“We cannot live for ourselves alone. Our lives are connected by a thousand invisible threads, and along these sympathetic fibers, our actions run as causes and return to us as results.”

-Herman Melville

 “It is well to give when asked, but it is better to give unasked, through understanding.”

-Khalil Gibran

I have been attending Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh shakha since I was twelve years old. We’ve heard it said before, but it’s common knowledge that children just don’t understand the importance of going to shakha when they are little. I know I didn’t. In my imagination, it was simply a place to play with other children on a weekly basis. I was told that it would help me keep in touch with my Hindu culture. As I got older, however, I realized that it was a little bit more than these simplistic generalizations. According to the HSS website, the goal of having weekly meetings in the form of shakhas is to “organize the Hindu community in order to preserve, practice and promote Hindu ideals and values.” I understood that as I entered my teenage years. I understood that the point of going to shakha, family camps and Sangh Shiksha Vargs was to develop characteristics that would enable me to be proud of my Hindu culture and be a leader in society. Somehow, as I became a young woman, I found myself wanting to get involved more and more, and I no longer needed to go to shakha at anyone’s insistence. I wanted to make a difference.