Foreword — Windows of Reflection

By Dr. Shefali Tsabary

Here’s what she had to say….

As a clinical psychologist I am privileged to help many individuals and families heal from their past and create new stories of courage, reflection and insight. I believe that it is when we explore our inner worlds and gain self-awareness that we are afforded a new perspective on our lives and through this, the possibility for change and freedom.

This insightfully and articulately written collection of poems, Windows of Reflection is an invitation to go deep within yourself and discover all the parts that were ignored, denied or abandoned in the process of growing up and being conditioned in culture. Tasneem’s ability to use different emotions etched with simplicity allows you to enter a still and quiet state of contemplation through which you will eventually emerge — if you allow yourself — into a more quintessential “you.”

Our relationships with hurt and pain are often skewed. Hurt or pain is viewed as an intrinsic failure of the self, certainly of the other and definitely of life. But hurt and pain need to be redefined. Its entry, its presence and its ability to transform the self is phenomenally outstanding. I believe there is nothing more pivotal in the journey of conscious living than the understanding, integration and evolution of hurt and pain.

Tasneem beautifully depicts how pain can in fact be used as a vehicle of growth. As it turns out then, hurt is not something that is so dark and dire and disruptive, something to be avoided at all costs. On the contrary, it is something that is profound, inevitable, intrinsic, and quite possibly, one of the most powerful portals of consciousness we can have.

I am positive Tasneem’s life-coaching expertise has given her the tools of insight and awareness to delve deep into the oasis of the human psyche. Her poems reflect her intuition, sensitivity and fearless willingness to internalize the vast and complex range of human emotions. Her ability to notice a myriad of different sentiments across different life stories is what makes this book a soul searchers delight.

“When we share our stories what it does is it opens up our hearts for other people to share their stories. And it gives us a sense that we are not alone on this journey.” — Janine Shepherd

So come and go or come and stay… I assure you this beautiful offering: Windows of Reflection will always remain open for you, night or day.

For life is an open book. Full of blank pages. Do write your own story along the way.

Dr. Shefali Tsabary
NYT Best Selling Author
International Speaker
Clinical Psychologist
Parenting Expert

www.drshefali.com 

To say that I’m feeling honored, special and ever so grateful would be an understatement. Thank you sounds weak.

Windows of Reflection. Coming soon.

www.tasneemkagalwalla.com 

Personal Life Update

So she has been a dream for the first 10 odd years. A challenge for the next 10 plus years. She sat on all kinds of burners — front and back, over another ten years.

Sometimes I re-stirred her. Other times I let her temper at the mercy of the ways of the Universe. Once she even burned her steam off. Exhausted. From all the efforts which brought no fruit. No signs of bloom either. So she aged with me. I let her burn, somewhere deep within.

Life happened regardless.

But she… she was never forgotten. She had become a calling. A passion which I woke up to, imperative, in the middle of many nights. A compelling urge through numerous manic days. Persistently stalking my thoughts. Like a gentle reminder in all my fervent prayers. She stayed with me.

Until she made me what I am today.

Windows of Reflection. Coming soon.

www.tasneemkagalwalla.com  

God sent angel.

Daily Quotes and Random Notes

www.tasneemkagalwalla.com

Hope.

Daily Quotes and Random Notes

www.tasneemkagalwalla.com 

Strength - A reminder. A realization.

P.S. Notes from my desk #1

‪Imagine… Your biggest heartache.


Your deepest wound. An unfulfilled desire.

Do you feel that excruciating pain?!


That blood curdling silent scream.


Those hot tears when no one’s looking.

That’s your strength fighting for you.


Standing you up.


Don’t give up. Or give in.

You are stronger than you think you are.

 ~Tasneem Kagalwalla~

www.tasneemkagalwalla.com

Click here for more inspirational poetry and videos http://tasneemkagalwalla.blogspot.com/search/label/Inspirational%20poetry%2Fvideos

3 important reminders when obsessing over what you want

Expect the Un-expected

Have you ever wanted something so bad, worked hard at it relentlessly and yet not got it? Have you given unconditional love hoping so much it would be reciprocated? And it wasn’t. Have you given it all you have, from the very core of your being and still faced failure? After failure. Have you cried hot silent tears? In the bathroom. On your pillow. When bowed in prayer. Have you wailed uncontrollably when the grieving was overwhelming? Or felt a void. A gaping wound which bleeds each and every time a candid remark erodes its scarred surface. Until you fear to hope, lest it’s just an insidious hoax. Unable to hold it together you struggle with drowning in your vulnerable thoughts of helplessness.

If you answered yes to any of the above, then this one’s for you. But first, here’s a hug and a coffee. Now let’s talk.

1. Hope and Faith. They go hand in hand and yet have very different roles to play when dealing with fulfillment of desires. Hope is an expectancy of materializing things the way you envision them; faith is the fuel to that belief. Hope comes with a picture whereas faith has no shape or picture of things to be. It just keeps you safely grounded in the knowing that, it will be. The best for you will come forth.

Learn from Faith then. When you are attached to an outcome, you hope things will happen at a certain time in a certain way – it is your expectation of how things should happen that makes you think that things are not working out. Expectations color your perception of things. You don’t really see how things are unfolding when you want them to happen a certain way. This prevents you from recognizing the good that comes your way and causes you to push it away. As it just does not fit with the way you imagine it. Without preconceived ideas to limit your perception, you are able to accept what comes your way as part of the solution to realizing what you truly desire in life.

In future if you lose hope, remember to keep the faith. It will re-ignite your courage in time and allow you to bounce back. 

