Let The Life Flow

We all are spiritual beings in physical realm, whether we are conscious about it or not. We all seek deeper meaning in our lives. And each of us has our own highly personal way of connecting to other beings.  The way we connect and relate differently to other beings, we also connect and relate to our spaces and environment in very personalized way. And each of us needs a personal space of our own to relax, unwind, calm our senses and connect with our higher self. Photo Credit: Jason Wang, Unsplash Whether we create it consciously or not, we tend to veer into these spaces as our energy gets aligned with these spaces. That is why you will see that in a house each member of a family has a favorite place/corner of their own. The energy alignment may have come from both the inner energy structure of the person commensurate with the outer energy structure of the space which may come from individual component or an amalgamation of components like direction, forms, colour, texture, light...

 I am into Day 22. What am I doing is simple; eating healthy and doing regular exercises.  The important point is I am able to do it consistently for 22 days now. The question is .. HOW? All thanks to the challenge thrown by Health First Everything Next. I do not eat meat. So for my protein intake I need to supplement my food with ltos of seeds and nuts. But I did not know how to incorporate that and keep it going regularly. Now I have a structure. Here is one of my Plate of Fruits, Nuts and Seeds. Fruits, Nuts & Seeds

 The common saying is that if you adopt a new habit for 21 days it becomes permanent. So I adopted it silently for 21 days. Now that the 21st day is over I can tell the world and rejoice in my achievement. I have taken the Healthy Life Style Challenge for 90 days!! So 69 more days to cover. Let me see how it goes. This is not only about physical health, the determination to hold on also is about mental health.  I have resolved to do daily posting about my experience till the challenge is over. :) I will give snippets about my food plates and other daily practices that makes this challenge interesting. So let the journey begin. Any Time Salad

I have listened and read many stories about Buddha and his life in my childhood. One of them was about a time when his brother Debadutta wanted Buddha to be killed by a mad/drunken elephant. So the drunken elephant was let loose and it came charging towards Buddha ferociously. But Buddha stood his ground calmly. The elephant came rushing, however as he came near Buddha he suddenly became calm and relaxed and went down on his knees bowing down to Buddha. Buddha just touched his forehead and blessed the animal.   Another time he was given a hut for night halt where there was a poisonous snake inside. But Buddha went and stayed there. He addressed the snake as his friend and requested him to go out into the jungle as the place was not safe for him. He told the snake that humans are afraid of him and hence they will kill him. The snake bowed to Buddha and went out of the hut to the jungle.   I was fascinated by these stories and the power of Buddha to control the mind of others. W...

With most of our lives spent indoors, the space we occupy has major role in our psychological behavior and well being. I stumbled upon this fact through my years of  meditation and healing journey. Any blocked memory that I have come across and healed, not only had emotional charge attached to events or persons but also elements and spatial dimensions.  So when I started learning and practicing  Interior Design, I tried to understand more as to how we are interacting and getting influenced by our built environment. And from the perspective of a practitioner  of meditation and healing,  I was curious to understand if our raised vibration has the potential to transform the energy of any built environment.  My curiosity to learn more on this lead me to a subject called Architectural Psychology or more popular term Environmental Psychology.  This branch of psychology looks into the interaction of people and the spaces they inhabit; both built and natural. ...

Today is a different day than my recent time normal day. Today in a Google meet I got chance to connect with former colleagues with whom I worked while posted in  Bhubaneswar Regional Office of Action Aid . For me it was first of its kind, as I had not yet participated in a digital video meeting like this. I have attended digital classes and seminars in recent months where you see the presenter in the screen and your participation is through the chat. But seeing all participants in the small windows together with your own image and talking to them was a first for me. I liked the experience. It was profound for me in the sense that as I saw them, each one in a box disjointed from other boxes, yet all together in a larger frame; similarly for each of them I have a separate box in my memory though all are part of my experience in that single frame – that office. I realized we might have interacted with people in a group, but we form our memory distinct and separate for each of the...

During this period of corona pandemic when there is neither medicine nor vaccine for the disease, there is lot of emphasis on our own immune system. The better is our immunity system, the better our chances of defeating the virus. Ayurveda prescribes many natural ingredients and processes to help boost our immune system. We have received many of those in our inboxes. But how many actually do that, take effort to do that? Naturally many though know would not take that effort because it is too cumbersome or may be despite knowing we do not believe fully that it has that magical benefit. So though the knowledge is there, the drive to take action will be absent. Similarly our ancient knowledge of Yoga and Pranayam suggests breath work and asanas increase vitality and strengthen immune system.  The knowledge helps us only when we take those actions and actions will be taken by those who believe in those methods and have a drive to take action. When we know something benefi...

