Latest / Thriving in the Age of Disruption / Season 5 - Episode 4 | From Engineering to Inner Mastery: Spiritual Practice, Leadership and Sustainable Success - Shalin Desai (USA)

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Season 5 - Episode 4 | From Engineering to Inner Mastery: Spiritual Practice, Leadership and Sustainable Success - Shalin Desai (USA) · Thriving in the Age of Disruption

• 0:00
  Dr. Ramesh: Welcome to Thriving in the Age of Disruption podcast series, Shalin.
• 0:04
  Dr. Ramesh: We're really excited to hear from you.
• 0:07
  Dr. Ramesh: And so why don't we start off by having you introduce yourself?
• 0:11
  Shalin Desai: Sure.
• 0:12
  Shalin Desai: Thanks, Dr.
• 0:12
  Shalin Desai: amesh, for having me.
• 0:14
  Shalin Desai: I'm Shalin.
• 0:15
  Shalin Desai: I live in the US.
• 0:17
  Shalin Desai: I've been here for the last uh about 25 years now.
• 0:20
  Dr. Ramesh: Oh, wow.
• 0:21
  Shalin Desai: And uh, you know, I'm an engineer by profession.
• 0:25
  Shalin Desai: My main passion is uh teaching the breath work.
• 0:28
  Shalin Desai: I'm I'm the director of programs with uh the Art of Living Foundation.
• 0:32
  Shalin Desai: Art of Living is one of the world's uh largest volunteer-based organizations with uh presence in over 180 countries.
• 0:40
  Shalin Desai: And as we spoke earlier, the founder of Art of Living is Krudev Sh Rishi Ravishankar.
• 0:45
  Shalin Desai: He's a world-renowned humanitarian and peacemaker, and he's my main inspiration behind what I'm doing in my life, actually.
• 0:51
  Shalin Desai: It's such a great inspiration.
• 0:53
  Shalin Desai: So I teach programs uh around the country, mainly North America, Mexico, Canada, and all that.
• 0:58
  Shalin Desai: And uh in the US, I've taught programs in 63 cities.
• 1:02
  Shalin Desai: And in addition to that, I'm also uh a chief revenue officer for uh Sri Sri Tattva.
• 1:08
  Shalin Desai: It's a Ayurvedic wellness brand.
• 1:10
  Shalin Desai: That's also very close to my heart.
• 1:12
  Shalin Desai: Uh, providing people a holistic uh medical solution than just making them pill poppers.
• 1:18
  Shalin Desai: So that's in a nutshell what I do.
• 1:21
  Shalin Desai: I I live in Indianapolis uh with my wife and uh two wonderful kids.
• 1:26
  Dr. Ramesh: Nice.
• 1:26
  Dr. Ramesh: Typically, I want to explore two critical mindsets.
• 1:29
  Dr. Ramesh: One is called the entrepreneurial mindset to be resourceful, which is able to identify the right problem.
• 1:36
  Dr. Ramesh: There is also the aspect of uh managing the uncertainty that comes with it and taking risks.
• 1:42
  Dr. Ramesh: And lastly, it is um creating value.
• 1:45
  Dr. Ramesh: Value can be both financial as well as non-financial.
• 1:48
  Dr. Ramesh: You were sharing just now about what you're doing today.
• 1:52
  Dr. Ramesh: I'm sure you started off doing something else, went to university, you know, started to work in the corporate space.
• 1:59
  Dr. Ramesh: In the work that you do, in terms of being resourceful, in terms of being able to manage uncertainty and take risks as well as create value?
• 2:14
  Shalin Desai: Sure, I think that's that's a beautiful question.
• 2:16
  Shalin Desai: And uh it's a bit complicated for me compared to everybody else because I have two different things.
• 2:22
  Shalin Desai: One is the the programs that I teach, uh which I do as a volunteer, and then I love that, and also my Shri Shri Tattva uh thing that I do.
• 2:30
  Shalin Desai: I found that uh anything that you're very passionate about, the entrepreneurial skills just come naturally.
• 2:38
  Shalin Desai: And in my opinion, instead of just trying someone to try and to incorporate that, you know, have this one, two, three, four skill sets for your entrepreneurial spirit, the key, the first thing is feeling passionate about something.
• 2:50
  Shalin Desai: Because anything you're passionate about, the mind naturally doesn't go on the problems, the mind goes on the solutions to grow anything, anything you're working on, any doesn't just have to be business, anything that you're doing in life that you want to grow.
• 3:04
  Shalin Desai: If the mind keeps going all the time on this is not okay, that is not okay, this is not working, that is not working, and I'm a firm believer, whatever you put your attention on that grows.
• 3:16
  Shalin Desai: You know, whatever plant you water, that plant grows.
• 3:19
  Shalin Desai: And if the mind keeps going all the time on the lack, on this this is not okay, that is not okay, that's what keeps growing.
• 3:25
  Shalin Desai: And when you're really passionate about something, what I found is that the mind naturally goes on the solutions.
• 3:33
  Dr. Ramesh: Yes.
• 3:33
  Shalin Desai: And your mind, when your mind is focused on solutions, you always find answers and you always find ways out.
• 3:41
  Shalin Desai: And you always find two ways to grow the thing.
• 3:43
  Shalin Desai: So the first and foremost, uh, in my opinion, is being passionate about what you're doing.
• 3:48
  Shalin Desai: I'm and it's okay.
• 3:50
  Shalin Desai: Sometimes if you have to work on a business, initially you're not passionate about that, it's fine.
• 3:54
  Shalin Desai: Uh, it's okay to fake it till you make it, but uh but once you get there, you just go with full-on and not having failure as an option, even in the back of your mind.
• 4:06
  Shalin Desai: I mentioned that uh even if you don't have the passion to begin with, it's okay and you fake it until you make it.
