Healthy And Happy In My Own Way

 It's always one thing after the other. No rest.That's life in big cities. Always a mad rush. And for the working women ? No less than a madhouse. Heard of Mumbai Madness ? Ask me !

You have to rise before the sunrise to set the ball rolling. You spin around the house like a top, quickly ticking the morning rituals. Getting ready for the office, helping all others at home to get ready, cooking breakfast and lunch for tiffin. All this in jet speed to catch the train to your workplace on time. 

In the office, meeting after meeting or working at your desk.

Reverse gear in the evening. Immediately after reaching home, you start cooking dinner, help children with their homework and projects and other endless household chores. Not to forget the numerous social commitments as well. Sounds familiar ? 

No wonder ! Wonder Woman is a fictional character mind you ! The Real Woman is caught in a whirlwind all through the day, every day.

How are you supposed to feel when your doctor tells you one fine day that you are becoming overweight, the lipid profile and other values do not look good, so you need to exercise regularly and religiously. 

What do you mean ? Am I not working too hard already ? ?

No, not really. 

What ??? As the minions would say.

Good Lord ! When do I find the time to WORKOUT ? As if I am not overloaded with work already. But then, since it is the doctor's verdict, you can't ignore.

Wondering what to do and how to do, I chanced upon the Saffola #ApneTareekeSeHealthy creative.

Hmmm...That did make sense to me and set me thinking. Slowly I started getting ideas with exercise on my mind all the time. 

An advisory was issued by the Home Ministry. Dos and Don'ts. Because everyone's health had to be taken care of. Not just me. Here you go ! Wanna try ?

I spend a lot of time standing in the kitchen while cooking goes on. Instead of just standing while the gas burners did the actual cooking, I started jogging on one spot, sometimes even flapping my arms. 

Yogasanas in standing postures, sitting postures, while lying down also. 

I discovered that sweeping and mopping the floor burns a lot of calories. So apart from the cleaning by the domestic help once a day, I stopped leaving the mess to be cleared next day. Mess up as much as you want but clean up immediately.

Dusting is a must in the land of Heat and Dust. More is less. By the time you finish one round of dusting, another layer of dust settles down on all surface. So the rule is... shake a leg while you are at it and the music is on...

Extra points for getting up to answer the doorbell every time it rings and to fetch your own glass of water. Get up ! That's the fitness mantra !

I turned all our office parties and social get-togethers into dance parties. That turned out to be a lot of fun ! 

The path from the local train station to my office is lined with lush green trees. I calculated and realized that the time I took to walk from the station to office was the same as the time bus took to navigate through the traffic !

When I accompanied my children to the swimming sessions, I started walking around the swimming pool while the children trained.

On the weekends, I played and cycled with my kids. 

I also made it a point to do yoga mudras and acupressure while commuting. That gave me the mental strength to fight the daily stress.

Eat everything but not too much of anything. Choose wisely. Even the minions patronize the bananas !

Soon it made a difference in my stamina. It took me lesser time to do strenuous jobs. Above all, I felt cheerful all day.

I had learned my lesson. It is next to impossible to find time exclusively for a strict regimen. But it makes life more full of life if you just play along. Behave as if you are a participant in a reality show. Minus the melodrama of course ! 

The challenge is to be healthy and happy. 

Having fun all the time !

I am joining Saffola #ApneTareekeSeHealthy initiative and sharing my ways of being healthy in association with BlogAdda

The Box

The doorbell rang. The shrill note woke him up from his reverie.

Raghav had been sitting on the balcony watching the shades of twilight. His mind was blank and his heart seemed to sink with the sunset. The doorbell sound saved him from drowning in sadness.

Raghav walked up to the door and opened it. It was the courier boy who greeted him with a grin and handed him a big box. As Raghav retired again to the balcony carrying the box, he wondered who must have sent the box and what was inside it.

He sat down heavily and looked at the box with indifference. He did not feel like opening it. But then he wanted to be done with it, so he started opening it slowly removing all the tape which was all over the surprise box.

As he listlessly did the job he thought how passive and lifeless his life had become after Revati had separated from him. Their only child Reeva was now in the boarding school as her parents tried to figure out what had gone wrong between them and how to deal with it. Differences had overcome the common bond between them which was love. How and why did that happen ? Neither of them had a clue. It just happened and shattered their happiness.

The box was now open. There were many smaller boxes or packets inside. All of different shapes and sizes. What was there in those boxes? Who had sent them? What for?

As he took out the boxes one by one, he noticed they were all sort of DIY - Do It Yourself kits. At the bottom of the box was an envelope. He picked it up. There was a note inside by....Reeva ? Oh ! so the box was from Reeva. What was the need for her to send him this box with a note? Raghav started reading the note eagerly.

"My dearest Papa,

I don't know why Ma and you have stopped living together. What I know is that living away from each other has made both of you sadder than you were before separation. Papa, I do not want to put pressure on you to be together because of me. But I want to tell you all the same that I am happy living together as a family with both of you. Do you think we can give ourselves one more chance ?

Here is the deal. I am sending both of you a couple of DIY kits. I have been very upset in the last few months. So are you. Both of you. The difference is that I am in a school. So I am still learning. Learning the tricks of the trade ? Well ! You could say that. One day our class teacher gave us an assignment which was a kind of DIY stuff, an assortment of all sorts of things. We were asked to create something out of it. Points for the originality of the idea. 

It was fun Papa. The results surprising. Every one of us had made something we could be proud of. The teacher said, " That was the whole idea children. What you have in life is what you make of what you have. "

That's it, Papa. All of a sudden it struck me. Life is a box of assorted Do It Yourself toolkits. Not everything is to our liking. Whatever it is, it belongs to us. Life provides the stuff. The ideas have to be our own. We can do our best and make out of it what we can. And have fun while we work on it.

Perhaps, it will not be a perfect situation. But Papa can we not try to have fun together working on our own things to do ? You and Ma know better of course !   

If life is a box of individual assignments and assessments, can we not try to figure it out together ?

‘This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for Indian Bloggers by BlogAdda.’

अपने मन की भी कहना

नदी में बहते पानी
सरोवर में खिले कमल
पहाड़ों पर जमी बर्फ़
खेतों में खिली सरसों
बच्चों से भरी स्कूल बस
पुल पर से गुज़रती रेल
कच्चे पक्के घरों
शतरंज के मोहरों
सियासती पैंतरों
किस्मत की लकीरों
अपनों की बेरुखी
पुरानी चोट की पीर
वक़्त की बेअदबी
झरने सी हँसी
जानलेवा रूप
खिली खिली धूप
सामाजिक मसले
रिश्तों के पचड़े .. 

और ऐसी तमाम बातें  . .
इन सबके बारे में लिखना ।

जब सब कह चुको ।
वेद पुराण बाँच चुको,
तब एक बात,
बस एक बार,
अपने मन की भी कहना ।