Geeta Vara I Ep #20 | Preparing our bodies for this autumn

excited to have you thank you thank you both so much tasha and denise really really a pleasure to join you and thank you for inviting me to speak on ayurveda today yeah well welcome uh welcome gita um so to jump straight uh into our conversation today i’m gonna look at a study that we kind of that raised our awareness uh recently and uh it’s on the topic of time trends and seasonal patterns of health-related quality of lives among us adults it’s this study that we we looked at and one of the findings is that they found that there’s a significant uh difference but it’s but it’s different according to seasons um so found significant but different seasonal patterns in physical and mental health the best physical health was during the summer and the worst was during the winter so i find it quite an interesting finding and i was wondering how how does are you rather look at seasonal change yeah that’s really um that’s really interesting statistics from my perspective uh vinnie because um when we’re looking at things from the ayurvedic perspective our immunity um and our body strength our digestive strength should actually be strongest in the winter so we should actually not be feeling uh sick but the thing is the way that our lifestyle is positioned in in the modern world makes us feel vulnerable so because of that reason we we are exposing ourselves to a diet and lifestyle that’s not necessarily the right thing for us or we haven’t managed ourself through the transition between the seasons and so what’s really interesting about ayurveda which is you know a 5000 year old science and it really focuses on two areas one is curative health so if there is uh you know if we’re suffering for any particular health issues then we have you know panchakarma which is cleansing therapies we have herbs we have a lot of rituals and routines to follow but you know the the biggest thing in the west here and the approach that we take with ayuveda is much more on the preventative well on the side trying to understand how we’re trying to understand ourself you know um based on our constitution and that and that’s when over the starts to become personalized um so then we’re looking at the preventative side you know what can i do um to align myself to my constitution and to nature and to the seasons and to the day um time of day to to really um optimize my wellness so i’m adaptable right so we have a beautiful um modality which we called uh ritucharia and ritocharia really is um abiding by the discipline or disciplining our diet and lifestyle according to the seasonal um patterns so traditionally we would have six seasons um based on the classical text but we really um kind of go by the four seasons um mostly um well here in the northern hemisphere anyway and uh although it’s kind of difficult to identify season to season i mean we just had a bit of an indian summer in london just last week um we had four days of you know 29 degrees i think it was um which is which is you know uh the kind of summer we didn’t have the entire june july august yeah so so um yeah i i think rudocharia really teaches us that um while we we want to have a routine we want to have a routine according to nature and we are really far off that right now so um what happens when we transition from season to season so right now um as we’re recording this podcast today is we’re transitioning um in in europe from and us as well from uh the summer into the autumn and so our during this transition phase between seasons our body’s vulnerable our body’s vulnerable because um the atmosphere is changing the energy is changing so we haven’t we need to adjust we need to lighten things in our bodies our hunger changes our sleep patterns change our digestive capacity change so we need to honor that you know these these changes um that naturally happen in our body um as well just like you know it does with nature so you know we’ve been told for example you know let’s we’ve got to eat a big breakfast it’s a it’s the it’s the biggest meal of the day it’s the main meal of the day and i always see all my clients they always come with this oh yeah well i you know i have to eat breakfast and i’m like well are you actually hungry no but you know i have to eat breakfast it’s like the most important meal of the day is it is it yeah so so that’s what we’re kind of um you know we have to ask ourselves the questions the right questions like is it the most important meal of the day why who said um we fall into these patterns and we never question um question it so it’s it’s really about asking ourselves those basic questions am i hungry you know do i need to eat breakfast because um you know the the doshas um which we won’t go into too much detail because that’s a whole subject area in itself yeah yeah yeah but but the the doshas play a role in understanding who we are but the doshas play a role in their dominance during the seasonals uh seasonal transitions or the different seasons and they have a dominance in the different time of day as well so once we get to understand um which dosha is is dominant or governing that season we can adjust our diet and lifestyle accordingly so the changes in season we can see you know the variation in um the length of the daylight hours you know the temperature um is shifting and then we see you know the blossom in spring and the um the autumn leaves fall so we can see nature doesn’t question it just does naturally according to the change in the shift that’s sort of happening so you you mentioned um that we are entering in a so we are going from summer to autumn right so you were mentioning lightning to to lighten things up why white lightning uh why is that a key word for for the season yeah so lightening um is really in reference