• 4:14
  Shalin Desai: Right.
• 4:14
  Shalin Desai: You know, yeah.
• 4:16
  Dr. Ramesh: Okay, good.
• 4:16
  Dr. Ramesh: So let's say you're somebody, right?
• 4:19
  Dr. Ramesh: You get into uh a corporate uh environment, or you are you started a business, and over time it gets to you, and you find that you know you're really not passionate.
• 4:32
  Shalin Desai: Actually, that's a very good question.
• 4:33
  Shalin Desai: A lot of people are at that point, you know, they start something, initially they're really passionate about it, and after some time, they're like, you know, I don't think I'm going to be able to make it.
• 4:42
  Shalin Desai: A lot of entrepreneurs have seen that, like it comes to a point where you just you feel like, you know, I'm just going to break.
• 4:47
  Shalin Desai: It's not this is not going to work.
• 4:49
  Shalin Desai: And that is the point.
• 4:51
  Shalin Desai: That is the kind of I've been, it's a make it or break it point in your life where most people, 80% people, what they do is they're like, you know, this is not for me.
• 4:58
  Shalin Desai: I'm not cut out for this thing.
• 5:00
  Shalin Desai: And they quit and they won't move on to something else.
• 5:03
  Shalin Desai: But those 20% people I've seen, like they just keep going at it, you know, having the tenacity and keep going at it.
• 5:10
  Shalin Desai: And it's not easy.
• 5:11
  Shalin Desai: I'll be very honest, it's not easy when I've been in those uh situations.
• 5:15
  Shalin Desai: I've not never found that easy.
• 5:17
  Shalin Desai: And what personally, what have worked for me is that I've learned the Sudarshan Kriya that the art of living programs uh teach.
• 5:24
  Shalin Desai: And now I travel and teach those workshops, and that's been a game changer for me.
• 5:29
  Shalin Desai: Because sometimes from the time you wake up in the morning till the nighttime you go to bed, it's all non-stop to-do list that you're working on, non-stop stuff going on.
• 5:38
  Shalin Desai: And how to maintain that calm and cool, that composure, that centeredness, and not getting overwhelmed is the key.
• 5:47
  Shalin Desai: And uh that's why I believe like taking about 20-25 minutes out every day.
• 5:52
  Shalin Desai: I do that every morning.
• 5:53
  Shalin Desai: I do my, we call it the sky breathing, the Sudashankary breathing exercise that we learn Art of Living course.
• 5:59
  Shalin Desai: I do that every morning, no matter what, how busy it is, how crazy it is, how much I'm traveling, I make it a point to do it every day.
• 6:07
  Shalin Desai: And personally, I found that as a and I tell I tell people that you brush your teeth every day, that is dental hygiene.
• 6:14
  Shalin Desai: You take a shower every day, that is a bodily hygiene.
• 6:17
  Shalin Desai: This breath work for me is the mental, it's a mental hygiene.
• 6:20
  Shalin Desai: Right.
• 6:21
  Shalin Desai: And now it's very few people actually put attention on the mental hygiene.
• 6:25
  Shalin Desai: So that's the thing, having the passion at the same time, taking 20 minutes out every day where you're completely dispassionate.
• 6:31
  Shalin Desai: And the more dispassionate you get, then the higher the more passion you can have after that.
• 6:36
  Dr. Ramesh: Right.
• 6:37
  Dr. Ramesh: Right.
• 6:38
  Dr. Ramesh: So when you refer to dispassion, right, as in DIS and the passion, you're you're talking about like almost detaching from that entanglement of passion with expectation.
• 6:54
  Dr. Ramesh: Exactly.
• 6:55
  Dr. Ramesh: Right?
• 6:55
  Dr. Ramesh: And then when you can bring it back to zero, like there's no expectation, then the passion reconnects again.
• 7:06
  Shalin Desai: You got it.
• 7:06
  Shalin Desai: It's like you know, you the more rested you are, the better you can perform, right?
• 7:12
  Shalin Desai: And not just physical rest, the mental rest is so important.
• 7:15
  Shalin Desai: So important.
• 7:17
  Shalin Desai: Nowadays, I've seen more and more people, they're so wired up.
• 7:20
  Shalin Desai: So when you're so wired up, you get some success, but at some point of time, you kind of come to a point where you just get overwhelmed, you get tired, you can't take it anymore.
• 7:30
  Shalin Desai: So it's very important to kind of give our mind also that rest, that break.
• 7:36
  Shalin Desai: And uh, the more rested your mind is, the more better decisions you'll be able to take, and the more clarity you'll have on any task that you take up.
• 7:45
  Shalin Desai: And that's what I've found.
• 7:46
  Shalin Desai: Like, because I'm so regular with my morning practice, my breathing exercise, my suddarsankriya, I found that throughout the day sometimes things just get crazy, and you have so many things hitting you from all different directions.
• 7:58
  Shalin Desai: And I found that as a leader, and I've taught a lot of workshops on leaders also, this is one trait which is which which is a game changer, right?
• 8:08
  Dr. Ramesh: So is it going internal connect to ourselves so that we can be available for everyone else?
• 8:18
  Dr. Ramesh: How did you get connected to this whole uh uh modality and start your practice uh so early in life?
• 8:32
  Shalin Desai: Yes, yes.
• 8:33
  Shalin Desai: Uh actually, I got started when I was uh 16.
• 8:37
  Shalin Desai: My my mom did uh she had an episode of depression for a short time, and then uh she had taken the program.
• 8:45
  Shalin Desai: And after she took the program, there was such a big change in her, such a positive change.
• 8:50
  Shalin Desai: Within just a couple of months, the doctor took her off all the medications and everything.
• 8:55
  Shalin Desai: And I I was so impressed.
• 8:57
  Shalin Desai: Like, I'm like, my mom is back, and uh and she had taken the art of living course, and that's what really helped her.
