Column: The Good Life: for Mint Lounge
For The National Abu Dhabi on Barcelona
Ah Barcelona! If you are an architecture or design or sports buff, or a foodie, this is the city to go to. Travelling with kids: When shopping abroad is a holiday July 24, 2014 Updated: July 24, 2014 05:31 PM A few months ago, we were in Barcelona, which, as shopping destinations go, is not my favourite city. I prefer the Grand Bazaar of Istanbul, the souqs of Dubai or the bazaars of India. Barcelona offers the pleasures of Zara, H&M and Mango, but not much atmosphere as far as I was concerned. My daughters, ages 18 and 12, were [...]
Indian Railways
To understand India, you need to have ridden on a train. One more plug for this fab book. Okay, so I have a piece in it, so not entirely a dispassionate observation. But cricket, Bollywood, food and trains are (so far) the things that are common to the "India experience." At least, so far as I can tell.
Clubs and dress code
It is a tough call to balance the gentility of wearing appropriate attire and tradition with moving with the times. I have been thrown out of country clubs in the US and in India for wearing wrong clothes--or rather for going with a man who was wearing wrong clothes. In particular, shorts. It's probably why I don't have a country club membership. India’s clubs should move with the times and embrace different traditions Shoba Narayan July 22, 2014 Updated: July 22, 2014 06:10 PM When Narendra Modi became India’s prime minister a new sense of national pride swept over the [...]
Living Will
This is a horrendously complicated topic. To get an idea, just imagine writing a living will yourself: when would you pull the plug on you? There needs to be a medical counselor to help with this sort of stuff. The will to die with dignity My father said something recently that freaked me out. He talked about icchha mrithyu, a phrase borrowed from the Hindu epic, Mahabharat, in which Bhishma has the ability to choose the moment of his death. My father is in the process of writing his will; and often, through stray phrases, he reveals to me that [...]
Day 4: July 18 2014
I am so mad. I woke up at 3 AM and surfed the Internet for two hours, looking at Hermes and Louis Vuitton bags. Fell asleep at 5 AM and woke up at 630 again. I could've meditated but I didn't. Instead the day has gone. I have just sat down from 330 to 345. I can feel myself slipping back to my old mode again. If it weren't for this damn log, I doubt that I would be meditating even. So what did I do today? I breathed in and out 45 times. My mind was swirling the entire [...]
Day 3: July 17 2014
From now on, updates will appear on the meditation page
Day 1: July 15, 2014
Did Brahmari Pranayama 11 times yesterday.
The Meditation Project
My inability to meditate properly is really stressing me out Shoba Narayan July 14, 2014 Updated: July 14, 2014 05:26 PM In his book, Focus: The Hidden Ingredient of Excellence, author Daniel Goleman talks about the different kinds of attention. The most obvious kind of focus, he says, is concentration where the mind is rooted to a task until a solution is reached. This type of focus is best suited to analytical work. Creative insights, on the other hand, occur when the mind is loose, open, and aware. There is a reason why psychologists like to put their subjects [...]
Mindfulness
To be obsessed with meditation seems like defeating the purpose. My problem is that I still haven't conquered this. How to sit "simply" and stare into space aka unfocus your eyes? How didn't all those rishis that I read about in the Amar Chitra Katha books do it? To the point where anthills grew over them? Crazy stuff. Reading and loving Haruki Murakami's "What I think about when I think about Running." Sejal Gulati, if you see this post, that book is for you. Reading Sunil Menon's translation of Mahabharata. Matsyabhangi-- now that's a name. Mindful wanderers When we think [...]
Takshashila and Deepak Nayyar
This promises to be a great event. Ummm....my husband is moderating and an organization that I am part of is organizing.