to the transition phase so as we go um as we’re transitioning from summer we we generally have um the digestive strength isn’t so strong um and as we come into autumn our digestive fire will increase slowly so in the in the transition phase we don’t want to suddenly jump into eating heavy foods for example so it’s a time to have you know yeah either either we call it uh is you know seasonal regimen and what we have the the word is uh which is the the one or two weeks in the phase between seasons so this is a this is a time where as a practitioner i would generally guide people through detoxification cleansing processes and just saying like let’s take four or five days uh we do a gentle rest and reset so that your body can adjust you know into the wind so we strengthen the digestive fire again so that as we come into autumn and winter we regain the momentum and gain that strength in the body to handle the heavier foods that are about to um come into our diet which is perfectly natural um so the the whole point of this is really you know trying to become more in tune with with with nature more in tune with our intuition so you know um not not listening to the ego mind you know that’s the breakfast is the most important meal of the day um well let’s address that um actually why you know why is life yeah my next question not so yeah i mean it’s it’s because the energy of kapha which is the denser element of water and earth it’s a dense energy between 6 and 10 a.m and so if we if we have there’s a density and wetness and earthiness in the in the environment our digestive system is mirroring this and what that means is that our digestive fire is also kind of a bit sluggish and a bit heavy right so unless we’re feeling a strong hunger what we don’t want to be doing is overloading the digestive system with a heavy breakfast and and if that is also cold like you know um granola with yogurt and fruits and not only is there incompatibilities there but it’s heavy and it’s cold so the digestive fire is not able to handle it so we end up accumulating more toxins in the body um at that time then you know allowing the body to digest so there’s there’s a lot of things that are misaligned there so we’ve got to first say am i hungry if hunger is there then we should eat hunger is not their weight wait until hunger is is is there and quite often a lot of people especially um you know if there’s cougher dominance or the dominance then they won’t feel hunger in the morning so it’s fine to have something lighter and and so you were saying that like okay so with the charia is actually like i guess having a plan to transition from uh season to season because it’s a seasonal practice right um so what does that look like and how does that translate to like the daily um practices um how do we you know adjust accordingly i know i know you were mentioning about the dosha so you kind of need to align back to what your dominant dosha is but also in general like how does that look for you know the majority of people when we move from season to season yeah so so um now we’re going into autumn which is uh we need to start eating foods which are warmer by nature so the way the way the the concept of it the way that the best way to apply the principles of iowa that intuitively is to understand the key concept here which is like increases like and opposites bring balance right so we don’t have to get super scientific and really um granular about what we should eat and what we shouldn’t eat if we just apply that one principle so if we understand you know going into autumn what is what is happening in the environment what’s happening in the energy so we can see the winds are picking up the air is drier so the quality of water is there it’s dry it’s colder it’s lighter in energy so when we understand that these are the qualities of vata and we’re involved the season then we want to say okay well like increases like so if i eat foods that are cold that are light that are dry it’s going to aggravate the vata also within me despite the fact that we might have other dominance in our constitution generally the energy of arthur becomes stronger in everybody you know overall so now we can say okay well if opposites bring balance what are these opposite qualities well they’re the qualities that are you know nourishing and grounding and warming and anxious you know oily foods um wet foods you know soups and stews and all of those lovely um nurturing foods you know they just kind of warm you up but are easy to digest you know so that’s these are the perfect foods um for this season because it’s it’s allowing our digestive system to get you know get fired up get stronger again now if we miss that if we keep carrying on with eating salads and whole foods and ice creams we become vulnerable we become vulnerable because we haven’t adapted and adjusted to that transition and that is you know one of the key reasons why people get um sick you know um in in the transition phase or or they haven’t built the strength um in the digestion or they start eating heavy foods or they just have irregular habits and patterns that are not aligned with their their their body type you know their constitution whole foods were kind of for summer where we you know because it was warm we kind of took something lighter and hence our digestive fire was reduced now that we are coming into autumn what are some of the type of foods we want to avoid okay so so the question is um like if i was to ask you that question yeah what would you what would you feel like eating like now that the weather’s changing what are the foods that you feel drawn to and and and that’s the beauty of ayurveda it’s that and that’s about intuition it’s like what am i i’m drawn to like oh i feel like having soup soup yeah like you know i feel