Bless the Water

 

Another fantastical yet scientific bit of knowledge that I come across is that water has intelligence, it has memory.

Japanese scientist Dr Masaru Emoto brought to light the tendency of water to hold feelings, words and thoughts in his book, The Hidden Messages in Water. He further stated that since human bodies and the planet earth are composed of water to the tune of 70 to 80 %, thus, a lot can be changed and accomplished by blessing water that we drink with positive thoughts and feelings.

So, I have begun using this knowledge to start my day with a draught of positivity, literally, everyday. I always commence my day by drinking two glasses of warm water. Since, the time I have come to know of this phenomenon, I have consciously used it to bless the water that I am about to drink with the goals or targets that I have planned for myself for the day.

I wake up very early, and I am the only one in the kitchen at that hour. So, in the solitude of the setting, I look with intention and love at the water boiling in the kettle and say out aloud, or sometimes, repeat in my heart words such as, harmony, success, good health, abundance, happiness, companionship and so on. As I pour the water into a glass, I continue to hold strong this intention and repeat the words to the water. I also sit on a stool in the kitchen itself, holding the glass of lukewarm water in my hands, repeating the words to the water, before finally drinking it. I like to believe that the water blessed with these attributes will spread these sentiments through every cell of my body. This morning ritual fills me up with confidence at the beginning of each day.

I also use this ritual to reinforce these feelings, sense of accomplishment of these gals during the day, especially when I am feeling dejected or out of sync with my inner being.

I have found offering a glass of water that is blessed with feelings of joy, peace, love, and other positive emotions, to anyone who is not feeling good, helps to uplift them.

I have advised many of my acquaintances and clients to employ this technique when they are about to enter an important meeting, call, interview, and even when they are in midst of a difficult discussion with a spouse or an argument with their teenage child. It has always helped.

Thus, being mindful of the water that I drink has helped me to accomplish many dreams. Let me know how your experience was with this ritual.

You may like to watch a video on this concept here:

https://www.instagram.com/tv/CZqpxjUJ2yN/?utm_medium=copy_link

Daily Dose of Wellness Chemicals

 

 

I came across this image that is shared above this blog-post, a few years back on a social media platform, and it made me realise that there is so much that I can do to keep myself feeling inspired and uplifted throughout the day.

There are four different types of chemicals that boost the ‘wellness quotient’ within us. We simply have to choose one activity from each of the boxes above and make it a part of our daily routine.

I like to club my energy levels and the course of my day, while scheduling these activities for myself.

Therefore, I always begin my day with meditation. The serotonin, a mood stabaliser grounds me for the day. I am more aware and connected with my physical, emotional, mental and etheric body, as I gradually ease into a new day. I am not such a fan of diving right into a day. I like to first know the emotion that is pervading my senses, manage it, become aware as to how I am planning to employ it and thus, carpe diem.

After the passage of a few hours, in order to have a gush of endorphins in my veins, I begin my exercise regimen. I practice it four to five times in a week. This helps me to get over minor physical inconveniences of daily life. A stressed neck from the previous day’s numerous online meetings and sessions, is quickly taken care of in the gym. I am renewed as I launch myself into the remaining day which comprises mostly work.

Love is a drug that I cannot get enough of! I uninhibitedly express love, and primarily compassion more than love, towards all I meet. My work requires me to be alone at most times, so to experience the benefits of Oxytocin, I have incorporated two activities in my daily schedule. First, I make a video call to my children every day from work around lunch time. Seeing them, blowing them kisses and also cuddling them virtually, immediately fills me up with joy. Second, I have kept two bird feeders on the ledge of my office window. I have a routine to fill them up with food and water two times during the day. I have birds from the neighbourhood visiting me, singing their melodious bird songs to me throughout the day, throughout the year. It is as easy as that.

Finally, I work towards rewarding myself regularly to have a shot of Dopamine in my system. I take out time to celebrate my small wins which can include five days of workout in a week, practicing my sitar, eating a clean diet, and many more. I have developed a routine for myself and follow it with as much precision and discipline, as possible for me.

There are many other activities, such as connecting to my breath, making a gratitude list, and so on that help me feel energised and well through a day.

In a nutshell, one does not really need to perform complex exercises to get a daily dose of these extremely vital wellness hormones. With a bit of planning and preparation, we can work towards getting a systematic infusion of these in our day and our life and be happy and healthy.

Let me know, what all you tried and how it has benefitted you.

Connect to your breath

In midst of a busy or stressful day, I have often found comfort and solace in my breath.

