The Inspired Life
The Inspired Life
Unlocking Creativity Through Multidimensional Art Forms
Could exploring multiple art forms unlock hidden dimensions of your creativity? Join us in this enlightening episode of the Inspired Life Podcast as we sit down with the exceptionally talented Nenita Praveen. From the disciplined world of Bharatanatyam under Guru Smt. Rajeshwari Sainath to the liberating practices of Kalari and Silambam at the Daksha sheth Contemporary Dance Company, Nenita's artistic journey is nothing short of transformative. Discover how these varied experiences led to the creation of the Meenakshi Studio for Arts—an innovative space dedicated to cultivating thinking dancers and fostering a more inclusive approach to classical dance training.
We then traverse the often challenging landscape of balancing passion with discipline. Through personal anecdotes, we touch on the emotional toll of stringent classical training methods and the liberating moment when one decides to explore beyond the confines of a single art form. Nenita and I draw fascinating parallels between the human body's architecture and its intrinsic healing powers, emphasizing the importance of maintaining joy in the learning and creative processes. This episode delves deep into the intersection of artistic creation and self-discovery, showing how experimenting with different art forms can enrich one's personal and professional life.
Navigating the complexities of body image, societal pressures, and financial independence as an artist, we share candid reflections on these universal challenges. The conversation sheds light on the unique experiences of female artists, the natural transformations of the body, and the need to address emotional health. From managing financial struggles to the realization that true independence often includes interdependence, this episode offers invaluable insights into the artist's journey. Whether you're an aspiring artist or someone seeking to rekindle your passion, Nenita's story will inspire you to embrace change, challenge yourself, and recognize the value of pauses in your creative journey. Tune in to hear stories of personal growth, community building, and the pursuit of a fulfilling artistic career.
If you like what you hear, subscribe and follow us on Spotify, iTunes and Amazonmusic. A new episode will come out every 1st and 15th of a month. You can also follow us on Instagram on theinspiredlifepodcast. If you want to mail me to discuss some of the things we are talking here or have a story to share on this podcast, email me at theinspiredlifeindia@gmail.com. This is Deepika and I thank you for listening.
Welcome to the Inspired Life Podcast. I'm Deepika, and with me today Nenita
Deepika:Praveen, a dancer, an actor, a yoga instructor and so much more. Narendra, welcome to the podcast. Thank you, deepika, nice to have you here. It's lovely being here. After a lot of rescheduling, most of us finally made it Right, so I did mention to our guests that, to our audience, that you are a dancer, you're an artist, an actor.
Nenita :Tell me more in detail about all the things that you do Okay, so I am a class, I've been trained in classical dance, which is Bharatnatyam, and, like the story goes, for most of us we start at a very young age. So is the case with me. I started when I was 5 years old, and I don't know at what point something that was a hobby became a passion, and passion became a profession, and profession is when you are actually making a living out of it over a period of years.
Nenita :So, as I was pursuing Bharatanatyam, there was a period in my early 20s my guru here is Guru Rajesh Puri Sainath I started in Hyderabad and in my early 20s my body was a little bored of the dance. It started asking for more, and the repetitive movements all of it was not really exciting me anymore and it was very easy for me to just be in my own bubble, like you're in school back then. So you know, I was just. I was also studying architecture. So I finished architecture, I was working as an architect, but I kept dancing alongside all the time.
Nenita :So I remember being inspired by one of the productions that we did with the dance school here with my teacher, which was written by a feminist writer and that started sort of shifting the way I looked at dance. And this is something I realised in retrospect. It wasn't something I realized then, you know, in retrospect I know that that was one of the shifts that happened for me because it was. I also had one of the solo characters in that play, like the sutradhar, the one who's you know stitching the story together. So it was after that performance and while we were touring that, and also while working as an architect, that I sort of realized that I needed more from movement, and I've been doing yoga since I was 13. Thanks to my parents, I've been quite a chubby kid, so they always push me into it. I hated it.
Speaker 2:But look at me now I'm talking about it.
Nenita :I did it because I think I just didn't want to be scolded for not doing my practice every day, but it was. Eventually I moved to Trivandrum. I applied to a dance company there and I moved to Trivandrum for a few years, couple of years. I got into a dance company called Dakshashet Dance Company and that's where my perspective of body, movement, core energies, yoga, everything started shifting, like all the old ideas I had started breaking and, like I said, I was getting bored of movement. So this is somewhere I found the joy again, because there I was getting trained in Kaladi, I was getting trained in Silambam and all of these things started exciting me, exciting my body, exciting the movement and, of course, the conditions we practiced and rehearsed and learned in were. It was completely in nature. There was a lake of water right in the front. After your rehearsal I used to go swim. That was my cool down you know, and it was so beautiful.
Nenita :It was absolutely delightful you know like it was and performing with them abroad, performing that was my first stint going abroad and performing on different platforms with the group and the way the company functions. The way the company works. I think I'm one of the. I was very lucky to be there because, if you look at the background, I come from being a first-generation artist, not knowing, I literally had, I feel like life kind of had people who came into my life to kind of take me from one step to the other and again in hindsight, this is what I see and it led me there and from there there was no stopping in terms of how my mind could flourish. For me to embody all of this and come to my own and bring it to my own took its own time, you know. It took its own sweet time and I, reluctantly, I had to let it be. I was reluctant with it, I was fighting with it through my years as an artist, but now I see that I just had to let it be. I just had to let it flow. I didn't have to fight it in any way, but I guess that was the learning. So, as I work with the company.
Nenita :I moved back to Hyderabad in 2016 again. So from 2014 to 2016, I was in Trivandrum. It was a very mutual understanding of okay, I think we've done enough together, in the sense like I felt like I had learned, like for me it was every time the learning period ended I needed to move. You know so and luckily, my mentor, dakshashy knew that and she also is someone like that. But the amount of knowledge I got from there and I continue to associate myself I'm still a freelancing dancer with the company. It was such an amicable move for me. And once I moved back, I set up Meenakshi Studio for Arts, which is a space where I started teaching Bharatanatyam. But looking at the way Bharatanatyam is taught, you know, in the traditional format I was unable to really be that person, be that teacher. You know I couldn't be too strict. I didn't believe in having a hierarchy. I didn't believe in I have to give you the choreography and you have to make it. Do it the way I'm giving it.
Nenita :So I'm like how do you create thinking dancers? Because I remember, for at a period of time as a performer, I became scared of creating myself and that is not really something that you want to be. That's not art again.
Nenita :Yeah, it's not art Like you're not. You wouldn't want to be scared of creating right, you want to create because it's happening from within you, absolutely. So that doubt, the self-doubt, so the amount of fight I had to put up within myself. As a teacher, I didn't want that to happen to my students, so I started seeing how I can do that, how I can work in a way that they're given a free platform, they're given the tools to work with and then they kind of put them together however they feel like tell stories that they want to. It doesn't have to be religious, it doesn't have to be based in hindu culture, it doesn't have to be any of it. It can be what you want it to be. You know, because each of us have such different stories, each of us have such different experiences, how can I box and say you just have to do this? And then that questioning for myself you know about.
Nenita :I went through my own artist journey, through this. While I set all of this up and in my journey I think it was more like I started fighting with the dance form. So it took me a while to say, okay, I'm a trained Bharatnatyam dancer, but I enjoy movement and I'm trying to find my own movement vocabulary with the knowledge I have from yoga, from Kalari, from Silambam, from Pilates, because I attended classes at one point, from social emotional learning I've worked as a social emotional learning instructor from the theatre space, so a lot of these things started adding into my vocabulary. And also, knowing that for me I didn't want my body to be in a rigid state, because when I'm talking in yoga about emotions get trapped in your body. Also, knowing that for me I didn't want my body to be in a rigid state Correct, because when I'm talking in yoga about emotions get trapped in your body I started thinking of it in the dance form as well, correct, you know, if I'm continuously doing the same thing repeatedly, especially with you have these different aspects in dance.