like oh yeah i really need like um hot chocolate you know you want to have things that are naturally warmer you don’t want to have the salads or um the raw foods but the problem for us is um when we think about eating healthy we have categorizing with pigeon hole oh this is healthy this is healthy but we’re not understanding that there’s a difference between you know carrot batons and hummus as a snack to carrot soup it’s not it’s carrots not the issue the issue is one’s cold one’s warm the same food can be suitable or prepared in different ways to help us in different seasons so carrot is a great example it’s a root vegetable it’s sweet in nature if we have it in a soup that’s a perfect you know light meal to have in the evening during the transition between um into from from either uh autumn to winter or summer to autumn you know or even you know any any transition even from winter to spring um so soups stews casseroles you know we want to strengthen the digestive fire um as we come into autumn because it’s preparing the body for heavier foods you know nuts meats heavy foods um that’s why we start to start to incorporate like warming spices you know herbal teas this this all starts to play a role into getting the digestive fire ready you know to be able to break down the heavier foods that are coming if we don’t do that then when we eat those heavy foods it becomes toxic even though it’s healthy it’s because the fire wasn’t wasn’t there to to break it down yeah i can see the pattern like i can see how it’s supposed to kind of how you’re saying that in winter your body should have the strongest uh immunity and digestive fire right um but could you could you touch or speak on a bit um what is like the impact for not practicing these practices you know when you’re transitioning into these seasons like you were mentioning that you know you have the higher chances to to fall sick but other than like physically falling ill are there are there any other impacts in the short term and then in the long run as well on our bodies and our minds yeah it’s interesting because it’s because it’s preventative it’s it’s not so much of a direct cause and effect so by um by not doing it it um we’re not going to see like we’re not going to suddenly have long-term sickness because it’s so it’s getting sick or having a disease or an illness is an accumulation and it is an accumulation of of um not following the body’s rhythm you know not being in tune and not following the body’s sending us signals all the time right but we override that with our ego with our mind and because we override it um the body has to adjust or adapt um to what it’s being given um and sometimes it’s that miscommunication that leads us to have issues but you know adapting to the seasons um the change the changing season helps us to establish a balance in our constitution because it’s it’s all the things that happening behind the scenes you know it’s the um it’s the basic body functions um we’re enhancing and supporting the basic body functions from digestion to absorption to assimilation nourishing the tissues taking the toxins away from the tissues to be um cleansed out you know and it’s really to generate um discipline and peace and happiness and longevity ultimately you know the more we’re in tune with our own biological rhythm um because everything around us nature does it all animals do it you know there’s this hibernation there’s um migration you know there’s something so the blossoming and elite so so nature is just working in clockwork aligned to the sun rhythms the moon rhythms um and we we you know with the with the invention of industrial lighting we’ve got ourselves into all sorts of bother you know like people people the fundamental basics are you know sleep you know without without good quality sleep and our eating patterns not aligned it really is you know the starting point of a lot of our health issues so the industrial lighting means that we can be awake till all sorts of hours but that doesn’t mean that’s good for us just because we can doesn’t mean we should yeah you know our ancestors used to you know most most of our ancestors probably worked on farms and had subsistence living so they would get exercise incidentally there were no gyms so it wouldn’t be like you know sit at a computer all day not moving at all and then had suddenly have a burst of gym in the evening which is the wrong timing for it right you know so we they would be working and they’d be incidental exercise they would stop for lunch to break to rest you know and they’d finish the day when the sun goes down and then they they’d commune as a family and have a meal together and then sleep when you know when when the sun goes down and then that pattern follows and that shifted as as the sun cycles change as the seasons change so um so we’re just uh really misaligned particularly in the urban environment um to to the way nature intends for us to to live and the rhythm that feels more aligned so while we’re not going to go back to that kind of rudimentary subsistence type of living we’ve got to find um ways to adjust ourselves in in the current um climate and urban environment i guess the best best we can i really like how uh it’s actually just an opportunity for people to kind of become or stay present with regards to your environment and what it’s going through um because as you were saying we we used to have lifestyles that was that were actually in tune with the environment and the climate but today it’s we’re so independent and detached to what you know our environment does because we are either seated in front of our computers and at what time we do that doesn’t really matter and so now um kind of resetting that and and trying to find uh ways to you know align to it is i think it’s it could be very