Whenever people asked me what my personal favorite podcasts are, I always struggled to answer this. I always responded with a smile — “how can you differentiate among your children, who’s your favorite and who’s not?”
I found myself repeating the same and realized that it’s time to write about it. When something keeps appearing in life, it’s a sign from life telling us something. Better to listen to life as one of my friends says life gives you a curriculum. Well, I finally decided to write about it rather than dodging this question every time.
Yes, every podcast episode is very dear to me as so much work goes behind the scenes. To shortlist my favorite ones was challenging and I had to think about some criteria to limit the list.
The criteria are:
I’ve become friends with the guests.
The podcast did exceptionally well beyond my expectations and self-judgments.
The podcast was very self-satisfying to me even though it didn’t do very well in terms of downloads.
Guests introduced me to their friends for future guest potential. Therefore, I’ve interviwed 185+ experts from different areas.
They have coached me in some capacity.
Guests promoted the hell out of the podcast on their social platforms and newsletters.
Below is the list of podcasts. This list is in the decreasing order of publishing date. It’s not in the order of my favorites.
Thank you to all of you to make The Nishant Garg Show successful and take it to the next level. It would not have been possible without your support. I hope this mission will help you live mindfully and learn new habits and routines to live with abundance and manage the struggles and challenges of life.
Here is a list of the Top 30 episodes downloaded/listened to in the decreasing order of the downloads in 4-5 weeks of publishing an episode. Each episode is unique and dear to me. I owe a huge thank you to all the listeners and guests on the show.
Please enjoy. Thank you so much for all your support. Your support drives me to do the work. This belongs to you all.
The Nishant Garg Show:
This show and blog is about helping Entrepreneurs, Tech Founders, Startup Enthusiasts develop Emotional and Mental health and be more human in their work and personal lives. I interview entrepreneurs, authors, mental health professionals, leadership executive coaches, psychologists, and many more For any questions, please contact me. If you have enjoyed listening to my podcasts, please subscribe to the new podcast updates on Itunes please provide your reviews on Itunes which will really help me.
This post is a selected excerpt from my interview with Ora Nadrich. I read the whole transcript and highlighted the important sections that I personally want to read and revisit. For my own convenience, I decided to put the highlighted sections in this post so that you can also learn something new or remind yourself of the things you already know.
Check out her new book Mindfulness and Mysticism: Connecting Present Moment Awareness with the Higher States of Consciousness.
Upon awakening, I try and retrieve a dream. I’ve done a lot of dreamwork over the years. I love to dream catch. I love to not hurry out of bed but to try and remember the journey that I took in a dream state, which is your unconscious. And, I love to spend some time in bed doing that. I never jump out of bed quickly, or I do a bit of meditation in the morning — a breathing meditation, and it’s really more of a meditation of gratitude. I really acknowledge that I’m one more day alive and connected to the breath. So it’s a mindfulness-awareness meditation upon awakening.
My dream work has been very extensive and there’s something called dream interpretation or dream amplification. And really what I encourage people to do with the work that I do, which is in the area of mindfulness, which is the practice of being aware. And I say, take a couple of minutes just to see if you can retrieve a dream because it might have a very special message for you that your unconscious presented to you in a dream state and and it can be really very illuminating
Cultivating a calm state of being:
I think each of us has our own true nature which is the essence or perhaps what can also be called one’s Buddha-nature. It’s just really maybe who we are and I think that if we accept who we are and we allow for our true essence to come forward, we can discover that it is probably much calmer than when we are engaged in life. French philosopher, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, which says we are spiritual beings having a human experience. And it’s our human experiences that really sometimes take us out of those calm states.
Mo Edjlali is the Chief Community Organizer of Mindful Leader, our mission is to enable people to foster the advancement of mindfulness and compassion in the workplace. He has served as a board member or advisor to multiple non-profits including Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC, Insight on the Inside, Minds Incorporated, Think Impact, Art for Humanity, and Hungry for Music.
Mo is a serial entrepreneur and has over 20 years of experience in management, technology, and marketing for start-ups, non-profits, F500 companies, and government agencies. He graduated with a B.S. in Computer Engineering from Virginia Tech. In his free time, he likes to go on toddler safe adventures, sometimes he takes his toddler, baby girl, and wife along too.
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As the saying goes, if you don’t have twenty minutes to practice meditation, practice for an hour.
Being mindful means that we must feel every emotion we experience in every moment, without disengaging and letting our emotions manage us.
This post highlights a written interview with Keren Tsuk, Ph.D. I sent her a few questions and she’s been kind enough to send me the responses. It’s my honor to bring forth her experiences in this short post. I’ve absolutely loved her answers which feel meditative to me.
