RAJA Yoga meditation teacher Shiela “Shielu” Chawla is recognizable on sight to about a million practitioners across the globe, even if she stays almost the whole year on the Brahma Kumaris main campus in Rajasthan, India.
This is because during their annual retreat season -- from September to April -- students of the university of spiritual studies from over 60 countries are bound to attend a lecture or two that she gives.
Sister Shielu is also the chief translator for the major Hindi classes, her accurate English versions picked up simultaneously in 26 languages, including Russian, French and Mandarin.
Easily a third of the student population, or those who live on the subcontinent, can identify her just by her voice on radio. She is regularly invited to give lectures (on values formation, stress-free living, self-mastery, values in education) on Zee TV, Sony TV, and other channels that broadcast in India and neighboring countries.
Three designations
Shielu, who became a student of the institution 49 years ago at age 12, has three official designations now: Senior faculty member of the BK Academy for a Better World; coordinator of the Education Wing, Raja Yoga Education and Research Foundation; and head teacher, Raja Yoga Training Intensives.
But she is always the first to say this is no big deal.
“A lifestyle based on the practice of meditation has taught me to make seemingly difficult things easy,” she insists, and she has one word to explain this frame of mind: “Love.”
Shielu says, “I love meditation, I love teaching others, and also teaching them to be teachers themselves. With love, there is no labor.”
She was not born this prone to lyricism, actually. Shielu is a BS Science graduate of the University of Bombay. But open-minded she has always been, and the disciplines prescribed by Raja Yoga—among them vegetarianism, white sari (symbolic of the aspiration to purity and simplicity) and karma yoga (incorporating meditation and action)— instantly appealed to her.
Taking it further, she worked full time at the BK university right after her college graduation in 1969. For the sprightly, idealistic and intrepid young woman, the uniqueness of the system was a big attraction.
Contrary to logical expectations, the university has no departments of philosophy or supernatural phenomena or any such equivalents. Possibly the closest to a traditional school setup are the literature and audio-visual department, where printed and recorded classes are available for sale. Otherwise there is just a vegetable department, a milk department, a bread department and a sweets department.
During the retreat season, students, regardless of nationality, age or number of years in the discipline, attend the same general classes three times a day.
Speaking of which, the subjects are likewise unconventional. For any given batch of the spiritual-study pilgrims, the day’s lessons may read: The Power of Silence, The Greatness of Humility, Service through the Mind. Plus, there may be an optional class on Meditation Experiments.
Popular classes
Among Shielu’s most popular classes are How to Give and Receive Blessings, Being a Worthy Child and Master, and Taking the Most Benefit from a Meeting with God. (She has given seminars in related areas to scientists, jurists, educators, media practitioners, politicians and medical professionals.)
Naturally, different qualifications from the usual are required of teachers here for whom, occasionally, separate classes and workshops are given.
Shielu explains: “In values education, certainly in Raja Yoga, teachers are constantly reminded that words can take students only so far. It is deep reflection that refines the knowledge that any teacher imparts. The teacher’s main role is to be a model of honesty, humility and silence of the mind. Otherwise, everything will just be lip service; the students will have no self-realization and there will be no transformation.”
And transformation all around, on all levels of the human social structure, is necessary for people everywhere to have peace, Shielu says. “From my travels [to 70 countries], I have learned that peace is most people’s one big wish. It is so important and urgent for many that they don’t even wish for happiness anymore; peace would be enough. This is sad because happiness is what God wants for His children.”
Which is also why, she says, spiritual education should go hand in hand with academic pursuit. “‘Spiritual’ should not be alien or forbidding to us,” Shielu stresses. “We know that we are more than our physical bodies. We should get to know this real self more, rediscover spirituality as something natural to us.”
Then, she adds, “Peace and happiness may once again be natural and normal for human beings. We look around and see that anger and sorrow have become the norm. We should remember and respect, and cherish what we are. Spiritual education is the key.”
BK Shielu speaks on “Relationships: The Power of Harmony,” Aug. 13, 6:30-8:30 p.m., at the Sapphire Ballroom, Mandarin Oriental, Gateway Mall, Cubao, Quezon City; tel. 4149421.
