Mind Over Matter- Learn To Live In The Here and Now With Benaisha Kharas Dongre

As a part of our Nmami Life wellness series, we assure you to bring the best of health & wellness experts to help you gain the maximum wellness. Our sole motto is to bridge the gap of awareness when it comes to your health & wellbeing.

Guest of the week: Benaisha Kharas Dongre

“You make an impression when you have created a brand of yourself and the best way to create this brand is with your image.”

Benaisha Kharas is an Image Enhancer, Inspirational Speaker, and Fashion Style Expert.

She is passionate about helping her clients project an influential, charismatic, and stylish image in their personal and professional lives. She is the absolute expert in the art and science of personal style and image management. Infact, she is the“go to Image Builder” for women, young adults, corporates, and fashion houses. At IMPA (Image Management Professionals Association), Benaisha is the only youngest Senior Image consultant to facilitate expert classes across India. Fashion Magnet Anita Dongre highly endorses Benaisha’s expertise and has got her entire sales staff sell fashion and luxury, ‘The Benaisha Way’.

She is India’s youngest internationally certified Image Consultant since 2012, Benaisha has inspired and trained more than 2000 people to be Style, Image, and Fashion Conscious.

She has provided personal consulting to more than 250 HNI clients to present themselves with more poise and polish. Being dyslexic, yet incredibly popular in the media; Benaisha does not let her obstacles come in the way of her dreams. At the tender age of 10 when her teachers told her to go to special school, she chose to become her own hero and fight for her dreams. She graduated with double majors in sociology and entrepreneurship. After receiving a standing ovation for her TedxTalk, she again inspired thousands at ‘Kaggaz’, a forum for the youth and shared her vision of India’s Young Image. Education Times invited Benaisha to speak and motivate their audience on image and career. Gulf Times has appreciated her work done with Qatar Airways and Indian Women’s Association of Doha. Benaisha also made her presence felt on India’s first image management TV show ‘Image Banani Hein’ on Zoom TV. Benaisha helps her clients on color, style, wardrobe editing, personal shopping and dressing for those tricky events like weddings, interviews and dating. She also advises fashion houses on creating delightful customer experiences, artistically sell fashion and luxury, and effortlessly convert walk-ins into shoppers. Corporate Clients like BMW, Qatar Airways, Deloitte, Jeena & Co, and many more count on Benaisha for transforming their executives to be their Brand Ambassadors with strong communication, personal image and influence skills. She is deeply interested in working with differently abled children to inspire them to lead meaningful lives. She has also helped children who suffer from attention deficit disorder, hyperactivity, and down syndrome to regain their confidence and enhance their self-image. 

Benaisha, an avid lover of books, travel, and fashion; lives in Mumbai India. 

Excerpts from the Session

You can also watch the entire session video here:

https://www.instagram.com/tv/CC3XQmVHUl-/?igshid=ph3fxxt9mf58

But, for those who like to read or keep a note of the expert’s opinion, we bring the entire excerpt of the session so that you don’t miss out on anything. Here are the points that were covered in the live session:

The shift from ‘WHAT IF’ to ‘WHAT IS’

We all must have had a conversation about what happened or someone who always talks about past or future wishing this could happen and for you as a listener, it might be a little exhausting and they don’t get to seem to move in future.

We keep on using words like ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’ or ‘had this been better’ or ‘had I thought about this before’, life would have been so much better. We are always busy jumping between the past and the future. We are not seeing right now, what is right beneath our nose. We can change our words of “what if” to “what is”. It is important to be in the present and be relevant. We all want attention, be noticed, recognized and that’s human nature. People often tend to not like us because we might be cribbing too often. We need to focus on what’s happening right now to succeed rather than cribbing of what could have happened. 

In her words:

There’s no point of all the anticipation and assumption, why assume the future when you even don’t know what could happen right now. A lot of us live like this forever. A lot of people do many chores juggling or simultaneously doing multiple tasks so what if I ask what are you doing right now, you might not have an answer because you are not present at one place completely, doing one task consciously.

If you fight for everything and want to do everything together, you may land up nowhere.  You are one person- in singular format and in singular heart and body; you can’t be everywhere, know everything, and stay super updated and may miss out now. Let’s focus on now, with our lives, in current NOW and present NOW. 

