Harsha Banthia: 6 Questions with the Optimistic Yoga Acharya

Hiba Mariam
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Harsha Banthia is a Yoga Teacher, Lifestyle Coach, Post-Natal Coach, and Sound Healer who is very passionate about what she does. She is the Co-Founder of her Venture, Samartha – A Better You, and believes that Yoga brings mental peace as much as physical changes to the body.

Harsha Banthia has also been hosting the event, Yoga At Home, where she helps people to get adapted to the practice of Yoga and be healthy. In her conversation with Icy Tales, Harsha Banthia spoke about her journey as a student, the importance of Yoga, and the changes experienced while doing Yoga brought her.

Q) How did your yoga journey begin?

Harsha Banthia: There are two phases of my journey. The first one started when I was just 16 years old when I somehow started gaining weight because of holidays and eating all the good foods at home. So my parents were worried about it, and my father once told me to do Yoga.

Harsha Banthia

He taught me two postures, which were so fascinating to do that I got utterly gelled to doing Yoga; that was my beginning as a student. Now about how I started as a yoga teacher, when I started doing a corporate job, I had to sit for long hours in front of the computer.

That gave me a lot of pain in my neck and lowered back and back then, and I lost the yoga practice because of the hectic lifestyle and everything. But then I decided to take a five-month yoga course, and while doing that, I was surprised to see that all my pain was healed within just two months.

Besides that, I had more clarity in my mind to balance my work and personal life. So I was thrilled to see the effect of Yoga in my life, which motivated me to spread the awareness of Yoga and become a teacher. That’s where I started the second phase of my Yoga as a teacher, and I left the corporate job and started a career in Yoga.

Q) What is the importance of Yoga in today’s world?

Harsha Banthia- First, let’s talk about the difference between today’s world and 50 years back. For example, 50 or 100 years back, women used to be only either a housewife or a mother. But right now, they are housewives, mothers, and also working. So there are two significant differences; one is where you see the responsibilities or the competition on everyone’s plate.

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Consider a student, earlier students used to be happy with just 60%, 70%, or 80%. But right now, nobody wants to drop below 90%. So definitely, there’s a competition for the kids. Coming to men earlier, they had to provide for their family’s basic needs, but now they have to give their family luxury and all quality changes.

The first difference in today’s world is that there’s too much on our plates. So to balance that, they need some mental peace which is why meditation should come here. Secondly, back then, I’m sure there were not many restaurants and online ordering apps; there was no concept of Friday nights, so it always used to be home food.

All these outside foods have led to all problems with the liver, and you start losing your hair, graying hair, wrinkles, and mood swings. So this is where physical practice comes into the frame. There’s something called Shat Kriya, six ways of cleansing your system.

This will help to overall clean your body and will help you to keep your gut strong. Many other pranayamas will also help you. So all these things come in handy in today’s world to keep your body healthy.

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Q) We noticed that you are a post-natal coach. Tell us something about it.

Harsha Banthia: When you talk about post-natal, especially in India, when a woman is pregnant, everyone takes care of her, but the moment the kid is out, the mother is left alone after 40 days. So there is no plan to help the mothers, which is why we have post-natal coaching.

We help them do pelvic floor exercises, which are very technical training. You shouldn’t be doing too much immediately after pregnancy because some muscles connect when you gain weight. The stomach is stretching, and the muscles tear apart.

So when you start exercising immediately after the delivery in the wrong way, the muscle tends to loosen the stomach. We would’ve seen people when they lose weight and don’t have a substantial stomach. So, you need to work on the pelvic floor and give your muscles proper training to bring them all together.

We also take care of postpartum depression because it is something that has not much awareness about. So there are experts who can help them to come out of this and give them healing. You also shouldn’t be in a hurry to lose weight and do it step by step.

Q) What is lifestyle coaching?

Harsha Banthia: Everyone has different lifestyles, doesn’t it? Lifestyle is not just about going to the gym for one night or going to a yoga class; and it is about how you plan your day. And hence everyone has their different excuses for not having a healthy routine.

For example, to be a successful influencer, you must have a healthy and organized lifestyle. So in this way, you are not just focusing on that one hour of training but actually on an overall day. You see how you use your day productively, how many steps you take, and how organized you are for the next day.

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If you know about Kaizen, it’s a Japanese technique that teaches you how to create a strategy for accomplishing any goal. When you pre-plan your day, your health is also sorted. Some people I coach as a lifestyle coach, if they have to go out and are on a diet, call and ask me what they should eat.

Eating healthy is also a reasonable lifestyle goal. For example, some people work the night shift for different reasons, so this lifestyle coaching helps them to modulate everything according to their life.

Q) What are the major setbacks that people in this generation have that stop them from living healthy lives?

Harsha Banthia – Certainly, the answer is to balance, which is missing in today’s generation. For a student, it is a balance between career and studies; for women, it would be a balance between being a mother and working. We are ambitious, but we don’t know how to balance.

Everyone has an ambition because nobody wants to do just a regular job or want to take care of the family. They want to do something very satisfying, which is, in turn, making them stressed. They are also falling back and balancing their happiness.

When you do Yoga, it is not just about the physical tasks; it’s a lot more fun to do that. It creates self-love within you, bringing balance to your life.

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Q) What changes did becoming a yoga teacher bring in you?

Harsha Banthia: A Huge difference! The people who met me in my school and college also say that I’m different in terms of skill level. Yoga has helped me to lift weights, go to the gym, run a marathon, and now I am even cycling 100 kilometers. It has given me the power that I can achieve anything and everything.

When I was eight months pregnant, I used to do running, and I also used to do a headstand. It has helped me to be stronger in my life than I was 10 or 15 years back; I am a different person now.

Also, it helps me understand my relationships and handle them better and more amicably. I have a mother-in-law, a husband, and my own family. So it’s not just family, there’s a relationship with the whole society. As a yoga teacher, I’m more balanced with my relationships in a very positive way with other people.

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Harsha Banthia also narrated some funny experiences that she went through with her students while doing Yoga. She urges people to be healthy and adapt to a healthy lifestyle to balance and achieve life goals confidently.

Check out the engaging conversation with Harsha Banthia on our YouTube Channel.

Last Updated on by Mehar Jolly

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