The virtues of parents exercise great influence on their offspring. Among all family members, it is the mother’s life and teachings that affect her child the most. An ideal mother can be very helpful to her child in attaining the supreme goal of life by inculcating good values in his mind. Bhuvaneshwari Devi was the mother who understood this and she was endowed with the highest values.
For inculcating good values in Narendra, she narrated good and inspiring stories to him since his childhood. Whenever she narrated to him the stories about extraordinary acts of the brave devotee Shri Hanuman who dedicated his life to the works of Lord Rama, he was greatly delighted. Since he learnt from his mother that, ‘Hanuman is an immortal. He is still alive’, his soul started longing for the divine sight of Shri Hanumanji. One day, Narendra went to hear a religious story. There, the story-teller was narrating the character of Shri Hanumanji in ornamental language in a humorous style. Narendra approached him slowly, and said: “Panditji, you have said that, Hanumanji likes to eat bananas and resides in the banana grove, can I go and meet him there?”
Panditji could not gauge the intensity of the longing and curiosity in the child about meeting Hanumanji. He laughed and said casually, “Yes, My Son! On searching for Hanumanji in the banana grove, you can meet Him.”
The child, instead of returning back to his home, stepped into a banana grove. He sat under a banana tree and waited for Hanumanji. A long time passed, but Hanumanji did not appear. When the night advanced more he became disappointed and returned back to his home and asked his mother, “Maa! Why didn’t Hanumanji turn up to meet me today?” The wise mother did not find it appropriate to shatter the faith of the child. She implanted a loving kiss on his face and said, “My Son! Please do not be sad, it could be that Hanumanji might have gone somewhere else today to accomplish Lord Rama’s work, he may meet you on another day.”
The hopeful child relaxed and smiled again. The child did not lose deep faith in Hanumanji due to the sensible reply given by his mother, and hence being inspired by Hanuman’s vow of celibacy, later on he also took a vow of Brahmacharya.
An ambition that arose in a child’s mind, a small spark of faith was fanned so much by the goddess-like mother that it turned into a conflagration of yearning for God-realization. And this yearning of Narendra was satisfied when he went to seek refuge in the lotus feet of SatGuru Ramakrishna Paramhansa. The grace of SatGuru turned Narendra into Swami Vivekananda. He enlightened Narendra of the bodiless soul abiding in his body and thereby established him in Supreme Brahman, the Supreme Self.
