6 Roomies. ALL 60+. NO politics

Yes, it is possible!

Hey People!

This is fourth edition of Raw and Real, where we talk about:

1 Thing I wanted to share with you
2 One Liners on Life :)
3 Gratitudes for the smallest things in life

Here we go:

1 Thing I wanted to share with you All

I am living in a meditation centre right now, for 3 weeks.
Came here early this week.
Will stay till July end.

In my previous visits here, I have lived in double or triple sharing rooms. For 4-5 days, max 7.
However, this time, I am sharing the room with 6 other people! For 19 days!

Can you imagine?

But it is anything but something you can imagine.

All these aunties are 60+ years of age.
I’d bet 2-3 of them must be in their late 70s.
And they are nothing like a commonplace roomie.

They all root for me.
For the community meditation that starts in the hall at 4 am, they all get ready and leave the room by 3 - leaving the wash room to me :)
Once I was exercising in the room looking into a video, and they also started imitating some of the movements (that they could, while lying on their beds) :)

Best, there is no such competition of:

“Let me use the washroom asap”

OR

“Let me steal their belongings” (in one of my paying guest days, someone once stole the transparent straps of my inner wear!!! I know. Same reaction bro :))

OR

“Tell me what are you doing. Why are you doing it? Where were you?”

This stay of a few days so far has been such a masterclass in:

• Humanity

• Innocence

• Minding your own business

• Learning from someone who is decades younger than you

• Having fun every single day (the aunties are chit chatting and lolling as I write this newsletter, having zero interest in what I am doing. I love this pro privacy in a pool of people. Once I was working on my laptop and they all had to nap, but they managed with light on, because they said “chhori computer me kaam kar rahi hai”). Wow!!

Few years back, I heard Elizabeth Gilbert on Lewis Howes’ podcast, where at the end of every podcast, Lewis used to ask every guest, “What is your definition of greatness?”

Here’s what Gilbert replied:

My definition of greatness is goodness.

2 one-liners on Life :)

• Sometimes traumatic experiences occur to make you realise how lucky you were to get out of them (tweet this)

• Everyone must spend a ton of time building their fancy website. Only to know that the real work is doing the work and not a fancy website :) (tweet this)

3 Things to be grateful for

1. A separate washroom of my own back home :)

2. Maid who comes to wash my clothes daily back home :)

3. My access to milk shake, cold coffee, Wake-fit pillow, Lavie handbag (gifted by my beautiful ex-colleagues at wariCrew) - all that are readily available to me at home.

Living in the meditation centre (even though it was my choice) made me be grateful for the tiny things at home. Even though things are way better here than other places, bed sheets get replaced every 2-3 days, environment is epic, I have been able to get more work done despite meditating and doing “sewa” of 5 hours every day, all these days away from home told me to be grateful for all of these tiny things.

That’s it, friends.

Which part of this email you found fascinating? Let me know. I reply to every email.

Tc. See you next Sat.

Nishtha