Kavita TATE-NADKARNI responds to ThinkWellness360 questionnaire:
Your view on beauty?
It’s a famed cliché, also platitude ― that beauty resides in the eyes of the beholder. There should be a reason behind it, right? Beauty is a subjective thing; it’s also an individual’s perspective, one that differs from person to person. Something, or someone who I feel is beautiful, may come across as boring, or unattractive, for others.
This is one reason why I believe that beauty is not about such limited facets that people perceive as being mandatory to look beautiful. The question is just not about having a fair, or dark skin, or being skinny, or fat. It’s all about feeling good about yourself; it doesn’t matter if this is with or without make-up; being plus-size, or working hard in the gym to achieving a fit, or slim, version of yourself, wearing nice, or ordinary clothes. It’s about loving yourself, having self-confidence and radiating empathy and love. A nice person with a kind, beautiful heart will definitely look beautiful to everyone. So, give power to your beauty by loving yourself, having that confidence in yourself and being pleasant to the best extent possible.
Your ‘take’ on fitness?
Fitness is not only about having good physical health, but also good emotional and spiritual health. Having a disease-free body isn’t just enough, though it is an important indicator of being fit. Fitness is having positive energy, stamina to carry out your regular activities, including moderate exercise without experiencing excessive fatigue, having the right weight for your age, a positive outlook to handling challenges and all the emotional ups and downs of life.
Your view of health and wellness?
Health and wellness are interrelated; they are not just ‘synonyms.’ Wellness is the way, or process, to achieve good mental, physical, emotional and spiritual health. It is about doing the right things and making the right choices to feeling healthy and happy too. This can include a well-balanced diet, regular exercise, meditation and regular health check-ups. I firmly believe that a personalised wellness routine with healthy lifestyle choices is the way to achieve good, optimal health.
Your ‘take’ on work-life balance?
Maintaining work-life balance is imperative because it helps one to achieve optimum results at work, have good health and reduce stress. It is not only coming to and leaving the workplace on time, but prioritising things in life that are vital to you and giving them appropriate time. This, of course, requires proper planning, including effective time management to pursuing hobbies, exercise, spending quality time with family and friends, including ‘me-time’ and doing things that are important to you… to make you happy. To achieve this, you might consider flexible work hours, work from home etc., It’s something that employees and employers have to work together to achieve. The pandemic has underlined one significant facet: a good, hybrid work environment helps one achieve to good work-life, life-work balance. This has a cumulative benefit: companies would, as we all now know, benefit and they will have a productive workforce that runs the extra mile to usher in great results. Also, whatever it is: always ‘wear’ your attitude; be assertive, but without being too pushy.
Your mantra to beat stress?
Different people have different ways to beat stress. This can be achieved by things that give you peace and happiness. It’d be something as simple as listening to music, walking in the garden, working out, allocating a spa day, spending some ‘alone time,’ playing with pets, or just ‘letting go’ things. However, at times, managing stress may require professional help. If talking to a friend doesn’t help, talking to an expert would be a useful prescription. We would all do well to know that mental and emotional health is as important as physical health. Well, when we don’t shy away from taking medical help for our physical ailments, why should we shy away from taking professional help for our emotional ill-health, as and when it happens?
