Invest in your “Me Time” and, like Nandini, fly!

“I am a bird. And I want to fly.”

When she was barely six, Nandini Nair recalls writing down this aspiration for herself in a school assignment that invited each student in her class to share what or who they wanted to be when they grew up.

Over 25 years later, Nandini recounted this memory, in a Conversation that she had with me in the second Edition of our Happyness Reboot Series on Wednesday, 4^th December. Happyness Reboot is a live, reflective, non-commercial Conversation Series curated by Vaani and me that explores human stories and discusses the opportunities, issues, challenges and emotions that truly impact Happiness at the Workplace.

In this Edition of the Series, we explored “Me Time” – a basic necessity and primary responsibility that everyone consistently ignores!

The truth is that almost everyone, at some point in time, feels like they are running on a treadmill, chasing meetings, chores and deadlines endlessly. They often feel they are sleep-deprived.  And even as a sense of feeling incomplete and unfulfilled is gnawing at them, they are searching for a quiet place and time. Some people even feel they are heading for a breakdown!

These are a few reasons why we believe you must create time – your own “Me Time”, for your Happiness, to be you, to lose yourself in whatever you love doing!

Nandini is a fine example of someone who has managed to pull off this amazing feat of creating and sustaining her “Me Time” consistently over the past decade. Here’s why I say this. Nandini is a young, dynamic, Indian Revenue Service (IRS) Officer, who is currently a Deputy Commissioner of Income Tax. But despite her high-energy, high-pressure work routine, Nandini finds the time to immerse herself in art and dance. She’s no amateur; she holds shows and performances as any consummate artist would!

Nandini in conversation with AVIS. Picture by Raam Frames

How does she do it, I asked Nandini, pointing out that several people in her position may have well discontinued doing what they love doing citing work and family pressures.

Nandini’s reply showcases the understanding she has about what Life is and what she wants out of it:

• “To me, my art, whether it is theatre or dance or painting, is not just another hobby. It offers me a ‘great escape’ from the stresses of everyday Life. While theatre helps me meet new people from diverse backgrounds and enhances my awareness of the power of community, dance – even as a daily practice – is an opportunity to be physically and spiritually expressive. And painting for me is a private, intensely personal, experience; each of my paintings is a ‘rescuer’ that has helped me during my troubled, anguished times…each work of mine has me, my feelings, deeply embedded in them.”
• “Without my art, I would have gone mad!”
• “I don’t have all the time that people imagine I have to do many things. I am not a very systematic person either. I simply create the time when I have to do what I have to do – whether it is my art or whether I am fulfilling my professional responsibilities.”
• “I don’t like stereotypes. I don’t believe that long hours mean greater productivity. As long as you are completing what you are setting out to do, you are doing great.”
• “Which is why I am not just an artist or an IRS officer…I am clear that I am a bird and I want to fly…if this means I will keep trying new experiences that enrich me and allow me to express myself…I surely will find the time, I will find the means, to do all of them.”

Nandini Nair. Picture by Vinodh Velayudhan

This clarity is indeed remarkable. Nandini refuses to allow herself to be boxed in by society’s views of how people must lead their lives. Society imagines that a working woman will not necessarily be able to do multiple things beyond fulfilling her professional and family roles or that everyday living pressures will suck your Life out so much that you won’t have the energy or time to indulge in immersive experiences like art or music or whatever it is that you are deeply passionate about. But Nandini’s I-am-a-bird-and-I-want-to-fly outlook throws social stereotypes out of the window. So she always finds the time, her “Me Time”, to be who she truly is – and to, well, fly!!!

Vaani and I totally relate to Nandini’s outlook. We too have evidently busted stereotypes by being the happynesswalas even though, in a worldly sense, we are failed entrepreneurs! On Wednesday evening, I also shared why we both completely understand and champion the value of “Me Time”.

To be sure, in 2004, when I was 36, my diabetologist had served me a wake-up call – my sugar levels were horribly high, my cholesterol was showing a worrisome spike too, I had a tobacco habit, I was drinking daily and, at 95 kilos, I certainly was over-weight. Shaken up from my stupor, I embraced a meditative practice called mouna – observing silence for an hour daily – which helped me drop anchor in a time of great stress and strife. Mouna transformed me. Physically, it helped me focus on my health; I lost 22 kilos in six months back then! It was mouna too that helped me and Vaani understand the transient nature of Life and helped us learn the art of being non-worrying, non-frustrated and non-suffering. It is through learning this art that we discovered the ability to be happy despite our circumstances.