preventative and i think that um as you were saying it’s a preventive um measure because today we wait till it’s chronic and it’s not too late but it’s just that it you could have done something for it not to come to that point so it’s um i think it’s a it’s an interesting uh practice for for everyone to to actually um do yeah i i think i think that’s that’s really true we do wait for things to to fully manifest you know until okay oh yeah now i’ve got a problem but you see the body has already shown us signs very early on that there’s an imbalance so let me give you an example like water is um you know it’s it’s the quality of air predominantly and you know it can lead to a lot of like um if it gets chronic and long-term then arthritis and sleep issues stress and anxiety and all sorts of vata related um conditions but you know maybe you know a year before a couple of years before maybe the body was like a little bit uncomfortable in the stomach maybe we’re getting constipation or bloating and gas and you know we were having lots of different signs maybe changes to the dryness in our hair or dryness in our skin now these are all signs that there is is imbalanced in at a mild level so there are there are in iowa that we have several stages you know in in the development of diseases and where we’re so preventative and why iowa is so different from western medicine is we recognize those earlier signs and symptoms and we want to we want to remedy that while we’re seeing those symptoms before it gets to the chronic stage but then we now need you know herbs and deep cleansing because uh you shouldn’t get to that stage um so yeah we there’s a lot we can do and as much as i i want to advocate for it i know that adopting those you know those uh practices and this discipline is not always easy what because one thing that uh someone would say is that it’s very restrictive because oh i have to adjust according to this you know i have a i’m actually when i’m telling you this i have my dad’s voice on the back i said how how do i manage this how can i it’s not convenient i have to eat a certain way i have people to you know to manage et cetera so what would you say uh are ways for us to implement those routines so those practices without it being intrusive to your day to day the question is our life has become intrusive on us on our natural body so it’s kind of um it’s kind of uh looking at bringing in one or two rituals you know slowly into your um day-to-day routine that resonate with you and that’s where we are intuitive it’s like okay well this this this makes sense this i can fit into my morning routine this i can fit into but the basic things are like you know sleeping um sleeping as close to 10 o’clock as possible and and really work on that really work on you know getting to bed a little earlier and waking up a little earlier and reason you know i know it’s something that every you know parents are you know early to bed early to rise you know makes man healthy wealthy and wise that was something my dad always used to say when we were growing up and like whatever i like to sleep in at 10 o’clock you’re a child like you know we want to do all those things but as we get older the body’s changing right the body’s changing we’re not um we don’t bounce back as we did when we’re in our childhood or teens so um what we really want to do is just get our sleep patterns that’s the first place to start look at the things look at the rituals that are accessible it’s not it’s it’s not about being rigid it’s about having discipline and it’s a choice right ultimately either we choose to listen to the body or we don’t if we choose to listen to the body it will guide us to be more healthful it will guide us to cherry-pick the rituals that we need right now until they become ingrained and we don’t even think about it we would never leave the house without brushing our teeth right we would never you know so it’s like well i don’t leave the house until i’ve done all my morning rituals because i need that it’s it’s a part of my routine um and it doesn’t feel like i have to do it it’s just a part of my routine i enjoy it it makes me feel good so you know using affirmations can really help us to motivate ourselves it’s about motivating ourselves to want to do those things it should never we should never do anything if we have a strong resistance we’re always going to have a disconnect the mind saying one thing and the body’s saying another and the moment we have that disharmony it’s almost irrelevant the doing of it is irrelevant we’ve got to fully be on board with anything that we do anything that we eat because if we eat something and we are hating every minute every mouthful of it that’s your body saying i don’t want this why are you feeding me this so we’ve got to be on board with whatever we do it’s got to feel aligned so there’s there’s a moment where we need to change and the body’s uh or the mind is resisting because we’re so used to following a certain habit following a certain pattern it’s hard to change habits yeah well once we like what my experience in clinic has been you know i’ve had a couple of clients recently who have been very resistant very resistant and i i often think why are you here you know you don’t want to make the changes um why are you here so you have to you know you have to get into the psychology of of how we operate as a human and um how we need to motivate ourselves why discipline is important because it does bring us freedom it does bring us happiness it does bring us health so it’s not about restriction it’s about discipline and that’s a choice so in what i’ve noticed with my clients is that when they make when they make those adjustments they think oh right i feel different i do feel like i have energy i thought i was fine like three