Nenita :So nirta is where you're moving, right, like it's your physical movement. So in the nirta aspect of it I always questioned what is the emotion going there? Correct? Does a movement change because of the emotion? Is emotional expression just limited to the face? You know, if you're tired will the whole body not show it. If you're sad, will the whole body not show it. How can you be happy in your body but sad on your face, correct? So a lot of these things, not just in Abhinaya but also in the dance, you know.
Nenita :So that became my personal journey of experimenting and breaking my body Somewhere. I think I also did somatic movement, unknowingly, so you know, I was healing through certain things within myself. So I feel like a lot of my experiences added on to the stories I wanted to tell, or I want to tell even now, and the stories I see around me in the world and the things that I want to speak off. And I started moving away from the religious aspect of it. But and in the meanwhile also, I was trained as a yoga teacher and I it was a time where, like I had to provide for family and I had to hustle and I was doing probably five jobs for over a few years and I injured my back because of all the stress I was like. That again taught me so much more about the mind and the body.
Deepika:So I started understanding that's something we don't really pay attention, people don't. They think if I have to get fit, if I have to get to so and so part you know point in my health or in my lifestyle, I have to just push through and do it. It's not your mind and body connection, the amount of mindfulness involved, amount of stress. Yes, stress, most often we don't realize, but it comes to your back the first thing. That's where it'll hit you with, yes, lower back pain. People think, oh, I'm sitting all day and working it. No, it's not just that, it's so much more.
Nenita :Yeah so you know all of the I think, all the things that I started learning, like there was this period, like I was saying, I was being very hard on myself for not doing a lot of things. I, you know, I've become more gentle right now, but it's like I didn't take into account the things that I has been happening inside me, correct, you know? Because in this whole thing of doing so much I've been performing since I was what? Eight years old, yeah, and like, just being out there and doing so much, putting yourself out there, there was no time to introspect, there was no time to reflect, correct. And when your body stopped you and said here you go, now reflect. And when everything comes to you, correct, that's when you're like, is this ever going to end? Is this reflection ever going to end? You know what have I done to my body? So then came a point where I sort of started the um, really trying to be compassionate, kind, because these are words I use in class.
Nenita :I right you, it's so easy to tell your students, but yeah, it's it's so tough to implement it, because you're you're like, if I'm compassionate with myself, then maybe I won't push myself hard enough, maybe I'll get lazy about this. But then you're like, how do I live this correct? So then that again, like I said, you can't push yourself to even live it. You have to take that journey because in all these grand your plans of having a career and everything which is great, I realized that I somehow forgot to live life. Yeah, you know, like I know, life and career, everything can go hand in hand, but there's certain things that throw you off, and that's life. Yeah, right, you can plan your career, you can do that, but it throws you off. And then the age factor comes and there's so many factors that come in play. But I think for me, it was at a point where I was fighting with Bharatnatyam and I said, okay, I'm trained in Bharatnatyam but I like movement as such. So I started just moving and experimenting with movement, and I still don't have a term as to what kind of a dancer I call myself, so I just say I'm a dancer, I'm a performer in all of this, while I was nursing through my injuries, I started in theater because that was one more way of expressing, yeah, and that really helped me use my voice. Now, when the voice came in, I can't tell you, deepika, like being like, because I've been a performer who, you mind, right, with Bharatnatyam there's no voice, but the moment the voice came in, the things that opened in the body and the mind, my body I'm free with my body, but I wasn't free with my voice. So then I was able to talk more freely, I was able to put across my opinions more freely. It took me some time, through rehearsals and through practices, you know, but that became another way of expressing for me and I'm so grateful that I was able to get there, you know, to be able to do that.
Nenita :So I think at this point, for me it's just art, like.
Nenita :I like making things, like, so I want to literally experiment with everything. Yeah, and it's not about having a career in just one. I feel like I've already had a few careers in different parts and now I'm just going to see where exactly it's taking me, because currently what I do is I've been teaching dance, but it's also something that I'm stepping away from, because I started when I was 15 teaching it, and it's been two decades of just teaching, yeah, and I think it's time, like I did take a break in the middle for a few months, like eight months or so. It wasn't still a complete break, but some sort of a break and I feel like now it's for me to discover myself as a choreographer, as a creator. I'm taking interest in writing, so I'm like I want to see what that is like. So, yeah, I mean trying to go with the flow of what the inner gut says, you know, and not just not be held up with what I wanted to do at one point of time.
Nenita :Because I don't remember having a set dream. I knew I'll be a dancer. That was one thing, but I know how much architecture also has influenced my art. You know, because design space it's pretty much like it's so much in the same space. So I feel like art design in itself is just inspiring for me and movement, like the anatomy of the body I'm obsessed about, I really correlate it to architecture, like the columns and beams.
Speaker 2:It's so similar.
Nenita :And I feel like our body has such amazing healing powers in itself if we have the time and patience to listen and actually go with it, which I really think we all do have. Yes, you know, but we don't want to give it that time, like I don't know like I yeah, you're right, we all have the time.
Deepika:Uh, when either we say that I don't have the time, my life is so busy or things are so hard that I can't take the time to reflect on it or give myself some try to do something, to just look inside, you, right, that's not true. I think most times we are avoiding to do that and that's how we come up with this thing. My whole thing is if you have time to watch a show on Netflix, you have time to do everything else too.
Deepika:Yeah, true, netflix is not even a problem anymore, If you can scroll through Instagram reels and keep sending people reels. You have time for this too. Oh yes, it's as simple as that. Yes, With your dance journey also, I find so many things similar, Like A, both of us are at least in a space of teaching in some way or the other and I learned Bharatanatyam for years.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Deepika:And same. When I was five or something I started learning. I had my Arangetram. I did everything. I performed on stage also quite a bit, but I stopped very early, I think when I was 16, something in 10th grade, just around 10th grade. I had to stop. It was a good decade of it. Yeah, it's a decade of it and I loved it. I love dancing I still do, but yeah, it was a choice between my teacher, kind of you know. He did good in his life, well in his life, so he opened a bigger studio somewhere further away. Till then he was teaching in one of the parents house in the colony.
Nenita :I grew up in a railway colony and so it was convenient.
Deepika:But once he moved really far away, it was a choice between me going for my dance classes or going for physics tuition, which I was in a bad state. So I had to go for math and physics Because 10th grade, so we make such a big scene out of 10th grade, and so I had to make a choice to quit my dancing classes. But I do understand when you said the hierarchy, the strictness. More than me remembering the dancing, I remember how strict he was with me and sometimes I look back. I was like I was a child. I was a young child. My Arangetram happened very early on.
Deepika:I think he was in a hurry for all of us to go on stage to make our parents happy. I was 12, 13, something, but yeah, I was doing it from five, so I guess it makes sense. I remember way before that, when I was barely 10. I was wearing my gungroos and like he was making me practice and I heard bleeding, because it was in the early days of bleeding and I'm like a 10 year old kid now I understand better because I have a son myself, so I understand what a 10 year old child, how young they are actually and him refusing like out of a movie, right, the blood, will you know, shed blood and it's gonna art and Saraswati and all of that jazz.
