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workshop with environmental and vegan educator, Rae Sikora. These experiences fuelled my interests in developing individual potential and in reaching goals through teamwork -- both ideas that have become hallmarks of my professional life. All the encouragement and opportunities, subtly directed my way, found their mark.
Parivartan: A Transformation
I can look back now at a dizzying deluge of memories: creating our Mahavir Jayanti play with Usha Auntie and Rupen...serving vegan ice cream at the JAINA Convention in Chicago...serving on JAINA's Jivdaya Committee, then the YJA Advisory Board... performing Jain stories at the Ackland Museum in Chapel Hill... Jain Storytelling. I was gently challenged and stimulated by a seemingly endless stream of possibilities... a Jain storybook? a cookbook? a theatre piece?
Hard to believe all this could happen in six short years and to someone who was a skeptic about organized religion. Sometimes, I think the Jain group took the encouragement other kids get over their years of growing up and gave it to me on a compressed schedule. I wonder how much of my own creativity or potential I would have found had I landed anywhere but North Carolina. I still feel grateful for every act of kindness and support.
Growing up in a small city in Canada, there had been few Jains around me. I was accustomed to the Jainism of my childhood. My parents had presented a personal, searching, critical thinking path, which I jokingly coined "protestant" Jainism. I'd also seen Jainism in cultural context while visiting relatives, some enunciates, in India. The intimacy of our Jain community in North Carolina appealed to me. And the group's openness to making Jainism real, applied and meaningful resonated with me. If it wasn't for my level of comfort with our Jain "family" here in North Carolina, I might never have ventured into the vast Jain community I later discovered. Having stepped into that Jain greater community, I soon encountered new friends and kindred spirits, across the continent, who have made my life richer ever since.
It seemed Pravin Uncle was always introducing me to other Jains interested in similar ideals, veganism, creative self-expression, a path of compassion. Living as roommates with Sejal in Amdavad... discussing rural development with Nisha... environmental justice with Ami... natural healing with Aaka-Mummi... frank discussions with distant friends, Monali, Purvi, Jina, Hema, Lynna... about identity... the matrimonial process... community issues in India and here.
A Burden Shared is Divided; Happiness Shared is Multiplied
Years passed, and with a young adult's typical schedule, I made sporadic appearances in my Jain family. Whenever I appeared, I always felt welcomed. One day, I appeared at a Jain meeting just in time to hear two closing announcements: our Jain group was organizing a Jain Pathshala Teachers' Workshop in NC, and the next JAINA convention was going to be held in Philadelphia. My thoughts turned to Tom, my closest friend, now my life partner... I don't even recall if Tom and I had come to "a decision" at that point, but I took this news as a good sign. The Pathshala Teachers' Workshop would allow Tom to experience Pravin Uncle's crash course on Jainism and to get a sense of the North American Jain community. And the next JAINA Convention would be in Philadelphia -- in Tom's hometown, minutes from his parents' home!
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