Anuradha Sridharan

 D: "1, 2, 3, 4.......Mummy, you have many strands of white hair" She starts to pluck them one by one. Me: "It's hurting, don't pluck, ma" D: "I don't want my mummy to grow old" Me: "aww, it's not possible, dear!" Physical changes like greying of hair are the obvious ones D notices. But as I observe myself in the past 1.5 years, I realize that the 40s is the decade of awareness and acceptance. The slightest mental turbulence immediately manifests in the physical body. In the 20s and 30s (to a large extent), the body is much more accommodating to the torture it has to put up with - overeating, unhealthy food choices, sedentary life, poor sleep, negative thoughts, and habitual reactions. In the 40s, the body tends to become a little less forgiving. Awareness about our daily choices becomes even more important in this decade, if not prioritized in our 30s. The effect of our thoughts and feelings reflects in the physical body so rapid...

 It has been quite an emotional roller-coaster ride last few weeks. Multiple thoughts to process, reflect and act upon. Last evening, came to know that a colleague of mine with whom I had collaborated back in 2016 passed away suddenly due to an accident. She was in her late 40s, used to lead a large team, and then moved on to do multiple other things. Though the mind tries to reason out through the lens of Karma and destiny, the heart doesn't understand and accept so easily. Sent prayers and healing thoughts to her family last night before going to bed. But couldn't get good sleep. Woke up around 4 AM (earlier than usual) today and started prepping for lunch. Then joined the Satvic Advanced Yoga session (Day 2 today) at 6 AM and the topic was on energy and imbalances due to the dominance of either Ida or Pingala nadis. The lesson that I'm carrying forward from today's class: When there is a constant conflict between the mind (left brain / Buddhi) and heart (right brain ...

  This happened in 2015. I started to mingle with a group of women. One of them had invited all of us for an evening meet-up. A bottle of wine was opened. I had never tasted wine (or any other type of alcohol) before that day. But since everyone was having it and I wanted to become part of the group, I decided to join in. To be honest, it tasted horrible, like unsweetened cough syrup and there was a burning sensation in my throat. After a couple of sips, I couldn't drink it any further. No one in the meet-up forced me to drink wine, yet I decided to change myself to feel accepted among new friends. Later in that week, I questioned myself, "Why would you want to change yourself? A real friend would accept you for who you are". That was the first and last time I ever sipped alcoholic beverages. During my school and college days, there were times when a few classmates mocked me for being "too thin", along with other not-so-kind comments (body shaming happens to thi...

About a month back, I came across an interview with Sister Shivani on Ankur Warikoo's youtube channel. I hadn't known about her until then. I was awestruck by her insights shared in such a crystal clear manner in that interview. Youtube then recommended me her podcast from The Ranveer show and more of her videos from her channel. Her calming voice, her analytical approach, and the right examples inspired me to listen to her videos whenever I opened Youtube. As I started to read more about her works, I stumbled upon this book " Happiness Unlimited " which is based on the conversations she had with Suresh Oberoi as part of a TV series. I picked it up from Blossoms last Sun and I was glued to it in the past week. If you have started exploring about mind, thoughts, the role of spirituality, and our responses to situations, then look no further and pick up this ONE book. I'm sure it will answer a lot of your questions. It is a short and easy read (around 170 pages) but...

 Yesterday (Mar 17th) was World Sleep Day. Though most of us understand how important sleep is to our overall well-being, we somehow deprioritize it for various reasons - be it work, hobbies, entertainment, distraction, socializing, etc. This compromise over time affects both the quality and quantity of sleep. Many of us have this habit of watching TV or browsing our phones until the last second before we go to sleep. You might have noticed, when you close your eyes after exposure to screens, there is some sort of visual movement or disturbance for a certain duration of time before it settles down. This impacts the time it takes for us to get to deep sleep. Sleep quality also gets impacted by the quality of information we consume just before going to bed. From my experience, I have noticed that whenever I watch a disturbing or scary movie in the late evening, my sleep cycle gets disturbed. I remember watching the movie "Gargi" a couple of months back and I couldn't sleep ...

