How to handle holiday anxiety?
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This episode is for you if you feel holiday anxiety and already panicking about handling your emotions during this time. Pour a cup of your favorite hot beverage, and listen to this episode with complete awareness and attention. We are hopeful that you will take away some practical and helpful tips to handle the holiday anxiety this season!
Have any questions or curiosities about your spiritual journey? Email Chandresh at askcb@leelagurukul.com.
Episode Transcript
Relax, breathe in, breathe out, and remind yourself there is no rush in this moment. There is nothing to achieve in this moment. There is nothing to fix in this moment. Breathe in, breathe out, and wherever you are, invite the calmness, the clarity to fulfill your awareness, to gently expand in your heart and soul. I am Chandresh Bhardwaj and this is Leela Gurukul. Namaste, everyone. I hope you're feeling relaxed, grounded, and creative wherever you are. This episode is all about handling anxiety during your holidays, during your travels. There are going to be two parts of this episode. One is this one that you're listening, and the next one will be a short meditation that you can do in the morning, evening, afternoon, anytime you're experiencing anxiety.
And before we get into today's episode, I'm inviting you to apply for my Signature Conscious Meditation Program to cultivate your calmness, clarity, and courage. It's a program that's going to give you education, guidance, and accountability. The education part is covered by my lectures, my guided meditations, complete access to me through our circle space, where you can ask questions 24/7 and I'll be responding to you. The guidance part is covered by my two absolutely amazing supporting teachers. We'll be having one spiritual mentor, one accountability mentor to guide you, to hold the space for you. And three of us will be leading weekly group calls every week for 12 weeks. And, finally, the accountability part, wherever you feel stuck, lost, confused, we'll be there for you.
Our worksheets, our assignments, our homeworks are all stuff that's gently, carefully, and joyfully contained into a 12-week package. It's a gift that you deserve. It's a gift that's very lovingly curated for you. After you apply for the program, you and I, or one of the teachers from the Leela team will be having the intro call with you. In that call, we'll simply get to know each other. We'll get to know your goals, your vision, your challenges, and you'll get to know us a little better. If by the end of the call, we both feel that, yes, this is a great fit and we both got to dive into Leela's universe together, amazing, we'll make it happen for you. And if you feel, "This is not for me right now," that's absolutely okay too. We'll give you a virtual hug and we'll continue to swim together in this collective space together. Either way, I'm inviting you to apply, have a conversation, and see where it goes.
And now let's come back to the holiday anxiety that no one wants to go through. And this is also a topic that becomes so heavy and strong around the holiday season. I start to see the social media posts around it. I start to see blogs and videos around it. The holiday anxiety is interesting because it could happen to anyone, anytime. The people around you could trigger you. The environment around you could trigger you. The food may not work for you. Their opinions may not work for you. And many times what happens when you go back to your family or friends, they are still seeing you as the old you and your mind is also seeing them through the old memories, through the old stories. So it's a clash of the fear with anxiety. It's a clash of discomfort with fear. And when we do not pause and listen to the signs, it simply multiplies.
And I'll repeat again, they are seeing you as the old you and your mind is also seeing them as the old them. But if one of them shifts the perspective, things could be different. And in this case, I want you to be the one who will shift the perspective. And I'm asking you to shift for yourself. Don't worry about changing them. It's their journey to change themselves, but it's your responsibility to shift your journey, your mindset for your own good. And as we go deeper in this, I want you to remind, a yes is a promise and a no is a choice. And that's a beautiful gift during holidays. You could say yes to everything that blooms you, that brings you joy, that brings you strength, playfulness, and love. And at the same time, you could say no to anything that crosses the boundaries, no to everything that's limiting your joy, that's not honoring your strength, that's exhausting your calmness and clarity.
So each time you come across any situation, remind yourself a yes and no are available to me. A yes is a commitment to my joy, to my truth, and my no is a strong gatekeeper to everything that exhausts me and drains me in this moment. And as you start your traveling, as you start the holiday season, understand one thing about the energy in tantra we call sthan devata, which means the deity, the energy of that place. When the energy of a particular place is powerful, healing, strong, that place is abundant, you will experience joy, peace, creativity, harmony. But when the energy of that place is unconscious or lost, you'll experience, anxiety, fear, anger, conflicts. The money, the joy, the plants, nothing flourishes in that space. So when we travel to new places or when we travel to our own homes, the same old energy will show up for us.
And if you're feeling anxious or uneasy, there's a good possibility that the energy of that place is not in alignment with you. But the beautiful part is, just like all of us, every energy is looking for acknowledgement. It's looking for acceptance. And as you start to meditate, wherever you are staying, it could be Airbnb, your home, your parents' home, a hotel, take 10 minutes in the morning, 10 minutes in the evening to meditate and offer your gratitude, your acknowledgement to the seen and unseen energies of that place. Offer your acknowledgement to the known and the unknown energies of that place. As you offer that acknowledgement and gratitude, you'll notice there will be much more support, much more calmness, because everyone is looking for validation. Even the energies are looking for that safe acknowledgement from you. And when you do it from a place of love, it works, my friend. Secondly, no matter what happens during the day, you are not going to take anything personally. Okay? I'll repeat. No matter what happens during the day, do not take anything personally. We take things personally because our ego makes everything personal. Our ego makes everything a competition. You feel that you need to win that argument. You feel that you need to explain yourself. You feel that I have to walk out of this place with some brownie points. But you don't have to. Ego makes everything a place of battle. An awareness takes you out of battlefield into blooming field. So if that conversation or experience is not helping you bloom, it's okay. You could keep quiet. You could go for a walk. You could go into your own awareness and solitude. But do not indulge in a battle where nothing productive or meaningful will happen. When we stop taking things personally, no one can attack us. When you stop chasing compliments and stop defending criticism, no one can harm you. You become your most powerful hero.
So every day in every way, remind yourself, "I'll not take it personally." Because the mind will make everything about your identity. It will bring in the old information, the old memory. It will create a mess that you'll find very tough to solve. And mind loves that. But a simple promise to yourself of not taking things personally will change everything. And, thirdly, keep things simple. And by simple, I mean your food intake, keep it simple, your lifestyle in the new place, keep it simple. Do not consume too much. Do not consume too much food. Do not consume too much information. Do not consume too much energy of the people around you. And you could do that by simply having a lifestyle that's not only simple but also consistent and disciplined. For example, wherever I go and travel, I make it a point that every morning I'll go for a walk. If there's nowhere to walk around, I'll take a car, drive somewhere, and find a space to walk, or I'll simply enjoy the morning drive.
That's my recharging hour. You must walk, you must meditate in the morning. And in the night, set a boundary that after nine o'clock, you will get up and go to your room, that after a certain point, you will cut down your time there. If you don't honor this commitment to your own growth then please do not expect anybody else to honor your boundaries. It starts from you. It will always start from you. On that note, I'm sending you lots of love, calmness, and clarity, and, of course, courage that you acknowledge the energies around you, that you don't take anything personally, and above all, you'll keep a simple, consistent, and disciplined routine wherever you are. The next episode will be a short meditation, which I hope will help you further. Take care. May the teachings of tantra continue to guide you and heal you and I hope Leela Gurukul helps you to unlearn the old and embrace the unknown mystical possibility unfolding for you. To support this podcast, share it among the seekers who are ready for the next step in their spiritual path.
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