New SPN'er Introductions

[spnadmin]

jasnoor ji

It is a pleasure to greet you here at SPN. I have already enjoyed reading your thoughtful comments.

Please write more and give us a chance to learn from your ideas.

welcomekaurwelcomekaurwelcomekaur

We will try our best to make this a comfortable place to interact.

 

[Mai Harinder Kaur]

Dear Jasnoor Ji,

A very warm welcome to SPN. I hope you find what you are looking for among the wealth of information on SPN, to help deepen your spiritual journey. Please feel free to ask questions and share your thoughts as we can all help each other on our respective spiritual journeys :happykaur:
Welcome welcomekaur

Jasleen Kaur

And we're nice people, too!

We're not all experts on all things Sikh, but certainly some of us will probably have answers to whatever you ask. And we all love to talk about Sikhi. cheerleader

Mai icecreamkaur

 

[davinderdhanjal]

SS AKAL Ji

Davinder Dhanjal JI

Welcome to this forum where every one is source of learning and exchanging thoughts with each others to understand the practical ways of living in Sikhism.

Hope you will have wonderful memories being active in this forum to exchange your worthy experiences and wisdom of thoughts.

WELCOME.

Jaspi

Thank you Jaspi Ji,
I am getting used to the way the blog is configured and apologise if I delayed my reply.
The state of Sikhi today needs all Sikhs to pool the resources and raise the bar of knowledge and their service to the religion - I recall an incidence where Guru Gobind Singh and one of the follower who was slapped by the guru when the follower wrote a word with kana rather than lavan as it changed the meaning completely.
It is only 300 years since then, we not only have over a dozen broken sects and they have their own versions of at least 'ardas' may be more.
My wife's family is namdhari and she had a gutka - checking the ardas it is completely different from one I know and on the net.
Well need thinking turbans on to get to some basis of commonalty! How do we do that?

 

[davinderdhanjal]

Gurufateh, Davinder ji!

I am always delighted when someone in my age group signs on. welcomekaurwelcomekaurwelcomekaurWe have a lot to learn from these kids and, if we pay careful attention to ourselves, we might have a thing or two to teach them. :blinkingkaur:

SPN is a great repository of Sikh knowledge and wisdom. Enjoy yourself and have fun.

Don't forget the ice cream!icecreamkaur

Mai

Dear Mai Harinder Ji,
Thank you and it is a pleasure to hear from you. I have enjoyed your comments to the spn and also liked your site. You have been through some experiances in your young age!
Keep opening the eyes of the community - it makes us all healthy with the wealth of information you bestow.
I was listening to the radio this morning where they were commenting about Jews who are about 70million in the world and their cohesive effort and contribution far surpasses any religion or community.They have been through some horrendous persecution over the last 4000years and are still a force to reckon with.
Their skills in organisation,religion, politics, engineering and science are well known. How can we a small, young and hardworking (26million Sikhs) religion pull together and direct the ship to similar direction without infighting and tearing ourselves apart?
Oh by the way do you know that ice cream has been around since at least 1730s - It must have been a feat to have kept it cold?

 

[davinderdhanjal]

Thanks Jasleen,
I find there is a lot of information - much more than I can handle but thankful of its presence.
I have difficulty finding information - and when you are in a section - nowhere, I know, it indicates the section. So when you change from to the other it is difficult to remember or find the same information again.
Yesterday I was talking to my brother and told him that I use SPN and that I found an email from SikhstoIslam that shook my being. When he asked me to find it and point it to him it took me half an hour yesterday before giving up and one hour to day.
I thank you for your comments

 

[spnadmin]

Thanks Jasleen,
I find there is a lot of information - much more than I can handle but thankful of its presence.
I have difficulty finding information - and when you are in a section - nowhere, I know, it indicates the section. So when you change from to the other it is difficult to remember or find the same information again.
Yesterday I was talking to my brother and told him that I use SPN and that I found an email from SikhstoIslam that shook my being. When he asked me to find it and point it to him it took me half an hour yesterday before giving up and one hour to day.
I thank you for your comments

davinderdhanjal ji I cannot remember if I welcomed you a few pages back or not. Please forgive me if I neglected you.

welcomekaurwelcomekaur

I am reading all your thoughtful and detailed replies here and on various threads and want to give you special thanks for being an active and engaged member so early on. It is a education for me every time you write a paragraph or two. A reality quotient in many ways that creates balance for us.