• 9:03
  Shalin Desai: She didn't stop there, she kind of made sure that my brother and I we also ended up doing it.
• 9:08
  Shalin Desai: And at 16, you know, you can care less about breathing and meditation.
• 9:12
  Shalin Desai: But because she asked, I mean, I'm very close to my mom, I ended up doing the program.
• 9:15
  Shalin Desai: And uh, when I did the Sudhashankriya, it was mind-blowing.
• 9:22
  Shalin Desai: I'd never felt so calm, so rested in my life.
• 9:27
  Shalin Desai: Never.
• 9:28
  Shalin Desai: And you know, at that time I was you're in high school, you have a lot of stuff going on from an academic standpoint, so much going on, maybe I was not getting proper sleep and all that.
• 9:36
  Shalin Desai: And that day, I remember I came home and the night I slept like a baby.
• 9:41
  Shalin Desai: Like, really, I woke up so fresh.
• 9:43
  Shalin Desai: And I'm like, wow, this is cool.
• 9:45
  Shalin Desai: And I continued with it, and uh, it was helping me with my academics.
• 9:50
  Shalin Desai: I realized that I did not have to put as much time into my uh studies, I had more time to play, I had more time to do fun stuff.
• 9:58
  Shalin Desai: I'm like, why not?
• 9:59
  Shalin Desai: It's not bad.
• 10:00
  Shalin Desai: And I remember some of my when I was in college, some of my friends would always tell me, like, you know, how come we know you're not putting that many hours, how come you're getting good grades?
• 10:09
  Shalin Desai: And I knew it was because of this.
• 10:11
  Shalin Desai: And then uh once I started working and I've got into a professional world where I mean you actually are required to perform, where the rubber meets the road.
• 10:21
  Shalin Desai: And every day doing this thing just helped me make much better decisions.
• 10:26
  Shalin Desai: And you know, I found that uh, Dr.
• 10:28
  Shalin Desai: Ramesh, there are two things that are required for a person to succeed.
• 10:31
  Shalin Desai: One is one is the your hard skills, you know, your technical skills, you know, what you know about your field and so on.
• 10:38
  Shalin Desai: And second is the soft skills, and we put such we don't put enough attention on those soft skills, and that's what this also helped me with overall nurturing the soft skills, working with people.
• 10:52
  Shalin Desai: And uh the first thing you mentioned in our podcast was uh being resourceful, and when you mentioned that, my eyes just lit up.
• 10:59
  Shalin Desai: I'm like, this is it, you know, how to be more resourceful and how you're able to connect with people easily.
• 11:09
  Dr. Ramesh: What had you sustain it as a practice?
• 11:12
  Dr. Ramesh: Not everyone journeys that way.
• 11:14
  Dr. Ramesh: What had you connect so deeply to it?
• 11:18
  Shalin Desai: The sense of uh giving, you know.
• 11:22
  Shalin Desai: I at some point of time I felt like you know, I've received so much.
• 11:25
  Shalin Desai: At some point of time, it just turned into passion.
• 11:28
  Shalin Desai: That how do I bring this to more people?
• 11:30
  Shalin Desai: How more people can benefit from that?
• 11:34
  Shalin Desai: You know, I live in the US.
• 11:35
  Shalin Desai: Uh, here, as per the Center for Disease Control, one in every three individuals uh is suffering from either anxiety or depression.
• 11:44
  Shalin Desai: Oh wow, and that is alarming.
• 11:46
  Shalin Desai: I mean, we live in one of the most developed nations on the planet, yet mental health is not a priority for people.
• 11:53
  Shalin Desai: Then this whole passion that I want to teach is take this knowledge to more people.
• 11:57
  Shalin Desai: And when I became a teacher, I started traveling and teaching workshops, the experiences that people started sharing was just incredible.
• 12:07
  Shalin Desai: A small anecdote, this was maybe 2014 or 15.
• 12:12
  Shalin Desai: I had uh gone to one city to uh here in Michigan to teach a program, and the the family that was hosting me, they were, I mean, they went they really wanted me to stay at their place.
• 12:23
  Shalin Desai: So I went to their place super wealthy.
• 12:25
  Shalin Desai: Back then they had a floor house in Michigan, like huge palatial mansion kind of a thing.
• 12:30
  Shalin Desai: And I was staying there, I was teaching the workshops, and one day I came back and the the lady of the house, uh, she's like, Shalin, uh, do you have a few minutes?
• 12:38
  Shalin Desai: I said, Yeah.
• 12:39
  Shalin Desai: So she's like, you know, I would like you to talk to my like you to talk to my husband.
• 12:43
  Shalin Desai: I'm like, of course uh, what happened?
• 12:46
  Shalin Desai: And she's like, you know, unless he drinks alcohol, he's not able to sleep every night.
• 12:51
  Shalin Desai: And that's like, and this person is such a successful entrepreneur, such a successful entrepreneur doing so well his business, but he's not able to sleep in the night because unless he drinks alcohol.
• 13:04
  Shalin Desai: And that's when it hit me that you know you may have all the wealth.
• 13:08
  Shalin Desai: Yeah, but if you don't have the wealth of managing your own mind, it's of no use.
• 13:14
  Dr. Ramesh: That's very profound.
• 13:15
  Dr. Ramesh: You're pointing to the current way of thinking where we um chase the external success, but we forget actually what uh supports us to grow and thrive is that inner success or the inner harmony that we can develop.
• 13:34
  Dr. Ramesh: So I got that you saw the impact that you were making with people, uh, whether you know they came from very wealthy situations or very ordinary situations, there was something for each person.
• 13:47
  Dr. Ramesh: And that's what has sustained your passion over the years.
• 13:51
  Dr. Ramesh: But you know what struck me really was that one can actually pursue a passion even as a volunteer.