On 24 th May 2020, I received an article in my inbox about World Interiors Day. I was not aware of such a day prior to this. Searching more information, I found about the International Federation of Interior Architects/Designers and their celebration of entire month of May and specific date 23 May as World Interiors Day. Since 2012, when I decided to understand and learn about Interiors more and joined a formal course in a college, my understanding on this subject has expanded from what it was earlier. But like any subject matter of human interest, the subject opens up ever new vistas for the traveler to explore and so learning never ends. In celebration of the day I decided to pen down some of my impressions on Interiors and its designing. To me Interiors are not standalone entity. They always entice you when you decide to explore a structure and go beyond its façade. So when I speak about interiors I may view it from very solid, dense forms of brick, mortar, iron, wood etc. ...

Ever since we remained confined to home after the declaration of nationwide lock down, it seems the subject of ‘food’ has taken a prominent space in our daily activities and communication. Food definitely is and has been basic to our existence. But never before was it in the forefront of our awareness. We used to see our existential pride in many other activities and skill sets than our culinary skill: except for those in the food industry. But once we became confined to the home, the significance of food took over a vast expanse of our perceptual canvas if not the entirety of that space. That is what it seems to me. Let us see, if my thought on food gives you some more food for thought! The moment nation wide lock down was declared; probably the first thing we thought of is food. People queued up the grocery stores for food items to stock up before midnight. Government authorities quickly responded to this panic and very next day assured people that both durable and perishable ...

 The following post was written by me in 2008 after my first visit and stay in London as part of my travel diary. But it had remained as draft for so many years. After so many years reading my own post I find it interesting and think I can share it with others. :) Buildings & Beauty: London Buildings through my Perception Clarendon Drive in Putney, London (where my London colleagues had organised my home away home) seemed to be a posh locality. Beautiful houses stood in neat rows, on both sides of the almost empty roads. After reaching there suddenly I realised why the ‘videshis’ and our very ‘phoren returned’ talk about dirt and filth in India. The roads were absolutely clean, stretching from end to end between two houses on both sides. One does not get to see any cracked road, ‘broken at the edge’ road or ‘with pot holes’ road. The mostly brick colour houses at the first glance look perfectly uniform; creating a synchronised rhythm of visuals. But two days after ...

My parents are ardent supporters of a political party whose ideology is different from what I and my siblings stand for.   So at times a discussion on political scenario in the family gatherings generates heated exchanges. During one such discussion my mother declared that she hates Muslims. It gave me a punch for thought. I stopped for a moment and then asked my 72 year old mother, “Have you been harmed by any Muslim in your life Ma?” And it was her turn for a pause. She finally said, “No”. But her antipathy towards Muslims decides her political perception and may be some other life aspects. And ‘a realization’ knocked me like a bolt. She has not been harmed nor done any good to her by any Muslim. She in fact has interacted with only one Muslim family in her entire life. And I know that interaction was always cordial till it lasted. They were neighbor to her brother’s family. When her brother’s family shifted out to some other place this interaction ceased.   Where from...

Recently I went for a get together of my high school batch mates. Never had thought a possibility of that exists and when it suddenly came to my conscious it was definitely a surprise. But joining and experiencing the high energy of that congregation was a pleasant surprise. I could not recognize most of the male batch mates at the first sight. But it was not awkward as the non recognition of the other was mutual in most cases. And that made the reintroduction process a fun game of guessing and failing and re-guessing and at times failing and at times shouting out their names with sheer pleasure of recollection of their names. What was surprising however to me was towards the end of the day when I looked those faces I felt there was not much change in their facial contours from the memory I had of them. Amazing! My mind had mapped out the new faces with the old ones stored in my subconscious and all the changes that seemed discords had been overlooked…! The impact of more than t...

