An Exclusive Interview With Jay Kabir – TED Speaker, Transformational Coach & Acclaimed Author
We are going through tough times. With the outbreak of Covid-19 assuming a global proportion, the outpour of such depressing news of fatalities, job losses, mental illness and suicides, out of helplessness and frustrations have become a common thing!
We don’t know what will happen in the future, but we can’t let these pessimistic thoughts to take a toll on our mental health either. One thing is sure that we have to cope with it. The lockdown and staying home is the new normal. But then what’s the way forward? Is there any solution to keep ourselves busy at home, and also stay motivated at the same time?
In an attempt to find these answers, we invited Jay Kabir (TED Speaker, Former Monk, Transformational Coach and Acclaimed Author) on our platform to speak a few words on this. And, he not only answered all the questions honestly but also shared insights into his turbulent life-journey and also suggested some tips to our readers on mental well-being.
It was a fascinating, informative and certainly life-enriching talks with inspiring Jay Kabir. So, what are you waiting for?
Let’s Read It. Here Are The Interview Excerpts
Hello Jay, Welcome to TheCheckerNews.Com. Please introduce yourself.
The first and the foremost thing I would like to do before I introduce myself is to thank Atish for inviting me on your interview.
I want to acknowledge you for the impactful and visionary work you are doing by bringing inspiring and truly amazing people on your platform of THECHECKERNEWS.COM.
Their journeys of challenges, success and growth will inspire thousands of the people to create a better, higher and an inspired life for themselves.
About myself, I am Jay Kabir, Author of the book Monk Wisdom for The Modern Mind, a TED speaker, a Former Monk and a Transformational Coach.
I founded my company, Peak Potential Paradigm in Mumbai in the year 2018 with the vision of educating people in the holistic systems of personal and spiritual growth and mastery thus helping them explore, experience and express their greatest genius, deepest potential and highest states of consciousness.
In last two years of our work we met, trained and transformed lives of over 30k people globally in countries like India, USA, UK, Netherlands, UAE, Lebanon etc through our Workshops and seminars conducted live and on online platforms, thus being recognised for our work, contribution and impact by platforms like TED, BNI and being appreciated and acknowledged by Nobel Laureate – His Holiness The Dalai Lama.
Before coming to the massive, mega, metro city of Mumbai and starting my enterprises of human well-being, I lived in a monastery located in the velliangiri mountains of Coimbatore, southern India, and under the guidance of my spiritual master.
I learnt some really powerful and profound yogic methods and meditation tools which not just helped me overcome the traumatic childhood I faced, empowered me gain mastery over my mind, emotions and energies, transformed my life beyond my family situations, social and economic upbringing, emotional, psychological and neurological structures, gave me clarity about my potential, genius and vision in life, but also opened some unperceivable and unimaginable dimensions of life which I didn’t even know exist and can be experienced by all human beings if one works on raising his/her consciousness.
Today whatever I am capable and competent of doing and the Impact I have been making is a result of the disciplined, devoted and dedicated time I invested in the monastery towards the expansion of my horizons, raising my perception and consciousness, intensely seeking to gain clarity of my potential, purpose and vision of life and healing the emotional wounds of my childhood.
To know more about my story watch my TED talk using the following link:
Please let us know what you are doing these days. Due to coronavirus-induced lockdown and panic, several people are stuck at homes!
Ans: If one believes that one is stuck and keeps repeating this mantra to oneself and to the others over and over again then naturally his intelligence will work towards finding all the ways and reasons to keep him stuck in that particular situation BUT if he asks himself the right question that how despite these challenges can I make the best out of this time and take my life to a higher level of joy, happiness, health, harmony in relationships, freedom and success then naturally his intelligence will also guide him towards finding better solutions for creating a better life for himself and for the others around.
