The Shiuli Magic

 

There is something about Bengal that quietly enters the heart and stays there.

I spent my college days in Durgapur, and somewhere along the way, Bengal became more than a place I lived in. It became part of the way I think, my appreciation of art and aesthetics, and my love for the simple pleasures of life.

From the aromatic chai at the roadside jhoops to hot bread pakodas eaten without much thought, from the endless variety of mishtis to the little food rituals that seem to belong to every corner of Bengal, there is an unmistakable warmth to its everyday pleasures. Nothing needs to be elaborate. A cup of tea, a plate of something fried, a sweet picked up on the way to the hostel, a leisurely conversation that stretches longer than intended. Somehow, Bengal makes room for all of it.

Yet, if there is one thing I will always associate with Bengal, it is the magic of the Shiuli season.

Shiuli, or Parijat, with its tiny white flowers and orange stems, has always felt like the heralding of Pujo to me. The moment those little flowers begin appearing, an entire season seems to arrive with them. One glimpse of Shiuli, and my mind is filled with a montage of Pujo, from the careful painting and intricate detailing of Durga Ma idols to the smell of fresh paint and clay, the bustle around the pandals, the bright sarees appearing everywhere, and friends making plans for pandal hopping. I can almost see the evenings spent wandering from one pandal to another, eating, laughing, talking, and simply being part of the celebration.

And then there are those autumn mornings.

There is something almost cinematic about an autumn night scented with Shiuli and the fragrance lingering in the air.

Many of my friends have told me about their childhood autumn mornings. They would spread towels on the floor before going to sleep, wake up in the morning to find them covered with fallen flowers, and gather them carefully for Puja.

They speak about it with such tenderness that, listening to them, I sometimes feel as though I had been there too. Their memories have somehow become a part of mine. A childhood lived yet again, through someone else's stories.

Some friends have also told me about Tagore's references to Shiuli and the poignancy with which the flower is woven into Bengal's cultural imagination. Perhaps that is what makes Shiuli feel larger than a flower. It carries a season, a landscape, a culture and an entire way of remembering.

I saw Shiuli scattered around my garden today morning.

Every time I see those little white flowers lying on the ground, something in me travels back to simpler times. Times when there seemed to be enough time to notice nature, talk about literature, wander around a campus on an unhurried morning, and have conversations that did not need to lead anywhere.

Maybe we Indians had mastered the art of la dolce far niente much earlier.

We simply never paused long enough to give it a name.

There was a time when doing nothing was not something that had to be earned. A morning could simply be a morning. A walk could be taken without counting steps. A conversation could stretch without anyone checking the time. Beauty could be noticed without being photographed. Memories could be made without immediately being documented.

Perhaps that is what Shiuli brings back for me.

It brings back the feeling of having time.

More time to look outside the window. More time to bask in the sun. More time to walk without purpose, talk without urgency, read without distraction, and simply get lost in the memories of the grand life we have already had the pleasure of living.

And perhaps that is the real magic of Shiuli.

It falls quietly through the night, and by morning, it has filled the world with beautiful thoughts and hope.

 

The 80s Are Back. Sort Of.

Recently, my Instagram feed seems to have been taken over by the 80s.

Everyone is asking AI to show them what they would have looked like in the 80s.

And suddenly, people who weren't even born then are discovering their apparently fabulous 80s hair, dramatic clothes and wonderfully grainy photographs.

The world is getting all nostalgic for a decade they may not have even lived through.

And at this point, I am beginning to wonder if I had an entire 80s life and simply failed to attend.

The funniest thing about this trend is that we are recreating the retro era with poses that never really existed back then.

These bright smiles, relaxed couple poses and perfectly curated grainy photographs look wonderfully 80s. Except I don't remember anyone looking this relaxed in the retro pictures I've seen.

Nobody was trying to look effortless. They simply stood there, slightly embarrassed to be posing, trying not to look vain while also making sure they looked good enough to be photographed.