• 13:59
  Dr. Ramesh: So you don't have to make money out of passion.
• 14:03
  Dr. Ramesh: Uh, it can be in parallel where you can make money out of your business or you can work for somebody, but you can also dedicate your time and your effort to this to volunteer passion.
• 14:16
  Dr. Ramesh: And can you share a little bit more about that piece?
• 14:20
  Shalin Desai: Sure.
• 14:20
  Shalin Desai: And I'll share one very interesting thing.
• 14:23
  Shalin Desai: I realized that when I started volunteering and started spending more time giving, you know, it's like uh sharing what you have.
• 14:31
  Shalin Desai: I found that all the other aspects of my life kind of started falling in place.
• 14:35
  Shalin Desai: It's very interesting.
• 14:37
  Shalin Desai: And uh I've seen that universe always rewards good action.
• 14:43
  Shalin Desai: And it's not like you do it because you're looking for something in eternity, it just started naturally happening for me.
• 14:49
  Shalin Desai: For me, as I mentioned earlier, the biggest inspiration has been Gurudev Shri Shri Ravi Shankar.
• 14:55
  Shalin Desai: You know, I got to meet him at a very early age, and when I saw the work that him and the foundation have been doing around the globe in 180 countries, it was so inspiring to see that.
• 15:06
  Shalin Desai: And like how he was tirelessly working and around the globe and doing the work that uh that Art of Living was doing.
• 15:13
  Shalin Desai: If I'm able to do a small percentage of what he's doing, it will be such a big deal.
• 15:17
  Shalin Desai: So that's another important thing I want to identify in my life is the importance of having a good role model.
• 15:24
  Shalin Desai: Very, very important to have a good role model.
• 15:27
  Shalin Desai: Otherwise, whatever you you know embody, whatever you look at, you kind of start imbibing those qualities.
• 15:36
  Shalin Desai: And when you embody somebody who's themselves driven, who's leading by example, it drives you also.
• 15:42
  Dr. Ramesh: Yes.
• 15:43
  Dr. Ramesh: Yeah, also calling out something very important here, which is um the fact that no matter how brilliant we are and uh how secure our circumstances are, each one of us uh can benefit from a role model.
• 15:59
  Dr. Ramesh: We also have to be lucky to get the right role model, right?
• 16:03
  Dr. Ramesh: Because we may be in a situation where our role models uh might not be providing us the kind of uh growth opportunities that we seek.
• 16:13
  Dr. Ramesh: So my role model has to be related to that.
• 16:15
  Dr. Ramesh: It can be someone like in your case, allowing you to look at spirituality, humanity, consciousness, meditation.
• 16:26
  Shalin Desai: All of the above.
• 16:27
  Shalin Desai: Exactly.
• 16:27
  Shalin Desai: All of the above.
• 16:29
  Shalin Desai: And that's what I saw.
• 16:31
  Shalin Desai: That uh, and uh my my gauge for a good leader is that uh one of the big things that I look for in a good leadership skill or a good leader is that that ability to create more leaders.
• 16:47
  Dr. Ramesh: Okay, good.
• 16:48
  Dr. Ramesh: Okay, can you say a little bit more about Grv?
• 16:51
  Dr. Ramesh: And uh and how he started his journey.
• 16:55
  Shalin Desai: Absolutely.
• 16:56
  Shalin Desai: So he started Art of Living in 1981.
• 17:00
  Shalin Desai: So it's actually 45 years this year, and uh how the whole thing started was that the school in southern part of India where he was shut down, and the kids were going to be without a school.
• 17:12
  Shalin Desai: And um, instead of thinking, what am I gonna do?
• 17:15
  Shalin Desai: He got all the 50, 60 kids and started teaching them from his own home.
• 17:20
  Shalin Desai: And he did not know where how the school is going to run next week or the week after.
• 17:24
  Shalin Desai: If there's only so long you can go by having 60 kids at your home every day, and but from there, um I you know the resources just kept coming in and it just kept growing.
• 17:35
  Shalin Desai: And uh then it in uh he went for a 10-day silence.
• 17:40
  Shalin Desai: Um, and in that he came up with this breathing excess called the Sudarshan Kriya, and he started teaching the art of living programs.
• 17:47
  Shalin Desai: Uh first it started with the southern part of India, then he traveled to the US and taught some programs in the US, and then people just started flocking wherever he would go.
• 17:58
  Shalin Desai: Huge programs would get organized.
• 18:01
  Shalin Desai: And uh now it is one of the world's largest volunteer-based organizations.
• 18:06
  Shalin Desai: We teach breathing exercises, meditations, we teach programs in the corporate world, we teach programs for the war veterans, the prisoners, we teach programs for the high school kids.
• 18:17
  Shalin Desai: You name it, and the foundation is working on it.
• 18:19
  Shalin Desai: Not only that, it is providing uh free education to 120,000 kids around the globe now.
• 18:26
  Shalin Desai: So a lot of uh charity work going on, and that's what inspired me about him.
• 18:32
  Shalin Desai: That and he does all those things with such such lightness.
• 18:37
  Shalin Desai: He makes everything look so effortless, and that's what also really uh clicked with me that you know, here is somebody who's doing so much, yet he's not throwing his weight around.
• 18:48
  Dr. Ramesh: I had uh met him in in the early 80s when he was coming uh into Singapore uh to do programs at that time, and um I had reconnected again in Vietnam with uh the group who runs Art of Living in Hanoi and uh and and did the meditation program.
• 19:08
  Dr. Ramesh: It's interesting.
• 19:14
  Dr. Ramesh: We started off the conversation talking about entrepreneurship but segued into a crisis-ready mindset, which is the second mindset.
• 19:21
  Dr. Ramesh: On a day-to-day basis, we are all facing some aspect of change which can show up as a crisis, a failure, uh, or even uh sometimes a negative feedback.