Often when we are preoccupied, rushing through our day and/or worried, we close our bodies. I feel that this is a natural coping mechanism for us humans, to close our heart chakra. What this does is that it spoils our posture; our backs are stressed, rounded, we develop a hunch, our shoulders droop and move inwards, and our lungs are constricted for open space within the ribcage. There are other changes in the body as well, and these changes differ from person to person.

All this change in our posture directly affects our breathing. We automatically begin to take shallow breaths. These breaths do not carry as much refreshing oxygen, as is required for our body, especially when it is working harder than usual. I feel all this adds to the stress and tiredness that we feel in difficult or harsh situations.

Connecting with my breath has always brought me respite immediately. I find a quiet corner to sit or I go out in an open area where I can sit alone and begin work with my breath.

I immediately straighten my spine, open out my shoulders and pull my chin up. I then close my eyes and take in a deep breath that fills up my abdomen and make it bulge. I hold the breath for a few seconds and then exhale. I exhale for longer than I inhale.

I also add visualisations of colours to energise and heal chakras as the situation may require. A simple technique for all can be to visualise inhaling pure whitish blue light and exhaling black/grey breath. As our system gets stabalised, we will find that the colour of our exhale turns to white or transparent. This is a good way to decide that we are now in a composed state of mind to tackle the tasks at hand. I sometimes, also like to receive messages or keywords to address the situation at hand. This is the first thought or word that comes to my mind immediately after I connect with my breath.

You can also connect to your breath otherwise, and not wait for the day to run you rather than you running the day. In fact being connected with the breath is a powerful tool to remain in the present and fulfill your tasks with grace and joy.

Everyday Miracles: Gratitude List

 

Everyday Miracles: Gratitude List

 

It is easier said than done to wake up each morning with a high voltage charge of enthusiasm and motivation gushing through our bodies. In fact, I have always found it more helpful to wake up feeling refreshed, calm and composed.

The most part of my day is already planned the previous day, yet I allow space for my emotions to decide my barometer of ‘happy, motivated, need inspiration, do not want to be bothered today’. Over the years, I have developed a morning ritual for myself that always helps me to slide into a new day with vigour and zest.

A part of this morning ritual is reading my ‘gratitude list’ after I get ready for work and before I take my breakfast. I usually maintain two copies of my list, one in the handwritten format in my handbag and the other in my mobile phone. I shall share the reasons for this later in the blog.

Many of my clients find it unbelievable when I advise them to reach out for their gratitude list before they read their to-do list for the day. However, once they follow my advice they become converts to the school of thought.

Here is what happens when we read our gratitude list in the morning:

·         We become aware of all the resources that are available at our finger tips. This repository includes not only tangible things like a bed, a roof above our heads, platefuls of food, and so on, but also the rarer and dearer bounties of love of our family and friends, sound counsel of our mentors, clean fresh air to breathe, a refreshing walk in the neighbourhood park, and I can go on.

·         Gratitude releases in us the hormones –  dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin and endorphins; together these are referred to as happy hormones. What actually happens is when we read about these blessings of our lives, we relive these experiences, and this triggers the release of happy hormones in our systems. So, when a difficult day is unfolding itself, it is always helpful to steal a few moments and read our gratitude list which is saved as a picture or a document on our mobile phone.

·         This exercises also creates a habit of thankfulness within us. I believe that a habit has the quality to be universal in nature. So, it will touch every aspect of our life, if not immediately but eventually. Hence, when we find it atrocious to be grateful for the irritants and challenges in our life, the primary sentiment of gratitude for all the graces of our lives, prepares us to be thankful always, for everything.

Since, I have talked enough about reading the gratitude list, you must be wondering when do we write it, right?

The best time to write our gratitude list is at night before we turn in to sleep. I have found through experience that it is best to initiate a ritual of winding down as we prepare for sleep.

I like to turn down the lights of the room, turn off all technology, keep my mobile phone away, curtail conversation with everyone and prepare to be with myself and my thoughts.

I add two or more things to be grateful for every night. Thus, the list is ever-evolving and ever-growing. I use a notebook and a fountain pen to write. Writing it puts me in a state of bliss. I can focus on the positives as I drift to sleep.

Try this and tell me how the experience has been for you.

BUDDY WILL YOU WRITE WITH ME?

BUDDY, WILL YOU WRITE WITH ME?

Writing is a skill and creative writing is not only an individual need but it is also a collective desire: there are writers who want to write together and readers who want to read together. We therefore, have writers’ workshops, collaboration among writers, and readers’ clubs.