But what has stayed with me from the many albums I have browsed through over the years is the killer stare.

As if smiling too much or looking too pleased might make them appear vain, so even the slightest curve of a smile was carefully withheld.

And yet, there was so much that went into that one photograph.

The time someone took to get ready. The excitement of knowing a camera was coming. Waiting for the camera from the neighbourhood to arrive. Finding the right light, choosing the right shade.

The photograph may have lasted a few seconds, but there was a whole little event around it.

Talking of photographs reminds me of the one almost every Indian household had after a wedding in the yesteryears. The newly married couple, dressed in their best, sitting or standing together with that shy, coy smile that somehow said everything without saying very much.

May be that is why the Ranabaali photograph of Vijay Deverakonda and Rashmika Mandanna felt so familiar and relatable despite belonging to a very different time. Their restrained expressions, stillness and almost solemn intimacy had the quality of those old photographs. It made even people in their twenties nostalgic, and soon people were recreating the pose, some with filters and some through photoshoots.

It takes a lot for a still photograph to hold that kind of intensity and presence. There is so little to hide behind. No movement, no dialogue, no music. Just two people, a pose and whatever emotion manages to come through.

This is what makes photographs special. Their minimalism can leave emotions completely bare, allowing people to see something, feel something and connect with it.

Photographs do more than preserve how people looked in an era. They preserve something of how people understood the moment. How much they prepared for it. How conscious they were of being seen. How intimacy was expressed without having to perform it.

And perhaps, years from now, someone will look at our photographs and wonder about us too.

They will see the forehead touches, the back hugs, the walking hand in hand, the almost-kisses and those carefully captured “candid” laughs that we have slowly accepted as the standard language of a couple photograph.

They may wonder how we had the time to curate such perfect moments.

They may wonder how so many intimate moments of our time happened to have a camera around to capture them.

And, just as we are recreating photographs from their time today, they may find a few of ours worth recreating too.

And call it oh so 2020s.

#80sNostalgia #Nostalgia #CouplePhotography #OldPhotos #VintagePhotography #IndianNostalgia #IndianWeddings #RelationshipPhotography #PhotographyTrends #ByTheWindow #JananiSrikanth

Know more: https://jananisrikanth.com/author

A journey called life

Journey.

It is an interesting word.

We usually imagine a journey as something that has a destination. A beginning, a route, a few milestones and eventually, a place we are trying to reach.

Life does not work that way.

There is no fixed destination. 

The route keeps changing. 

People come into our lives and leave them. Some stay for years, some for a season. Some change the course of our lives. Some leave quietly.

Circumstances change. The world around us changes.

And we change with it.

Yet through every beginning, every ending and every transformation, there is one person who remains present through the entire journey: ourselves.

Perhaps that is why the foundation we begin with matters so much.

For me, that foundation was my parents.

Growing up in a home where my choices were not constantly questioned, where my place in my parents’ lives was never in doubt, and where I was allowed to make mistakes, learn, grow and find my own path shaped my life in ways I can never fully put into words.

It gave me something more valuable than certainty.

It gave me the freedom to be myself.

And this Teachers’ Day, when I think of the many teachers and gurus who have guided me through school, college, my master’s degrees and beyond, one person inevitably stands apart.

My mother, Mrs. Rajalakshmi Kannan.

My high school Chemistry teacher.

My teacher in so many other things.

My lifelong guide.

She taught me to believe in myself. To believe in the goodness in the world. To face disappointment and challenges with grace. To spread hope and positivity by living those values rather than simply talking about them.

She set a standard so high that simply trying to live by those ideals makes a person more refined, more gracious and, hopefully, a little more classy.

I have a particularly fond memory of Teachers’ Day from school.

We had a tradition where the 10th standard students would wear sarees and take classes for the day. Each of us would be assigned a teacher whose classes we would handle.

For most teachers, I imagine, it was probably a lovely opportunity to let the students have some fun, manage the class for a day and perhaps enjoy a leisurely cup of coffee in the staff room while the students took over.