And it was mouna that brought me back to writing. You see, I am first a writer; I have spent most of the years in the first decade of my career as a journalist. But the lure of worldly success, the challenges of entrepreneurship, the tribulations of trying to save a sinking business – all these had weaned me away from writing for almost 15+ years. But as we descended into our bankruptcy in 2007, when fear and darkness engulfed us, mouna reminded me of what I was missing – writing! I found writing therapeutic and a deeply immersive daily practice. I started with writing this Blog, which I sustained daily for 10 years on the trot, without missing a single day! I still maintain much of that prolificity though I do take reflective pauses. My return to writing led me to publishing my book, Fall Like A Rose Petal, in 2014. And through doing all of this, Vaani and I awoke to our Life’s Purpose – Inspiring ‘Happyness’!

So, simply, “Me Time” has changed the game for us. It introduced mouna to us, it is our anchor, it inspires us to Happiness, it sustains my daily writing and it has truly aided and abetted our survival through this enduring, tumultuous, 12-year phase of our bankruptcy. It has helped us stand in the midst of the everyday battle of Life, in the whirl and madness of the chaos that surrounds us, and has taught us the ability to be unmoved.

Which is why, I concluded Wednesday’s Conversation by sharing a key learning from our own lived experience. I said that intelligent living simply means recognizing the perishable nature of Life and choosing not to postpone Happiness. It means focusing only on what matters most to you, on what you love doing. A simple beginning can be made by investing in your “Me Time”, in one hour on yourself daily – start with your health and with what you are deeply passionate about, what makes you come alive! When you do create that one hour for yourself, you will, magically, see how you gain control of the remaining 23 hours of the day!

Note: AVIS and Vaani are the happynesswalas. They believe their Life’s Purpose is Inspiring ‘Happyness’! They are going through a fascinating Life-changing experience – a crippling bankruptcy!! Look them up here: www.avisviswanathan.in and www.avinitiatives.co.in.

If you are being a ‘khadoos, dukhi atma’, go get yourself a ‘jadoo ki jhappi’!

Your awareness can help free you from your anxieties. 

This morning we were visiting a friend at a five-star hotel property. This is a global hospitality chain that has been my first preference for many years as a world traveler. In fact, until our business went bust, I had even earned many thousand stay points with them as I was rated a privileged guest by their loyalty program. Our meeting this morning was with a key manager in the chain. While we were seated with our host in his small office, in the back (service) area of the hotel, the general manager of the property walked in. He was looking very tense and spoke tersely to our friend. We were introduced to him briefly; he tried to be cordial but his anxiety, his stress, showed. To me he looked very unhappy and burnt out. After his boss left, our friend apologized for the interruption and told us that he was planning to put in his papers. He said that he had stopped enjoying working for the hospitality chain and that he particularly found his boss khadoos – someone who is forever grumpy and stuck-up! I told our friend that his boss perhaps needed a jadoo ki jhappi* – a magical hug that can re-energize and repair dukhi atma – a worn-out, unhappy soul!

I have a confession to make here. I once used to be quite like the hotel’s general manager we met this morning – forever tense!!! And I used to hate myself for being that way. It was only when I became more aware of my true Self, that I learned to deal with my anxieties, worries, insecurities and fears better!

Think about it: how can anyone enjoy being in a continuous state of tension? Anxiety is nothing but being in a tense state – tense about things, people, events, situations, kids, work, commute, traffic, almost everything! To be sure, anxiety is a real threat to our happiness but it has, unfortunately, become a part of our everyday living. And that’s primarily because the mind unfailingly magnifies our anxieties. So the hotel’s general manager is not alone.

Is there a way out? Indeed. Awareness can rid us of anxiety.

The human mind is like a freeway. Hundreds of thousands of thoughts, like vehicles on a freeway, make their way through the mind. And every thought need not be a call to action. But because of this notion that you are supreme, you are the center of your Universe, you jump at every thought. The anxious human mind is like a scared rabbit – it is forever scurrying in different directions! Responding to several zillion, irrelevant calls to action!

