Upcoming daily program for the 3rd month of Cāturmāsya

Jaya Śrīla Saccidānanda Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura ki jaya!

This a quick update on our plans for the third month of Cāturmāsya, which begins the day after tomorrow. It’s past 11 PM as I write this, and I’m feeling quite tired, so I’ll keep it brief. I wanted to share this now, as I might not get the chance to write anything tomorrow.

Starting on Viśvarūpa Mahotsava, we will continue meeting on Zoom every day at 7 AM India time (I'll be on Zoom 30 mins early at 6:30 AM for those of you who want more time). In each Zoom session, we’ll begin with 15 minutes of reading an excerpt from one of our ācāryas or singing a kīrtana of Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, followed by a 1-hour focus session dedicated to cultivating a specific practice of your choice and then we'll briefly check in at the end. This will replace our usual reading program.

I’ve become very attached to our regular daily reading sessions, which we’ve been doing for quite a while now. But, during this month, I need to fully concentrate on the Gauḍīya Gīti-guccha (songbook) project, so I’m pausing the 1-hour reading program and turning it into a focus session until we’re ready to send the book to the printers. After that, we'll continue doing the Bhaktivinoda-gīti-dhārā program and reading various books.

If you'd like to join this new program, please take some time to consider what you’d like to focus on for an hour each day throughout the month. Is there an area of your sādhana you’d like to improve on? A set of verses you’d like to memorize? A devotional book you’d like to study? A number of words you'd like to write?

During this third month of Cāturmāsya, we’ll motivate each other by committing to show up and give our full attention to our chosen practice.

To stay on track, I suggest making a plan of what you'd like to do in all the sessions until Ekādaśī and noting down your daily progress on a piece of paper. One idea is to draw a line of numbers up to 11. Each day, mark an "x" under the number when you complete your session. You’re welcome to focus on more than one activity within the hour if you prefer.

Here's an example:

Then once we reach Ekādaśī, you can take a moment to evaluate how you went, make a new program, add or subtract something, or simply continue on with what you were already doing.

That’s all I’ll write for now. We can discuss more details and ideas in our upcoming morning programs. Please write a comment on this post if you have any questions or ideas.

I hope you had a wonderful celebration in honor of Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura!

Your servant,
-Madhukar das

Ps. The Zoom links will be shared in our Bhaktivinoda-gīti-dhārā WhatsApp group. Let me know if you'd like me to send the Zoom link to your email.