Oneness JOURNAL

“Namita, pack your bags. Come soon. Get the next ticket as soon as possible.” My mother was calling from Mumbai. My brother and I were home in Rajkot. “Your medical examination is tomorrow. Then there is one day off, and after that you have your visa interview.” My brother was almost jumping beside me. I […]

When I moved to the Washington, D.C. area at twenty-one, I believed I knew what would be difficult about starting over in a new country. I knew the winter as numbers. Numbers told me little about how a windy evening would feel while I waited half an hour for a bus, standing without any shelter, […]

A poster of Swami Vivekananda hung on my childhood bedroom wall. An orange sunrise filled it, and beside him ran the sentence I grew up under: “Arise, awake, and stop not till the goal is reached.” I had chosen a monk for my wall. He was my ideal. I was drawn to intellect, spiritual depth, […]

How a multi-passionate child learned to fold her wings By the time I reached tenth standard, I already knew I could become many things. As a child, I participated in almost every activity available to me. If there was a cultural program, dance, singing opportunity, essay contest, drawing activity, or elocution competition, I wanted to […]

The Sign I Could Not Hide It began beside my mouth. A rough patch near my lower lip. Another along my cheek. Small enough to explain. Winter air. A new product. Something I had eaten. For years, my body had given me signs I could manage privately. This one followed me into meetings. It appeared […]

On the difference between being looked at and being seen The way he looked at me had a name, although I did not know it then. I first saw it on the day we met. I had grown up with an image of how a man in love would look at a woman. Books had […]

My body knew before I did. This is the first story in a series about the ways a body keeps the score. My body knew before I did. Before the marriage, I was full of energy. Full of cheer. I was in my early twenties, new to America, and curious about everything. A whole country […]

Why self-definition begins with awareness of the beliefs you never knew you wrote My mother was braiding my hair when she said it, out of nowhere: it was good to have modesty when it comes to beauty. She lived that principle herself. She was simply seeing it in me. My mother valued education. She valued […]

In my mid-twenties, before I became anyone’s wife, my mother used to joke that marriage might finally give my giving one place to go. She said it with love, half-teasing and half serious, because she had watched me move through life like someone who could not see a need without wanting to meet it. If […]

I pick up small things intuitively, long before most people notice them. A meeting that has yet to happen will feel wrong, so I cancel it, and the reason I was right to cancel reveals itself later. I walk toward a coaching session, and I already know the real direction it will take, before a […]