While I fully understand and empathize that this is an extremely unusually challenging situation for each of us, now that we are aware of the present reality, let’s see it the way it is and take a step forward to find solutions for the problem instead of feeling stuck and creating more problems for ourselves and our loved ones, who need us in a much more calm, solution oriented and resourceful state of mind than ever instead of being in a chaotic and stuck state of mind.
Talking about myself, when I got to know about the lockdown and when it was declared that all of us have to remain at home, I saw it as an opportunity for personal growth and service to humanity. I committed to myself that I am at least 10% better in each major area of my life including my health, spiritual growth, my levels of inner peace and balance, my work, relationships with my friends, family and loved ones and most importantly my contribution to the society, by the time this pandemic gets over.
Three months back, the pandemic was at its peak and people were losing their mental and emotional balance. I wanted to be of help to as many people as I could so In order to achieve this outcome I started to search for the ways which can help me get there and I found the solutions, before the lockdown what I was doing through my Unleash The Ultimate YOU physical Seminars, I shifted them to the online platforms.
I didn’t have much idea about how it’ll work, will it be as beneficial as the physical live events were, yet I kept going and I feel very happy, proud and fulfilled to share that in last 4 months we conducted over 150 Unleash The Ultimate YOU online webinars and workshops impacting 1000s of people across the globe helping them to overcome their challenges and create peak states of performance, peace and prosperity in their lives.
To my surprise, it produced better than ever, miraculous results in the lives of my participants and all of them have formed a very profound life long bond of support, encouragement and success with each other. The second important thing i have recently started to work on during the lockdown period of solitude, is writing my second book titled Unleash The Ultimate YOU.
Either you find excuses to live a mediocre life or have reasons to enhance your life and life around you, the choice is always yours.
— Jay Kabir —
Well, you are a firm believer in spiritual things. Can you please explain how you got connected to the world of spirituality?
Ans: Either there can be beliefs or there can be true spirituality, they cannot exist together, if one wants to live by beliefs and conclusions then there is no possibility for spiritual growth and if there is true spiritual seeking in you then there is no place for any kind of belief.
Beliefs essentially are conclusions based on some limited experiences of life of yourself or of someone else thus by their very nature they are limiting and cannot be expansive and liberating, they might be good to survive but are not of any use if you want to thrive. Whereas spirituality is a path of transcending all beliefs, limitations and conclusions.
Spirituality is a path of limitless seeking, exploring, experiencing and knowing. Spirituality is a path of mastering one’s body, mind, emotions and energies through scientific methods, tools and systems of human evolution that you reach an equanimous state of joy, happiness, empowerment and bliss within yourself which is not mortgaged to outside situations and circumstances but is totally in your control, this is true freedom, this is true empowerment.
Spirituality is a path towards reaching this state of freedom and it doesn’t need any belief system but proper scientific methods, tools and guidance to use them properly in order to attain to this state of consciousness of absolute freedom and bliss within yourself.
Looking back at the entire journey of my life, I feel, I was always on the spiritual path, but I started seeking it consciously at the age of 23 in the year 2014, I did my first meditation program as I somewhere realised that if I don’t turn inwards and take absolute charge of my mind and emotions, i’ll be a complete disaster. By that time I had developed extreme social anxiety, stuttering and stammering issues and I was diagnosed with chronic depression and PTSD.
The psychologist appointed by my law college prescribed a lot of medications to me and told me that it’ll take 3-4 years for me to overcome these issues and even after that I’ll have to continue the medications.
I committed to myself that I am not going to drug my brain with chemicals but would instead find higher and holistic solutions for my healing. This made me start to research extensively in the fields of modern neurosciences, psychology of transformation and ancient indian spiritual sciences.
I chose meditation over medication, and just within 3-4 months of disciplined meditation with the help of the conducive environment I got in the monastery, I transformed myself from a stuttering stammering person into a fluent and fearless speaker,
My PTSD left me never to come back again and I was totally a new human being transforming myself beyond my family situations, socio-economic upbringing and neurological structures.
