July | 2013 | Namaste All Day

I am so honored and excited to introduce everyone to a new friend of mine Tejal Patel from Astitva Seekers. Her vision and mission resonated deeply with me. For those of you who follow my blog you know my mission is to encourage and inspire others to stay true to our authentic selves, Tejal is as authentic as they come! So grab a cup of tea sit down and enjoy this interview!

BIOGRAPHY:

Tejal Patel is a former divorce attorney, mediator and party girl who reinvented her life and became a new generation spiritual inspirer, children’s yoga teacher and Reiki healer. Tejal brings a real life perspective and practical tools to anyone of any faith and background living in this busy and relentless world. Tejal created Astitva Seekers, as part of a spiritual movement to empower others to live consciously, spread love and create lasting peace and happiness.

What is the name of your website/blog and How did you come with the concept?

The name of my website/blog is Astitva Seekers.

It took me some time to find the right name. Language is a manmade tool of thought. There aren’t always the proper words available to fully describe an experience. For example, moments when we are truly present and connected to our higher self, words do not a adequately describe the feelings and sensations. I wanted a unique word that evoked many characteristics and feelings.

Knowing the Hindi, I always believed Hindi and Sanskrit words were richer in definition than English words. Simply defined, Astitva means existence, but the original Sanskrit word has much more of a complicated and profound meaning.

According to the Cappeller Sanskrit English Dictionary,

Astitva is from the root word “Asti”, which means be, exist, happen, become, be present or at hand, belong to, be enough for, be able to, and turn to. The suffix “Itva” is similar to “ness” which gives Astitva a wide range of meanings and many definitions:

ASTITVA [us -TITHE-vah]
1. existence (exist-ness)
2. identity (belonging-ness)
3. be present (present-ness)
4. potential (becoming-ness)
5. capability (able-to-ness)
6. awareness (turn-to-ness)
7. Reality
Fascinated by the depth and meaning of “Astitva”, I knew it was the closest word that will ever encompass everything we strive to learn, become and master during our life on earth.

Astiva Seekers is a space for like minded seekers to feel supported, inspired and empowered to live consciously, spread love and create peace and happiness in their life.

What does the term “Astitva Seekers” mean to you?

An Astitva Seeker is someone who is searching to find answers to life’s big and important questions. They are seeking to understand how to be present and cultivate peace of mind in this busy, relentless and material world. It is someone who wants a connection between their “higher true self” and their personality. Someone who becomes aware of the subconscious and conscious mind. It is someone who taps into their unlimited power and life force energy to fulfill their life purpose. They are someone who does the inner work and healing to understand who they truly are. Most importantly an Astitva Seeker is looking to live consciously, spread love and create peace and happiness.

What inspired you to create this site?

During my own spiritual journey, I started to devour all the wisdom I could from books, self-help leaders and motivational speakers. I was excited to share the wisdom I learned with anyone who would listen. Though much of it resonated with me, I found that when I shared it with people with no spiritual background or interest, the concepts were too complicated for them to understand. I began to appreciate that not all people are at the same place in their journey. That didn’t mean they wouldn’t benefit from spiritual truth in their life.

We all face challenges and tests during our life path. I wanted to bring inspiring tools, universal truths, metaphysical principles and healing techniques in an easy to understand way to people of any background, beliefs, or faith. I believe the best way for me to help people is not to change them, but to help them reveal the best version of themselves. As we become the best version of ourselves, we will inspire others by our example to change. Simply stated- Change yourself, change the world.

Why do you feel that people, especially young people, need to hear this sort of inspiration?

Our generation is being faced with much pain and darkness. From the recession, to environmental issues, wars or cancer our world has more negative energy than positive energy circulating. In order to combat darkness, we need more seekers willing to spread messages of light, inspiration and love to the world.

As we become the best version of ourselves and live as an example of positivity, the people around us will be inspired to change. Our children will grow up with more centered parents which means they will have the tools to be the best they can be. If we change, our children will emulate us and essentially that could change the negativity in our world towards positivity. We all must do our part to be that catalyst of change.

What is one of your strongest messages on Astitva Seekers?

“Love is everywhere, choose to see it.” This is the mantra of the Spread the Love Challenge I created. Our life is based on our perceptions; shift your perception, and you will create a life beyond your wildest dreams.

What is the Spread the Love Challenge all about?

One of the biggest struggles I have had is keeping my pesky EGO in line. I have a bad case of monkey mind chatter.

Being an attorney, I was taught to analyze and use logical reasoning for every decision. I carried that over to every aspect of my life and overanalyzed everything. At one point, What if’s, should haves, could haves were my daily affirmations. Getting out of my head and into my heart has been a constant struggle. I realized it is a moment by moment practice we have to cultivate.

In order for me to stay present in each moment, I created a fun game.I made it my daily intention to search for love each day. The most common symbol of love and happiness are hearts. So I look for hearts in the most unexpected places.