Deepika:I didn't think much of it, but I remember being really irritated it didn't want me to go back for at least a few days because I'm like it hurt and he wouldn't let me sit down for a bit and like throwing the stick and hitting you while you do a step wrong. I think that there's no need to be so dramatic, and that's not just my teacher. I've heard over the years, with a lot of classical dance forms, teachers being so strict. I don't think it's needed. I do understand this is something I see with a lot of sports coaches also, I think because their goal in their head becomes to make you the best and to put you out on the stage or on the ground or on the turf, whatever it is. Sometimes that takes away the joy of learning, because not all of us want to be, you know, a world-class tennis player or football player or a dancer also, for that matter.
Deepika:A lot of us are trying to do that because we love doing it and it's just a part to express ourselves, part of our life to do that and that takes it away from it. And this is a struggle I have noticed with my son's teachers, our sports teachers and now my niece's teachers with regards to trying to tell them listen, we don't, we are not looking to send them for tournaments tomorrow. Can you just calm down? And I don't want the kid coming and crying and saying I will not go because my sir wouldn't stop. He hits me or yells at me Of course kids nowadays don't take a yelling also.
Nenita :very well, and it's in my home.
Deepika:But it's just that you're taking away the joy of learning. You want adults who love multiple things Because, as an adult like you know you from what I understand you're like 35 something. I'm in my 40s and, as honestly, as you get busier and older, it's so important to have so many little hobbies. Yes, because you want something to go back to after the stress and madness of life. Yeah, right, and if you are going to scare away these kids from maybe doing gymnastics or going on just playing a game of tennis or even dancing to some music, then what's the point of all of it? So I think that's very important. As a teacher, yes, whether in whichever field, you have to keep in mind, keep that in mind that you're not. The goal here is not to make geniuses over everybody.
Deepika:The goal is to spread the beauty of what you're teaching, the lessons that that art or that subject is bringing.
Nenita :And yeah, that's really, really important, like I've been very lucky in terms of I didn't have a teacher who was strict in that sense of the word, because she was also breaking a lot of barriers by then. Yeah, um however, I think, uh, there was a point where I wasn't learning a lot like for the number of years I was there, most of my learning happened through observing, correct? So there was a different kind of kind of politics that I kind of saw you know, and you know the financial implications of being in a field like this.
Nenita :You have to put in so much, right? So for me, even when I started teaching, I was like how can we make most of what we have? So I haven't gotten even one costume stitched. We've used old sarees. We've learned how to tie it up in different ways, we want t-shirts and you know just palazos. We've done different things to figure out for costumes and if they wanted, if some parent could afford a costume, it's okay, please get it stitched. You know, I personally could not afford a costume at that point of time because I think couldn't put any money for myself and even for a show. Like it's not possible, like it's something I knew.
Deepika:I can't do. Yeah, I remember when I would be dancing as a kid, each time my parents had to shell out money to rent the whole jewelry, the whole costume and it's quite a bit, and especially in the 80s and 90s. It's quite a lot of money each time you're renting all of it and yeah.
Nenita :Even the space, even the orchestra and everything right, and I knew early on that this is not my cup of tea in terms of going on stage and performing like this, so I think that also helped me just navigate another path you know, although that regret in the sense I'm like why is it not possible? Why?
Nenita :can't everyone get that? How? I mean? How can you just say because if someone is rich, you know, has the wealth for it, is allowed to be a dancer, you know why not the others? Why can't we find different ways to make this happen for them? So I think that was an experimentation also for me, to see how that can happen, but you started something.
Deepika:Yes, yes and.
Nenita :I think, like with me, it's been what eight years now with the, with Menachi and we. I did two Arangetrams last year and I completely refused to take on the Arangetrams in the first place, but they got their parents involved. They followed me for three months. I said, no, I don't think we should do an Arangetram. Then I said, okay, let's keep it as small as we can. You know, maybe in a temple or maybe at a house small audience.
Nenita :But they had different dreams. Then it was a way for me to say, okay, let me also not be rigid about this, let me see what I can do. But then working with them I'm actually glad that I did it, because working with the students they were both in their early 20s, so working with both of them, and they were two different Arangetans on a week apart, and we're actually hitting their anniversary this end of this month, and so I really like working with the stories, because a lot of the stories are written from a certain lens, right, and I don't know if it's right or wrong to do it, but this is what we felt and this is what we did. We started looking at it from a lens of how do you humanize the gods?
Speaker 2:How can you humanize everything Correct?
Nenita :You know. So, instead of like, we did a piece called Jagad Dharana on Krishna and Yashoda, and it's about Yashoda not knowing that. You know. The phrase goes like. You know, yashoda is not aware that her son is like supreme personality. So our counter to it was how Every mother thinks their kid is the best. I'm not a mother yet, but this is what I've heard, seen around me. Even if she doesn't know that he is the greatest, she will still feel the same way if he is going and fighting with a snake. If he is going and right, she will still feel the same way if he is going and fighting with the snake. If he is going and stealing butter, you know she is going to feel the same right. So how do you humanise her? So we humanised her her birth, like we went through that entire cycle of when the child goes to the school. What happens to the mother?
Speaker 2:you know, so we played with it a little bit.
Nenita :So in the same way, even with the other dancer. We played with another character of where it's a Telugu padam and in that it's like the man cheats on his partner and she gets to know of it and towards the end she's still pining and she's whining. So the first question my student posed was why is she pining? Why would I pine? Yeah, I would want to give it back to that person.
Nenita :Okay, let's work with that let's work with how, what is the arc, what is the emotional arc we go through to get to that point, because you will grieve. It's not like you'll just be like, okay, whatever you know, you won't just push it off right, you will grieve through it.
Deepika:You will try and go through your stages.
Nenita :So we kind of explored those stages in that 10 minute piece, correct. So that was exciting for me. So I feel like, and then when people who came to watch it, the things that they told me about you know, they were like we did it in a sabha, like we did it in Ravindra Bharti, and they were like it felt like a home function and that was a great compliment and they were like the joy we saw in my face, like as a teacher. They were like you're, you were so expressive as a teacher. I'm like are you looking at me? You know like no, but you were just so expressive because I did the Natu Angam and that was another talent of mine. A lot of my people didn't know and I was like really, I'm like okay, I mean, I guess I didn't show this out. And also the fact that they said that both of the dancers some of them attended both the performances and they said both of them looked very different to each other and they didn't look anything like me and I was like amazing.
Speaker 2:That's what I need yeah.
Deepika:That's a great compliment for a teacher, yeah.
Nenita :So every goal that I wrote down for my you know school kind of came true that day. So I felt like it came a full circle. I felt really satisfied. In that moment I am like, okay, I am on a good path.
Nenita :I am on the right path, so it was all about building a community and I hope that community keeps growing in whatever shape form it takes. Like I said, I am not rigid about it anymore. I was at one point because it started with a certain vision, but vision changes, things change. I've been changing so rapidly, so it's been exciting that way in terms of being a teacher and now currently I teach yoga and I work with Shamila's Yoga Zone. I also have my own online classes and I keep doing acting gigs whenever they come back.
Speaker 2:The other thing about theatre that you were saying.
Deepika:I've always believed. I still think that I can't act to save my life. I'm really bad at it. But then the recent another podcast a friend of mine started talking about it and it hit me like, if I can dance and emote without words, of course I can emote through my face and hand gestures, and all of that because I tried to learn Kathak in the middle. I was doing online because I love dancing and over the years I've you know Bharatnatyam. Of course I left in school but then I went to ballroom dancing. I did salsa for a bit, I did jive for a bit, then I did Kathak last years for some time, but it was really hard.