When clients come to me- say mother and child or couples, and complain that they don’t listen to me or they fight a lot with me, I always ask about their behavior and they say he/she is always on the phone, or child says that when I talk or play with them, they are busy with their phones or watching TV. So you are not paying attention to what you are supposed to do. We always want to multitask and not pay attention to now.  

For example, we always prefer going to a specialist for any kind of problem in/with our body like for skin problems, we visit a dermatologist rather than a general practitioner so why not to specialize our time with what we are currently doing.  Why become so ‘AAM JANTA’? 

We are always living ahead of our time and people around you will soon start to repulse you by saying he has the health now, he has the family now, he has the money now, why is he not enjoying now? Outsiders can see what you have now, what you have always wished for and you have it now and you yourself cannot see it, we can often see it for others but why not for our own selves?

That’s another sad fact, delusion!

Take a pause, re-evaluate, are you living in now?

Do I understand that I need to focus on one thing alone?

Give full concentration to what you do, one thing at a time, go slow. Our communication skills get affected if we multitask, say when someone asks, ‘how was your day?’ and you just answer ‘fine’, or ‘what was there in that series?’ and you answer ‘nothing’, you land up not communicating with such answers, people lose motivation to talk further, instead share every detail with them, with your child, friends, spouse and if you just say ‘hmm..nothing’, you keep passing these traits to everyone else around you. They will also respond to you the same. Don’t give half attention. 

Another thing is if I am talking to somebody but you are busy fidgeting with the phone, you are not ignoring me but also insulting me; you are disrespecting that person and not giving full attention which is why we don’t have much to talk about these days.

Anxiety

A lot of us feel anxious, we have been nervous about something because we are anticipating, assuming, thinking what will happen, in fear of past saying that happened so it will happen again. We judge our present relationships with our past experiences. Pay attention to finer and smaller details of life, be a keen observer, saying ‘oh! you eat like this’ or ‘oh you like this color more’, it will help you understand the person better.

While talking, boosting the biggest thing human needs- that is attention if you listen carefully, they in return respect you. It builds your relationship with them, you listen to them patiently. If they are not willing to open up, don’t give up on that person so soon, sometimes people need a little nudge so do so. 

Organized Person is a better person

If you don’t structure and plan or don’t focus on one thing at a time, you cannot reach anywhere, you’ll keep feeling that there’s so much to do but I am not able to do enough. To know who you are and where you are, you always need a focus and structure to live in present, in now. 

How to tackle overthinking? 

Don’t compare your journey with others or don’t be afraid of trying to think that someone else or your friend had a bad experience so you’ll have a similar one. Go try it for yourself first. Overthinking starts with worrying too much about the future so avoid it. Don’t cross the bridge before it has even come, many times people even don’t get that bridge. 

How to begin with living in now?

Make a checklist, don’t let your mind drift away thinking, this is a bad decision, just say that its fine and its okay. Stick with your decision positively.

How to make children focussed?

When you start focusing on things, children ape the parents almost always. Stay highly motivated in telling your child about what they are doing and their benefits. Stay 100% in that space and not give up.

Career advise for girls in early 20’s

Make a list of pros and cons, don’t stress yourself into the future and do what you love. Don’t listen to people who would be there to tell you not to do it.

How to avoid holding onto the past?

Address your past, just by saying that I have moved forward won’t mean anything if you don’t accept it. Say that even if I don’t feel inadequate today, doesn’t mean that it will happen again. Don’t let the strings of the past let you hold behind as your future relationships will also be affected. Shut that door and don’t keep going back.

Conclusion

Think of what can you do now rather than what can happen tomorrow?

Yesterday has gone and today will be soon yesterday and tomorrow is still waiting to come, so make sure to be at least in Now, in today.

When they say the magic is inside you, what they really mean is take a moment, take a breath and see, appreciate and thank what all you’ve got today. Gratitude journals and books only work when you appreciate what you have now.

Think positively!

Footnote

Stay tuned for more such fun sessions every day on Nmami Life Instagram: https://tinyurl.com/ycbd3e47