My constant search for love throughout my day, helped check my EGO. The negative mental chatter stopped when I focused my attention on being in our natural state of love. I concentrated my energy to on find love, I found that my spirit was more elevated. This single act of searching for love has opened my heart to share love, compassion and kindness to everyone I met throughout my day. I try to be a living example of love each day.

I urge all my subscribers to join the Spread the Love challenge. Any subscriber who shares their pictures of love will be posted on my website so they can inspire others to see love in unexpected places.

Who inspires you?

CHILDREN!

We spend most of our adulthood undoing the limiting beliefs, fears and insecurities we learned as children or teenagers. We acquire this them by our parents, siblings, teachers and/or society. As my own mindfulness and yoga helped me deal with life challenges more effectively, I began to think if I only knew these techniques when I was younger, I could have saved a lot of mental anguish.

That was the catalyst for becoming a certified children’s yoga teacher. What if we gave our children the tools to incorporate yoga and mindfulness into their life? What if we spend 10 minutes each morning and evening mediating as a family? How would our lives change? How would our world change? These are the goals and questions that inspire me!

My desire to teach yoga and mindfulness to children is that even if one child takes the breathing techniques, positive affirmation or mindfulness skills with them, they could calmly handle challenging life situations. The implications of that excite me because our children have the power to change our world!

What are some road blocks you face in your life?

Like many people 20 and 30 something’s, I was living an inauthentic, material driven life that society accepts as “normal”. I was trying to find happiness from sources outside of me. I needed a man to feel complete, I defined my success by my salary and credentials, I determined my self-worth based on my external beauty and the clothes I wore, and I felt powerless without the approval of others. I didn’t value my body or mind and wasted away many weekends of my life partying and drinking.

By the time I was 25 years old, I found myself going down a path of bitterness, anger and jealousy. My life had become stagnant, blocked and filled with drama and negativity. I was stuck in an unfulfilling legal career, I suffered from shame, guilt and anger from years of unexpressed emotions. I suffered from severe low self-esteem and self-worth.

How did you overcome these road blocks?

By age 28, I reached my ultimate breaking point and asked the Universe for help and guidance to gain peace of mind and happiness. I randomly came across Oprah and Eckhart Tolle’s podcast on Itunes -A New Earth Fulfilling Your Life’s Purpose. That began my journey of self-discovery.

This determination to find the truth about life, started a remarkable journey of change. As I chipped away the layers of fear and healed past wounds, I was reminded of the innate wisdom of “who we truly are” that lies dormant within all of our subconscious minds.

I broke down each area of my life and pinpointed the limiting beliefs, my triggers, my emotions and how they were hindering me. My healing included introspection, inner work, meditation, soul searching & guidance from spiritual and self-help leaders. I had repressed my feelings for so long, I no longer knew what I felt. I utilized many tools to confront my fears and limiting beliefs. I journaled, to understand my feelings, used Gabrielle Bernstein’s May Cause Miracles to help change my perspective of fear to love. I used Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) to work through the negative charge of traumatic childhood events. Along my journey, I realized all the peace and happiness I was searching for was within myself all along.

When are you the most your “true self”?

Though I try to practice being present and connected to my higher self at all moments of my life, I find that it is always easier to tap into my true self when I am in nature, or engaging in activities that require a mind, body connection.

Even the feeling of the unseen breeze, watching clouds transform in the sky or embracing a beautiful sunset, I feel chills. That’s when I know my soul has truly connected to love. For some reason I completely resonate being around the ocean. I bet I will spend my retired life in a home overlooking the ocean.

Since I’ve given up drinking alcohol, I’ve freed up a lot of time to engage in activities that I loved to do as a child. I love bowling, painting, playing the piano, reading and writing. I would love to do any outdoor activity playing sports, treetop and zip-lining whatever that can get me outdoors.

What’s your favorite quote and why?

People are often unreasonable, illogical and self centered;
Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;
Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies;
Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;
Be honest and frank anyway.

What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight;
Build anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous;
Be happy anyway.

The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow;
Do good anyway.

Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;
Give the world the best you’ve got anyway.

You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and your God;
It was never between you and them anyway.

– Mother Theresa

I love everything what Mother Theresa stood for. This nicely sums up my mantra of life and guidelines I follow. Just because you are filled with light, positivity and calmness doesn’t mean that the people will come into contact with in our life are going to give you the same. We tend to put so much emphasis about what other people think of us, we take things personally when someone hurts our feelings, and we harshly judge ourselves and others. This quote puts everything in perspective. We put so much emphasis on other people but all along the most important relationship is between you and your god.

I feel like we are a society who wants a guidebook given to us about how to deal with life. I feel like this is the closest thing we have about the universal way of living our life. If we follow these principles, we will live a peaceful, content and happy life.

What does happiness look and feel like to you?

I’ll probably give you a more convoluted answer to this question than you anticipated.