My mother had other ideas.

She gave me her lesson plan.

She gave me her syllabus.

And she expected me to actually teach it.

So there I was, in a saree, standing in front of her 8th standard class, teaching aluminium extraction and balancing equations, while she watched from the window.

What stayed with me was not the saree or even the Chemistry.

It was the seriousness with which she trusted me.

She did not give me a simplified version because I was a student. She believed I could take her class, follow her lesson plan and do the job properly.

That confidence stayed with me.

Perhaps that is why I always give my best even when nobody is watching.

When you take something upon yourself, you do it with integrity.

You do it with care and precision.

I think that is one of the most valuable lessons she ever taught me.

Today, I wish she were here.

I wish she could read my books, listen to my thoughts, add her perspective, challenge me, enrich my ideas and perhaps even write her own books.

There is so much I would still like to share with her.

But she is still part of my journey.

In the way I think.

In the values I try to live by.

In the strength with which I face disappointments.

In the hope I try to pass on.

And in the lives of the many students she taught, who went on to accomplish so much.

Some teachers teach a subject.

Some teach us lessons.

And some become part of the person we spend our entire journey becoming.

I was fortunate enough to have one of those.

Happy Teachers’ Day, Amma. ❤️

Music, Memories, Books: An Ode to My Mother

Some memories are stored in photographs. Some live in old letters, familiar places, or the voices of people we have loved. For me, some of mine live in songs.

Music has been part of my life for as long as I can remember. Before I understood what music could do, I knew what it felt like to hear my mother sing.

My mother, Mrs. Rajalakshmi Kannan, was trained in Carnatic music and had a beautiful, melodic, pitch-perfect voice. I grew up listening to compositions that I now know are extraordinarily difficult. At the time, they simply belonged to my world because they belonged to hers.

She was also the person who introduced me to far more than music. She taught me to notice subtlety, beauty and the finer things in life. Every one of my books carries a quiet dedication to her, because so much of what I create begins there.

Today, my listening moves freely through Hindustani classical, Carnatic, operatic pop, jazz, country, fusion, film music and instrumentals. Genre has never mattered as much as what the music makes me feel. If a piece of music evokes something deep within me, it finds a place in my playlist.

Whenever I write fiction, songs find their way into the story, and before long, each novel has its own playlist.

Music is not something that one listens just for relaxation. It gives memories a place to live. Certain songs belong to people, others to seasons of life, and some become inseparable from characters who exist only on a page.

So I began creating playlists for my novels.

Taste of Fate has songs that became intertwined with Maya and Arjun’s journey. Work-Love Balance has Vikram’s Setlist because Vikram is a singer and music is woven into his story.

With Wings of Love, I wanted to do something a little different.

There are two Spotify playlists this time.

🎧 Reading Companion: instrumental music to accompany the novel and create the mood while you read.

🎼 The Soundtrack to Wings of Love: songs that remind me of Shalini, Vishal and the emotions that shape their story.

Perhaps this is why making a playlist for every novel has become such a natural part of writing for me. It began with a mother who filled our home with music and taught me to notice the beautiful things. Rajalakshmi Kannan will always be part of whatever I do. Anything good in me has been imbibed from her. Whatever is flawed is entirely my own.

This playlist tradition, like so much else in my life, is dedicated to her.

If you’re a music lover like me and would like the Spotify links, comment PLAYLIST and I’ll DM them to you.

#WingsofLove #Soundtrack #ReadingCompanion #Love #Friendship

Why Advice Isn’t Always Helpful: A Psychologist’s Perspective.

In my work, I have often seen people who are already struggling receive plenty of advice.

What they should have done.

What they should do now.

What they should have known better.

Sometimes, the advice is perfectly sensible. Sometimes, it merely states what the person already knows.

“Take it one step at a time.”

“Think positively.”

“You know what you need to do.”

“Try to stay calm.”

