACE: CALL FOR HELP

Visiting numerous places of middle

and south part of the Adriatic coast

(on the Croatian side) I decided to

spend my holidays on a little island

close to Zadar. Actually the island is

not even that little, but there's

something special about it beside

intact nature; only 25 people are living.

One of those people is my friend,

nicknamed Breza, who gave up living

in capital city of Croatia only a year

ago for the calm and serene life on this

island called Sestrunj and all because

of love. Today together with her

husband and her beautiful son, she

runs a market which is a café bar,

being the only social happening on

the island, at the same time.

The place is simple and therefore

wonderful. It increases the senses of

smell and taste, hearing becomes

sharper, and emotions are glimmering.

One cloudy evening we decided to

go to „downtown“ for shopping at the

only local gathering place. As you

know, time passes slowly when you're

on vacation, and after quite some

time we were still there on the terrace

chatting and beside that, it was

lullaby-time for the baby.

All of a sudden: BOOM! Lightning strike!

But really close! I mean C-L-O-S-E!

Well, we were a little bit stressed but

we went on with our conversation.

Suddenly I turned out to the

neighboring bay and heard someone

shouting: “Is that fire?!!“

Lightning stroke the tree and the wood

was in flame, only around 70 meters

from my friends' house.

We alarmed everyone at once and in

a hip all were there, all of the 35

people present on the island at that

time, standing on our terrace. We

were discussing what we shall do.

Fire was spreading fast, but fortunately

with the north-west wind, out of the

way of our house. We were ready in

any case. If the wind starts to blow

from south/south-east, we would be in

the sea within 2 minutes!


I started telling myself: “What now?!

What now?!“ My body was shaking,

but the head was surprisingly calm.

My brother–in-law! That's a solution. I

rang my brother-in-law (waking him

up): „Hey, you work in the air traffic

control! I have a question: Do the fire

fighting aircraft fly at night?“ Surprised,

he answered „ No, they don't see the

electric wires. Why do you ask?“

„Well,...there's a fire....pretty close to

us....what shall we do?!“ And he said:

„Why don't you call 911?“, and

completely carelessly and confidently

(which surprised me) said:“...talk to you

tomorrow...call me back to tell me

how it went....“.

I said to myself: „ Well it's a fire, for God

sake, not a date with my boyfriend!?!“.

It was pretty hot, people were in

panic, but what most astonished us,

was the little baby sleeping in the

house. Besides all the noise, screaming

and shouting, he was still sleeping.

In the meantime, a friend of mine was

talking to the fire brigade and they

said they will be here within 35 minutes.

„Jesus Christ“, I said to myself, „we

don't have that much time!“ I know!!!!

With my palms closed, looking at the

sky, I said loud and clear inwardly:

„Baba, please help, we need big,

heavy, lavish rain! “

In the meantime, people were already

putting on some appropriate clothes

and preparing fire fighting devices.

Some were shouting out of fear, some

were just walking around in panic, and

I was no more part of all these

emotions, but perfectly sure that all is

going to be alright.

Not a minute passed since my cry for

help to Baba and look! Hail started to

settle down, and shortly afterwards

big, heavy, lavish rain...and it was

raining and raining and raining and

raining until the fire was extinguished.

Some were shouting: “Miracle!

Miracle!“, some were jumping out of

joy and some started to kiss and hug

each other.

Very soon most of the people went

down to the market/café bar to

celebrate, telling stories of their brave

struggle with fire, while the rest of us

went for a well-deserved and needed,

and careless sleep.

The next morning, we found out that

people from the island nearby were

ready to come to help us with fire

fighting, but as they said, it

unexpectedly started to rain.

I phoned my brother-in-law and my

sister and they told me they were not

worried not even for a moment,

because something was telling them

not to panic and how it all will be just

fine.

And me? Well, I am just grateful to be

able to share my experience with you;

the story about our dear Baba always

watching and looking after us.

If we ask him for help with total

surrender, without any fear and with

deep faith and if we let go and let him

do, then there is nothing to be worried

about.

And one more thing I forgot to tell you!

The little baby in the house (who, by

the way, wakes up on every minor

rustle) was blissfully sleeping until the

morning.

Tanja Mihoci

Croatian Sai Sister


ON LAEDER-SHIP

The question that has been made was:

“What do you understand by self-

leadership?” This is actually one of the

SSLTP topics.

Sherif, one of our brothers from Spain,

says: “How to lead oneself is a great

challenge. To be led means to put

faith in others. But to lead oneself

means to have faith in yourself. That is

much more difficult because it means

you always know what the leader

thinks and feels. And all doubts are

your doubts. You are asking and

answering. So the first step is to build

self-confidence. You can do that by

making promises to yourself and keep

them. The more you learn to trust

yourself the better leader you'll be for

yourself. People look for leadership

because they are looking for

somebody superior to themselves. So

you have to consider yourself a

superior person to put trust in yourself.

Integrity is the key. Unity of thought,

word and deed. Baba says first have

faith in yourself and then in God.”