Deepika:Again, as an adult is so hard to commit a certain time for yourself. Especially the online classes weren't working for me. It was lovely teacher, young girl from Delhi, and I was learning from her. But I felt like in person I might feel more committed, also because dance is such a thing. You have that environment around you, the people right there, the music, preferably some more classmates with you. It's nicer that way. You know, I would prefer to learn that way. I've been thinking I will go back to it. But yeah, I've started learning pole dancing.
Nenita :So that's something I'm doing now.
Deepika:Yeah, so I'm doing that. I decided, you know, let's do something. In my head because the way you said that you wanted to, it wouldn't excite you. After the point, you wanted your body to do different things. So for me it became that I do want to learn dancing, so I want to be around the art and the music and moving your body with music, but I want to do something which challenges me physically also. Yeah, and because I am from the fitness, I am in the fitness field right now I want to do something which would enhance my fitness a little bit more, challenge me in ways I am not doing right now with my workouts, and that's why I started going pole dancing.
Deepika:I love it, I absolutely love it. I'm gonna break from it right now because of all the traveling, but I'm gonna go back to it. It challenges in so many different ways, I'm sure, and it is amazing, right, you know you think you are a fitness coach yourself, you're teaching so many people, and then you go in a class you can't move, you just are not able to move, and then you wonder, hey, like, am I really strong or not? And then you realize it's again learning the techniques, yeah, the different way of engaging and moving your body, and that's something I've been doing and you know it's. It feels really good to go back and, you know, go back to an art form that you can relate to and, yes, you can express yourself from, but that's where the theater thing came up right. If I can emote myself in different ways is it's just about saying it out loud too, and I love talking. That's why this podcast started.
Deepika:I love talking. Let's forget other people and let's just talk. So I've been telling my friend how I would like to experiment with theatre, but like really tiny thing, because I think I'll just go to the stage and start laughing my head off because I'm so self-conscious about being on stage. Again, I used to be really worried about talking on stage, but I did teach in a dental college for a year and a half too, where I taught a class of 120 kids and of course, you know, over the years, with work and in different positions and companies, the fear of being on stage and talking is zero now. So earlier I had no fear of dancing, but I had a fear of talking.
Deepika:Now that's not there either. So I'm like, maybe mix them together, maybe I can try theater. So I've been thinking, but the fact is, from what I hear from everybody who's in theater, it again takes a lot of commitment, a lot of hours and times. If you're part of any play or any group again takes a lot of commitment, a lot of hours and times. If you're part of any play or any group, it does, yeah. So I really don't think I'll do justice to it right now.
Speaker 2:But yeah, one day, whenever it works out for me.
Deepika:I'll do a little roll off, maybe coming and yelling at somebody, because I'm good at that too.
Nenita :Yeah, I think theatre is forgiving that way in terms of you know, especially with the whole age thing that really plays in the society we live in, I think you don't have to be a particular age to play a particular role in theatre, like you can just play it, and that's something I like about stage, you know, because on screen you have to look a certain age, even though you are a certain age.
Nenita :It's quite. It's quite like it's very taxing on the body and the mind, honestly. So I feel like theatre you can do. It's very taxing on the body and the mind, honestly, absolutely. So I feel like theatre you can do. It's very malleable, like you can just do whatever yeah.
Deepika:There's another thing like I was talking. Like you said earlier, your parents put you into yoga and you didn't like it. But look where you are now. Same thing.
Deepika:I think I said for years that I don't ever want to be in a profession where how I look would be important how my body looks, not how I look. How my body looks would be so important. Because I think I still think it's so extreme, like you said, it's so taxing, so stressful. I don't want to be dissected perpetually about how which part of my body is looking how. But look at me. Now I'm again in a field where it is it's very hard for people to understand and the way the media has made fitness about right. It's not about being healthy and fit, it's about looking and weighing a certain number, which is just so, so incorrect and wrong and harmful to everybody. But this is something I deal with on a regular basis. People wondering why I don't look a certain way is one side. The other side is, you know, because everybody has a different perspective and thinks people loving how my body is shaped and saying I want to look like that which?
Nenita :is again ridiculous, Because we are not in a more.
Deepika:We are such different people, different histories and our bodies are different. It's unfortunate. Media has made everything to look like certain shape and size is ideal. There's nothing ideal. Ideal is you being healthy and happy, I think, which is something to push through and come through has been a task, and I'm sure that is something that you deal with in yoga too, as a yoga teacher. Oh yeah, I mean I've not dealt with.
Nenita :a lot of others coming and telling me about my body in a long time, but a lot of it had happened in my younger years, in my teenage years. So I feel like those voices and I was never insecure about my body then but somehow during adolescence, it all kicked in, you know, and those voices became louder and louder.
Nenita :So whenever I deal with the body shaming, I would say it's mostly within me. Yeah, you know, it's not outside of me, it's within me, and it's more like okay, I have to look like that, to be like that. But then, when, one night, once I understood what my body is like, what my frame is like, how old I am, you know how my body has shifted and changed over the years, I I'm really trying to this is something I want to do like talk about how which I will, I think, do right now is, as a woman, okay, because I've experienced a woman's body alone. Your body shifts through the ages. Yes, absolutely.
Speaker 2:It never stays the same.
Nenita :Your bone structure of the body changes when you're in your, when you hit 30. Yeah, you know it's getting ready for childbirth and all of these other next aspects of your life.
Deepika:Biologically, you want to have a child.
Nenita :Don't want to have a child, that's secondary, yeah but biologically that's what's happening and biologically your body shifts so much and then you hit menopause, and then you know after that, and it's a continuous thing. You can never be a certain way all the time.
Deepika:Yes, absolutely, it's not possible.
Nenita :It is not at all it's not healthy like we forget to kind of remind people and say it. You got to understand how you feel, yeah it's not just the physical right it's your mental, it's your breath, your how you're breathing. Is everyone breathing fine, like we're so obsessed with six-pack I? It's not just the physical, right, it's your mental. It's your breath, how you're breathing. Is everyone breathing fine, like we're so obsessed with six-pack abs? I know right, but your diaphragm is getting squeezed.
Deepika:Yeah it's the most unsustainable, unhealthy body type Okay, again, there are a lot of people because genetics also plays a big role. Okay, again, there are a lot of people because genetics also plays a big role. You can, there are a lot of people who are genetically have a much lower fat percentage, and you know they naturally by living a still healthy lifestyle doesn't mean they're just going in.
Deepika:You know a lot of people in the fitness field, a lot of regular people, people that I know who live a healthy lifestyle, not anything extreme, but they have a really good frame.
Deepika:If you're talking about six-pack abs, they're very close to it or almost have it, but majority of us cannot have it, uh, sustainably.
Deepika:You can, of course, go and get it, yeah, but if you honestly anybody who has tried and held it it's the most unhealthy mentally and physically state to be at because it takes a lot out of your day, especially if you are somebody who needs to work. Otherwise too, right, you have a job, you have a family, you have a house to run. You cannot I can't, because I don't want to get into details of that, into it right now how difficult it is with regards to your nutrition and exercise regime, to be there and all the things with regards to your sodium levels, the salt, the water, the sleep. It is so hard. People don't understand what it means to be and keep that, and even actors or models who have it everybody knows they don't maintain it through the year it is for that period for that shoot and yeah because unhealthy to be in that state, but yeah and they have an entire entourage of people helping them Exactly.
Deepika:Their job is to look like that.
Nenita :That's all it is, so that is a focus.