Let me try to help you find things -- as I know the forum is complex.

If you want to stay on top of a discussion Look for the word "Tools" at the top of any post you are reading. If you click on it you will have the option to "Subscribe" and if you select that it will prompt you to your next steps. This will keep you advised of new developments in a thread.

If you want to find something that you wrote, or a thread that you started. Click on your account id anywhere you see it in the forum. That will take you to your profile. You will see a Tab on your profile "Statistics" There you can click on the link Find all posts, or Find all threads by davinderdhanjal. You will also see these choices just by clicking on your id.

If you want to find something that you read but you did not reply, this can be more difficult. There is a search feature in the upper left corner of the home page. If using a search term does not work for you, then let me know and I will try to find it.

Wishing you luck.

 

[davinderdhanjal]

davinder ji

Welcome to SPN. SPN tries very hard to create an atmosphere where learning can take place, where the history and beliefs of Sikhism are accessible to study, reflect and discuss. That you are taking the time to share what you know with your grandchildren is a wonderful thing. And please share your love and knowledge of the environment with us. We have a section on environmental issues, and on law and advocacy. So may your energies match ours and everyone can learn.


welcomekaurwelcomekaurwelcomekaur

Dear Aman Singh Ji,
Thanks for you comments. I will do my best to contribute.
Is there a way for tagging the files (mails of the blog) so that they can be recalled as and when required? As you can see the heading of this page says 'introducing myself' but if you were in another section and were looking to get back here you would not know which heading button to use.
Secondly there does not seem to be a dictionary to check the spellings of the words - I think it would be great help so that mistakes can be picked before publishing which allows correct message to be shared.
Please do not consider this to be negative remark but a feedback- as I believe SPN is the most informative and wide ranging voice of Sikh community.
I have an engineering background and use the CS4 forum where engineering questions are raised and discussed. Their layout is worth a view.
Thank you again for welcoming me to your forum

 

[spnadmin]

davinderdhanjal ji

Back to you :happykaur: I am not the same person as Aman Singh ji. :happykaur:

First of all we should take a look at the layout of that engineering forum, as we are constantly looking for ways to improve the search features and organization here. In part we are limited by the platform and what it permits us to do. It is v-bulletin. Changing forum software would be an undertaking which would require SPN to go offline for a major amount of time. We then would lose out on participation and traffic. But let's look anyway.

You can, when you subscribe to a thread, select a feature that sends an email to your normal email address. Over time however that can become cumbersome. I have a free email account that I use just for forum and network notifications. That might be helpful.

The other thing you can try is using the tabs in dark brown/maroon at the top of each page for quicker browsing which index the most popular searches.

You can bookmark threads too, using SPN bookmarks which comes with the SPN toolbar. That is located under free downloads. It might be the quicker way to find a complete list of recent threads you have read - if you remember to bookmark a thread or comment.

Look in your browser's history. That is one of the main things I use. I search my history by subject matter.

One last tip - If you are reading or posting in a topic and think you read something very similar days or weeks ago and want to find it, try looking in the related threads which are linked just above the thread you are in. Many times the information is there in a different thread on the same subject.



That is all I can think of at this time. Because I use the forum every day and read every new post every day I have a mental map that has developed over time of where things are or should be and where I saw something. But even I at times become very frustrated, especially i looking for comments posted more than 2 weeks ago.

 

[Admin]

Thank you spnadmin ji for an elaborate insight into various search options. You may consider opening a new sticky message for the benefit of all new readers SPN.

I would like to suggest two more way that you might find easy to access your posted content.

1. At the top left side of page there is search bar which says "To Research, Type Here and Press Enter...", now after typing your search keyword, on immediate right side is a drop down menu with two options: 1. Search in Topic Headings Only 2. Search in Every Posted Message.