Since childhood I was curious about existence. Who am I?  I remember as a child, probably when I was 9/10 year old I used to ask other friends, “Who are you? “The friends used to say “I am X, Y or Z”. My second question used to be “where are you?” The friends’ usual answer was “I am here.”  I used to ask “how do you know you are here?” Either amused or irritated the friends’ reply used to be “Cann’t you see? Here I am” pointing a finger at some part of their body, usually chest. My counter used to be “That is your chest. Where are you?” If the friend used to show me any other part my question used to be again “You are showing your --- body part. Where are you? It used to end in a irritated response from my friends like “Ok, ok do not try to be smart” or “ Ok, we know you ask smart questions”  and so on. Invariably there was no answer. I did not have an answer nor them. I used to ask this question to myself. This is my hand; this is my leg, my face and so on....

A week back while cleaning my bookself I opened an old 'intention book' of mine. I had not looked into it for some years now and almost forgotten what was in it. Flipping through I found many of my intentions have come true over the time! :) Some intentions I found showed some of the confusions I had faced then. Some intentions looked irrelevant now. If I look back,  this intention book was a resultant action after I first read the book The Secret and learnt about the Vision Board of John Assaraf . I had read about how to his surprise he found that he owned and was living in the house which he had put to his vision board some time back. After that I had read many more write ups and books on the subject and out of curiosity had devised my own version of putting intentions on record - An Intention Book. One of the intention in my book was to design my house by a famous Interior Designer.  At that point of time that was something way out of my reach and an ultimate luxury....

Almost a year and I had not even visited my page. Its like a pause. No movement here. Nothing changes in this limited space. But was it really a pause? When I stop in one point, that does not stop everything. That only showed to me that my movement has changed direction. But life moves all the moment, all along. I was engrossed learning the nuances of designing interiors and it was fascinating. In fact now I understand there is nothing in this life; which when I take interest and get into is not fascinating. So many possibilities life holds in one moment. And when I put my choice on one, it opens up again numerous possibilities and it is a continuous game. Only I need to have the intention of playing. I was not writting - pause. I was sketching so many lines and curves to get so many different forms and shapes on paper. Hours and hours moved on. My mind was not thinking of words- pause. In stead it was visualising spaces made beautiful with different forms and colours - moving on ...

I was feeling down and low. Recovering from a viral fever. As it happens with me often, something in me inspired to pull out my copy of Deepak Chopra 's book ' Ageless Body Timeless Mind ' and flip through randomly. It was about being with nature. Deepak talked about the value of being with nature, even if for a short while in the day. He talked about if got opportunity to lie down on grass stretching out the body and soak up some sun.  My body was aching severely, head was reeling and my mood was in depression. But a thought raced through my head like a lightning. I have developed and nurturing the small lawn in front of my house for last two years, but have never ever thought of lying down on the grass! Leave alone lying on it, I have not even sat on the bare grass on my lawn! I have this lovely little patch of green and the thought had never come! I tried to remember when was the last when I had stretched myself on green grass anywhere and it was years back! I gave ...

Awareness, in itself, is curative - Fritz Pearls   During my 20 days retreat for Vipassana in 2008, I met the teacher Mr Baburam Yadav. During the 19 days of silence I had thought he would be around 60 to 65. On the 20 th day after the metta when we came out of silence, many of us wanted to express our gratitude to both the conducting teachers. That is when I came to know that he was 82. If that piece of information was startling even more fascinating was his journey of letting go.  While listening to a meditator’s physical problem and how that was making it difficult for him to meditate, he was explaining about equanimity and letting go. In that conversation he talked about his own experience of physical difficulty and meditation and healing.  When he was diagnosed that he was at the last stages of cancer and in doctor’s opinion he had a month to live if he does not go through a surgery. And what was his chance of survival post surgery? It seems the do...

Despair to Hope; Meaningless to Magnificent – Life is a Flow. Just let it flow. Life is a flow, changing moment to moment. This moment it seems all pleasing and jubilant and the next it is so out of sync with our expectation that coming to terms is the first lesson.  The celebration of life is in learning these lessons and let the life flow.  If you have read my previous post then you know my submission to all of us to see the innumerable blessings we have instead of the few blocks which keeps us stagnant. Is that possible when things go completely haywire? Is it possible when you have been thrown out of a job yesterday? Is it possible when you have just seen the relationship you were banking on crumbling down shattering your trust and faith in relationships and love? Is it possible when you are celebrating your success and a life shaking health problem has overtaken your body?  These are moments when life feels very threatening and it is very natural tha...