  Are you a list maker? Do you thrive when there are long to-do lists and multiple projects? Do you feel low when your to-do list has fewer items or none? Do you diligently maintain and update your to-do lists at the end of each day? We create these lists to manage our external lives better - home, work, career, studies, parenting, social life, etc. While reading an enlightening book (review coming up soon), this thought came up. Along with our to-do list, it is valuable deciding on a TO-BE list for the day as well. TO-BE defines our state of being for the day. It can also be an intention on the tone we want to set for the day. We could create a sample TO-BE list from this master list as below: I want to be peaceful aware conscious calm happy energetic strong alive light humble joyful cheerful here-and-now We can't focus on all the different states in one day. Pick 1-2 states and truly be that way, irrespective of what comes up during the day. Once the intention for the state of be...

 In the past couple of years, I've become a fan of Om Swami's writings. What makes me go pick up his books one after another are his simple words without much jargon, yet profound in the impact they leave behind. " A fistful of Wisdom " is a collection of articles on varied topics related to life, love, spirituality, death, and more. You could choose any random chapter and finish reading in 10-15 minutes. It doesn't require a particular sequence to be followed, though I read it from the first chapter to the last. Depending on what you seek, some of the chapters will strike a chord, while the rest may not. The very first story in the Foreword section gave me goosebumps and so were the insights from the first two sections on Life and Love. On the role of adversities, he gave a fresh perspective - "By giving you everything, life has deprived you of the triumphant feeling of defeating your adversities". In his typical narration style, he brings up insightful...

 I boarded the bus after back-to-back meetings kinda day at work (Took a cab in the morning). The conductor walked past me, though I was giving him exact change. A couple of stops later, an elderly lady sat next to me. I called out to the conductor to get my ticket, but the lady said to me, "free today, no ticket". I quickly googled and realized that BMTC had announced free rides for women today on the occasion of Women's day. For someone who doesn't follow the news (or newspapers), it was a happy surprise🙂 While swiping through Insta Stories, I came across a comic strip of a woman drowning in a water body, quoting these lines: "Being expected to work like we don't have children Being expected to parent like we don't have work You are a super mom" This struck a chord so deep and I could relate to it so much. As I pondered deeper, I asked myself, "Are these expectations self-driven or by others?". In my case, it is heavily influenced by sel...

 Many times, we mistake "what you are good at" and "what you love" to be the same. "What you are good at" comes from years of deliberate practice. These years of investment need not necessarily be self-driven. It could be due to parental pressure, peer influence, society's expectations, deep-seated insecurities, or simply due to the sheer amount of time and effort you had invested in the same. As you invest this time consistently, there are chances that "what you are good at" eventually turns into "what you love". A concept that Cal Newport shared in his book "So good they can't ignore you". There is also another angle to it. Though you might be doing what you are good at, there is a sense of emptiness or lack of satisfaction in what you do. After a point of time, putting in the required time feels so draining and exhausting, though it might now take lesser time than what you used to in the initial days. Another overlo...

  A silly argument, a rude comment, a mild insult, or an unexpected reaction - from a family member, colleague, friend, or even a stranger on social media - can throw us off track for the rest of the day. Sometimes, our minds cling to them so much, building a narrative and adding more "masala" (spice) than required. We keep ruminating over them, unable to let go, which in turn disturbs our sleep cycle. We will be able to sleep ONLY when our body completely relaxes and lets go of any stiffness or tightness when our mind quietens and lets go of unprocessed emotions from the day A situation had already happened and we might have felt the impact of it. The hurt is real and there is no need to deny it. Most of the time, such situations are beyond our control. But what's in our control is to not let the impact deepen any further than a tiny dent. Avoiding the dent altogether is a result of years of spiritual practice and it is super challenging. So let's accept that the den...