Nenita :That's a very different kind of focus, like even a lot of the dancers I'm aware of has an entire entourage or a support system that is helping them. Be that way. You know you have to forego a lot of things in your life, so it's your choice, it. You know you have to forego a lot of things in your life, so it's your choice, absolutely you choose it, you choose. But then again you're going back to the feel of it, like even your emotional body right, like I remember um at my I would, the fat from my body would not fall off, okay. And but the point, when I started addressing my emotional state, my mental state, my fat felt like that.
Nenita :So at that moment I was like it's not just the physical because I've been working out since forever yes, like to a extent, where, at one, at one point, I'm like I don't work out for a while. Yeah, because my body is my body became tired of moving so much. It just said you need to stop. You haven't really addressed a lot of things within you. You need to stop. So there's so many factors, there's so many things that make up your own body composition, because it's not just what you eat. Yes, absolutely, it's the people, it's the thoughts that go into you, the thoughts that are churning in you, the things that are bothering you, the emotions you've not let out, which most of us have not let out most of them.
Nenita :How many of us actually live it freely.
Deepika:We haven't been taught how to address our emotions.
Nenita :Hence comes art, where you can express and be free a little bit, and because everything is so reflective, it's, at the end of the day, it's a journey with yourself, right at the end of it. What are you doing here? Are we here to make a career like, okay, you'll probably be remembered for the next hundred years? And then what? Yeah, right. So it's like, what are you here for, really right? So I think that's what body has done for me, yeah, and also a lot. I remember as a young kid it was in my periphery quite a bit where our body is like when it comes to the scriptures. It doesn't put a lot of what do you say importance to the body. It puts more importance to the mind.
Nenita :But then when now the narrative is flipped, now we are all looking at what the body stores, what is happening, etc. Etc. You know, but I mean for various reasons, I feel like it's because the westerners have taken it and started talking about it now we are like oh yes, you know, it's right for some reason. But intuitively, that understanding that we have, we don't want to nurture that Correct Right. It takes you that time to also probably nurture it. But I feel there's so much more that the body can do and give.
Nenita :And you know that you can talk to it, you can learn from it Absolutely, and like when your body knows to tell you enough, you've eaten so much, enough. It can tell you so many other things also.
Nenita :Yeah, yeah. So I've become somewhat of a body nerd over the last many years, yeah, and I really like I like learning about, like being aware of yourself, your physical, mental, emotional states, and you know your energies and everything is something that I think has led me to where I am, like it got me here it is. It is sort of sustaining me. It is also helping me make certain choices in my life yeah, whether they're right or wrong, I will never know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because it's the only thing I'm doing yeah, you know so yeah so that's what it's?
Deepika:no, that's lovely and I think I completely agree with you. Again, as a woman myself, I've seen my body change so much over the decades and I would joke initially. It's like the day you turn 30, it's like your body's doing a flip. But it is a fact that you know, with our hormones and anybody you know not anybody, unfortunately not a research and not a lot of studies or time has been spent on women and our bodies, because obviously it's not worth for most people till now in the medical field, all these decades, what the research has been done.
Deepika:But our hormones play a huge role in how our body and even our mind is working, how we are emotionally feeling over the years and now, being somebody in my early 40s, I'm aware of maybe in a decade or something I'll hit menopause and I do so see so many differences, differences in my body and in the recent time, like I just want to quickly address and not make a big deal out of it. But the thing is, this was very interesting because as a woman, we all are told right like periods okay, fine. You know, some women have discomfort. Discomfort is okay, little pain is fine. I've been very fortunate to not have any discomfort. I've had a very comfortable period, as I can call it, all my life in the recent time.
Deepika:For six, eight months, I had a lot of you know dates, up and down and everything. I just assumed, because that's how you've been trained to think it's normal to have issues, thinking maybe it's perimenopause, maybe it's too early, I'm too young for perimenopause, but then you just think, okay, I'm in 40s, maybe, and perimenopause sometimes lasts for 10 years, so maybe this is what it is, only for things to go suddenly wrong overnight in March and I had to go undergo surgery within two days because I had a growth in my in my uterus, which had been, you know, growing bigger and bigger and blocking and and I kept. You know, you don't take it seriously. We women, us, don't take our body seriously when it comes to this, because we've been taught it's okay to have discomfort, yes, and if you don't have, you're lucky. So if I'm having it, it's okay. I should not complain about it too much, because women have it worse. Other women have it worse and that's why I feel horrible sometimes to even tell any symptoms, because I know how many women suffer so much more.
Deepika:So this was an important lesson and this is something I told almost all my girlfriends who I could speak to, who I speak to on a regular basis, that this is what it is. So please be mindful, let's not take it so lightly. It's fortunate that the growth was nothing, it was benign and there was no cancer and everything, but that's what it is about, right? You know you don't take yourself seriously and it could lead to so many issues and I think, yeah, absolutely. As women, we have to keep talking, especially with regards to the body shaming, with the body structures, with the weight, the whole story and narrative which is being spread around and how incorrect and unhealthy it is to our mind and body. And when we go into this mental state of you know, we I think we both have felt it at some point or another that you are questioning, like you said, the internalizing, the things people tell you and you are.
Deepika:You are shaming yourself like why is my body like this? Why can't I do this? It is so harmful not only to us, but to people around us. Yes, because subtly, knowingly, unknowingly, we start pushing out that oh yeah totally, and this is something I try to restrain myself and it's my kid or my knees or anybody, because I don't want all my self-doubts to come out and affect them and only for them to sit in therapy 20 years from now and say my mom was like this I'm like good.
Nenita :I have to watch this. I had a moment such as this. I have worked from ages three years old, not as a Bharatanatyam teacher, because we take in teacher students at five, as in classical forms, you know, five or six, depending on the development of the child, yeah and but as a social, emotional learning teacher and as a like. There were schools like magnet schools which wanted me to teach science and maths through the body. So that was a lot of exciting, through dance and theater and body and all. So that was a experimental phase, um, so what I'm getting at is I've taught from that age group till about 60, 65, um, so across ages, whatever it may be like.
Nenita :At one point with kids right in one of my classes I remember this so clearly. It was a, it was, it was an online class and it was during the pandemic and I think it was like it was raining, if I remember. I guess it was raining, it was quite dull and I was not in a great space in my mind, but before class I always take a few moments so I kind of can center myself and come into the class. This is also a time I was nursing an injury kind of can center myself and come into the class. This is also a time I was nursing an injury. So I remember in class I was sitting and I am very, very, I'm very what do you say careful what the words I use in class, right, but this one day I said something which came very unconsciously to me and I realized that that was my insecurity, because I denied the child what they said and then I said what I wanted to, and then I paused myself, I said no, like that's not okay. And then I said, hey, I'm sorry, that's your opinion, this is my opinion. They can all exist, so we'll keep at it. So there was an immediate okay, fine, you know, she was also. I could see in the expression that she was like, all great about it. But that then began this whole thing, like usually it is.
Nenita :You know, when children come into your life as parents, there is a certain internal work that you begin. Right, a lot of churning happens and that's most of the time where you don't want that. You get irritated with the child because of that internal work. Yes, it's nothing else, correct, because the child is constantly poking you. It's the same case with teachers, correct? Yes, you know, and you have so many children to deal with and you're, you know, probably addressing so many versions of yourself. Yes, maybe not in the same intimate way, but there are some students who get attached to you and it becomes a very close relationship Absolutely. So you can't keep projecting, yes, right. And then, which means you do your own internal work, yes, right.
