This blog series is my offering to you, a chance to see how Ayurveda is weaved into my life & how you can apply these principles to your own life.

SETTLING IN

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How many of us look back to reflect on what we have achieved?

Generally I am not one for looking backwards, firmly believing that, from experience, living in the present brings the most joy. The past cannot be changed but for the purposes of assessing progress I think the occasional glance backwards can still provide plenty of insights.

I do this with a careful watch to not become critical. This isn’t about highlighting what went wrong or where I could have been better. This is about growth and how far I have come.

If you have been following along you will know that:

a) I retired from corporate life after 30 years

b) Have transitioned from my pitta years to my vata years (hello post 50!)

c) Founded Inner Nourishment

So what have my recent reflections shown me?

I am naturally pitta dominant. This shows up in my drive and ambition, my desire to perform well and to achieve. My venture into the wellness industry has proved rather interesting, as has my relationship with social media.

A year or so ago I began noticing. The two different voices. Pitta asking to add one more thing, another piece of training, another type of offering, a rebrand and website upgrade. Changing the goalposts or success markers. Not because I was getting it wrong as such but more that the energy required me to keep doing, to keep chasing.

But Vata was speaking a different language. Showing me a different way. Vata was asking for space to breathe, to let things be fluid. Vata showed me that the box wasn’t really a box at all.

My Pitta brain wanted actions and rules while my Vata brain wanted creativity and flow. Neither were wrong, just different.

So where did that lead me?

With Love

Claire

What I have learnt is that balance is required in all things, that is it ok to have some drive to take Inner Nourishment where I want it to go but that it is also ok to allow it to flow. I have learnt to listen to my Vata voice more often, to allow my decisions to be based on what I feel rather than metrics and expectations.

I am no longer grasping at standard measurements. Over a thousand followers on a platform doesn’t equate to anything other than a thousand followers. 3 likes are better than no likes.

The real lesson has been in what I genuinely feel, what really nourishes me. I never expected to be writing like this, sharing my life on the interweb (albeit only a small slice of it). The teaching is less of a surprise, in my corporate world I loved to nurture and mentor people, there is so much satisfaction in that. But Ayurveda is a different kind of teaching, my old world had a right and wrong answer, Ayurveda is more nuanced. It is a lived experience not a set of rigid rules. This is often misunderstood. Which is why I write about it. I want to share my experience so others can see what it could look like for them not what it has to be.

My environment is as Sattvic as possible. And yes, that does mean limiting some of my old activities (late night parties, trips to London, over committing and attempting to say yes to every social offering!) I have written about my home environment too, it has grown into a sanctuary for peace and serenity. That is not to say we don’t have busy family gatherings and lots of visitors, it just means they happen a little less often. When I am not entertaining my home returns to a place of rest and study and nourishment. I have found that it is possible to have both, they just feature in a more balanced way these days.

My relationship with myself and others has shifted, I judge less. We all walk a path that is right us, our Dharma, our life’s purpose, will show us the way. I have learnt to trust in myself and to allow others do the same for themselves too.

For me, Sattva is as much a mindset and perspective shift as it is an action or behaviour. During those family gatherings now I can take a moment to sit, listen and observe rather than needing to constantly perform as a host. I can take a quiet moment to feel enormous gratitude for the life I have.

Looking back there are many lessons learned, there are some measurable successes but mostly the win is about where I am now. I have grown, not just in building a wellness practice but in understanding myself. In understanding what lights up my world, the feeling of Inner Nourishment hasn’t changed but what the shape of it has changed massively.

The original ideas have morphed into something that I now feel settled in. The recent addition of The Veranda is to complement what Inner Nourishment provides, wholly aligned but actually two different threads. Same values, same lens, same resonance.

I resisted adding to my social media load but decided that The Veranda needed its own space (well that’s what the Vata voice was saying!!). A space of its own with its own rhythm and texture. Ultimately there wasn’t a winner, I needed the Vata voice to follow where the flow was heading but I needed the Pitta energy to make it happen. I now have a Substack account where this blog is now published but it also has an arm to allow for my little musings From The Veranda. There is a new space for The Veranda on Instagram and Facebook, not something I expected Vata to approve of! I felt like it needed its own space. I continue to teach Classical Ayurveda but I have a better capacity to share the lived experience this way.

It started out with lots of drive and enthusiasm for building a business, excitement about new and shiny things. As a numbers girl I fell into the trap of thinking followers and likes was a measure of success – I now know that it isn’t a measure of my success!

Then I wanted to know how long this would all take to build, would I have a thriving business in a year? Two years? Longer? The frustration of not having a straight path from A to B started to creep in. My old world was very linear, very regulated with very well known and expected outcomes. I realised that I wasn’t very well prepared for this new way of being. It felt uncomfortable at times and I questioned whether I was cut out for this kind of work.

And actually I didn’t want to call it work, that felt uncomfortable too.

Being honest with myself also allowed me to see that I really didn’t have a proper plan for Inner Nourishment. All I knew was what it would feel like, not what it would look like. I didn’t know what success looked like either so how could I measure something that wasn’t even defined.

In came more frustration, watching this person on social media doing something ‘successfully’, seeing someone I know being ‘successful’. How long did I need to ‘look’ like that?

The interesting answer was that I didn’t need or want to look like that. That was not my life, their story was their own, not mine.

I can now see that I was moving out of pitta both physically and mentally and spiritually. And that was a lot of adjusting going on

The lesson isn’t about whether another account is the right or wrong path, the lesson is about what resonates with my values and my goals and my purpose. I had to lean into how that felt as an outcome, my new found flow was taking me somewhere I had been moving away from. It felt at odds with my stance on social media. But finding a resonant audience is about being available, I see the new account as a signpost, there will be no mass marketing campaigns, no reach no grasping. I will resist looking at the professional dashboard and trust that those ready to find me will have their path illuminated for them. I am here and I am newly settled, not rushing off to do something new or to move the goalposts. The metaphorical veranda will always have seats available.

The change is in how I imagine them to be filled. In fact my overriding question is ‘are you one of my twelve’? Are you the one ready for change, ready for deeper, meaningful work rather than a trendy wellness checklist.

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