In your particular case selecting the second option is more likely to show your desired topics in search.

2. Right on this scree, clicking on your username in one of the posts made by you would showup a drop down message, and one of the options there would be Find All Posts Made the [username]. This will show all the posts you have made on this forum thus far...

3. Above in orange navigation towards right side there is Search Drop down menu and toward the end, there is an Advance Search Link, this is as comprehensive as it can get!

To test these ourselves, would you kindly let us know the keyword you were using to find your desired posts... we will do a search on it and would let you know which search option works best in this particular case.

Once overtime you get familiarized with the website, you would realize that you can search in a particular forum/section as well and also search in a particular topic as well... check all the dropdowns just above the first post in any topic to explore many options.

And, please also post a link to the forum you were referring too! We are always looking forward to improve your experience at SPN!

Gurfateh!

 

[Admin]

in continuation to my previous post,

The spell check option is not there by default. but i would recommend you to use Mozilla's firefox browser and you will get spell check option by right clicking in this text box and click check spellings. wrongly spelled words would be highlighted in red! On right clicking on the mis-spelled words, Firefox would suggest the right words. You can select the right word and you are done!

I hope this helps

Regards

rangesingh:

 

[findingmyway]

Thanks Jasleen,
I find there is a lot of information - much more than I can handle but thankful of its presence.
I have difficulty finding information - and when you are in a section - nowhere, I know, it indicates the section. So when you change from to the other it is difficult to remember or find the same information again.
Yesterday I was talking to my brother and told him that I use SPN and that I found an email from SikhstoIslam that shook my being. When he asked me to find it and point it to him it took me half an hour yesterday before giving up and one hour to day.
I thank you for your comments

Dear Davinder Ji,

I have been enjoying your posts a great deal over the past few days! I am happy to try and help you to find things. Another tip is to glance at the address box of your browser when reading a thread of interest. Before the name you will see the name of the section the thread is located in, eg hard talk or sikh sikhi sikhism or interfaith dialogue.

Best wishes,

Jasleen

 

[seekingsachch]

Sat Sri Akal ji

I've been interested in Sikhism for quite some time and have a few Sikh friends. I have had an interest in South Asian culture for quite a while and thereby came to know about the faith. I am familiar with some of the basic concepts in the faith, but am looking to find out more by reading through already established threads as well as through dialogue and particular questions I have. I hope to learn more and hopefully find sachch soon.

 

[spnadmin]

seekingsachch ji

Your choice of screen name says a lot. We are all seeking, all on a journey, and perhaps we are all missing the markers along the way now and again. But we are making the effort. Here at SPN you may find people to share the journey with you. I hope that you do. Please avail yourself of whatever we can offer. Thanks for joining us. And I hope to see you participating in all the threads that intrigue you and even those that may bring a smile to your face.

welcomekaur

 

[a.mother]

Sat Sri Akal ji

I've been interested in Sikhism for quite some time and have a few Sikh friends. I have had an interest in South Asian culture for quite a while and thereby came to know about the faith. I am familiar with some of the basic concepts in the faith, but am looking to find out more by reading through already established threads as well as through dialogue and particular questions I have. I hope to learn more and hopefully find sachch soon.

seekingsachch ji you are most welcome to the SPN and SIKH world, as spnadmin ji said you describe your self very well . An old saying that I have heard from my grandfather I have to share with you that "ghar de bhaag darvaje to hi pata chal jande han" mean someone you can judge by look or it says lot of. That we can see in pic and post. Thanks

 

[prakash.s.bagga]

SEEKERSACHCH Ji,
YOU ARE MOST WELCOME TO THE FORUM OF DISCUSSION IN KNOWING SIKH AND SIKHI.
IT WOULD BE OUR PLEASURE IF WE CAN BE OF ANY HELP IN THE JOURNEY TOWARDS YOUR GOAL YOU ARE SEEKING FOR.
WITH BEST WISHES,
Prakash.S.Bagga

 

[seekingsachch]

Thank you all for the wonderful welcome! It really is encouraging for me as I was very nervous about introducing myself.
:shy:

 

[davinderdhanjal]

Dear seekingsachch,
That is a very 'Sikh' name - that is exactly what our gurus wanted us to do I am sure your route to 'suchch' will be very enjoyable and rewarding.
Is it not remarkable that a small group of people (2% of India's population) are the only people whose teachings are written by their gurus themselves rather than diluted and time modified versions of other religions?