The relevance of this question is due to

the importance of self-inquiry, which is

essential for everyone on the spiritual

path to improve. Asking yourself if you

did well from a wider point of view,

taking into consideration all the

aspects of life is a good exercise to

discover yourself. This will lead you to

self-awareness and self-realisation. This

is the main lack among humanity and

the reason why people refuse to take

responsibilities, they have many fears:

fear of change, fear of not being able

to cope with the new situation, fear of

being hurt, fear of loss and maybe

some more. “Why fear when I am

here?” Swami says. Just relax, life is a

game, enjoy it, play it, Swami will take

care about the rest.

Self-leadership is part of the greater

concept of “TO BE, which is the source

of leadership; to be a person of

character” as Sai Baba´s Mahavakya

on Leadership says, it is 80% of what a

good leader defines. I am sure you all

questioning yourself, finding your way

through life, realizing yourselves: you

are all leaders of yourself, so “never,

never, never, never give up” as

Winston Churchill once said.

SSLTP sounds familiar, right? Finally Sai

time has come to announce you the

modules dates and locations for the

pilot of the Zone 6 Sathya Sai

Leadership Training Program.

There will be 4 weekends in which we

will give an insight of leadership

through 8 modules (2 modules per

weekend). The modules contents are

still under construction and will be

announced in the coming newsletter.

Since Zone 6 is spread through 3 time

zones from Romania to Portugal we

wanted to give all the countries an

equal opportunity to participate. At

the same time, we wanted to achieve

synergy and oneness by having all the

youth together. We therefore reached

a compromise solution by which the

first and the last weekend would be

done together with all the participants,

while the middle 2 weekends would be

done in 2 locations separately for

groups A and B.


1. WEEKEND ONE, 28 Feb. - 2 March,

Mother Sai, Divignano - Italy (for all

participants).

2. WEEKEND TWO GROUP A, 10-13

April, Mother Sai, Divignano - Italy (for

Region 62 and those from Region 61

that can travel again).

WEEKEND TWO GROUP B, Date to be

agreed, Croatia (for Croatian, Bosnian,

Serbian and other youth from Region

61).

3. WEEKEND THREE GROUP A,

October 30 - 2 November, Mother Sai,

Divignano - Italy (for Region 62 and

those from Region 61 that can travel

again).

WEEKEND THREE GROUP B, October

during Croatian National Conference

(For Croatian, Bosnian, Serbian and

other youth from Region 61).

4. WEEKEND FOUR, ALL TOGETHER,

Date to be announced, Mother Sai,

Divignano - Italy.

If, for example, it is easier and cheaper

to fly from Greece to Milan than from

Greece to Croatia, Greeks should go

to Milan meetings. The same applies to

other countries.

We are looking forward to seeing

diversity in Mother Sai unity in

Divignano, Italy.

The leadership committee

CROATIA

Dear Zone 6 Sai Youth,

Looks like so many projects are going

on in Croatia but when it comes to

sharing news for the Zonal newsletter

suddenly you are speechless and it

seems there is not that much to say.

Well, the reason lies in the fact that

youth are engaged in so many

different projects of other wings and

the priority of LASA is still a project that

goes on publicly from time to time,

but…

Yes there is a but…Youth of Zagreb

have been pretty active recently and

on their meetings after regular

"program" of Namasmarana,

discussion on Swami's discourses and

meditation on light, they were working

on new songs for the LASA project.

As we hope that you eagerly expect

to hear their new material as much as

we do, let me assure you that you'll be

up to date as soon as they decide to

give the world their smash-hits!

And is there any better way to share

new songs with a whole wide world

than public performance?

Looking back on the year that's behind

us regarding youth activities it comes

out by itself that one of the highlights

was a performance of LASA in

Dubrovnik on 24th of May and

accompanied a mini-retreat, we all

enjoyed those two days while we were

preparing our act.

As we are now a bit experienced and,

in football terms speaking, winning

combination is never to be changed,

we decided to give the world one


more chance to experience all the joy

from giving love to one and all by

serving with a song on your lips.

And the performance is set out for the

1st of February, 2009 in Dubrovnik.

You may expect review in next issue.

As this time of the year make us

recollect memories to see what we

have done and what yet has to be

done, it is a perfect moment to take a

minute or two to think about our true

self.

As we do, it's good to have in mind a

quote from Star Wars: "There is no try,

just do!"

May all of you find yourself in 2009.

Aware of every moment of your lives

with inner calmness and acceptance

for whatever may come your way.

May you all be happy all the time and

may you share this happiness with all

that you meet on you way back to

Self. Blessed be.

Youth of Croatia.

SERBIA

This year the youth was very much

involved in the Swami's birthday

celebration. We prepared two skits.

One was about Swami's childhood,

and the second was a modern one. In

that way, both tradition and modern

culture were included. We also

participated in all other activities, like

singing, preparation of the video, etc.