• 19:32
  Dr. Ramesh: And each one of us uh has got different ways in which we respond to it.
• 19:38
  Dr. Ramesh: Some of us can freeze, some of us can fight back.
• 19:40
  Dr. Ramesh: That you pointed to was breath work, uh, a daily practice for yourself to develop this inner resilience.
• 19:48
  Dr. Ramesh: Uh, we also talked about the ability to depassion on a daily basis so that passion doesn't become an attachment uh with expectation that it burdens one.
• 19:58
  Dr. Ramesh: So, what what else in terms of crisis-ready mindset or resilience that you want to share with you?
• 20:04
  Shalin Desai: You know, and also knowing this thing also helps me really is that looking back at your life, you've gone through so many crises, you've been at points where you think, oh my god, I'm going to break, and you got over it.
• 20:15
  Shalin Desai: You know, you got over it, you moved on, and life, life, life moved on, and you moved on.
• 20:20
  Shalin Desai: So, no matter what difficult situation you're in right now, knowing that you're going to get out of it, you're going to move on, and you're going to do you're going to come out of it.
• 20:30
  Shalin Desai: And also faith in it that there's a bigger power that is going to take care of me.
• 20:35
  Shalin Desai: And when you move with that faith, with that belief, the universe has got my back.
• 20:40
  Shalin Desai: And you don't have that fear of failure.
• 20:42
  Shalin Desai: Well, I mentored people, and when you start working with them, you realize that before they even start working, there's a fear of failure in them.
• 20:50
  Shalin Desai: Before they even get into it, they're like, What if it does not work out?
• 20:54
  Shalin Desai: What if it doesn't happen?
• 20:55
  Shalin Desai: You can never start something with that kind of mindset.
• 20:58
  Shalin Desai: Having a belief, strong belief in yourself, also having a strong belief that then there's a bigger power that is kind of going to take care of me, that is going to that's always got my back.
• 21:08
  Dr. Ramesh: So you you've identified for us to reflect uh that we've had these moments of crisis, that we've moved on, and that we are still around, right?
• 21:18
  Dr. Ramesh: You're also asking us maybe with that faith, trust in something which is greater than us, like in the universe, right?
• 21:26
  Dr. Ramesh: You've also highlighted is that we all live with the fear of failing.
• 21:30
  Dr. Ramesh: And that instead of focusing on that fear, focus on that faith.
• 21:36
  Shalin Desai: Exactly.
• 21:36
  Shalin Desai: Not just giving up easily.
• 21:38
  Shalin Desai: So that patience and keep going, keep going.
• 21:41
  Shalin Desai: And I have always found there's always a light at the end of the tunnel.
• 21:49
  Dr. Ramesh: So, what is spirituality for you?
• 21:53
  Shalin Desai: That's a good question.
• 21:54
  Shalin Desai: So, there are two different things that one is religion, which is the uh organized part of the thing.
• 21:58
  Shalin Desai: Spirituality is For me, it is what gives me peace.
• 22:02
  Shalin Desai: It is what gives me calm.
• 22:03
  Shalin Desai: It's what makes me a better human being.
• 22:06
  Shalin Desai: Spirituality is not something that you just learn, or it's it's a necessity.
• 22:10
  Shalin Desai: It's good to it's good to have that in your life.
• 22:12
  Shalin Desai: To be a better human being.
• 22:14
  Shalin Desai: I when I work with the other leaders, they always are concerned about their own family, also.
• 22:18
  Shalin Desai: Yes.
• 22:19
  Shalin Desai: And always tell them that you know your kids won't do what you tell them to do.
• 22:24
  Shalin Desai: They'll do what they what they watch you doing.
• 22:26
  Shalin Desai: If you're getting angry all the time, if you're stressed all the time, you're feeling overwhelmed all the time, if you don't know how to manage your own mind.
• 22:34
  Shalin Desai: Your kids are going to think that that's normal.
• 22:37
  Shalin Desai: Yeah.
• 22:37
  Shalin Desai: And those that's what they're going to imitate.
• 22:39
  Shalin Desai: And when your kids see you that in spite of everything going on, you're happy, you're smiling, you're enjoying life, you're taking time out for important things in your life.
• 22:49
  Shalin Desai: Those are the values your kids learn.
• 22:53
  Dr. Ramesh: They call it uh implicit learning, right?
• 22:56
  Dr. Ramesh: From what happens around you.
• 22:58
  Shalin Desai: Yeah.
• 22:58
  Shalin Desai: Exactly.
• 22:59
  Dr. Ramesh: Yeah, so true.
• 23:01
  Dr. Ramesh: On the same note, do you think it's possible to live a simple life?
• 23:09
  Dr. Ramesh: And what is a simple life for you?
• 23:12
  Shalin Desai: Simple life for me is actually uh having good meals and being able to enjoy my life, spending time with the family and doing what I'm passionate about is simple life.
• 23:23
  Shalin Desai: And it's different for everybody else.
• 23:26
  Shalin Desai: And uh, certain people are very passionate about building big structures, that's fine.
• 23:31
  Shalin Desai: Certain people are really passionate about other things, and I have what I need, I'm more than comfortable, but that's not what I found that gives me happiness.
• 23:40
  Shalin Desai: Happiness is somewhere with deep within, and that's what we need to tap into.
• 23:45
  Shalin Desai: And uh Dr.
• 23:50
  Shalin Desai: Ramesh also wanted to share, just I was not planning to share it on the web uh the podcast today, but uh something that Gurudev blessed me uh last year is to be able to do intuitive scanning.
• 24:01
  Shalin Desai: I'm able to, you know, sit with somebody, I'm able to tell them about their past, present, and future.
• 24:07
  Shalin Desai: And that's also been uh incredible since last one year I've started doing it, and it's brought so much peace to so many people.
