Since 1990, Tasmania Region has conducted an annual residential spiritual retreat. For over 20 years, that retreat has been conducted at Carnacoo Scout Camp on the Tamar River northern Tasmania. This year, the retreat was held from Friday evening, 6 March until Monday, 9 March. In keeping with the spirit of the National Theme, Spirituality 101, our retreat theme was ‘Your Life is My Message’. Coincidently the same theme adopted by Victoria in their Sai’s 100th Birthday retreat.
Twenty-two attended the retreat including 2 children. The retreat caters for devotees across the state and includes some who are too distant from our centres to be regular attendees. We were fortunate to have Vignesh, our National President and his wife Durga, NSW Region President join us for the time.
The ‘weekend’ program focused on the theme, drawing on the song, ‘Love is My Form’ for inspiration in discussion groups, and the three spiritual paths as opportunities to explore ways of using their practice to promote the message of Sai through transformation. A daily early morning devotional program was followed after breakfast by the Light Meditation and an energising bhajan session each day. We were blessed by sharings and insights by Vignesh and Durga as well as a session in which each attendee was able to share briefly some Sai experience they had had that we had not heard before – wonderful listening. An amateur hour concert was conducted on Sunday night with impromptu performances and much joy and laughter. The final activity of the retreat was all joining beside the beautiful Tamar River and whilst singing “May the Love We Share”, symbolically leave behind some impediment in our spiritual growth and leave with and embrace something positive we recognised as desirable for our progress. All-in-all, a wonderful weekend of inspiration, camaraderie, joy and above all love. Swami’s blessings were there for all.