months ago i thought i was fine now that i’ve made these changes and i feel more energy more lightness now i realized that i wasn’t feeling great it isn’t until we see that contrast that we realize that what we were doing before felt okay but it was okay it wasn’t optimal that’s the difference it definitely resonated with that actually because before doing i did like a eye over the cleanse earlier this year and i didn’t realize how much of an impact it made on my life not having done it before right and i was like wow i’m sleeping so much better i’m so much more focused when i’m doing work i’m not distracted i don’t have like you know the urge to to disrupt my routine right and you know because vata is it’s it governs movement okay like wind it’s it’s like it’s moving it’s rapid it’s mobile it’s it’s really you know just movement so we want to slow down right we want to create the opposites that bring balance to slowing down you know this is time for a little bit more calming meditations and these sorts of things you know not hibernating we’ll leave that for winter but this is the time you know we’re starting to slow down so so these are the things um that we want to start thinking about um we’re having more rituals around bedtime um you know so that we’re we’re lengthening the the sleep we don’t need so much sleep in the summer but in the autumn and winter we start to increase the amount of sleep we have making sure that we’re getting a better quality of sleep because so much is happening while we sleep so when someone just says oh what’s the med what what do i do i’ve got all so well what’s your sleep pattern i mean if if if we don’t sleep well and i’ve had issues with sleep for a while um recently um and it disturbs me it disturbs my my entire day my focus my energy so um you know i’m not gonna look for a herb to fix this i’m gonna have to find ways to fix the quality of my sleep yeah meditation more breathing um what am i doing that’s aggravating me you know am i am i staying up late at night watching netflix you know money heist or something that’s really like engaging my mind and now it’s like it’s running through your consciousness right so we’ve got to you know stop doing the things were you like in my house because you like pointed out exactly the things yeah the showing plus the show i was watching oh yeah i sleep has been like a constant um that’s like a battle for everyone i think especially for uh potashi and i um sasha having her own you know type of uh how to say demons that will not allow her to go to sleep i have my own but yeah focusing on that is a is a good it’s a good tip yeah like the last three practitioners we spoke with everyone highlighted sleep and i was like point taking this point down and gonna practice that tonight yeah yeah it’s it’s it’s almost like if we um if we don’t um get the fundamentals right we don’t get the pillars you know you know we’re building a house we need a stable foundations it doesn’t matter what happens on the balcony i mean you know you can only party on the balcony if the foundations are nice and strong so yeah sleep and eating patterns not even the food is the eating patterns these these form the foundations and underpin you know everything that we can grow so we don’t like we said before it’s not about you know just being okay and you know avoiding disease we want to feel good we want to age well we want optimal wellness so if we want to have optimal wellness then a little bit of discipline in our day-to-day lifestyle that is nothing more than self-care actually is really worth the effort you know and it infiltrates into everything that we do if we don’t give ourselves the time and energy um it means when you know we have to address whether you know we’re we’re lacking self-worth lacking self-love um and you know we can see over the pandemic so much of this you know um suppressed trauma has come up for so many people yeah um so self-care has become really not um not uh something that’s a luxury it’s absolute necessity for mental health so you know we’ve got to address mental and emotional wellness and when vat dies we come into the seasonal transition it it it becomes really aggravated um in our body and mind so we want to address and calm the mind down so you know western medicine or you know a lot of research is now being done right on you know the benefits of meditation the benefits of certain sleep patterns and should you have coffee you know but everything’s in isolation we’ve got a cause and effect but what what’s missing is this this whole person this whole one whole human yeah in the middle that there’s a myriad of things going on we’re a complete ecosystem so yeah it’s great measuring things but let’s understand ourself and honor ourselves what we need uh what feels right not what the mind thinks it’s right what feels right you know by our body i think that’s key right there like the word honoring ourselves and it’s i think getting to the point where you even understand what honoring yourself means is like that’s the work and then when we get there we can start taking the bits of research and information and putting it together right um to apply it yeah yeah absolutely um yeah i couldn’t put it better myself it is it’s it’s applying it’s it’s integrating um the knowing so we can flow so it’s it we can know we can know all the right things to do i mean we can read books on books so yeah this is good yeah and know everything but the integration like you asked earlier it’s it’s very hard so you know that’s why working with a practitioner um or a consultant can help you well stay accountable but also stay on track and say okay this is a this this pace works for me i’m struggling with this this is not working and so you get into a rhythm so i i like i like to work with um clients