Keren Tsuk, Ph.D., is a keynote speaker, consultant, and thought leader in 21st-century leadership sought-after speaker, As the founder and CEO of consulting firm Wisdom To Lead, she specializes in the development of senior management teams and corporate leadership. Tsuk guides companies and senior management teams to reach their full potential using various techniques in the field of mindfulness. She is also the author of Mindfully Wise Leadership: The Secret of Today’s Leaders.
Nishant: What books—or even movies and documentaries—would you recommend to someone who wants to live a meaningful life? What books have you gifted the most, and why?
Keren: One book that had a deep impact on me was The Alchemist, about an Andalusian shepherd boy named Santiago who consults a Gypsy fortune-teller about the meaning of a recurring dream. The fortune-teller interprets the dream as a prophecy, telling the boy that he will discover a treasure at the Egyptian pyramids. After Santiago sets out, he meets various people on his journey. From everyone, he learns something about the world, and, in particular, he learns how to realize his true self from a wise alchemist. As he progresses, his challenges increase. He needs to believe in himself and in the journey. The story demonstrates that to fulfill our calling in the world, we need to search within ourselves, while also being open and curious to the signs outside that help us find our path.
I truly believe that each of us has wisdom, and nobody can know about ourselves more than we each do. This is the reason I called my company Wisdom To Lead: In order to lead, we need to connect to the wisdom within ourselves.
What touched me most from this book is that even on our challenging paths, everyone has a present to bring to the world. This present is our unique quality and calling in the world.
In order to fulfill your calling, you will also need to find your unique path. While you move forward in life, and people around you will show you the way, give you signs, open doors for you, and connect you to the people you need to meet to fulfill yourself. They will teach you what you need to learn along the journey. And as you go in your path, you need to connect deeper to your inner self and overcome fears and distractions. And as we get closer to our treasure and fulfillment, the challenges get bigger and we may have to face our fears. However, this is a sign that we are on the right path. We need to dare to get out of our comfort zones to experience the meaningful lives we wish for ourselves.
Another meaningful book is: When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times by Pema Chodron, which teaches us how to handle uncertainty and adversity. When I read the book, it gave me a wider perspective on challenging situations and how to handle them. Each and every one of us goes through tough times especially today under pandemic conditions that are transforming the world. We are experiencing uncertainty, ambiguity, and complexity. It looks like the uncertainty is here to stay. This is why being present and being able to navigate in uncertain and challenging times is a crucial skill that we need to embrace and nourish.
At the beginning of her book, Chodron shares a difficult experience she went through when her husband divorced her and her life fell apart. She felt a lot of anger and fear. However, this turning point brought her closer to her mission in life, as she encountered Buddhism and went on a path to become a teacher. In the end, she was thankful for the experience, and that is a major theme of the book—the idea that life is all beginnings and endings. Moreover, she talks about becoming familiar with fear and looking it right in the eye so that we can really come to terms with what we feel that we cannot address. This resonated with me so much; this is what being mindful truly means. Being mindful is to feel our various emotions without disconnecting from them, and choosing freely how to react instead of being managed by our own feelings and emotions. So, if I feel fearful right now, I will accept that —that part of me feels scared right now but I won’t let this fear paralyze me. Acknowledging fear allows us to keep on going toward our goals.
“Mindfulness is about having a regular daily commitment to a kind of practice that is about awakening and awareness, in a very deep way, that is ongoing for one’s life.“
Rhonda
Rhonda V. Magee (M.A. Sociology, J.D.) is a Professor of Law at the University of San Francisco and an internationally-recognized thought and practice leader focused on integrating mindfulness into higher education, law, and social change work. A prolific author, she draws on law and legal history to weave storytelling, poetry, analysis, and practices into inspiration for changing how we think, act and live better together in a rapidly changing world.
Born in North Carolina in 1967, Rhonda experienced a childhood of significant trauma and challenge. Yet, she was gifted with the insight that through a life of caring engagement, self-development, and service with others, she could find a way up and out. She has dedicated her life to healing and teaching in ways that support others in a journey to wholeness and justice. A student of a variety of Buddhist and other wisdom teachers, including Norman Fischer, Joan Halifax, and Jon Kabat Zinn, she trained as a mindfulness teacher through the Oasis Teacher Training Institute of the University of Massachusetts Center for Mindfulness.
She teaches mindfulness-based interventions, awareness, and compassion practices from a range of traditions. A former President of the board of the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society, Professor Magee is a Fellow of the Mind and Life Institute, where she recently completed a two-year term on its steering council. She is a member of the board of advisors of the University of Massachusetts Center for Mindfulness and the board of directors for the Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute.
Rhonda has served as a guest teacher in a variety of mindfulness teacher training programs, including those sponsored by the Mindfulness Awareness Research Center (2017, 2018), led by Diana Winston, the Engaged Mindfulness Institute, led by Fleet Maull (2017, 2018), and the Center for Mindfulness (2017), led by Saki Santorelli and Judson Brewer. She serves as daylong or retreats co-leader and solo teacher at centers including Spirit Rock Meditation Center, the Garrison Institute, the Shambhala Mountain Center, the Omega Institute, Esalen, and New York Insight Meditation Center.
