Healing with yoga: 7 stories of resilience and hope

  Mind - Living The Opposites The nature of mind is very complex: The mind has very delicate and beautiful aspects The mind has rough and tough aspects In life you come across both. But neither life, nor these states mind, occurs with our permission. In fact, they often occur in direct defiance to our wishes and desires. Meditation can bring about a balance between the different states of the mind. Mind – The Delicate Aspect You kindle the soft, beautiful, and delicate aspect of your mind - when you are in touch with sattva. And this makes you feel good and elevated. But you can’t be like that all the time - otherwise, you'll be very vulnerable. Those who are so soft, crumble even when someone just gives a tough look. They start crying and feel shattered, often shutting down all communication. When you feel nice and soft, you want everybody to respond to you that way too. At that point, a small thing can upset you. You start pitying yourself. The complaint - “nobody under...

  It was Friday evening. Priyanka and I decided to try out a new Thai restaurant adjacent to our workplace for dinner. We entered the grand building and gradually settled into the plush ambience. The setting and the welcome was quite spectacular. We opened ourselves up to the ultimate gastronomic experience but when the food arrived, we decided that a four-year-old could cook better. I started complaining and just went on and on. But, to my surprise, Priyanka (who didn't look very happy with the food either) continued eating! She kept talking about how her day was, how beautiful the restaurant looks and that she was so happy to catch up with me after so long. She knew that the food was not great but she was still open to trying out something 'new' and actually enjoyed the whole experience. She was all focused on the up-side of things – a rather ideal state to be in. I was going to ask her just how she manages this…and I knew the answer before my thought became word. Of cour...

  Congratulations on meditating regularly for several years, or more! No doubt by now you’re very familiar with the wonderful beneficial changes that come through consistent practice. To allow your meditations to be deeper and more impactful, we present here some suggestions for you in the form of simple, practical tips. These tips fall into two categories: tips for preparing to meditate and tips that apply during meditation. We suggest starting with the preparatory tips first, as many people find that these pointers alone are enough to profoundly  deepen their meditation experience . The preparatory tips are designed to help settle your mind before you sit to meditate. You will find some of these really easy to implement in your practice – getting sufficient sleep, keeping an empty or relatively light stomach before meditation, doing some yoga asanas are just a few tips to help you meditate in peace. You can get many more of such useful suggestions from our advanced meditator...

  The one who says meditation is for the old or someone who sits at the foothills of Himalayas probably needs to revisit the thought. Meditation is like a kaleidoscope. Every time you change the angle of the kaleidoscope, you get a different, beautiful picture—an experience. This is what meditation brings to one’s life. It’s the small shift that one needs to make within; then every day you see life as a better picture the kaleidoscope shows you. It’s not that by doing meditation your life will take a 360 degree turn overnight, but it does start the journey of the turn. It has become very necessary to steal time out of our daily schedule for ourselves. The competition today has compelled the mind to exercise 24/7. The body is at rest when it’s sleeping but the mind and memory are still playing their games by bringing in the thoughts and dreams. These dreams and thoughts tend to wake you up from your pseudo sleep and you look around anxiously only to realize it was all a dream. Peopl...

  Get your creative juices flowing with meditation A re you stuck in the rut of working-sleeping-eating-working? Where then, do you get the enthusiasm to step out-of-the way and create something never seen, never heard of or never read before? We understand, and therefore we bring to you 5 simple yet unique ways that can help boost your creativity to unimaginable heights. Are you ready to take the journey? Let’s explore these ways: Let Your Imagination Fly How many times have you stopped yourself from creating something new just because you were too afraid to fail? Failure precedes success. You’ve got to open your mind to a field of all possibilities and that can happen through meditation. Meditation increases your capacity to move out of your box and perceive the complexity of your work from all angles so that you can choose the best approach. You’ve got to think through your situation and not wait for the ideas to pop out of the blue. It is nice to meditate before you start worki...