There is nothing inherently wrong with any of these statements. In another moment, they may even be useful.

But timing matters.

Knowing what to do and being able to do it while overwhelmed are two very different things.

A person experiencing intense stress, fear, grief or emotional overload does not suddenly lose all knowledge of what is sensible. Often, the difficulty is elsewhere. They may know exactly what they need to do and still feel unable to do it. Emotional overwhelm can narrow attention, cloud thinking and make even simple decisions feel difficult.

This is something I have observed repeatedly in my work.

Sometimes people do not need another explanation of their situation. They have already analysed it themselves, often repeatedly. They know where things went wrong. They know what they should probably do next.

What they may need first is to feel heard.

Sometimes they need someone to stay with the discomfort rather than immediately trying to fix it.

Sometimes they need practical help.

And sometimes, they simply need a hand.

Advice is not the problem. Advice has its place. Perspective has its place too.

The question is whether we have understood the person’s state before deciding what they need.

One of the important things I have learnt through my work is that when people are overwhelmed, more information is not always more helpful. Before deciding what someone needs to hear, perhaps it is worth pausing long enough to understand what they are actually experiencing.

Because helping is not always about having the right thing to say.

Sometimes, it begins with understanding where the other person is before deciding how to help them from there.

Janani Srikanth is an author, psychologist and human behaviour specialist whose work explores the mind, emotions, relationships and the patterns that shape everyday human behaviour.

She is also a mental health advocate whose work contributes to creating more open, informed conversations around psychological well-being and challenging the silence and stigma surrounding mental health.

She is the author of several books across psychology, personal growth and fiction.

Explore her books: https://www.amazon.in/stores/Janani-Srikanth/author/B0BTX2G413
Explore her mental health advocacy work: https://jananisrikanth.com/break-the-taboo

The Double Exclusion: How difficult times can quietly change our place in other people's lives

There is a particular kind of loneliness that can happen when you are going through a difficult phase in life.

The first exclusion is often obvious. 

Your circumstances themselves may already have pushed you to the edges of life. Stress, loss, uncertainty, disappointment, financial difficulties, grief, or simply a period when nothing seems to be working can change how much you participate in the world around you. 

You may withdraw. 

You may have less energy. 

You may no longer feel able to show up in the same carefree way.

Then comes a second, quieter exclusion.

People around you begin to edit what they share with you. They hesitate before telling you good news. They leave out stories about celebrations, achievements, holidays, relationships, plans, or other happy developments. They may assume that the contrast between your difficult time and their good time will be too much.

The intention is often consideration. The impact, however, can be isolation.

You are already excluded by what life is putting you through. Then you are gradually excluded from the good things happening in other people's lives.

That is the double exclusion.

When someone is struggling, people often become careful around them. They wonder whether talking about their own happiness would seem insensitive. They may feel guilty sharing something positive while the other person is dealing with something painful. So they filter themselves. They share less. They stop mentioning certain things. Sometimes they stop inviting the person altogether, assuming that participation might be uncomfortable.

This leads to something subtle. The struggling person is still present in everyone's life, but they are no longer fully included in the whole of those lives. 

They may still be asked how they are coping. People may know their problems and try to support them. Yet the celebrations happen somewhere else. The happy news is shared with others first. The plans are discussed in circles they are no longer part of.

No one necessarily intended to push them away. Yet they are still standing outside something.

One of the assumptions behind this kind of exclusion is that someone going through a bad time cannot fully participate in someone else's happiness. But it is important to remember that people are capable of holding more than one emotion at once.

One can be worried about their future but genuinely celebrate a friend's success. 

One can be lonely and happy that someone they love has found companionship. 

One can be grieving and still laugh. 

One can wish their life were different and still want good things for others.

Someone's happiness may occasionally touch a sore point. That is part of being human. But that is often more about the reality of their own circumstances than a reaction to your happiness.

Sometimes being included in another person's joy is exactly what makes them feel connected. It reminds them that you are still part of their life. That their difficult chapter has not turned them into a person who must only be approached through sadness, caution, or concern.