Your anxieties are actually evidence that you are not anchored within. And that’s because your reference points are all outside. For instance – Who’s saying what about you to whom? What will people think of me now? What if my kids don’t turn out like other kids their age? What if people think I am not smart, not handsome, not beautiful, not intelligent, not wealthy – whatever? Anxiety is not just a feeling. It is a reflection of your continuous desire to become something rather than simply be.

Such thinking makes Life miserable. Because in an anxious state we are being driven by desire. Besides, in worrying about wanting to become something that we are not, we are missing what we already are. In Tuesdays with Morrie (by Mitch Albom), Morrie tells the story of two waves in the ocean. The wave in the front tells the one following it that it is frightened because it is about to crash into the shore and cease to exist. But the second wave shows no fear. It explains to the one ahead: “You are frightened because you think you are a wave; I am not frightened because I know I am part of the ocean!”

Our anxieties are an impediment to our being happy! Once we become aware of our true nature, of who we really are, we will be free. Awareness will then replace anxiety. And then, like the second wave, we will realize that no matter how many times we crash on the shore, and stop being a wave, we will still celebrate being part of the ocean! So, let your awareness take over, drop your anxieties. Whenever you catch yourself being a khadoos, dukhi atma, go get yourself a jadoo ki jhappi – or two!!

*In the Bollywood movie Munnabhai MBBS, Sanjay Dutt, Munna, memorably uses the jadoo ki jhappi – a magical bear hug – treatment to heal dukhi atmas – unhappy souls!

 

Of sipping Zen from a cup of ‘kahwah’ tea!

Zen is not an abstract concept. It is all about cultivating and practicing awareness – and that simply requires diligent practice and training of the mind.

“Is it possible to be in acute pain and not suffer,” someone asked me the other day. Surely suffering is avoidable. You suffer only when you wish that your Life is different from what it is. But whenever you are completely aware of whatever is happening to you, you will be peaceful. Your awareness need not be only about what you are doing – cooking, walking, breathing, washing, whatever – it is also about how you are feeling – be it pain, sorrow, anger, fear or anxiety. Just be fully aware.

This may sound paradoxical. How can anyone be peaceful while in pain for instance? Or when in grief? Or when angry? As long are you have not realized your true Self, chances are you will associate your present human form with your circumstances. So, when your body has a back pain, you think that you are in pain. When the human form of someone whom you loved is dead, you think you have lost that someone. So you grieve. When you are angry, you see the person at whom the anger is directed as different, as separate from you, hence the anger. But awareness changes everything. With awareness, you understand the true nature of creation. You realize that you are not what you think you are. You are not this human body. You are not your car, your job, your designation, your bank balance, your relationship, your social position. The real you is indestructible. The real you cannot be touched by any worldly event or sentiment. When this awareness dawns upon you, it leads you to peace.

This is what is Zen – the flowering of inner awareness!  The Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh (lovingly called Thay by his followers) recommends practicing awareness in our busy lives. He does not advocate any special hour for this practice or training. He simply says: “Carry your Zen every minute. Focus wholesomely on your everyday tasks without getting distracted. Be mindful.” Thay says this is the way to anchor in peace.

I have known this to work beautifully. For instance, this morning, I had some exotic Kashmiri kahwah tea that a friend had gifted us. I did have reason to stress over a development from last night. But I chose to be mindful instead as I sipped the tea – I took in its aroma and let the flavor impregnate every pore of my body. And, magically, my stress dissolved in no time. You too can try this. Just be mindful, be aware, of whatever you are doing. Be mindful when walking – take each step with awareness. Be mindful while in the shower – feel the water soothe your body and lift your spirits. Be mindful while crossing the road or while being in business meetings. The key is to not let your mind wander. Without doubt, the mind will resist. It will want to slip back into a painful past event or rush into the future with worry. Every time you sense that the mind is not mindful in the moment, call it back to focus on whatever you are doing and how you are feeling. Over time, the mind will be trained not to go astray.

My morning’s Zen came from each sip of my kahwah tea. Of course, it is not the tea that caused my Zen, my awareness of sipping the tea did! So, surely, it is possible to experience Zen in each moment and all day long. Provided you are living in the moment – and not merely existing!