• 24:14
  Shalin Desai: You know, people have anxiety about the future, people have things that have happened in the past that they're stuck with, being able to get over it.
• 24:21
  Shalin Desai: It's been uh it's been a gift.
• 24:23
  Dr. Ramesh: Yeah.
• 24:24
  Dr. Ramesh: I'm sure.
• 24:25
  Dr. Ramesh: And why did that suddenly show up in your space?
• 24:30
  Shalin Desai: I don't know what it was.
• 24:31
  Shalin Desai: I see it as a blessing that came.
• 24:34
  Shalin Desai: We all have that intuitive ability in us and how to develop that before me.
• 24:38
  Shalin Desai: He kind of blessed, and I just thought I was able to start doing it.
• 24:42
  Shalin Desai: And when I started working with people, people that I've never known before, I would sit with them for a 10-minute session.
• 24:48
  Shalin Desai: We can even do it do the session if you'd like.
• 24:51
  Dr. Ramesh: Yes, yes, yes, I would be very curious to see how that goes.
• 24:54
  Shalin Desai: Yeah, yeah, 10-minute session, and then uh I'm able to tell them about the past, they're they have any questions, they I can answer their questions about the future.
• 25:03
  Shalin Desai: It's been very, very helpful to people.
• 25:05
  Shalin Desai: For that, my calendar gets booked out two or three months in advance.
• 25:09
  Shalin Desai: So it's uh it's a gift that I like to give.
• 25:13
  Dr. Ramesh: I guess um, underneath all that, right, everyone is seeking answers, uh and um wanting to um discover the way.
• 25:27
  Dr. Ramesh: And uh sometimes understanding the past or knowing what's coming in the future may ground some of us.
• 25:38
  Dr. Ramesh: That's a great gift, yeah.
• 25:40
  Dr. Ramesh: And then you can share that with others.
• 25:44
  Shalin Desai: Sure, yeah.
• 25:45
  Shalin Desai: People have so much anxiety about the future.
• 25:47
  Shalin Desai: You know, mind constantly keeps vacillating either between the past or the future.
• 25:50
  Shalin Desai: Either something has happened in the past, you keep regretting, you keep feeling bad about it, or you're angry at something that has happened, or you're anxious about the future.
• 25:59
  Shalin Desai: This constant vacillation causes so much stress in our nervous system.
• 26:04
  Dr. Ramesh: Yes, yeah, yeah, and also the burden of uh expectation that we put on ourselves, yeah.
• 26:12
  Dr. Ramesh: Uh both to avoid what we thought that we did in the past, uh, which is going to show up in the future.
• 26:24
  Shalin Desai: When your energy levels are higher, you don't have any doubts.
• 26:28
  Shalin Desai: Only when your energy is down and it's low, you start having doubts.
• 26:31
  Shalin Desai: So that's very interesting.
• 26:33
  Shalin Desai: Science behind it.
• 26:34
  Shalin Desai: I've seen that when the prana, when the life force in you is high, your mind just naturally goes on the positive, doesn't have doubts, has more hope, less doubts.
• 26:45
  Shalin Desai: But when the prana is low, when the life force is low, that's when you start having all the doubts.
• 26:51
  Shalin Desai: And that's where again the breathing exercise and the meditation comes into the play, where you know you naturally uplift your prana.
• 26:58
  Shalin Desai: I mean, by doing these things, you uplift your life force energy, and the mind just doesn't go in the doubts because you keep telling people, don't have doubts, don't have doubts, doesn't work.
• 27:06
  Shalin Desai: You know, uh it's like if someone's mind is filled with a lot of doubts, they're going to keep that's going to keep churning in their mind.
• 27:15
  Dr. Ramesh: That's right.
• 27:15
  Dr. Ramesh: That's right.
• 27:16
  Dr. Ramesh: Uh as you were speaking, I was reflecting um, you know, back um in my own experience of uh, you know, there was a point in my life where it's like I had the sheer willpower to do whatever I liked, right?
• 27:32
  Dr. Ramesh: Or I I wanted to do, uh which might seem like impossible.
• 27:37
  Dr. Ramesh: And then at some point, like you said, maybe the prana was uh uh low, the energy was low.
• 27:43
  Dr. Ramesh: And what I would be able to do, I sort of struggled with that.
• 27:48
  Shalin Desai: Yeah.
• 27:49
  Dr. Ramesh: And then again, you know, the energy becomes high, and it seems like uh, you know, the universe is working uh and everything is just happening without the effort again.
• 28:00
  Dr. Ramesh: And and what you're pointing to is really that conscious effort that we have to put in as well as the practice to develop and sustain the energy, to nurture that energy rather than take it for granted, because otherwise we're just gonna have these highs and lows, uh, and then not even know why we are experiencing the highs and lows when we can actually you know sustain that uh peace, that inner harmony.
• 28:29
  Shalin Desai: Exactly, exactly.
• 28:30
  Shalin Desai: Great, wonderful.
• 28:32
  Shalin Desai: For women, I found like naturally they're more in the heart, the more spiritual beings, and they have a social structure around them, you know, a social circle that usually have.
• 28:43
  Shalin Desai: They have something, their girlfriends that they can call, they can talk, they talk to their sisters, talk to their mothers, they talk to their friends.
• 28:50
  Shalin Desai: And lately I found with guys that has not been the case.
• 28:54
  Shalin Desai: When it comes to what they are going through, they are in their own bubble.
• 28:58
  Shalin Desai: And uh many times culturally, and many times just the way the society that we are in, men are brought up not to express their emotions much, not to show their emotions much, and somehow they just learn to keep it everything bottled in.
• 29:14
  Shalin Desai: And uh the outlet when everything is bottled in, it's either some anger comes out, some outpost comes out, or person goes starts feeling low, goes into depression and whatnot.
