9 Incredible Parenting Pebbles shared by Navadurga during this Navratri
With the onset of the fall season everywhere in the world the nature will start changing its colors and prepare itself for the forthcoming festival season across countries and cultures. In India, October is the busy festival season, with both Navratri/Dussehra and Diwali coming in sequence. This is the time of the year, most of the families tend to get together and enjoy the festivities and enjoy being together. And it’s also the time of prayers and rituals at home.
But at any point in time, have you ever wondered what is the underlying message these festivals are bringing to us? As a Parenting coach and Kid’s mental health blogger, I was just explaining how Navratri is celebrated differently when compared to North to one of my clients. That’s when a thought came to my mind to check whether there are any parenting lessons that we can learn from this festival, Navratri.
To my utter amazement, when I started digging deeper and deeper into Devi Bhagavatham and other stories, I learned so much and some of those very same points are being talked about repeatedly in a new form by the modern-day parenting coaches and child psychologists. In fact, while doing this research, I remembered vaguely about some of the points which my grandparents used to share with us.
So here are those nine parenting pebbles from Navadurgas whom we worship during this Navratri. Let’s try to embrace them and start using them in our day-to-day lives.
Navaratri and Nine different Devi rupams:
During Navratri, the goddess, Maa Durga is worshipped in nine different forms across India. Each day, we worship a different incarnation of the Maa Durga and there is a special significance and associated color, prasadams we offer to the diety during this time. The following is the list of those different forms of Maa Durga worshipped across India.
Most of us would be busy doing the decorations, learning/relearning the chants associated with each incarnation. Elders in the house would be busy with the preparations of the offerings and the puja rituals. But no one reminds us what each of these goddesses is telling us from the parenting perspective. This blog tries to bridge that gap.
Parenting Pebbles from Navdurgas:
Some of you might have the objection while reading this blog as to why I am referring only to the mother here and not to the father? Agreed parenting is a job for both parents and nowadays, even the fathers are taking an active role in parenting.
But we need to understand how the society was in ancient India once, before answering the questions above. In the ancient days, parenting was never considered as a job for a mother or father alone. They used to strongly believe that the children are raised by the village. Everyone was actively involved in parenting. And now coming to the parenting pebbles from Navadurgas, as we are worshipping the mother goddess in this festival, the lessons captured here are from the perspective of the mother alone. There is no other intention of undermining any parent’s role in rearing the child.
The actual parenting pebbles from Nava Durga have been captured in the next post under this series, as it will ease the reading for the readers. Please click on the links below to read parenting lessons from different days.
Parenting Pebbles from Navaratri — Part I (Days 1,2 and 3)
Parenting Pebbles from Navratri — Part II (Days 4,5 and 6)
Parenting Pebbles from Navratri — Part III (Days 7,8 and 9)
Originally published at https://mommyshravmusings.com on September 29, 2021.