It is a 'truth seeking' religion which is necessary in any walk of life. The teachings throw away, bigottery, idol worship, persecution and makes you question yourself at every point so that you do not offend the LORD or his CREATIONS.
It is a religion and a way of life that sought to allow freedom of speech and religious beliefs that eventually freed India from Moslem and British rulers.
Anyone who comes in to this fold is also a remarkable person - I hope you build a solid base of beliefs of NANAKS and contribute to the family with your learning of 'suchch'.

 

[jasi]

SS AKAL JI.

You are very correct what your grand pa told you.

Like old saying " coming events cast thier shadows before"

You can clearly vison the future where we are going.

One's face is mirror and eyes are doorway to reflect your innerself.

Our Gurbani teaches us all to be truthful to our self.

Jaspi

seekingsachch ji you are most welcome to the SPN and SIKH world, as spnadmin ji said you describe your self very well . An old saying that I have heard from my grandfather I have to share with you that "ghar de bhaag darvaje to hi pata chal jande han" mean someone you can judge by look or it says lot of. That we can see in pic and post. Thanks

 

[rbamrah]

Hello, everyone My name is Rebecca and I am a white American female married to a wonderful Punjabi man. At the time of our marriage I was without religion but after much meditation adopted Sikhism as my own. My parents brought me up Christian but I never felt any connection to it, to the Bible, to Jesus, and in fact disagreed with many of its teachings and followers. My husband gave me a kara soon after our marriage but I only began wearing it when I was certain I would never take it off. I want to be truly serious in my faith and am still learning many things about it.

I have a question however out of curiousity; how are converts like myself looked upon by fellow Sikhs?

 

[spnadmin]

rbamrah ji

First of all welcome to SPN. welcomekaur

Then I must gasp and grope for words, for in a way you are an answer to a prayer. How is that for putting a lot of pressure on someone the first time we meet. motherlylove

To begin with no one of us individually will have more than a personal and subjective sense of how Sikhs look upon converts to the religion because it is personal and subjective. No one individual can speak for everyone else. Having said that -- my own experience has been almost no prejudice, and mostly great enthusiasm and interest and welcome. And I have never personally observed negativity directed toward any other convert.

Sometimes, and this is really quite rare, there is the assumption that a convert must be a member of the 3HO organization, which is not true but understandable. The idea starts with the actual truth that most white converts to Sikhi in the west have been introduced to Sikhism through 3HO and also because the founder of 3HO Yogi Bhajan saw his own yoga students deeply moved by this faith. Upon that, he gradually built a dharma that spread throughout the western world. In time the presence of white Sikhs was acknowledged in places like India, and Singapore. White Sikhs nearly always is taken to mean 3HO.

There are many stories of others who are not 3HO -- in fact well known people among them, and people not so well known. Each making a contribution in their own way to greater understanding of Sikhi. Again -- I am unaware of barriers other than language, any negativity or suspicion, any horror stories. And we can talk more because this is a personal interest of mine.

Finally to my earlier point. Do you know how many times non Sikhs have posted threads here at SPN and in near depression and great anxiety because of barriers to marrying a person born a Sikh. Most of the time the problem has come down to the issue: The partner who is Sikh is pressured to chose a traditional arranged marriages with someone of the same caste. The non-Sikh stands to be cast aside. Understandably emotional. Hard to give constructive advice.

Can you find the time to tell us your story? How did your relationship unfold? Were there cultural barriers? How were they overcome? You cannot imagine how valuable your own experience will be to other members at SPN. So of course you did not come here to be put to work right away. Do enjoy yourself and find some spiritual company too! But please every now and again, check to see where your own life can provide lessons for others. Thank you.