Episode 198- The Collective Power of NO

The Power of No

 Like many women of earlier generations the ability to utter the word “no” was difficult. But I quickly learnt its power when I arrived in NYC at age 16 and had to survive a new and abstract environment .Fresh from a village in the Corentyne  of nearly 500 people  I landed in Greenwich Village , Manhattan- the bohemian community of artists, hippies, gamsters, gangsters where live accelerated- surrounded by cozy pubs,  pool halls, record shops, vintage clothing shops ( where I found my first style in a Balenciaga dress, and Givaunchy coat for  than one hundred dollars, feasted on lunches at a Cuban cafetiera - arroz, black beans, and fried platanos for less than five dollars… traded Vidal Sassoon haircuts for fashion tips with my new friend, Miwa… a  metropolis exploration where I learned to unreign my free will to bolster and materialise an infinite sense of creativity. I trained myself to learn the word “no”, 

No to taking the easy route 

No to being exploited

No to jobs that underpaid immigrants

No to unscrupulous landlords

The most aggrieved No was to my father who was adamant about my pursuing my academic studies. 

The power of No did not alleviate mistakes and blindspots along the way but it safeguarded my focus. I had no choice but to succeed with my new life. With the power of NO, I was able to step by step build a new life with revolutionary clothing designs and empowered the brand name Maya which fashion designs in the seventies were featured by 80% of America’s hi fashion fashion retailers. I had delved into unearthing remembered skills. 

Then cancer struck at the height of my fashion career. A five year long journey that took me through the first fire of imitation of adult life. Cancer rerouted me back to the rich ground of my Vedic ancestry. My father was the pivotal oarsman In this transition. He reminded me that my birth path was a sacred one. I belonged not to the path of celebrity, but to the path of service. Just like that the power of No which had rapidly grown my success in the fashion world morphed into itself to bail me out of the cursory industry of commerce and commodity. His echo was a resounding NO to my life in the fashion industry. I closed the doors to my quintessential Madison Ave boutique, Closed all retailers access to my designs, closed out my licensing project that had just opened its first flagship store. The journey of Yes had begun: Yes to realigning with ancestral wisdom. Yes to being the first of my family to return to the Motherland. Yes, to the grace of an intensely disciplined and structured vocation of studying Vedas. Yes to my remarkable Guru, who was one of the rare and authentic scholar of Vedas. After my spiritual initiation, I returned to a fresh blossoms of  new life, with abundant pristine energy, and opened the Wise Earth School for disseminating Ayurveda holistic  medicine way of life. 

 The Spiritual Life of YES

40 years of Yes ( while there were thousands of noble deeds and  lessons culled in these years, what stands out in the wane of energy is the priceless cost of Yes.

Yes to women who needed my spiritual energy without accountability

Yes to women who needed a mother because their own relationship with their mother was deficient.

 Yes to those who needed to heal without doing the work 

Yes to the