Corporate life has taught me a lot of things, and one of
them was to stay at the top of your game and to be more productive, you have to
keep a journal/ list or tool to track your activities.
Then, I started trying different things to work on my goals for the day. From Wunderlist to Evernote, I tried multiple apps and excel files but it still wasn’t working for me. I just couldn’t get the stuff done because I would write everything on the list, then I would forget to read the list and will miss tasks then and now.
Gradually, I shifted from keeping a virtual task list to
Sticky Notes, and I would completely fill my desktop’s corners with them. The
good thing was that they worked, the faulty part was the space that they were
using.
Finally, I started making a handwritten task list on a page, and I would not mark something off until I completed that particular task. And, it helped, and I use them till this date. They are one of the best productivity hack till now.
Here are some tips to create your own list
Take first 5 mins of your day and note down the things
that you have to complete in the given day.
Be realistic, don’t
burden yourself with too many tasks.
Be honest, if you
haven’t completed a task on the given day move to the next day’s list.
Keep this list where you can easily see it through your
day.
Review it, after the
end of each day review your list and make sure all your tasks are completed.
Write it down yourself.
This was the main difference which made me more productive
than I was. After writing the list in your own handwriting, you get a sense of
investment and commitment towards your list. This hack has made me much more
productive than I have been in my whole life.
Try this if you are struggling with managing multiple
things at once and let me know your experiences and opinions in the comments
below.
Photo by Cathryn Lavery on Unsplash
Life can feel heavy at times, and if we accept it for too long, heaviness becomes a new normal in our life.
Many of us cling to the clutter in our life. The dress
that we haven’t worn in a year, old books that we do not read anymore or those
broken articles holding a place in our wardrobes in the hope of fixing.
Being attached to things that are not serving us any longer, takes up unnecessary space in our lives. It not only creates blockages in our storage space, but also blocks the energy flow of our life.
Get things fixed or let them Go
We often have a dysfunctional item in our rooms because it needs fixing and we will keep it in our drawers for months, in hope of getting it to work again. But, getting it mended never makes it in our to-do list. Raise your hands if you have been there, or are still guilty of it. This time, assign a specific day each week when you get to work on the items that require a repair.
Another challenge here is when an item keeps
dysfunctioning again and again even after getting repaired multiple times. This
time, take a day out in your week and let this item go.
The Clothes we won’t wear.
We keep holding on to clothes for more than we should, in
the hope that we will get to wear them again. We might be expecting to fit into
that size again or, waiting for the trend to come back. To live lighter, we
have to let go of the clothes or things that are not right for us at this
moment.
Detox your body
Take a day to cleanse your body. I would recommend one day
per week but if you cannot, take one day in a month to purify your body. This
can be done by adding fruits and juices as a major part of your food intake for
one whole day. If you feel like you have to have a full meal, then prepare your
dinner with a healthy salad. A single day of detoxing can make us feel lighter
and fresh.
A No Complain Day
Take one day and carefully pick your words and statements;
consciously choose not to complain about life. No comments like, ‘people are mean’,
‘we don’t have good food in the cafeteria’ or, ‘it is a boring day’. We use
these sentences very frequently in our day. If we pay close attention to words
we are saying and choose to not complain, just for one day, we can create
lighter energy around us.
Get rid of relationships which do not add
value to your life
If you are constantly giving your time to the empty conversations and your presence to the people who do not value it, then you need to detach yourself. Your time and energy are two precious aspects of your life, and spending them on the company which does not bring joy or happiness is a complete waste. Remove yourself from your friends, colleagues or relatives, who do not add positive value to your life and use that time in something that you find productive. This will be tough at first and might make you feel lonely, but it makes your life lighter.
Forgive
Forgiveness makes our heart feel lighter. Letting go of
the thought of people who did you wrong, is a beautiful experience for your
inner peace. Forgive each person who has caused you pain or sorrow. It may be
difficult at first, but keep trying till you get there. I will soon be posting
a different blogpost focusing on the ways you can forgive.
