There are at least a couple of reasons to appreciate the month of June.  The Radha Krishna Temple of Dallas celebrated the International Yoga Day on June 18th by hosting Dallas YogaFest, an all-day event to promote well-being of the body, mind, and soul.  On June 19th, everyone celebrated Father's Day to appreciate the earthly and heavenly father for all the beautiful gifts of life.  Thus, this month's newsletter focuses on these celebrations and on the theme Understanding Maya.  

In Bhakti Ras, we attempt to understand the meaning of maya knowing full well that we cannot overcome maya without the grace of God and Guru.  In Inspirations for Living, we share a story about how Kabirdas ji's total surrender to God pulled him and his wife out of a precarious situation.  For our Bal-Mukunds we share a short poem to celebrate Father's Day.  In the Wellness for Life, we share four ways for weight control.  Finally, we share the various exciting community events to uplift yourself and others. 

Saint Kabirdas is known for many righteous qualities including his devoted service to unannounced visitors and guests at his house.  Under the most challenging conditions, he and his wife made sure that guests always had food to eat and a place to rest when travelling from one place to another.  More often than not, they went hungry but their guests always were cared for with love and dedication.

One night, several ascetics came to his house and said that they had not eaten all day and were very hungry.  Kabirji's wife, Loi, said that there was no food since they had fed any remaining left-overs to visitors who came earlier in the evening.  He asked Loi to go to the different stores in the market and ask the storekeepers to give food items on credit.  She went and asked so many merchants but none would oblige knowing their state of poverty. Finally, a young merchant made a conditional agreement to lend food.

The merchant told Loi to return to his shop at night when all others were asleep.  His intentions were despicable.  Loi took the food items, went home, cooked and fed the ascetics.  Then she told Kabirji about her conditional agreement with the food merchant.  Kabirji said that God had created this situation so if this was his wish, they would fulfill it; if this was not what God wanted he would pull them out of it.  Kabirji told Loi that he would escort her to the merchant's house as it was dark and raining heavily.

After getting to the merchant's house, Loi went inside while Kabirji waited outside.  The merchant was surprised to see her and asked how come she was dry even though it was raining heavily outside.  Loi said, "My husband carried me on his back to keep me dry because I was coming to see you."  The merchant was shocked and stepped outside to see which husband would bring his wife to another man.  When he saw Kabirji, he immediately recognized him and filled with a deep sense of shame, begged for forgiveness.  Kabirji thought, "So this was your leela, Lord?"

By surrendering to the will of the higher father and wanting nothing against the desire of his Lord, Kabirji and his wife were pulled out of a precarious situation.