About Paradigm Shifts

I am sorry for my prolonged absence here. I would like to say this happens to me pretty often because I am not a consistent person. But that’s a lie.

I AM a consistent person. What I choose to be consistent about changes from time to time.

May-June has been about looking at things from a different perspective. It’s been about changing the lens of my view, mostly about myself but also about the world. It’s been about Paradigm Shifts.

For the longest time, I’ve blamed my inconsistency for my many failures. After I missed writing here for 2 weeks, I said to myself “There you go, you did it again! You are just not consistent” 

And then I didn’t write for another 4 weeks thus proving my hypothesis.

But this is what I’ve been up to for the last month and a half:

I went for a trial Yoga class at a local Yoga studio near me. It’s called Bhakti Barn. I’ll be honest, I went there because I heard they host workshops and I’ve been looking for a physical space to host Sacred Women’s Circle. 

Going there was coming home for me. You know the feeling you get when your whole body relaxes and says “Aaaaah. This.is.home. I feel safe here. I belong here. These are my people.”

That!

Yoga has always done that for me. But this wasn’t like the Yoga I’ve been doing on my Peloton App since 2020. 

This is the Yoga my ancestors created and meant for the world to understand. 

My teacher and the owner of Bhakti Barn, Betsy, starts her class by chanting a Sanskrit Mantra as she plays the tune on the harmonium. 

I cry every single time! 

Side note - The more Spiritual I get, the more connected I feel to my Hindu roots. 

Being in that space, I forgot all about why I went there in the first place. I just wanted to go there again and again.

Now 3-4 times a week, I am there consistently! To practice. To come home.

The gorgeous Hanuman mural at Bhakti Barn Yoga Studio

I shifted another perspective and I have to thank my husband for it.

Early this month, I had an opportunity to speak at my local library. I was speaking on “How to Master your Inner Critic” 

Speaking is my favorite thing to do. In my mind, I have already spoken at the world's largest stages filled with thousands of people. And in my mind, I am also paid big bucks for it. 🤩

I worked so hard on this presentation and I enjoyed every single minute of the work. It had everything - brain science, spiritual wisdom, funny examples, and of course me to orchestrate the whole thing. 

On the day of the event, we reach the library. “We” as in me and my husband. I dragged him. I didn’t know why at the time.

We reach there to realize there is a huge Pride picnic next door and parking is a pain to find. It’s also a Sunday on a beautiful sunny day.

We get 7 people in the room. 2 of them being my husband and the organizer of the event.

Now before I go on, let me just say that this has been the sob story that I’ve been telling myself every single time. 

Every time I launch an event, a workshop - paid or unpaid, and it’s attended by few people or none at all, I go to my hurt little girl who sobs and says “No one likes me, no one wants to hear from me”

I could feel my little girl surfacing when I looked around an empty room with 7 people, but here I was giving a talk on Inner Critic so I manage both my inner critic and the hurt little girl and go on to give the best presentation of my life!

One of the women who attended came to me in the end to say “It’s a shame others couldn’t attend because you were great!”

Now my little girl pokes her head and starts to scream internally “I know, I know I am good. I did a great job and no one cares”

I turn to my husband to get some validation and what he said next changed my perspective and perhaps my life.

“Look what you did today. You were able to impact 7 lives!” He showed me his fingers to prove the point.

He kept saying this many times as we drove home and for the first time, I kept quiet and listened and understood.

I was focusing on the 33 empty seats while totally missing (and celebrating) the fact that I did in some way impact 7 people.

That right there was my Paradigm Shift. 

We don’t change the world in one fell swoop. We change it one person at a time. One small action at a time.

And that often has to begin with ourselves.

This is how I changed and came home to myself even more in the last month and a half

One yoga class at a time

One asana at a time

One meditation at a time

One word on the page at a time

One paradigm shift at a time

P.S. - One small step at a time not only changes us in profound ways but also builds momentum. I’ve been doing the #1000wordsofsummer challenge with the amazing Jami Attenberg from Craft Talk (Can’t recommend enough!). Today is Day 7 and I thought to myself “Hmmm if I can write 1000 words every day, I can also write on Substack.” And here I AM!

Here’s to coming home, one small step at a time.

❤️

Deepshikha