I hope that the dullness in your life may disappear using any one of the tips mentioned above. Or, If you have figured out your own ways of making your lighter let me know in the comments below.
Last few weeks have been full of gatherings, and it has
been a fun but EXHAUSTING experience. But, here is the delightful experience
which drove me to write this blog.
During dinner, on a Saturday night, the ever exciting
topic of Stress came up. I have mentioned it in my book, how people think that
Stress is an inseparable part of their daily life. One interesting question
came up where Someone mentioned knowing that Stress is unhealthy but, it is
difficult to distinguish the time which is being spent stressing, from the time
being consumed in simply thinking about things.
Do you know? If you stay near the garbage long
enough, it will eventually stop smelling.
Yes, this is what stress does, initially you get stressed
and you know, but if you stay with this feeling consistently then, there comes
a stage where you can no longer feel the difference; this means, that you are
constantly worrying, even for the littlest thing.
How to know if it is stress?
Think about one person that you absolutely adore it can be
your sibling, a family member, your lover, your friend, your pet or your own
self.
Imagine being in their presence and having a good time with them, does it make
you feel relaxed? Loosen up a little? Does this thought make you smile?
Now, notice the difference between this feeling and your
usual thinking pattern. If you observe a considerable shift in energy then, you
are stressed in the day to day life. Even a small thought grows up in your mind
and creates disturbance, and now worrying is a habit.
Practice makes stress stay. The more you focus on things
that worry you, the more your mind drags your attention towards the conditions
which will lead to further tension.
So, if you think that you are no longer able to
differentiate between the two, then it is time to change the way your mind is
thinking.
Emotions like Jealousy and anger can teach us a lot if we
give them a chance.
Jealousy is one amazing teacher that I met. On few
occasions in the past, I found myself comparing my life to someone else’s and
tried to justify in my mind how my life was better than theirs.
Gradually, critical judgement towards others and their
work, started increasing. I would hardly be impressed with other’s
accomplishments. At times, I would even try to do things better.
Before I went too far with it, the little voice in me who
was getting burdened with these feelings asked me to ‘shut up and reflect’.
reflect on what was causing this behaviour to arise.
I found some very interesting facts about Jealousy.
It creeps up when we lack love for a particular aspect of
our own existence.
When we are confident about one area of our lives, we feel
admiration for the people who possess the same quality. For example, I was
confident about my work and therefore, I was always happy when I saw someone
putting in the same amount of work, but, things were not the same when I saw
someone having a great time out with their friends.
But why would I feel bad about someone else getting the
things that are important to me as well ?
Because, I lacked love for myself in that area. I was not
confident or content about my life outside of work. It was not because I did
not have great friends, I was just denying my need of getting out there and
letting myself loose once in a while. It was my excuse to stay in my comfort
zone, and to not interact with the world.
Once I started putting in efforts on my life outside of
work, on my relationships with my friends and started being more comfortable
with putting myself out there. I was content with my life. I didn’t start
partying every night, but I did not judge or got jealous of the people who were
having a great time.
Jealousy is hard to accept
It is a courageous thing to accept that you feel jealous
of another individual. Acceptance of jealousy also reveals what we truly
desire. It highlights a part of us which needs more love. Acceptance of
jealousy helps us look out for answers and ways to resolve it.
Resolving Jealousy
It can be resolved by working towards our relationship
with the part that we do not love enough. Identifying that I needed more love
and contentment in my personal life was the first step. The next step, was to
cherish and to be thankful for the people who were in my life. I learned to
love myself for who I was when I was not in office.
Jealousy eats you up and makes you look suspiciously
at this world, it will also create more negative experiences because of a
negative mindset. But, by learning what it is trying to teach us we can
transform our lives.
How do you deal with the process of getting from where you
are to where you want to be?
In a lot of cases, we do not participate in the process
gracefully, which leads to an unhealthy transformation or an incomplete
process.
We usually start our dissing our current self in order to
get to the desired place.