Nenita :And in that case, that's when a lot of the questioning started. Right, because I needed to be authentic to myself. Even if I am saying something wrong, yes, it is coming from an authentic place. Place so that child has the space to say hey, you're not right, correct. And that space, I think, is very important, even between a teacher and a student. Yes, you know, where the student has the freedom to say I think there's another way to do it. Absolutely, you know being able to put another thing and the teacher saying, okay, maybe. And then, because, how are you using or exercising your brain, correct?
Speaker 2:you know how are you going to make forward, go forward or make any progress.
Nenita :As a human, let's say more than anything else, right? So, yes, I completely get that where you're like, you don't want the child to go through something that you have over a period of time.
Deepika:Same thing with my trainees, Like I work with older people you know, oh, it's the same with them, same with them same with the same with them.
Deepika:I work with mid-20s to 70s uh, early 20s to 70s same thing. There are times when I am trying to project my ideas, my insecurities, my experiences with yeah, whether it's health or fitness or body, yeah, uh on them and I have to like sometimes. Sometimes I realize it a day or two later and then I go back and I'm like, no, no, this was not right. Like you know, I have to show them the right and wrong, what's possible, what's healthy, what's unhealthy, and let them make the choice and not push my ideas. But, yeah, absolutely.
Nenita :I think we can go on forever about this.
Deepika:Tell me something Now choosing these unconventional methods or unconventional professional right Whether it was dancing or theater or yoga coach which is not a run of the mill you will get the salary and your PF and gratuity. How has it been your experience? When you talk about what is success, success could mean a lot of different things. How easy or hard has it been? What have been your experiences with it?
Nenita :Need a break for that. Okay, when I started earning a living, like professionally, I was like so I got my first payment as a teacher when I was 15. Okay, I would get a small sum and that would cover my auto affair and all.
Nenita :So, that was okay and I was somebody who started saving, like that was something that my mom inculcated in me and I would like take care of myself, yeah, from quite a young age, um. But when I got into architecture um, that's again I got a monthly salary. So that was for two years. After that is when I went to Trivandrum again. I was really lucky there because I got paid a monthly salary, I had a place to stay in. They function in a way that the West functions like you're paid per rehearsal, you're paid per show, and I didn't have any liabilities or I didn't have anywhere I could send money. So I was able to take care of my things Like I was taken care of. It was after I came back and I set up as an independent artist, as an artist in my own right, without having a mentor or a teacher to backing me, because that's something that's very important in the Bharatanatyam space is what I realised years later and I somehow do.
Nenita :I feel upset about it, not really Because I think I came into my own at a young, much earlier, and sort of made my own path, but with money. Right, because that's where we put success. That's where we put how are we growing? What is our growth like? We also need money. We also need money to survive.
Nenita :So, as a teacher, again, I think I was happy with what I was getting. Again, I think I was happy with what I was getting, but over a period of time, I think, when I started hitting my late 20s, when there was so many more responsibilities, when there was okay, I got to take care of my family. I got to do this. How will I do it as an artist? Should I go back to architecture?
Nenita :That was my first dilemma around 27 and I remember, because I'd already not done work as an architect for six years by then. Yeah, six years by then I couldn't really go back five, six years. I couldn't really go back to a big bay or anything. So it made more sense to stick to dance, you know and I liked being here the reason I love architecture, but there was something about a desk job that I didn't want to do there. I didn't want to sit in one place, I wanted to move. So when I chose to continue dancing because, again, like something you said earlier, when your passion becomes your profession, you want some other passion- right, you want something else.
Nenita :So then yoga became a passion, and then yoga became a career again.
Nenita :So then, there were so many things which were my passions, which I decided to explore because I had to make money from various sources, you know, and in all of that there was a point where I just I burnt out. I burnt out to the extent where I was working so much I was making money, I was saving a little bit, but I was still going hand to mouth. You know, the savings would go some month, but that was literally for a rainy day, and that would rainy day would come very often, you know. So it was more like am I doing it right, am I not doing it right? My friends seem to be doing fine, and a lot of the artists. I mean, I didn't speak to them regularly because, like, it took a while for the community also to come together and share these things.
Nenita :Yeah, it just seemed like everybody is doing great, except me yeah, and I beat myself up about it a lot, a lot. You know I'm like why am I hustling so much? Why am I doing this? It was great to do it in those 20s, but when you hit your 30s, yeah, you are like exhausted, yeah. But I think now I feel like all that experience I've gained is working for me. Now, you know, I charge a little higher. Yes, um, I make a little more. I, I probably make the same amount I did doing five jobs, but I, I'm doing it with one job. You know I'm not doing five jobs anymore. So I feel the experience worked.
Nenita :But in that period of, you know, going 29, 30, 31, that little curve there, the whole success thing, the whole money thing, really got to me because you have peers making a lakh and a half a month, or two lakhs a month, and you're just like still in your thousands, or you know like maybe some sixty thousand or so, but then you're paying rent, you're paying bills but you're saving some, but by the time you know like maybe some 60 000 or so, but then you're paying rent, you're paying bills but you're saving some, but by the time you know it, you don't have anything for yourself, you know. And then you want to plan holidays. You, I love traveling, but it's so tough to get yourself to go for a travel and you continue to have these things and there are more additional responsibilities coming, so it did get very overwhelming. You know, like it got to a point where I'm like, should I just take up a job? And I did look for a job. Yeah, I did look for a job here and there because I was done going from pillar to post, I was done doing all of it.
Nenita :But as I kept looking for jobs, I realized that being a freelancer or being an entrepreneur, being on your own, especially as an artist, it's not easy for you to get a job. Yeah, you, what is the skill set you carry? Correct, you have a lot of skill sets. I literally would say my skill set is you get me a job, I'll do that job. Right, because I know I've been a multitasker in terms of being able to do multiple things. Yeah, uh, but there's no company as such which is going to give you a job like that, right, they won't, they won't, uh. I mean, of course, how are they going to test?
Nenita :you, yeah, it's going to be a probation like quantify all your skills.
Deepika:You can't put it on a paper. That's the problem, and I knew I didn't want to be a teacher.
Nenita :I've done that gig for a long time. I I continue to be a teacher, like a coach, in terms of your yoga, but um and dance also whenever those small little gigs come in some of the classes. But it's, I think, like now I would say, my success. I've sort of it's been a year since I've been feeling this, where the feel has become more about do I have like? This is something again I tell my adult students who are trying to make it in the art space yeah, that make sure you have enough for yourself to live a comfortable life. A comfortable life according to whom?
Nenita :you, you, nobody else but every lifestyle is yeah, everyone's lifestyle is that you can live with five lakhs a month. You can live with five thousand a month also, depending on how you want to live, right, but what is comfortable for you. So you make that much, but don't burn yourself out, because being an artist or being a coach, you need to invest time in yourself. You can only be better if you invest time in yourself. People I'm with the speaking. You know speaking with people more than the quantity of how much I'm making yeah, you know, I make a decent amount.
Nenita :Now I live a comfortable life. I am married, I have a partner, and that's been a great support too, because we we have a double income house. You get to like run the house together. It's not just on you, correct, and but he also is an artist, so sometimes there are months where I'm completely relying on him, depending on him, and that was also a little tough because I've been independent for so long. That took so long to just feel comfortable with, like I felt like I'm not successful because I'm dependent on my partner financially.
Deepika:Now my husband is also. We both are business owners right and we are little, tiny, little entrepreneurs in ourselves. And over the years we both have shifted roles, where sometimes he's depending on me when I have making more and what's the worst, I wouldn't. I don't know about him, but I'm sure he felt it too, because we are in a society where it makes you feel, if you don't, especially men, I think it's a lot more pressure but for me also because I've always been independent, I've been working from the get-go.