We continued with the LASA

preparations. Once more we went

through our strengths and weaknesses

to see what would be possible to

perform. The weakest point is singing,

because there are only a few of us,

and without many instruments. That is

the reason why we feel

uncomfortable.

One of the ideas was to make only a

performance because this is what we

could do. That is why we worked

carefully to make a good concept of

performance with human values in it.

Indeed, we made an interesting

concept which we worked out into

details. Some suggestions about the

places for LASA performing were:

squares, mega –markets, as being part

of some festivals, etc. We would adapt

LASA depending on the place where

we are performing, and we would also

make some service activity at the end,

if it is possible.

Zvjezdana Bijelic

NYC Serbia


SPAIN

The youth all over the island of Tenerife

joined together, transforming the

months of November and December

into non-stop activities. Akhanda

Bhajans began on the weekend of

the 9th of November. Considering it

had been a long time since the youth

actively participated in devotional

singing, the one and a half hour slot

given to our group this year was taken

full advantage off and all members

who were able to attend sang

wholeheartedly, charging the

atmosphere with lots of good

vibrations.

Following these celebrations, on the

23rd of November, as a symbol of our

admiration and love to Swami on the

day of His birthday, a seva was

organized by the Youth, whereby

around 50 devotees and non

devotees were involved in the

preparation and distribution of food for

people on the streets. Food items

were cooked in various houses and a

full meal including fruit, juice, a main

course and desert was packed into

bags which were then distributed

around the streets of Tenerife. Thanks

to the guidance of our Master and the

efforts of everyone involved, we

managed to feed approximately 116

people all over the island that day.

At the end of November, we had an

opportunity to work alongside the

council on an environmental project.

We were asked to cooperate in a tree

planting activity in the highlands of the

north of Tenerife. Several members of

the youth group and children from the

education wing woke up at early hours

of the morning on the 30th of

November and together we managed

to plant about 90 trees, increasing

green spaces in the island, which was

a clear need after a devastating fire

burnt down a lot of our tree cover

quite recently.

December followed and the need to

spread some Christmas spirit to those

surrounding us became apparent and

we were able to put this into action at

our yearly visit to the old age home in

Tenerife. People from all over the

island joined together, kids, parents

and even elders to sing lovely

Christmas carols and shower the

residents with affection and gifts which

were partly prepared by the children

of the education wing of the

Organization.

Lastly, and due to the success of our

previous food distribution service on


Swami's Birthday, it was decided to

distribute food once again to people

with no shelter on the 25th of

December - Christmas day. The youth

group planned and organized this

activity involving a lot more people in

order to reach out to a larger crowd

on the street. 120 hungry mouths were

fed putting an extremely satisfactory

end to two months of full force

activities.

Youth of Tenerife

AGENDA

The agenda is thought to inform the Sai Youth about the future Sai activities of our

zone and t give the opportunity to whoever is interested to participate in any of the

following events a/o to visit the Sai family in any other country of our zone. Please

contact your National Youth Coordinator for further information.

24th January 2009: National Youth Meeting, Zurich – Switzerland (National Event)

1st February 2009: LASA Public Performance, Dubrovnik – Croatia (National Event)

28th February 2009: National Youth Retreat, Zurich – Switzerland (National Event)

28th February-2nd March 2009: SSLTP, Divignano – Italy (Zonal Event)

March 2009 – to be confirmed: National Youth Retreat – Croatia (National Event)

Prasanthi Nilayam, 24th December

In one's life, the years sixteen to thirty are the most precious.

This is the period when all of one's faculties and energies are

at their peak. Hence one should strive to make the best use

of this period. Noble qualities like self-confidence, sacrifice,

aspiration and courage must be acquired then.

If this time of one's life is wasted, there will only be failures in

later years. Bad thoughts and bad practices should be

eschewed altogether. During this crucial period, one should

try to understand the purpose of life and concentrate one's

efforts on achieving one's ideals. No spiritual effort is possible

when one has dissipated one's physical and mental abilities.

BABA


Love Express ©

SSO Zone 6 – Youth Newsletter

Love Express is the only zonal youth

publication of the Zone 6 Sathya Sai

Organisation updated every two months.

These pages may be reproduced,

distributed, and transmitted in any form,

by any means, provided that: (1) no text

or photographs are altered; (2) the

copyright and website information are

included with every set of pages; (3) it is

not sold for a profit; (4) no fees are

charged for distribution.

Publisher: SSO Zone 6 Youth Wing

Editor: Saja Svilar

Zone 6 Youth Coordinator: Ivan Bavcevic

[email protected]

Zone 6 website: www.sathyasai-zone6.org

International website: www.sathyasai.org

We offer Love Express, at the Lotus

Feet of Our Beloved Bhagavan

With humility, love and gratitude.

May our hearts, hands and minds be

In harmony with your thoughts words

And deeds, always suffused with

Divine love and eternal bliss.

Jay Sai Ram.

love expressunderstanding of the meaning of “being ourselves” and the meaning of “unity”...

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