Going from one state of existence to another involves a
process.
This process needs to be completed from a place of love,
or else it could give us unwanted results, or we may even end up leaving the
process in the middle if it causes us grief.
Therefore, when you decide to develop yourself in a better
person, you should not start hating your current self.
In the process of trying to lose weight, most of us start
hating our bodies and follow the process with hatred towards ourselves, and
punish our body for it. This creates an imbalance, and we may end up hurting
our bodies in the process.
To learn any new skill you need a process. Remember when
you decided to learn dancing, cooking, or singing, you followed a process. Did
you judge yourself, or hate yourself when you did not know how to cook? Or
dance? You just said that you will learn more and enhance your skill.
Did you start cussing yourself for being in ‘Grade 1’ on
your way to graduation? No, right? So why do you put so much pressure on your
imperfect self in the process of reaching to desired self?
Similarly, when we try to make more money, we start hating
our current earning or existence. It creates an emotional gap in our connection
to ourselves.
This emotional gap does not result in healthy
transformation, and you are likely to get back to your old ways, or you may
achieve the desired results, but you will not be in a happy place emotionally.
How would you react if someone asked you to do the
right thing, forcefully? Their intentions may be nice, but how would you feel
if a teacher punished you physically to achieve good grades?
We grow best in the in the places we feel loved.
When we are brought up in a loving environment where we
feel trusted, we bloom the best. Having a partner who loves and trusts us, can
bring out the best in us. We can be that partner for ourselves, we can love
ourselves on this journey to become the best version of ourselves.
So when you want your body and mind to work with you in
harmony, you have to give them love along the way. Thank yourself for choosing
to take on this journey and for consistently evolving into a better person.
Loving yourself can make your transformation process a
wonderful experience, rather than a torturous one.
There are two kinds of people who don’t practice
meditation. Those who think that they don’t need meditation and the other ones,
who want to give meditation a try, but don’t know where to begin.
This post is for the ones who do not know where to start
with meditation.
The confusion is normal. There is too much information out
there, and everyone is ready to discuss the benefits of meditation. The
processes that they suggest are either too complicated to follow or easy to
follow, but you may lose your attention within minutes.
I am sharing with you 5 easy techniques that can help you
in taking your first step towards meditation.
Things that you need as a beginner to meditate:
1) A comfortable surrounding where you would not be
disturbed by other people or noises.
2) You need to set a ‘Do Not Disturb’ on your phone.
3) Ten Minutes – Yes, 10 Minutes are all you need to start
with, you can stretch these up as you advance.
4) A posture which keeps your spine straight. You can
either lie on your back with your hands fully relaxed, or you can sit straight
up, with your legs crossed.
Technique 1: Relaxation
1) Make your body fully relaxed so that there is no
tension in the muscles.
2) If you sense any tightness in the body then take a deep
breath and let it go.
3) Close your eyes
4) Take five deep breaths, while inhaling through your
nose and exhaling through your mouth.
5) Now, Start with your forehead and relax your forehead,
move forward to your face, and relax your face muscles.
6) Focus on relaxing each part of your body, from your
head to toe by paying attention to each part.
7) Once your body is relaxed, rub your palms against each
other and put them on your eyes.
8) You can open your eyes when you’re ready.
Technique 2: To Increase mind control
and reduced clutter from the mind
This a very simple method to adapt. It relieves your mind
of all the worries and gives you some time without the thoughts that are
bothering you.
1) Make your body fully relaxed so that there is no
tension in the muscles.
2) If you sense any tension in the body, then take a deep
breath and let it go.
3) Close your eyes.
4) Now picture the number ‘3’, three times (inhale and
exhale deeply each time you picture the number), in your mind and feel
that your body is now relaxed.
5) Next, picture number ‘2’, three time in your mind and
relax your thought process and mind.
6) Then, Picture number ‘1’, three times in your mind to
initiate the remaining process.
7) Now, count from 100 to 1, at a 2-second pause.
8) You can open your eyes once you are ready.