However, there is another aspect of this exercise that I explored and gained immensely from, during a particularly stressful period of my writing journey.

While I was pursuing my studies in Durham, I was required to write a lot of content, of different variety. The demand to produce good content with narrow deadlines, was a stressful period for me. I am a person who likes to take her time to be ready to write and to write what I feel like writing, writing to a brief was new and difficult, initially at least.

The practice that came to my rescue at this time was, developing a schedule with a friend who happened to take to writing around that time. Navjot had landed in a situation where she had to write a book, much to her discomfort. We were in constant touch with each other despite the distance and the difference of the time zones that separated us. So when she took up writing, she would sometimes ask a few things about how to write a certain portion of her book in a better manner. I remember that more than the technique, we would discuss the suitability of a particular content for her target readers.

I too began brainstorming with her about the ideas and themes that I would want to or have to write about, in my creative compositions at that time. We would discuss and debate for hours about our pieces, and before we knew it, we would have settled on something very different from where we had initially decided in the beginning. However, this was not the case every time.

I am fortunate to have my sister and my father to review my work. Their inputs have helped me immensely, always. I believe my sister who is an intelligent reader with a refined taste, truly understands my sentiments in my writings. I attribute a lot of my transformation in my writings lately, to her review of my work. Despite this, I felt that my interactions with Navjot aided my writing process to a great extent.

While my sister reviewed the drafts of my work, Navjot helped me to crystallise my thoughts on a theme before I began writing. Navjot, also gave inputs from the situation of a writer who is not a stickler for technique, my peers in the writing course are, and thank God for that. Navjot’s circumstance of being in a challenging position of beginning to write was similar in a way to my situation of writing under duress, this helped us become each other’s buddy in writing. We planned our writing schedules together and ensured that we adhered to them. We pulled each other out of procrastination or the fabled writer’s block (we never had the luxury to experience one, in fact not even now). We kept each other in an environment of writing, in order to elicit the best writing from both of us. We became each other’s writing buddy much like ‘gym buddies’. In fact Eli Roth, an American media personality who is also a writer has said, ‘Creative writing and shooting are muscles that atrophy. But when you work them, you become a self-generator who can branch out.’  

So, we need to workout our creative writing muscles and who better than a buddy to workout with?

Masterclass with Shiv Khera Part - 3

The final part of my interaction with Mr Shiv Khera. I have sneaked in a question that he has answered brilliantly.

#Monday_Motivation #Motivational_Speaker #You_Can_Win #Everyday_Motivation #Life #Life_Skills #Leadership #Leadership_Skills #Leadership #Management_Guru #Shiv_Khera #You_Can_Achieve_More #Love_Life

IT'S AN INSIDE JOB

It’s an Inside Job

It was a couple of months ago when I had the opportunity to interact with Mr Shiv Khera; he was in town to promote his latest book, You Can Achieve More - Live by Design, Not by Default. I was part of a small group of journalists, representing my newspaper Asian Lite. What was a media interaction turned into a masterclass with the celebrated motivational writer and speaker.

I was fortunate enough to develop a video of the event which I am sharing in this link. It will be a three part video as my meager subscription does not allow me a long upload.Hence, I am not summarising the talk with him into a written piece. However, there is one aspect of his interaction with us that stood out the most for me, and I share that below.

I had posed at a later stage, a question about how does one know when things are right or not, in one’s life. By the way, the question is not in the video because chai-nashta had been served by then, and the later scenes were more of gupshup over a cuppa, far removed from the more formal tenor of the interaction in the previous part of the video.

When asked this question, I had taken a cue from his TedX talk, he replied that the others know when things are amiss in our life and so do we. The barometer for that is our happiness. So, it is an inside job whether we want to be a millionaire or a saint who gives up every material possession. The test to know whether we are doing the right thing or not is to know our own happiness quotient. In fact, as I reviewed the tape before posting, and  number of times at that, I realised that this is the crux of everything.

If I am happy, independent of every outside factor, then I am doing the right thing. The same stands correct for choices v/s compromises. If I am happy with my choice, it stops being a compromise. It is so easy to not to end up compromising. If am happy with a work or a job, my passion shines through, and in some cases the other capabilities, their presence and absence, may not even affect my performance at that job. I will acquire the requisite skills out of my own volition, and will become actually competent to do the job. The list goes on.

Being the unabashedly spiritual person that I am, I feel this is the mantra for living life. For why else does God place us on this planet, but to indulge in its joys and be happy? We just have to work on our inside happiness to live life the way we intended to at the beginning, as nothing else is ours to keep.

A good note to begin the new year with.