2. Start taking one day at a time. Live in the present. Your deepest longings forever push you to look ahead, mentally entrapping you in the future. Like a chess player you’re always thinking 8 moves out –what should I do, what if that doesn’t work out, what’s next. You create much of your own suffering by getting caught in an endless cycle of pining and attachment. You are living a conditional life; you cannot be free in the present moment. You cannot be happy with a beautiful sunset or with a moment of warmth between you and another; instead, every experience is interpreted in the context of how much better it would be in an expected future.  

Instead keep it simple. Breathe. If you’re feeling overwhelmed because you want something too much, then do something else to distract yourself. Get involved in other things that are also important to you. Things that come 2^nd and 3^rd on your list of wants. What can I have right now? What can I do right now? Stay in the moment, see your decision right now as the best decision you can make in the moment. What happens next – how it turns out– doesn’t matter. Focus on right here. Right now. 

3. Detach. ‘You only lose what you cling to,’ says Buddha. Break free, let loose that which you desire the most. There’s a story about a monkey who comes across a trap in the forest. He can see a coconut inside. He’s hungry and so he puts his hand through a small hole to get at it. He grips onto the coconut, which he really wants to eat, but while he’s holding the coconut he can’t pull his hand free. If he only opened his hand again, he could escape, but clinging to what he wants keeps him trapped.  

We can only be deeply affected by loss when we are clinging on too tightly to something. Mind you, I’m not saying to stop wanting things. Just stop clinging to them. Clinging is holding on to something too tightly.  

When you find yourself obsessing about a desire, ask yourself. Why is it so important? What are you afraid might happen if you don’t get it? Would it really be the end of the world? 

For when you really think about it; have you ever lost out on something or someone only to be redirected to something better? Have new windows of opportunity opened just when you stopped knocking on the old closed doors. Are you eternally grateful to have something not work out for you as you had planned only because what you received instead was so much better?  

God is able to do above and beyond all that you can ask and even think of. Surrender; know that good things will come to you when the time and place is right. You will get what you need, just may not be the exact way you want it. In that sense, expect the unexpected. 

And Thank God for that. For He knows best. 

www.tasneemkagalwalla.com

Contact Tasneem Kagalwalla to seek support and overcome personal and professional blocks and barriers.

Click here for more articles on self-improvement http://tasneemkagalwalla.blogspot.com/search/label/Self%20Improvement

I Hope

8 ways to go from hopeless to hopeful

We’ve all been there. Swinging the seesaw of hope. We’ve experienced the highs of feeling full of anticipation, brimming with confidence, optimistic about the path ahead, encouraged to achieve in spite of adversities. After all; there’s hope!

And we’ve seen days (if not more) of feeling low and miserable, seeing no light at the end of the tunnel, forlorn and lost, we despair; desperate we trust our fractured souls to any ray of hope!

Hope then is like the weave to the fabric of our existence. The quintessential thread that holds us together. Having hope is like taking your next breath; breathing. Without hope; would it be fair to say that we essentially lose motivation, direction or even the will to survive?

Wouldn’t it be ideal if we never had to struggle with the hope-less days and forever remain positively charged? Always be hope-full.

Spirituality, Faith in a Higher Power, Trust in yourself, Belief that everything happens for the best… these are a few of the likely answers and (to each heir own) rightly so. Hope then is intangible, it needs to be felt. It’s a feeling. And luckily a feeling can be evoked.

Like a song that makes you sentimental, an old perfume that makes you nostalgic or a photograph that brings forth happy memories.

So how do you evoke hope?

Here are some ways to do just that.

• Ask yourself, "Are hope and possibilities through faith related things?”

If you answered "Yes," then focus on how to improve your possibilities and the faith to believe. What do you believe in and why? How can working on that make you stronger?

If your answer was "No," figure out the difference between the two – hope and possibilities. That may help you understand how to best use your faith to have hope and see possibilities.

• Look at the people around you. You can learn plenty from them.

Observe those that are making progress toward their goals, are centered, happy and optimistic -- do they do possibility thinking?

• Imagine waking up fresh every morning, truly feel hopeful. That is possibility thinking. Make time every day to imagine the day going well as you work to continue making progress toward possibilities. 
• Get training or coaching/counseling. Sometimes this needs a sincere commitment towards change and can be time consuming. Stay determined to improve. 
• Decide to take it as it comes... accept life events and work with them. Living in denial blocks hope. 
• Take risks, make shifts in your lifestyle if that seems like the way to make progress. 
• Redesign, rebuild -- a little at a time or start afresh, but don't you quit. 
• Relax and be refreshed; meditate/pray and find time for recreation to be able to keep going forward.

Most importantly; pause long enough to realize you probably already possess a seed of hope -- even if you don't realize it! You either feel hope – less or hope- full. Regardless of both eventualities; hope exists.

Look within – hope only needs to be evoked.

Notes from my desk:

Hope has been recognized as an important and central element of healing, and has been known by many other names, including optimism, the placebo effect, self-efficacy, and positive expectancies. A life coach inspires hope during treatment and change. Often equated with the particular promise of a cure, hope is better understood in its broader meanings that involve will, way, wish, action, and horizon. This richer and deeper context of hope is a vital perspective for the therapist. Helping clients to find and realize their sources of hope can be a process of waiting together for a clearer vision to emerge. It is important to remember that the task is not one of installing hope as much as evoking it, calling it forth from the client's own resources. In this sense, hope is not given as much as it is found. What therapists can give their clients is, at most, a lens or mirror through which their own vision is clarified.

Contact Tasneem Kagalwalla for more information on how Life Coaching works best for you.

www.tasneemkagalwalla.com