Pilgrimage to Braj Bhumi – Part 3 – Kurukshetra

Day 4/5 – Kurukshetra, Haryana

Now that I had the fortune of seeing Krishna Janmabhoomi and Vrindavan, it was time to go to Kurukshetra, one of the most holiest places in Hindu Sanatana Dharma, where the Lord gave Arjuna, and the world, the Bhagavad Gita. As the cousins range on either side of the battlefield for the “mother of all battles”, Arjuna worries about killing his family and friends on the other side. Bhagavad Gita is the conversation (700 shlokas) that transpires between the Lord and Arjuna, at the end of which Arjuna stands up transformed and ready to fulfill the Lord’s Master Plan.

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Pilgrimage to Braj Bhumi – Part 1 (Mathura)

[Pilgrimage] reconciles the spiritual and the material, for to go on pilgrimage is to make the body and its actions express the desires and beliefs of the soul. – Rebecca Solnit, Wanderlust: A History of Walking

In 7 years every cell of your body gets replaced by a new cell. There must be a permanent point inside you around which this process is happening, the point of no cell and no-thing, the site of the holiest pilgrimage – Shunya

Whether you consider a pilgrimage as a spiritual sojourn, or a yearning to visit architectural, religious and/or historical sites, a pilgrimage transforms you. Read about my pilgrimage to Braj Bhumi spread over five days in September of 2022. We covered Mathura, Vrindavan, Gokul, Nandagaon, Govardhan and Barsana; and finally drove across to Haryana and ended it in Jyotisaar, Kurukshetra.

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Hey Corona! Thank you

I admit I am one of the privileged few. I have a maid, a servant, a driver and a gardener. But thanks to COVID19, I can no longer avail their services. So since March 16th, I have been planning, cooking, cleaning, de-stressing, and managing one bedridden patient on palliative care, his nurse, another senior citizen who just turned 75, my husband, my older daughter who graduates this year, my younger one who just finished high-school, and a 3-year old pug. In total, a household with 6 adults, 1 teenager and 1 dog. And all this while also working from home.

But this blog is not about how Corona helped me become superwoman (ahem!), managing family, house work, office work, and in-house counselor with elan and grace.

This blog is about my father-in-law’s death and how Corona played a key role in the way he passed away.

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They say we learn from our failures. BUNKUM.

If a book about failures does not sell, is it a success? – Jerry Seinfeld

Failure lies concealed in every success, and success in every failure –Eckhart Tolle

Conventional wisdom says you learn more from your failures. After all, nothing assists an healthy dose of introspection and “lessons learnt” sessions than wondering how to repay the loan you took from your father-in-law. Or being stumped about how to present the latest balance sheet to your investors. After all, conventional wisdom says that to fail, and to fail often, is the right thing to do. Failure is the mother of all success. All inventions. All enterprises.

Nope. In my experience, failure sucks. Big time. And research (biased, of course, since I searched specifically for it!) says that “failure does not lead to success. In fact, startups fail as often during their second startups as first-time entrepreneurs – 20%.”

My company just turned 10 last month. Before I started the Suyati journey, I had 2 failed ventures as an entrepreneur. Within Suyati, I headed a successful content outsourcing unit for 7 years, before moving on to becoming the Communications officer at Suyati. So did I learn more from my failures? Ha ha!

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5 Ways (each less than 30 seconds) to Trick your Mind to Relax at Work

No, meditation is not one of them. So go ahead and start reading!

The mind is a monkey. It jumps from one thought to another, with no logic or system, and is constantly wavering and unsteady. At 11 AM, 2-3 hours into your work schedule, waiting for that all-important contract to come, trying to reply to your emails and ensuring that you have ordered the groceries for dinner, your mind is probably all over the place. So here are 5 quick things (all of them in less than 30 seconds) you can do to relax your mind. And get your mojo back in time for the next meeting.

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No pain, Yes gain – that’s Yoga

If I had a dollar every time I heard or read about the “No pain, no gain” rule for losing weight, I would be one rich yogi. Frankly, I am a bit tired of articles and fitness gurus preaching about the need to endure pain and “feel the burn” if I needed to lose weight. While there are multiple, legitimate and healthy ways one can lose weight, my basic premise is that you DO NOT need to endure pain to lose weight.

A popular misconception is that while yoga may be great for managing stress or to increase flexibility, you need to hit the gym or the streets, push yourselves, and sweat like crazy if you want to lose weight. After all, yoga does not burn as much calories as an hour at the gym or running in the park does. Nor will it build muscle quickly which ensures you burn more calories when your body is at rest.

It is time to bust that myth.

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The Lost Art of Eating

Eating well is a form of self-respect – Colleen Quigley

The appetite comes during eating – Russian proverb

I used to visit my paternal village at the foot of the Western Ghats near Mysore every summer. Grandparents, one uncle and six aunts and their families, distant relatives, neighbours who came to see us – the house was filled with people at all times. And as you can imagine, feeding 30+ people for a very minimum of twice a day would have been utter chaos.

Not really.

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Hiding in bathrooms. And other lovable traits of an Introvert

Image: You know things are serious when the Introverts show up!

As a child, I was painfully shy. And that’s not a phrase I casually use. I would pinch my wrist, bite my nails, or keep prodding the pimples on my face to ward off anxiety attacks caused by having to meet new people. Hiding in bathrooms when the company become too much to handle was something that I did naturally. Even today, most of my ideas for blogs or articles rightfully stems from the time I spend in bathrooms!

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How the Supreme Court and Aster Medcity helped my mom die peacefully

My mom passed away just 2 weeks ago. But I really feel the need to write my thoughts down as quickly as possible before routine, daily duties, and the real impact of her death hits me.

Two momentous things happened in the week before my mom passed away. In a landmark decision, the Supreme Court passed a verdict allowing passive euthanasia and declared the validity of a living will. Ironically, I was reading the newspaper headlines as my brother, his wife and I were heading to Aster Medcity to see Dr. Ramkumar, Pain and Palliative care specialist. 

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