Technique 3: Affirmations
This is advantageous if you are centring on one situation
or aspect of your life.
For example, if you want to be more confident, then the
affirmation that you are going to use, should be ‘I am confident about myself and my decisions‘.
1) Make your body completely relaxed so that there is no
tension in the muscles.
2) If you sense any tension in the body then take a deep
breath and let it go.
3) Close your eyes
4) Take 3 deep breaths
5) Now recite the Affirmation 100 times. Yes, to add
replace the old patterns with new ones, you must follow repetition.
6) Open your eyes when you are ready.
Technique 4: Cleansing
1) Make your body fully relaxed so that there is no
tension in the muscles.
2) Close your eyes
3) Take a deep breath in, and imagine inhaling a golden
light which is filling up your body with healing energy.
4) Breathe out and visualise sending all the negative and
heavy energy out, and relax your body with a sense of lightness.
Technique 5: Guided Meditation
If everything else fails, you can find engaging guided
meditation online. These meditations can last from anywhere between 5 mins to
Few Hours.
There are meditations by Louise Hay, Dr. Wayne Dyer easily
available on YouTube. Also, there are multiple YouTubers who create their own
meditations, Michael Sealey is one of my favourites to tune in to.
Meditation can bring more mindfulness in everyday life and
make it blissful experience.
Once you start on this journey, you will open yourself up
to many other techniques and new ways to meditate. I hope these techniques can
give you the start that you need.
Yogis have known for several thousand years: mantra,
whether chanted, whispered, or silently recited, is a powerful meditation and
therapy tool.
What are Mantras?
The repeated enchantments of one or a group of words used
to heighten the spiritual and psychological activity.
How can they help?
Though if you pick up a book of mantras or ‘stotras’, you
may come across many mantras which can be helpful. But you can also create your
own mantras, to specifically achieve the desired results.
Making your own Mantra
You can make your own mantra, which can work for you to
target a specific quality that you want to include in your present self.
For example, you want to be more confident about yourself.
Then, you could design one like below:
I am getting more confident with each passing day
Or
I am confident about myself and my decisions
Your words or sentences should always be in Present tense.
To make it work better, use these affirmations while standing
in front of the mirror.
Our mind learns the new pattern and changes the old
subconscious patterns by repetition.
Repeat these mantras for five minutes Every day. If you
can’t go for 5 minutes, start with 2 minutes each day, and extend them to five
after 15 days of practice. Soon you will see that your mind starts accepting
your words and starts attracting similar circumstances for you.
Repeating the mantras or affirmations can cause miracles
in your life.
Loneliness is not the absence of the people around you;
you can feel lonely in a crowd as well. It is a dominating emotion that you may
sense in your life, at some point.
Life is not a party all the time. You are not always
having fun and surrounded by people.
Even when you are hosting a party and waiting for people
to come in, you have to set the venue up all by yourself. Or prepare everything
before the party begins.
While the people at the party can bring us joy and
happiness, the only person who stays before and after the party is you (or your
best friend).
You cannot prepare for a party with a lot of people in the
room. Nor, can you clean up after the party is over if they have not left.
This is why being lonely is important it gives the time
and space that you need to prepare for the next thing in your life.
People often consider loneliness as a block that they need
to get rescued from. They go looking for partners, friends, and kids to escape
their loneliness.
People choose a miserable company over solitude because
solitude can get scary. Though it is scary at first, it can get rewarding
towards the end.
Lessons I learned from Loneliness
We get to see things from a different perspective
When we are lonely, at first our mind starts with the
mindless chatter and slowly moves to our deeper fears, desires and thought
patterns. You can only know your thought pattern when your consciousness is
independent of other’s thoughts and running freely. We start thinking more
about ourselves instead of what people want from us.
Loneliness can help us choose the right company
It is not that you should stay in isolation and cut
yourself from everyone, but don’t be afraid of the time when you have to deal
with life all by yourself.