Going through a bad time is something happening in their life. It is not the entirety of who they are.

And then there is another side to this dynamic.

When people do share their difficulties with us, especially when we have been through hard times ourselves, we often feel an immediate need to say, “I understand. I went through something similar.”

Sometimes this is genuine. We are trying to build a bridge between their experience and ours. We do not want them to feel alone, so we reach into our own memories and look for something that resembles what they are going through.

But occasionally, we stretch that resemblance too far.

Deep down, we may even know that what we experienced was not really the same. The circumstances were different. The scale was different. The consequences were different. Yet we still try to make the comparison work.

“I know exactly how you feel. When this happened to me…”

And suddenly, their experience begins to disappear behind our own story.

This is not always selfishness. Often, it comes from the human need to relate through familiarity. Someone else's pain can make us uncomfortable because we cannot fully enter an experience we have never had. So we search for the closest thing we know: ourselves.

We may overstate our struggles because we desperately want to establish a point of connection.

Sometimes the most honest response could be, “What you're going through isn't the same as what I went through, and I may not fully understand it. But I'm here, and I want to understand.”

There is a difference between finding shades of ourselves in another person's experience and forcing their experience to fit our own.

Perhaps that is where these two behaviours meet.

When someone is going through a bad time, we may assume we know what hearing our good news will do to them. So we decide not to share it.

When someone tells us about a struggle, we may assume we need to understand it immediately. So we search for our own version of it and try to make the comparison fit.

In both cases, the intention is often connection.

Yet both begin with an assumption about another person's experience.

Someone can be going through a terrible chapter and still want to remain part of everyone else's story. And when someone else's pain does not resemble our own, we do not have to force a resemblance in order to care.

Perhaps, in trying so hard to connect, we sometimes leave too little room for the other person's experience to remain their own.

Their own pain.

Their own happiness.

Their own version of what they are going through.

And perhaps a deeper understanding and a stronger connection sometimes begin with allowing that.

8/8: A Powerful Portal or a Powerful Belief?

8.8. The Lion’s Gate Portal

Today, social media is full of talk about manifestation, abundance, new beginnings, setting intentions, visualising what you want, and stepping into a new reality.

A friend of mine asked me whether there is any merit to this idea and what I think about manifestation in general.

I do think there can be something meaningful about choosing a day like today to pause and set an intention. There is something to be said for collective intention and the positive energy that can emerge when many people turn their attention towards possibility. 

So, 8.8 can be as good a day as any to pause and explore what manifestation means to you.

But before you begin, let me share what I believe manifestation really means.

As someone who has been writing and researching on this subject, I have become increasingly frustrated with how casually we use the word today. 

I manifested a car. 

I manifested my dream job. 

I manifested learning German. 

It has become a catch-all phrase for almost anything we wished for and eventually received, as though the wish itself made it happen.

Manifestation is far more than thinking about something, wanting it badly, or holding a beautiful idea in your mind. 

It is not simply an affirmation or a wish sent into the universe.

Manifestation is about the inner work beneath the wish. 

The beliefs you hold. 

The identity you carry. 

The patterns you repeat. And the way your inner world begins to align with the reality you want to create.

Manifestation is not a wish you make today and forget tomorrow.

It asks something deeper.

What do you believe?
Who do you believe yourself to be?
And is the person you are today aligned with the reality you say you desire?

That kind of transformation takes time.

I know you may be curious about how to make this more structured and, more importantly, how to move from a moment of intention to lasting, transformative growth. I’ll share my framework for that when the time is right. 

For me, manifestation becomes meaningful when it becomes a way of living rather than something we do on a particular day.

So take today as simply a reminder to envision an internal transformation:

Set the intention. Know the destination. Then prepare for the journey of becoming the person who can live it.

It takes only a moment to wish for a dream job or a new car.