After that there was no looking back, I made a strong resolve within myself that I’ll make sure no one goes through such issues and challenges in their life and can overcome them easily and effortlessly thus living and enjoying their life to its fullest. Since then there has been no looking back and we have been helping and impacting 1000s of people globally through our seminars and workshops.
What is your ambition in life? Where do you see yourself in the next five years?
Ans: I don’t have any personal ambition for myself, my only vision and purpose of life is to create, teach and transmit systems, ecosystems and in the future infrastructures of education and human evolution which help and empower human beings to explore, express and harness their true inner potential and genius and express it fully in the world thus creating a life of passion, peak productivity, prosperity, peace and profoundness for themselves and the world around. We have already started to work on many such projects but it’s a secret till it finds its fullest manifestation in reality.
Please suggest any three tips to our readers so that they can keep their mental stress and anxiety issues at bay.
Ans: Quick tips might look good, give some temporary solace but won’t create much of a difference in real life. “Talks and Teachings might create adoration and appreciation but only tools and technologies create lasting transformation”
I want to ask the readers, how much time did it take for you to learn simple alphabets like ABCD and then using them to read or write simple sentences? 1-2 years or more right? Then how is it possible that just by reading some tips you’ll gain mastery over emotions and will be able to keep mental stress and anxiety at bay.
Essentially stress and anxieties are caused not because of a challenging situation or tough boss, or unsupportive colleagues and family members but because of our own inability to handle our thoughts and emotions and it takes focussed efforts and time to master these faculties of mind. It depends on you whether you are investing in your misery or you truly value your life and want to invest some time and energy in learning ways to create joy and blissfulness for yourself and for your loved ones and there are proper scientific systems to do that.
How do you manage daily stress and other anxiety issues in life? Do you think creativity can help us on this?
Ans: Today modern neurosciences are proving that all the emotions which we go through whether they are of happiness, love compassion, joy, bliss etc or stress, anxiety, agitation, frustration, all of them are like muscles in the mind and the more you practice and train them, the stronger they become, unfortunately due to even our education systems we in our schools and colleges were never taught in a focussed way how to practice and strengthen our joy muscles, happiness muscles, bliss muscles but throughout our lives unconsciously we have every single day without a days break have practiced stress, anxiety, anger, agitation, frustration muscles and we have made biceps out of them.
It is time we stop doing that and learn proper tools to every single morning consciously practice joy, happiness, bliss, compassion and love muscles and make them stronger and stronger each day so that we can overcome toughest of situations and challenges in our lives, not from a state of frustration, agitation, anger, stress, anxiety but from an inner state of bliss, balance, happiness and harmony and only this way we will be able to find better solutions for our problems and as I mentioned earlier it is possible with right guidance, education and tools.
As far as I am concerned, lucky for me I understood these concepts and sciences early in life and invested my entire life in empowering my spiritual process and making it available to those who are willing.
About creativity, I feel that once you are in a certain state of peace and pleasantness within yourself, everything you do finds a very beautiful, aesthetic and creative expression of itself.
It seems you are also interested in writing. Was it your childhood hobby? Please explain
Ans: It has never been a childhood hobby for me, in fact while growing up I never had any kind of supportive environment where I can read or write apart from the normal academic books which I had to study just to pass the examinations.
My real passion of writing began when I embarked upon the path of my self healing and spiritual growth, I started to write my journals, express my emotions in them, write down the ideas, insights and clarity I used to get while travelling, reading and meditating and most importantly I wrote in my journals about my dreams, goals and visions in life, and surprisingly sometimes when I read my old journals I find that all the goals and dreams I wrote in them a few years back, have become living experiences in my life. So this is the power of writing, you can become the writer and creator of your own destiny.
How do you keep yourself motivated and inspired?
Ans: Simple, every morning after waking up, I remind myself of my Vision and purpose of life, the reasons why I want to make that vision a reality and how it’ll serve my fellow human beings and the planet and what actions I have to take today in order to achieve it.