This podcast is brought to you byNewsletter. If you’d like to learn more about what I am reading, new documentaries, what I am learning new, recent podcast updates, things I am experimenting with, or anything —which I share extensively in my weekly short and sweet “Friday Newsletter”. No spam ever! I hate that too!
Dr. Romila “Romie” Mushtaq, M.D., ABIHM, is a neurologist, mindfulness teacher, sought out keynote speaker, and never-to-recover chocolate addict. She is the first Chief Wellness Officer for a corporation of 5,000+ employees in the United States (Evolution Hospitality), integrative medicine specialist, and mindfulness expert who has impacted over 1.1 million lives across the world through her keynotes and corporate workshops on mindfulness and brain health.
Dr. Romie entered neurology at a time when less than 5% of neurologists were women. After reaching the pinnacle of “success” while working 80-100hr weeks and achieving her career milestones, she developed a rare, nearly-lethal health disorder. This experience sparked a shift towards mindfulness, meditation, and integrative medicine and led to her current path of shifting the minds of Fortune 500 leaders, organizations, and corporations through science-based meditation talks and workshops.
With nearly 20 years of expertise and her signature style, energy, and sass, Dr. Romie delivers dynamic corporate wellness keynotes and workshops, corporate leadership lectures, and business wellness consulting. She is an in-demand speaker with a popular TedX talk on “The Powerful Secret of Your Breath” and she is featured in NBC, Fox Business, Inc, CBS, Huffington Post, NPR, and dozens of other national media outlets. Dr. Romie has worked with Grammy-award winning musicians, top NBA/NFL/PGA athletes, and Fortune 500 company executives.
This podcast is brought to you byNewsletter. If you’d like to learn more about what I am reading, new documentaries, what I am learning new, recent podcast updates, things I am experimenting with, or anything —which I share extensively in my weekly short and sweet “Friday Newsletter”. No spam ever! I hate that too!
Download this audio by right click and choose “save as”
Resources from Dr. Romie:
Busy Brain test: If you have a busy brain? Take this 4-minute FREE test to see if brain DRAIN is robbing you of your sanity and sleep
Brain Shift course: For the first time ever, brainSHIFT Protocol is being offered to the public! This unique, 6-week program teaches you the microhabits you need to improve your sleep, energy levels, and professional success.
Nina Paul is a mindfulness instructor for adults and teens. She has taught workshops in Virginia, led courses for teens in the Fairfax County school system, and is a Lecturer of Mindfulness at the George Washington University in Washington, DC, working with college students, staff, and faculty to incorporate fundamentals of mindfulness into their everyday lives.
Nina has received training in Mindfulness through UCLA’s Mindful Awareness Research Center, Mindful Schools, the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction -Teens (MBSR-T) program, and the National Institute for the Clinical Application of Behavioral Medicine. She is trained to teach mindfulness to youth through the .b Mindfulness for Teens Curriculum certification (UK), Mindful Schools K-12th curriculum training and MINDS INC’s High School Mindfulness Curriculum Training. Nina is also a Practitioner in Training through the EFT Universe.
This podcast is brought to you byNewsletter. If you’d like to learn more about what I am reading, new documentaries, what I am learning new, recent podcast updates, things I am experimenting with, or anything —which I share extensively in my weekly short and sweet “Friday Newsletter”. No spam ever! I hate that too!
Between the period of 1994 and 1997, you were working as a Montessori teacher, educating children on being aware of their bodies to understand themselves.Could you elaborate on that experience of yourself?
How did you raise your own children and what was your parenting style?
How old were you when you entered into therapy?
After you went into therapy, what changes or breakthroughs did you observe in your own self?
What advice would you give to someone who maybe looking for a therapist?
At what point in your life did you enter into mindfulness space?
What was the underlying cause of your anxiety and distress? Was there any childhood connection?
I want to touch upon healing modalities. You have been in therapy for a while. So what different healing modalities have you tried or practiced on your own?
How do we practice Emotional Freedom Tapping(EFT) technique?
Could you describe about your meditation practice now? How much time do you spend in your meditation every day?
You mentioned that you manage your stress well now. What is your relationship with stress?
You are also an emotional resilience coach. So how do you help people?
You are also a lecturer of mindfulness at the George Washington university in Washington, DC. So what does a lecturer of mindfulness do?
Could you recommend some resources in terms of books, blogs, or online resources to live a calm better life?
And, much more
The Nishant Garg Show:
This show is about helping you live a fulfilled life and my job on this show is to sit with the world class experts to extract the practices, routines and habits to help you live a fulfilled and abundant life. For any question, please contact me.
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