Turning that wish into an intention you are willing to live by, and becoming the person capable of living that intention, is the longer journey.

May your wishes become intentions, your intentions become action, and your actions become your reality.

The Psychology of the Invisible Audience

Lately, I've been wondering how much of our lives are shaped by invisible audiences.

Sometimes it is the people around us who watch us.

Most of the time, it is the people we imagine are watching us.

Or the version of ourselves we hope to become.

Or the conscience we answer to.

I think that is why we often behave a certain way even when no one else is around.

We choose our words carefully even while talking to ourselves. We mentally justify our decisions and actions. We replay arguments until we end up being unequivocally right. We celebrate imaginary victories and defend ourselves against criticisms that have never been spoken. Not to mention the imagined future conversations where we finally close all the open loops.

From the outside, it may look like authenticity.

But authenticity is more complicated than simply appearing right in the eyes of other people or even ourselves.

After all, if we are still performing, who are we really being authentic for?

Psychology has long suggested that human beings do not perform only for other people. We also perform for our future selves, for our ideals, and for the identities we are trying to grow into. We compare who we are with who we believe we should be. We seek consistency between our actions and the stories we tell ourselves.

In a curious way, the self becomes both the actor and the audience.

This quiet performance is not necessarily unhealthy.

A student studying late into the night may be answering to the person they hope to become years from now. An athlete training before sunrise is often motivated by an identity rather than immediate applause. Even our private acts of discipline, kindness, or restraint may be guided by an internal observer whose approval matters more than anyone else's.

The problem begins when we ruminate over every interaction and feel the need to be accepted and right all the time.

We absorb the expectations of parents, teachers, culture, workplaces, religion, social media, and countless everyday interactions, allowing these voices to become part of our inner dialogue. We keep following their standards until they quietly become our own.

The longer we carry these voices, the harder it becomes to tell where they end and we begin.

Philosophy asks, What does it mean to live authentically?

Psychology asks, Why is authenticity so difficult?

Different questions.

The same mountain.

The philosopher encourages us to examine the life we are living. The psychologist helps us understand why examining it can feel so uncomfortable. One searches for truth. The other explains the forces that make truth difficult to see.

The more I read, the less I believe wisdom comes from accumulating new ideas.

It comes from recognising the invisible scripts we have mistaken for ourselves.

Some of those scripts deserve to stay. They remind us to be compassionate, disciplined, and responsible. Others quietly keep us trapped in borrowed expectations and outdated fears.

Growth is not simply adding another layer to who we are.

Sometimes it is having the courage to ask, Whose voice is this?

And if the answer is not our own, deciding whether it still deserves a place in the story we call ourselves.

Perhaps that is what self-awareness really is.

Not becoming someone new.

But slowly separating our own voice from the invisible audience that has been applauding us at times and judging us at others from the very beginning.

So much to learn.

So much more to unlearn.

 

The Psychology of False Hope: Why emotionally exhausted people become vulnerable to certainty, miracle claims, and manipulative healing narratives

“Years of medical research failed you. This hidden method finally explains everything.”

“Doctors manage symptoms. We address the real root cause.”

“Parents are seeing more change in 3 weeks than in years of therapy.”

“The system wants your child dependent. We want your child healed.”

These statements spread rapidly among emotionally exhausted families because they are speaking to people who are no longer simply looking for information. 

They are looking for relief.

Relief from years of uncertainty.

Relief from helplessness.

Relief from watching someone they love struggle.

Relief from the fear that they may never do “enough.”

A parent caring for a child with developmental, emotional, behavioural, or medical challenges is not functioning from a neutral emotional state. They are often carrying years of anxiety, sleep deprivation, guilt, financial pressure, social judgment, uncertainty, and grief over expectations that did not unfold the way they imagined.

When the nervous system remains under prolonged stress, the brain slowly changes its priorities.

It stops asking:
“Is this scientifically sound?”

And starts asking:
“What if this finally helps?”

That shift is where emotional vulnerability enters.