Deepika:I finished my master's and I was working and I have. You know something that you said with regards to should I go back and look for a job yeah, from the time 23 years I'm working to now and I'm 42. It's going 42 this year later, so I'm 41. So, but yeah, around 20 years of working almost. I have gone through cycles of being an employee, trying something of my own, being an employee or no being an employee trying something, let's take that off.
Deepika:And being an employee, you know doing that again and again and let me tell you, it never ends it never ends, yeah unless you know, because, uh, you hit a point where you have reached the, you know, the little benchmark of success society calls you in regards to financial gains, which I think also comes from a lot of other points, because you know a lot I have, we have a lot of friends, and this is something we faced in COVID. Right, we both are sitting at home, covid, with zero income, because we both were some people who are livelihood dependent on other people. Whether it was for him, it's a hospitality industry, bars are shut. For me, it was, at that time, personal coaching. That wasn't possible. But on one side, our friends were either people who held jobs, so they were working from home and getting paid, right. Of course, a lot of people lost their jobs too, but in our circle this is what we saw. On the other side, we had business owners, but at a certain level where it didn't matter to them. You know, financially this made no difference in their life. But for us we've wondered, like, what have we done wrong? And we have a kid? Yeah, it's just good.
Deepika:The stress. First two months we sat and played cards all day long because our son was bored out of his mind and that's how we could like he loved. And there was this card game called krida. It's ramayana, so it's either ravana's team or rama's dream in the card. You just make your team and you win with points. It was it's either Ravana's team or Rama's team in the card. You just make your team and you win with points. It was a super fun game, but that's what we did. At the end of two months the stress started hitting us Like what are we doing? And then online training started. Because a lot of apps came up with online training. They knew this is the need of the hour. I started working. Money started coming in, but still it isn't enough for a household. School fees were still had to be paid.
Speaker 2:That didn't take a break. It was ridiculous.
Deepika:Yeah, but then teachers have to be paid you know what do you do.
Nenita :It's a cycle that you can't get out of it.
Deepika:And then finally, wine shops opened. Right, and this was something we both my husband, I felt. So you feel little, you feel small at that moment. Wine shops open, people want to up, so you want to go buy a beer. But because you're meeting for once in a while and you're a whole bunch and our house is something without parents, everybody would come down there and of course we are buying the beer and everything. And after two, three gatherings we both are like dude, we can't afford to keep buying. And we're like Rs 130 beer, do like we can't afford to keep buying and and they're like 130 rupees beer, like we are thinking about that in our 30s, in our late 30s, like what have we done wrong in life?
Deepika:Of course, that was a phase. Then you go up, then you come down again. We started something new again. So again, it's a struggle, I think, being an entrepreneur, unless you have reached a certain stage either. Of course, hard work always plays a huge role, not taking it away from anybody, but there's a lot of factor. Luck plays a huge part, your connections, what money?
Deepika:you already have if your family was already in business. If you're a first generation middle class entrepreneur like us, who doesn't have a background where rents and electricity bills are something, you know, it's a really hard road. So I was like, yeah, this summer was so hot. He was like, like you know, it's easy, let's see how it goes.
Deepika:Sleep, sleep. So you know that's a whole different thing, that I think a lot of us and that's one of the biggest reasons I wanted this podcast to start, because we have a lot of successful people we hear from. We have a lot of successful people we hear from, but we don't. We want to also hear and talk to people who are more run-of-the-mill, regular people than somebody who's built a huge empire, because we know that's once in a while. You know, if they are very few, the person is very small. Yeah, small businesses are so much more and they are successful in their own rights. Small not when I say businesses, it could be anything right and I think that becomes important to talk about.
Deepika:How you know this ups and downs will keep coming keep going and that is something I think we have to be prepared with and. I the number of times I thought about quitting this and getting a job if I could get. I thought about quitting this and getting a job.
Speaker 2:If I could get, let's say, 10,000 rupees for it, I would be a rich person right now, unless the penny and all won't work.
Deepika:So, yeah, I think this is a phase all of us will go through all the time, and I think you know something. My next question was something you already answered. I loved what you said, that the advice you give to your students who want to make it in this you know, in the world of art, that you know, just you know. I would like you to elaborate a little bit more on that.
Nenita :Yeah, like I, I remember like when I had asked for you know what do you do for money?
Deepika:a lot of the artists.
Nenita :Either they said they had someone supporting them or they said that they had a job for themselves. And there was this entire questioning in the dance world at one point where it's like, if you're a dancer, if you're a working professional, let's say you have an IT job because you want to support. Everyone has different responsibilities, different things. You don't know anyone's personal life. There are a lucky few who don't have all of that and they are able to focus on their art. Now their art is going to look very different to your art. Their practice will look very different to your practice.
Speaker 2:You cannot compare anybody to anybody at this point.
Nenita :But there are some people who would be dancers but also be either professionals or be a doctor or be so many other things right, or studying somewhere. But would you say that they're not an artist because they're doing something else? So that was one questioning that happened. So I remember like I made choice to be a dancer because I Sort of like, in my naivety, I kind of just went into that path. I didn't think about money. Money was literally never on my mind. Yeah, I never thought I'll have to.
Nenita :You know the earning, because I was making enough to sustain myself. Correct, it was when other responsibilities came on is when you started feeling the pressure of it. You know where you're like okay, I have to take on this, this is how much more I have to make. And then you realize you give away yourself in the whole process. So I, um, like, I used, like I said, I told, tell my students, like you know, if, let's say, um, you're making 30 000 a month, right, is 30 000 enough?
Nenita :Because some of them do stay on their own, some of them are supporting their families, uh, in whatever way, if 30 000 is enough for you to live a comfortable life, make that. Don't stress about how much more you need to make. Practice your art, because I'm talking about performers, and when you perform, make sure you get paid for your performance. There'll be an additional income for you where you can then keep it. So sort of getting them to understand that you don't have to make a lack every month. Yeah, you, because if you make so much I have this belief you make a lakh, it'll somehow go. Tell me about it, it'll go. It's not like even if your expense is 30, it's reality, I know right.
Nenita :Like something or the other. I remember every month I made an extra amount. Every month I was like, wow, I don't have to stress so much. The next month, no, there was a random leak in the ceiling. Yeah, oh, there's a random crack somewhere and you're just like this is not stopping, correct? You know the cycle never ends. It's literally like you're making enough, so you spend it, correct? So then, when you understand the money cycle also, you're like okay, yeah, the idea is to be able to make enough to be able to sustain your life. You have future plans, invest in it, correct, you know, but also know that there's no point stressing about this thing. Yeah, and I think that comes with age, deepika, also it doesn't come like you will stress about it.
Nenita :You have to go through that because you are working through your own internal cycles and you will come out of it and say okay.
Nenita :I probably didn't have to really think so much, because I feel like help is always there. You know, I really believe like if you're truly putting yourself into your work or into what you want to do or even it doesn't even have to be money, right, I'm saying like even if I wasn't making an income today, as long as I'm putting my heart into something, the help will be there, like the fact that I have a partner who can support me. Now, right, I think that is that is. That is a blessing, right, it's not like I could also have a partner scribbling about it. You know who's just like pointing every day how much they're spending on me. You know pointing every day how much they're taking care of, yeah, you know, pointing every day how much I'm he's they're taking care of me, right? So I feel like that support system it's literally like you do your work it'll automatically happen around you that things kind of support you.