at least you know at least once every season at least you know so that we can we can handhold through that process and and once you understand a bit more about how your body’s functioning how your mind operates um it can really help because the sun’s playing a role the planets are playing a role you know the moon’s playing a role i mean for everybody but particularly for women you know around our menstrual cycle um and and our hormones so there’s a myriad of things happening and we we can’t discount or ignore any of those you know um yeah i i see clients and and they’ll have missed huge chunks of their medici like their history it’s like oh yeah and plus oh yeah and also take like antidepressants or i also am on hrt or i’m also on like but it’s like it’s become so normalized yeah that it’s not like well that i’m not here for that issue i’m just here for this issue because we’re so it’s so normalized that we’re gonna see different people for different conditions and we see a specialist but we want to be more generalist we want to look at the whole picture yeah i think and i think that’s that goal is really ties back to like why why are we doing what we’re doing like dartif the podcast like we’re really trying to bridge that gap and kind of um plant the seeds slowly but surely to people to know that it’s really not um one issue in silo it’s everything together um yeah and i think that kind of ties back to like i guess the takeaways you were saying earlier you know it’s just the small habits that we need to just uh practice and incorporate in our day-to-day and aim for minor changes right oh it’s um i think it’s a great message as well because it’s an opportunity for the seasonal change and the adaptation and reflecting on on your habits and undoing all these things are an opportunity to consciousness and so um to practice consciousness and um i think that’s a a nice takeaway for for our conversation today um but before we we end our conversation uh we like to we like to just give you some rapid fire questions and see what you have to tell us about that so the first one is what is the worst health advice you’ve ever received in your life um well one i think we touched on earlier about you know breakfast uh being the most important meal of the day but uh i don’t think i elaborated on that but maybe that’s for another conversation but but one one of the ones i think for me is oh you know you have a headache just just take a paracetamol you know right like you know just just just just pop the pill and you know it will go away so that’s that’s that’s the culture that we have it’s like you know just uh pill popping you know it’s like so yeah for me um that’s that’s definitely uh yeah don’t don’t resort to taking a pill let’s address the root of of why why that’s happening yeah for sure yeah and the second one is uh if there was one habit we should all adopt today what would that be okay something um that i am actually a huge advocate of uh and i’ve practiced since i was five years old uh well since i ever brushed my teeth actually um was uh tongue scraping so yeah so you know it allows us to see all the the toxic accumulation um that’s happened overnight so yeah scraping the tongue after brushing the teeth in the morning can really you know kind of start the digestive system um in in in the right way um every day so you know it’s it’s clearing out the toxins tingling the taste buds so that’s uh i would say you know well if you don’t have one you need to get one and to see how how it changes you know um your taste perception and uh you know if you want to say if i say well rice isn’t sweet well use a tongue scraper and then eat rice slowly and taste the sweetness good point and last one a bit more lighter and fun so if you were to put a soundtrack to your life what would it be okay um this is a difficult question actually but i because it’s just this i mean i love music and i love all different genres of music but um it’s it’s not so much a soundtrack the out the album that i think really um that resonates with me and it was it was released 20 years ago uh by india ari um called acoustic soul and now if you listen to each and every single song there’s not a single song i could actually pick because the the meaning and the resonance that that every song has in the album is really the depiction of of life yeah it’s deep it’s it’s beautiful um beautiful music beautiful words and i don’t know anybody who wouldn’t resonate so although it’s yeah i would say that’s my my soundtrack to life um i think everybody should um give a listen in you know um i’d also like to just like mention to your listeners um you know we’ve been talking about ritu sandy and ritucharia and transition and cleansing i do have virtual workshops and virtual retreats um running right now you know they’re coming up um very soon um so if if you want to um engage with me directly and and get got more guidance that that option is there um on my website also you’ll put the link there um but if someone wants to just sort of learn a bit more and um you know there are plenty of books i also have a book um that was published called i rather incidentally surprise um yeah so the book is there and there’s all the daily rituals all about digestive health and the doses it’s it’s all in there so it’s a nice introduction into either the as a as a topic so yeah well yeah nice we will we will do that for all our listeners we’ll put in the show notes so be sure to check that out um to [ __ ] where to find gita and you know how to contact her and also her book great thank you so much gita for coming on our show today it’s been really uh insightful and nice to chat with you sasha booney it’s been my absolute pleasure i i’m honored and very grateful to have the opportunity to speak with you today thank you