This is why emotionally persuasive claims begin sounding believable even when they collapse under basic logical examination.

Think about the contradiction carefully.

Years of medical education, clinical training, supervised practice, regulation, research review, ethical accountability, and thousands of professionals working patiently with children and families are dismissed with:
“They are only doing it for money.”
“They are controlled by pharma.”
“They only suppress symptoms.”

But suddenly, a stranger selling a three hour workshop, miracle supplement, crystal healing session, energy balancing method, detox protocol, or “hidden root cause framework” is viewed as pure-hearted, awakened, and trustworthy.

The therapist charging consultation fees is called greedy.
The influencer selling emotional certainty is perceived as more trustworthy.

The developmental specialist with years of training is accused of hiding truth.
The unverified stranger with dramatic confidence is seen as courageous and honest.

It is worth pausing to examine this contradiction carefully.

Why is financial motivation assumed only for regulated professionals but rarely questioned in emotionally persuasive industries built entirely around fear, urgency, and hope?

Why is evidence treated with suspicion while confidence is treated like proof?

The answer lies in psychology.

Emotionally overwhelmed people become more vulnerable to certainty, simplicity, and authority-driven narratives.

Especially narratives built around three powerful psychological hooks:

1. A villain
   Someone to blame. Doctors. Therapists. Schools. Pharma. Society.

2. A hidden truth
   “You were never told the real cause.”

3. A rescue fantasy
   “Everything can change once you learn this.”

This structure is psychologically compelling because uncertainty is emotionally exhausting.

A parent dealing with years of slow progress often does not merely want improvement anymore. They want clarity. They want emotional relief from confusion. They want someone to sound absolutely certain.

And emotionally persuasive systems understand this extremely well.

That is why these spaces often rely heavily on:
• emotionally charged testimonials
• dramatic before-after narratives
• insider language
• urgency
• distrust of experts
• “they don’t want you to know this” messaging
• spiritual superiority
• exaggerated transformation claims

The goal is emotional capture before rational evaluation.

Another important psychological factor is cognitive fatigue.

When people are emotionally drained for long periods, the brain naturally starts preferring emotionally relieving explanations over complex realities.

“Your child may need long-term support, regulation, adaptation, structure, and patience” is emotionally harder to accept than:
“We found the hidden root cause and reversal pathway.”

The second statement offers emotional relief.
The first requires emotional endurance.

This is also why emotionally vulnerable communities become highly susceptible to collective reinforcement.

Once enough people repeat:
“This changed everything for us,”
doubt begins feeling emotionally uncomfortable.

People fear missing out on hope.
They fear being judged for “not trying enough.”
They fear regret.
They fear being the parent who ignored the “real answer.”

And slowly, emotional pressure starts replacing rational evaluation.

This does not mean every alternative approach is false.
Nor does it mean medicine is perfect.

Healthcare systems have flaws. Some professionals are dismissive. Some interventions do fail people. Families deserve more compassionate, accessible, and holistic support.

But emotional disappointment should not become intellectual surrender.

A complicated condition does not become simple because someone speaks confidently about it.

And confidence is not evidence.

A sincere person can still be wrong.
A hopeful parent can still be manipulated.
A viral testimonial is still not scientific proof.

This is why emotionally vulnerable families need grounding more than grand promises.

Pause when someone makes you distrust everyone except them.
Pause when urgency replaces nuance.
Pause when a person sounds more interested in certainty than complexity.
Pause when every problem suddenly has a single hidden cause.
Pause when criticism is labelled “closed-mindedness.”
Pause when emotional storytelling replaces evidence repeatedly.

Manipulative systems survive by keeping people emotionally activated.

Grounded thinking returns when the nervous system slows down.

A calm mind asks:
“Is this measurable?”
“Is this evidence-based?”
“Is this reproducible?”
“Would this claim survive scrutiny outside emotional testimonials?”

Emotionally exhausted people do not need shame.
They need psychological steadiness.