Nenita :If not your partner, maybe a friend, maybe a really good friend, maybe a sibling, maybe a parent, yeah, and that that's another thing I had to learn, like, how I said, you know, being dependent on a partner, being okay with being dependent, actually being grateful that you can be dependent, and that's a realization that came to me a few months ago. I creeped about it. I internally creeped about it, not externally. I was like, yeah, yeah, of course you know, but internally I was like, no, how can it be? I'm an independent woman, and that's another thing that I think I'd like to say that this whole thing of feminism playing on my head, of being a strong, independent woman but are you really independent all the time? Aren't we all sort of interdependent we are.
Deepika:We live in a society and we're meant to be. You are right Humans are meant to be.
Nenita :And here we, as coaches, are telling people that be dependent on us.
Speaker 2:How are?
Nenita :we not going to be dependent on another person?
Speaker 2:Correct, absolutely.
Nenita :So are telling people that be dependent on us. How are we not going to be dependent on another person, you know? So I think that a lot of those again working with your internships really helped. And the next month I got again. Like you know, I basically took a pause from teaching, from a lot of things and I was just making enough to be able to sustain my mom and, you know, certain my own expenses and not really pitch into our home. So now I'm again gone, gone back to that place where I'm able to do it again.
Nenita :So I feel like he was able to give me the space to do that sure, which he did say quite openly and said I'll give you the space, you do it, you know, and uh, yeah, and it was the case, uh, at some point ago where he was dependent on me, like you also said. So I feel like that is something I tell my students that you don't always have to be very rigid about what you're making. Yeah, you know, if you're someone who feels comfortable with a job, get a job. Yeah, you may have to work doubly hard to be an artist too, but get a job and be an artist because it's not like, if you're a full like for me, I thought being a full-time artist would be I'm going like.
Nenita :If you're a full like for me, I thought being a full-time artist would be I'm going to be with my art all the time. No, I got to cook. I got to make sure the house is organized it's clean. I'm very finicky about dust being around in the house and there's one room in my house where I just keep everything which doesn't get sorted until a few months.
Deepika:You know that how, that room in the that place in the house where everybody goes, and I have that and even now I'm thinking of it and I'm like I really have to clear that room up because I know where things have to go.
Nenita :So you know it's like all of these things are playing right and yeah, I think there's so much more to just being an artist like you live life. You do so many other things, so don't kind of give what do you say? Sort of be alive, right, you gotta be alive. You can't uh, we can't constantly keep complaining about what is not there, correct, and I've been that. I've been that person who constantly complained about what is not there, but look at what's there and make the best out of it, because that's the mindset we grew up with. I remember growing up like that, like in my 20s, I was like I look at what is there and I make the most of it, but then just this whole thing, oh, you see your peers doing so many other things you're not doing it.
Deepika:You know the pressure, especially, I think, social media, the kind of pressure it brings is quite intense. I think that's a that will be a whole podcast if we get into it. But no, very nicely, very beautifully said, and I am, you know, I'm sure all your students are really lucky to have you and to give this kind of advice. Thank you, you know I wouldn't want to stretch it even further. I've been holding you for a long time.
Nenita :No, that's okay, I'm loving it yeah, like. I said, find people who love to talk and you know we have a podcast.
Deepika:Yeah, yeah, finally, I want to know what are your upcoming projects and plans. What are you doing right now, Whether it's dance theatre, teaching yoga? What are you doing?
Nenita :So I've been, sort of, through this year, been more action oriented towards things I want to do, because I was struggling mentally for a few, a couple of years good few years actually and it took me a lot of energy to push myself forward to do anything. This year it's been more spontaneous, in the sense my body and mind is doing it, I'm not having to push it too much, so I'm kind of leaning into it and also pacing myself out and not overwhelming my body and mind. Hence that break came about. Usually I take a December break every year, one month I'm like not working, I save up some, so it's enough and like you know, but this year it extended a little bit more. I did travel a bit and I did continue to work also.
Nenita :However, I think my plans for this year I've been writing something. I mean I'm not a writer, like I haven't. It's something I sort of fell into during the pandemic and I just felt like writing, like I've been journaling most of my life, yeah, but you know, I'm like, okay, my partner's a writer, so I kind of see him doing it and, like you know, listening, talking about stories and all of it, and I'm like what I do is nothing but storytelling also, so I want to write original work, hence I'm doing a bit of that. Um, I'm trying to work on a production again. I'm not sitting on it every day. I think it'll be nice to have a disciplined thing, but work is a little.
Nenita :What do you say? Uh, it's very dynamic, right, you know, the classes can be any time and I need to rest. Also, I'm learning to rest, yeah, more with my body, because, uh, the body does ask for it and my personal life is going through a lot of shifts, so I feel like I'm taking a little more time for that. Then my internal space is taking shifts. I'm taking more time for that, as opposed to, like, just constantly being out there. Like, even social media has become a lull for me at this point. Like, I go on it, I don't post on it, I don't bother how many followers. I mean, I'm like I'm actually surprised with myself because I remember for a beautiful place to be, yeah.
Nenita :I'm just like wow, like okay, this is awesome, like this is growth for me, so I'm not stressed about that. Um, I have been doing some auditions, so if they come through I'll be shooting and um, they're um with theater. Nothing right now because, like I said, I'm writing something and I want to create work, yeah, more than anything. I don't know when that will happen there is no deadline as such but I yeah, so that's what I'm working on. And, yes, yoga is something I love teaching, so that will continue in my life because I think I'll do more in that space. I feel like and I want to go deeper into my own practice.
Nenita :Currently, prenatal is one of my most like. I've been teaching prenatal for five years with Shamila's yoga zone and now I'm just going more deeper into it. I'm looking at, you know, before pregnancy, during pregnancy, after pregnancy, really trying to understand it, how yoga can really help reading more about it. And you know, before pregnancy, during pregnancy, after pregnancy, really trying to understand it, how yoga can really help reading more about it. And you know that's another space. I'm kind of investing my time. So I think writing and this and when it comes to dance, it's more of my own movement, like like I, the ideas kind of come.
Nenita :I think I'm understanding my process as an artist of creating work, like as a teacher, I've been creating modules, curricul. As an artist of creating work, like as a teacher, I've been creating modules, curriculums and all of it, which is very easily just churning itself out Like I can sit and just write it down.
Nenita :Yeah, after a while it's just autopilot, yeah, so but when it comes to like creative work like this, I need to wait for that burst that comes sometimes. Sometimes I just sit with it, so I'm taking my time there. So these are like couple of things where I have my hands and legs in really cool.
Deepika:they are interesting and I'm looking forward to all of them. Thank you so much and hopefully we get to work together yes, some space or the other? Yes definitely awesome. Thank you so much, danita. This was a lovely podcast and so so nice of you to come and make this happen. Yes, and I think we've been talking about this for two, three months. Yeah. This date that date and waiting for this office of mine to get ready. So we can sit here and record. So thank you so much, thank you so much.
Nenita :Thank you so much for having me. It was really lovely Like. I didn't even realize how time passed. It's been a while, but it was great just having this chat and also I love doing these things because it's been a while since I started going out and doing interviews, like I did. For a long time I took my. I just took a pause and then now I'm like okay, let me start, because it also gives me an insight as to what I'm thinking, because the questions are not questions I would think of.
Nenita :You know not all of it, other than what I do or what my future plans are, but even that changes right. So you kind of get an insight into your own mind. So hence I love it, and also, of course, with you like I've known you for a while now, although not that closely, we've met each other and it's been great. So thank you so much.
Deepika:My pleasure, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2:If you like what you hear, subscribe and Thank you or have a story to share on this podcast, email me at theinspiredlifeindia at gmailcom. This is Deepika and I thank you for listening.