• 29:26
  Shalin Desai: So it's very important to be able to connect with your heart, connect with that inner space.
• 29:32
  Shalin Desai: And it's not always necessary that you have to have a guy or a girl that you can always talk and you know express your emotions, but having an outlet is very, very important.
• 29:43
  Shalin Desai: And that's where I found this breathwork, the Sudhashankriya in the art of doing programs to be amazingly impactful.
• 29:52
  Shalin Desai: You know, uh three years ago, Yale University did the research.
• 29:56
  Shalin Desai: They took three focus groups.
• 29:58
  Shalin Desai: So one was the people doing the art of living, uh, sky breathing, then the second one was the uh the mindfulness-based stress reduction, and the third one was Yale's own emotional intelligence program.
• 30:10
  Shalin Desai: And they found out that the art of living Sudashankria was the most effective in reducing the anxiety, reducing the depression, the stress, and whatnot.
• 30:18
  Shalin Desai: And it all the markers for stress, the cortisol and all this went down, the markers for the well-being hormone went up.
• 30:24
  Shalin Desai: So it's also backed by science, especially in the US.
• 30:28
  Shalin Desai: You know, people believe it when there's also science behind it.
• 30:31
  Shalin Desai: And there's so much science and research done behind this thing.
• 30:35
  Shalin Desai: And coming back to the men's mental health, because we are at a point where the society needs people to be more happier.
• 30:45
  Shalin Desai: Society needs people to be more pleasant.
• 30:49
  Shalin Desai: This was maybe 20 years ago.
• 30:52
  Shalin Desai: Uh, I used to, um when I used to work uh at a plant here, and we used to get and end of the year uh performance reviews, and and we had an online system where our supervisor would put in her reviews.
• 31:03
  Shalin Desai: My boss had back then had put in my review was Shalin is the only guy I see smiling on a Monday morning.
• 31:10
  Shalin Desai: And I'm like, all right, this like I didn't realize that, but for people it is a big deal, you know, to have someone who's happy around you, who's pleasant, to have someone around you who's joyful.
• 31:23
  Shalin Desai: You know, we all like to be around people who are happy.
• 31:25
  Shalin Desai: And when you're happy from within, that happiness just exudes.
• 31:30
  Shalin Desai: And that's why it's for men, it's very important to be able to have that time for yourself where you are able to just calm, go into your own inner self.
• 31:40
  Shalin Desai: And the more you go in into your inner self, tap into that inner source of peace and joy, the more you can start expressing that.
• 31:49
  Dr. Ramesh: I really like what you shared here.
• 31:53
  Dr. Ramesh: It is true that women have a different way of socializing.
• 31:58
  Dr. Ramesh: And when it comes to these intimate issues of you know what they're struggling with, they have a support structure.
• 32:05
  Shalin Desai: Yeah.
• 32:06
  Dr. Ramesh: But when you talk to women about when it comes to their careers, they don't have the old boys' network to support them.
• 32:14
  Dr. Ramesh: And you know, they talk about how uh it's easier for men to rise up uh on the corporate ladder because they they can leverage on that network.
• 32:24
  Dr. Ramesh: But then when it comes to uh men being able to share their vulnerability largely because of the socialization again, that men have to be strong, to be successful, and they have to portray that to the to the outside world, then it becomes difficult to communicate these inner uh feelings and thoughts that they have.
• 32:46
  Dr. Ramesh: What I appreciated more was rather than again form just a social uh community where we're talking about it, uh actually investing, doing the practice consistently uh for ourselves is in some ways uh a better way because we don't then get into this whole conversation of having someone else to validate our experience, because here we can just do that process uh uh and see the benefit for ourselves.
• 33:20
  Dr. Ramesh: What do you think is going to happen to keep the inner health of ourselves?
• 33:30
  Shalin Desai: It's already happening to some extent.
• 33:31
  Shalin Desai: People are becoming more and more aware.
• 33:33
  Shalin Desai: See, I mean, 20 years ago, not everyone was talking about meditation, right?
• 33:38
  Shalin Desai: Meditation was a uh new thing or in thing, and not it was not that familiar, but now it has become such a household name.
• 33:47
  Shalin Desai: I always joke with people that you have two options: either you take medication or you do meditation.
• 33:53
  Shalin Desai: Like that, you know.
• 33:55
  Shalin Desai: Uh, either you want to become a pill popper for the rest of your life, or you want to do something which is more holistic, which brings overall happiness in your life.
• 34:03
  Shalin Desai: And it's already happening quite a bit for your viewers.
• 34:06
  Shalin Desai: You know, if you want to begin with, there's an app that we have in Art of Living.
• 34:10
  Shalin Desai: All right, it's called uh Sattva S-A-T-T-V-A.
• 34:14
  Shalin Desai: It's a free app.
• 34:15
  Shalin Desai: They can download the app and there are a bunch of meditations on there in Gurudha's voice that you can start practicing right away.
• 34:22
  Dr. Ramesh: Oh, nice, thank you.
• 34:29
  Dr. Ramesh: What is thriving?
• 34:30
  Dr. Ramesh: I I believe two things.
• 34:32
  Dr. Ramesh: One is the spiritual world, one is in materialistic world.
• 34:35
  Dr. Ramesh: And in materialistic world, thriving for me is simple.
• 34:39
  Dr. Ramesh: Am I doing better than what I was doing before?
• 34:42
  Dr. Ramesh: Because so many times people are falling into the trap of comparing themselves with somebody else.
• 34:47
  Shalin Desai: Correct.
• 34:48
  Shalin Desai: That's such a headache for so many people.
• 34:50
  Shalin Desai: You keep comparing yourself with people around you, either your peers, your friends.
• 34:55
  Shalin Desai: Cannot be that way.
• 34:56
  Shalin Desai: And you beat yourself down, and then you don't look at all the good things you have going on in your life.