Don’t cling on to people who are no good for you in search of company. Take a
deep breath, take your ‘alone’ time and prepare for the great company
coming your way.
Loneliness can bring you closer to your real self
It eliminates the noise around so that you can make
yourself the centre of your life and take work on things or hobbies that will
make you happier. Because when everyone and everything is gone all that we are
left with is ourselves and that is always enough.
Spending enough time being alone can make you cherish your
own self. Take your self out on dates, spend more time in self care and be your
own person. It is a great time to work on yourself and your craft. You get more
comfortable in your own skin and that leads to wonderful changes in your state
of life.
Loneliness can teach you Gratitude
The best things in life are often taken for granted.
Solitude can make you develop a genuine appreciation for the people who are
always there for you. It makes you appreciate life more and makes you thankful
for all the resources and gifts that life has presented you.
We all feel lonely at some point in our life, the best we
can do is not try to run away from this feeling, instead embrace it. Learn the
lessons that universe has been asking you to learn, once you learn to be happy
when you are alone, life will gift you the people you truly appreciate your
company, and chances that will lead you to a life full of Joy and
contentment.
If you keep running away for it, you will find yourself in
the same situations again and again. If you cannot be happy when you are alone,
it will be challenging to find happiness in your relationship and friendships.
I hope you enjoyed reading this piece, let me know your
experience with loneliness and the lessons it taught you.
This is year brought crazy changes in my life. Things that
I never could imagine myself doing happened so suddenly that I haven’t had time
to catch my breath yet. Out of all the adventure that 2018 brought the 3 major
ones were:
1) Getting Married
This one is super weird, I always thought that marriage is
just about two people deciding to spend the rest of their lives together, but
NO!, it is much more. A wedding brings each bit of insecurity and anxiety that
you may have, to life. Guests, families, people taking a sudden interest in
your life, outfits, and Makeup! (for a person like me, who used to just get by
in this area, I had to brush myself up a lot). Coping with the change in
address and house was scary for the first few weeks. Eventually, my nervousness
found peace in Green Teas and Hot Chocolates made by my partner.
I worked for more than 5 years in capacity management, and
I was pretty confident with all the things I learned so far. I loved my work in
this domain. But, I felt like switching my profile and learning a new skill.
Therefore, I shifted to Project Management. For those of you who are new to
these IT jargons, these two profiles are quite different from each other. This
change was long overdue, I always wanted to work in project management.
Therefore, 2018 gifted me this change as well.
3) Becoming an Author
Cover designed by Juhi Bhati
I waited for this the longest; to make this shift and add
the word ‘Author’ to my profile. So yay! Here I am and Live More is finally
out.
More than anything, I consider these changes to be the
greatest gifts I received in 2018. Now, I will be stepping in 2019 with hope
and will be anticipating miracles that this new year will bring.
What are the gifts that you received in 2018? Let me know
in the comments below. I wish you a Happy
New Year!
It is a different experience, but it feels the same as it
felt after standing for the first time in front of the Eiffel or getting
married to the person I love. I never thought that I would make it, at least
not this early.
Yes, I wanted to publish a book for a long time. I wrote a
few chapters for a few days and then didn’t write anything for months. However,
in my darkest times, writing became a beautiful escape. I thought maybe this is
the time I am going to write a book, but after a few days, the idea seemed
crazy and too big to execute.
This on and off relationship with writing went on for the
first 2 years. After a while, I started my own blog, and after a few blog
posts, I began receiving messages from complete strangers who found my writing
relatable. After those few articles, I decided to take writing seriously.
In 2016’s Christmas holidays, I was traveling from Rome to
Brussels in an airplane; let us say it wasn’t exactly a bad landing but, it was
bad enough to scare me, and the first thought that came to my mind was, ‘but,
the book is not out yet’. This brought my attention to the place this book held
at the back of my mind.
And for the past 2 years, I have been writing every day to
complete ‘Live More’. I could not wait to send my book out there, and for
people to read it. Now, it feels the same but different (I don’t know if you
can relate to this part).