  Are the wedding bells and bills giving you the jitters? Or have you been carrying that tensed look everywhere lately? Wedding, I'm sure you'll agree, is like restarting your life with a new identity and new people. The stress factor (or better still, uncertainty) is then considered a given. What can we do at such times to allay our fears or manage the stress? The following are a few helpful tips that can give your wedding a head start. #1 Understand The Factors That Give You Stress If you've ever solved a complex mathematical equation in your life, you will agree that half your work is done the moment you crack those unknown variables. Pre-wedding stress is as good as a set of complex equations, and half your problems will be solved the moment you realize exactly what is bugging you. "If you are able to figure out what stresses you before wedding, half your problems are managed", quotes Dr Dinal Vora, MD, Homoeopathic Psychiatrist, and wedding Counselor, Angels ...

  Are you having difficulty falling asleep? Do you wake up feeling tired and groggy? Perhaps you’ve noticed that your ability to function effectively is diminished or that you’re feeling irritable a lot of the time. You may be suffering from insomnia. Short-term or transient insomnia is quite common and usually resolves by itself. However, insomnia is considered chronic if it persists beyond a few weeks. Insomnia, both transient and chronic, can be dealt with meditation. There is an abundance of evidence that regular meditation can improve sleep patterns, often dramatically. Research indicates that an overly aroused sympathetic nervous system is an important causative factor in chronic insomnia. It states that practices that can reduce nervous system arousal, such as meditation, can be very effective in relieving insomnia. Our nervous system is usually excessively aroused by several factors. They include stress, tension, overindulgence in stimulants such as tea and coffee, use...

  An Art of Living teacher who has spent the last 19 years teaching meditation to people across South Africa & Africa - Meet Vani Pavadai. A pioneer Art of Living teacher in Africa, and inspired by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar’s vision of a stress-free, violence-free world. Vani, initiated a global peace initiative for Africa in 2013, under the auspices of the Art of living Foundation Africa. In its 6 year, with an incredible team of Art of living volunteers across Africa, the peace campaign has reached over 2.3 million people, and united 22 African countries. In conversation, Vani, shares her passion for meditation, peace and Africa. I Meditate Africa – An Art of living Peace Campaign 2013 - 10 000 Participants       23 African Countries    31 African Cities     54 Countries Internationally 2014 - 100 000 Participants   24 African Countries   31 African Cities     52 Countries Internationally 2015 - 500 000 Participants   ...

  Good morning. This is my favorite greeting to start the day. I have always loved the morning sunshine and I want to make an honest confession here. I am someone who loves waking up early, opening the curtains and gaze out at the sunlight. And yes, on some days, I even shout out: Good morning, sunshine!  Why do I do that? Because I simply love the peace and quiet that the early hours give me. It helps me to prep myself for the day ahead and more importantly, enables me to follow a routine to get started. And no, I wasn’t always like this. For me, studying late and getting up equally late had become a pattern. Later, I became lost in a growing social life and late office hours. In all the buzz, I was losing myself. Fatigue, low energy levels, irritability and low productivity. I had to catch myself from dozing in an office meeting once - the stare from my manager and the dressing down later was enough to give me a wake-up call. I developed some tools to help me turn aroun...

 T he task to make important decisions in a short time not only seems difficult, but it also brings a momentary halt in our life. There are numerous decisions that we make – big and small – often, but the moment we realize we have to make a decision, we are inevitably caught in an array of emotions. It’s natural. Ever thought what really throws you in that dazed state? One can blame it on the fast-paced living or bombardment of limitless information, but what brings that momentary pause while you’re about to make a decision is stress. In fact, it gets more challenging when uncertainty around the consequences of your decision builds up the pressure. Though it is a constant subtle happening and most of our actions are born out of a decision, the pertinent question here is how to make the right decision at the right time? What are the factors that aid in making right decisions? Be it at work, in family matters, career, relationships or other miscellaneous issues, how to know that the ...