Because when fear, hope, guilt, and desperation become intense enough, the mind stops searching for truth and starts searching for certainty.

And certainty, in the wrong hands, becomes incredibly profitable.

Families of children with special needs already carry enormous emotional, mental, and financial pressure.
The least society can do is avoid adding misinformation to that burden.

Not every emotionally convincing claim deserves to be forwarded.
Not every dramatic testimonial deserves instant trust.
And not every “hidden solution” deserves amplification simply because it sounds hopeful.

When we circulate unverified information casually, we are not just sharing content. We are influencing vulnerable families who may already be searching desperately for answers.

In spaces shaped by fear, exhaustion, and hope, discernment becomes an ethical responsibility.

Before forwarding health claims, miracle stories, workshops, or “reversal” narratives, pause and ask:
Is this evidence-based?
Is this responsible?
Could this emotionally influence someone already overwhelmed?

A family already carrying emotional exhaustion should not also have to carry the burden of filtering everyone else’s emotional convictions.

Let us become more responsible about the information we circulate, especially in spaces involving families of children with special needs.

Because protecting families of children with special needs also means protecting them from misinformation disguised as hope.

Book Bhook

 

Books. What would we do without the treasure trove.

I grew up in a house where books were not kept aside. They were in the middle of everything. Conversations would slip into quotes without announcement. Characters would come up like familiar people.

And because it wasn’t just one reader but everyone, the conversation never really ended.

One person would pass a book, another would respond with a different one, and slowly you found yourself inside that flow without deciding to enter it.

That is how most of my memories around books are held together. Not as separate moments, but as people passing something to me at the right time.

My grandfather did that first. While others speak of summer outings, mine meant walking into Higginbotham’s and coming back with illustrated books. He was an accomplished teacher, known among his students as a walking dictionary. With him, books weren’t a hobby. They were the most natural gift.

At school, my mother extended that same rhythm. She would bring home library books for the holidays, and I remember feeling quietly included in something important. That soon turned into rental libraries, where the pace picked up. Two books a day. Read, return, exchange. It wasn’t pressure. It was momentum.

So when I watched R. K. Narayan’s short story series on television in fifth grade, it didn’t feel new. I had already met that world through Swami and Friends. This was just the story continuing in another form. My uncle, who watched it with me, seemed to understand that. The next time we met, he gave me the published version of those stories. Another handoff. Another continuation.

That’s really how it kept growing. A library teacher placing The Good Earth in my hands. My brother bringing in non fiction that stayed with me through my corporate years. My mother reading Shakespeare and, without saying much, showing me what language could hold.

And then, much later, Srikanth slipped into that same pattern without trying to. When we first started talking, the conversations didn’t really stop. Somewhere in between, he mentioned that the latest book he had read and discussed with his grandmother was The Tao of Physics. It sounded like a conversation already in motion. And I remember thinking, I want in. So I read it. Cover to cover. Entirely to keep up, and also, if I’m being honest, to impress that very interesting grandmother. It gave me a place in that conversation. That’s all I needed.

Even now, it hasn’t changed. I still read across genres. I take recommendations from my niece. I return to the same people to talk about what stayed after the last page.

When I look at it now, it doesn’t feel like a series of memories. It feels like one continuous exchange. Books moving through people, and people shaping how those books stayed with me.

Writing, then, didn’t arrive separately. It grew out of that same exchange.

Books have always been there. But more than that, there has always been someone placing the next one in my hands.

From a Tamil aficionado aunt who drops a line so precise it sends me back to the book, to a cousin who insists, “Akka, you have to read this,” to a friend who checks in on my take on whatever is on the bestseller charts, to someone who sends a quote with a quiet smile because it mirrors a core idea I often return to, all of you are part of this.

Which is to say, I am always one recommendation away from a good book. What’s yours?

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P.S. If you’re curious about what I’ve been writing, you can find it here: https://www.amazon.in/stores/Janani-Srikanth/author/B0BTX2G413