I’ve realized happiness is an emotion and not a constant or natural state of being. Our natural state of being is love. We all say we strive to be happy but actually we want each moment of our life to bring us sensation of happiness. Quite honestly that is not the purpose of life. What we really strive for is peace of mind. Our lives are meant to have moments that will bring about feelings of happiness, sadness, anger, forgiveness, grief and the whole slew of messy emotions. They are all necessary for us to be whole individuals. No matter how spiritual of a life you pursue or how evolved you are, your life is filled with tests and challenges that will arise uncomfortable feelings. Will you be happy in those moments? Probably not, but if we are in a calm state of mind, will we handle those moments with clarity and ease.

So my happiness moments are when I’m playing with my niece Jayna, when I connect with someone on Astitva Seeker, taking in a beautiful sunset, when I teach a child a mindfulness technique, enjoying a healthy home cooked meal, traveling to a new country with my husband, when I’m on my mediation mat and each breathe I take.

Happiness feels like light, energetic life force flowing through me. Being connected to my higher true self and being fully present in that moment. I feel happiness when I am in the flow of life and allowing life to happen without any resistance or expectation.

Describe your dream day?

This is a great one. Especially cause I never really sat and thought about this before. I learned something new about myself when I was answering this. Doing that exercise I realized my dream day incorporated many of the things I already do. If you asked me 5 years ago I would have said my dream day would involve daytime drinking on Pacific Beach and partying at a bar in the evening. I’ve realized that simple pleasures bring me peace and happiness now. Enjoying home cooked meals, connecting to nature, trying new activities, quality time with others and carving out quiet time to connect with myself. My dream day would have a nice balance of all that.

If I could pick a specific place it would have to be my future dream home in Orange County California. But my dream day would be any warm summer day that is near a beautiful clear blue ocean.

Wake up and take a jog by the ocean to watch the sunrise.

Mediate in nature and do some outdoor yoga.

Take either a candlelight shower or outdoor shower(if available) with some of my favorite music playing.

Have a quiet breakfast outside on our patio with my husband with some of my favorite foods which would include a fruit bowl with lots of guava, pineapple and mango please. My green juice, water with mint, cucumber and lemon and Belgium waffles with Nutella.

Curl up on my sofa outside and read the spiritual book I’m devouring at that time.

Lunch – have some of my favorites prepared by my mom and mother in law. Have a wonderful lunch with my family, husbands family and siblings.. ( I think you can see a trend that my dream day has a lot of good and healthy food )

Write VLOG and Connect to some of my members on Astitva Seekers.

Play and connect with my pet bird=)

Do a fun activity or go play a sport. – I don’t discriminate but would love to go to Skyzone and get my rebounding, paddle boarding in the ocean or doing a treetop and ziplining adventure.

Dinner- have a dinner party at my house and invite my closest friends, my husband’s closest friends and our cousins. I’d probably have to prepare my classic Mexican food. Have great conversation, great food and play a board game maybe Quelf, Taboo, Rummikub or Sequence!

Wind down the day- Write in my Happiness Journal about the things I am most grateful for in the day.

Meditate for 10 minutes with my Om Harmonics and go to bed in my big comfortable bed with my favorite Sherpa blanket!

What does authenticity mean to you?

I could write a book about authenticity. =) I’ve struggled with authenticity for a large part of my life. What I now know to be true with much self-forgiveness, soul searching and healing is that being authentic is a daily practice. It is a moment-by-moment choice of embracing your truth and being courageous enough to share it with the world. Authentic people don’t allow their fears or others opinions prevent them from being themselves. When you have nothing to hide and you can freely be your true self with everyone, there is a profound peace and confidence you exude to the world. That to me is the essence of an authentic person.

Any tips or tools to lead a more authentic life?

As I mentioned, being authentic is an ongoing moment to moment decision. Before we can become authentic I think we have to do three following things.

Forgive and love ourselves – in order to show our “true selves”, we have to accept every aspect of ourselves which includes the good, the bad and ugly. As the bad comes up, learn from your past mistakes and be kind to yourself. You did your best. Once you know better, you will do better. Once you deal with your past, don’t dwell on it, let it go.
Be willing to make changes- we inherently resist changes even good changes because we have to get out of our comfort zone. Embrace your imperfections and own them. Share them with those that deserve to hear your story and commit on letting your true you shine out. Who you were yesterday is not who you are predetermined to be today. It is your choice to change.
Create a daily practice of living authentically by taking care of your mind, body and spirit. Creating new habits takes time, patience and will power. Carve out 30 days and dedicate yourself to cultivating the characteristics authentic people have.

I have written a wonderful article on Tiny Buddha on Authenticity (http://tinybuddha.com/blog/becoming-more-authentic-accept-yourself-and-stop-seeking-approval/) where I share the common traits authentic people share. Create a daily practice of cultivating those traits.

Join in the Spread the Love Challenge or subscribe to Tejal’s free weekly video blogs and mediations on :www.AstitvaSeekers.com

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