• 35:01
  Dr. Ramesh: That's right.
• 35:02
  Shalin Desai: And that's something I first time I heard and learned from Gurudev was that just compare yourself with you.
• 35:08
  Shalin Desai: I mean, where you were six months ago, one year ago, are you doing better than that?
• 35:13
  Shalin Desai: Are you a better human being than what you were before?
• 35:15
  Shalin Desai: Even on the spiritual path.
• 35:16
  Shalin Desai: It's a tendency of being too hard on ourselves.
• 35:19
  Shalin Desai: Am I progressing?
• 35:20
  Shalin Desai: Because I found that people have that passion and everything in the corporate world, in the professional world, when they come back to come to spirituality, somehow those tendencies come to the spiritual world.
• 35:31
  Shalin Desai: Am I advancing fast enough?
• 35:32
  Shalin Desai: Am I getting enlightened?
• 35:34
  Shalin Desai: Am I getting this?
• 35:34
  Shalin Desai: Am I getting that experience and all that?
• 35:37
  Shalin Desai: And the key is just being calm, being cool, and just comparing yourselves with where you were a month ago, two months ago, six months ago.
• 35:44
  Shalin Desai: Are you progressing or not?
• 35:46
  Shalin Desai: And that's the key.
• 35:48
  Dr. Ramesh: That's true.
• 35:49
  Dr. Ramesh: We will have so much more uh happiness if we just um took that on to look at our own journey.
• 35:58
  Dr. Ramesh: You don't have to overthink it.
• 36:04
  Dr. Ramesh: What's your favorite book?
• 36:06
  Shalin Desai: Actually, I don't read books.
• 36:08
  Shalin Desai: Only book that my favorite book is uh The Journey Within by Gurudev.
• 36:13
  Shalin Desai: And uh it's a beautiful book.
• 36:15
  Shalin Desai: He's spoken on every single topic under the sun, and it's my go-to book.
• 36:19
  Shalin Desai: Anytime I'm feeling stuck or something, I open a page, and that's exactly what I'm looking for that day.
• 36:26
  Dr. Ramesh: Right, okay, great.
• 36:27
  Dr. Ramesh: And uh, if you could have dinner with anyone, who would it be?
• 36:35
  Shalin Desai: My family.
• 36:38
  Dr. Ramesh: I got that.
• 36:39
  Dr. Ramesh: You already have a superpower, thanks to Guradev.
• 36:43
  Dr. Ramesh: Yeah, but if you could have any other superpower, what would it be?
• 36:48
  Shalin Desai: To make people realize what the real happiness is.
• 36:53
  Dr. Ramesh: And um, what's the best advice that you have ever received?
• 36:57
  Shalin Desai: I don't I can't think of one such thing, but at the end of the day, what I've heard is that it's all going to work out, yeah.
• 37:04
  Dr. Ramesh: Great, and it's a wonderful affirmation.
• 37:07
  Dr. Ramesh: We're coming close to the end of our interview, but I want to record a meditation practice with you.
• 37:20
  Dr. Ramesh: And of course, I'm very curious if you have time to share with me my past and my my future.
• 37:26
  Shalin Desai: We'll do that.
• 37:27
  Shalin Desai: We'll do that.
• 37:27
  Shalin Desai: So, usually the meditations we conduct for 15 minutes or so, but I can do something short for five minutes with every ice cream.
• 37:35
  Shalin Desai: And after that, we can do the live scanning and then we'll keep it simple that way and uh call it a day.
• 37:43
  Shalin Desai: Yeah, yes, it will be lovely.
• 37:46
  Dr. Ramesh: Yes, so and uh uh do do I uh stay uh on uh and participate in the meditation as you're doing it?
• 37:55
  Shalin Desai: Yes, yes, yes, right.
• 37:56
  Shalin Desai: So let's close our eyes.
• 38:08
  Shalin Desai: Take a breath in and breathe out.
• 38:18
  Shalin Desai: Become aware of any noises that you hear.
• 38:23
  Shalin Desai: Noise of any people talking in the background, any traffic, noise of a fan.
• 38:44
  Shalin Desai: Accept all the noises.
• 38:50
  Shalin Desai: You are in complete surroundings, you're in complete acceptance with your surroundings.
• 39:32
  Shalin Desai: Given to you by nature, just love your body.
• 39:40
  Shalin Desai: Take a breath in and breathe out.
• 44:22
  Shalin Desai: And slowly and gradually, when you feel complete, you may open your eyes.
• 44:33
  Shalin Desai: Thank you.
• 45:00
  Shalin Desai: Yes.
• 45:02
  Shalin Desai: Quick and easy.
• 45:04
  Dr. Ramesh: Yeah.
• 45:05
  Dr. Ramesh: And uh it's like uh time just stood still.
• 45:10
  Shalin Desai: Yeah.
• 45:13
  Shalin Desai: So like that, I'll share the app with you.
• 45:15
  Shalin Desai: We can share it with your viewers.
• 45:17
  Shalin Desai: It's something any anybody and everybody can go on the app and start doing those meditations.
• 45:22
  Shalin Desai: That'd be great.
• 45:24
  Dr. Ramesh: It's late for you.
• 45:25
  Dr. Ramesh: Thank you so much for spending.
• 45:27
  Shalin Desai: Wonderful connecting with you.
• 45:28
  Shalin Desai: Wonderful.
• 45:29
  Shalin Desai: Thank you.
• 45:30
  Dr. Ramesh: Yeah, listeners, if you've been listening and enjoying the Thriving in the Age of Disruption podcast series as well as our Mastery Effect Podcast Series, we'll appreciate it very much.
• 45:41
  Dr. Ramesh: If you can share with us the topics that are close to your heart so that we can source the relevant uh experts and change makers and have them be on our show, do comment below and let us know where you are commenting from and what is it that is of biggest concern to you.