Bookstrapping: The Power of One Thought - Master Your Mind, Master Your Life by BK Shivani

Time to begin the journey within In the twelve chapters of this book, which read exactly like the talks we hear on television and YouTube, Brahma Kumari Sister Shivani talks about the impact of every thought we think on our destiny. With tremendous clarity, she places two options before us; one that we create an outer world which functions completely the way we want - when this outer world becomes perfect, we will experience lasting happiness and health. The second being that we act as though our inner world is independent of the outer world. We start creating certainty (and stability) in our responses to the uncertainties of the outer world. With this option, we will naturally remain happy and healthy. The reader sees that option 1 is not realistic and this is just the first step of the journey.

Here are the key Bookstrapping insights: 1. Being exceedingly profound, while remaining utterly simple have always been the highlights of Sister Shivani’s talks. This book is in the same vein. It gently nudges and reconnects you to the source of emotions … your thoughts.

2. As you read the book, you realise that each one of us, is like the bird which feels that the branch is holding it! Whereas, if the bird can let go of its own clutch, it can set itself free.

3. Sister Shivani’s own pithy message is ‘what we think about is what we bring about.’

4. With various anecdotes, she talks about the fallacy of our impulsive reactions and how we never take responsibility for ourselves, ‘taking the remote control of our mind’ and handing it over to random individuals. Sister Shivani calls the ‘power to choose our response,’ no matter what is happening outside, as emotional intelligence.

5. The author also reminds us that the extent of our dependency on external circumstances is wholly unhealthy. The book also offers a step-by-step manual for using guided meditations, self-care techniques, personality development activities, and reflection exercises. Her clarity of thought stays with you even as you close the book. Summing up, Sister Shivani says that we can magnify a situation in our life or minimise it. How we see it determines our reaction to it. She reminds us that ‘using willpower means exercising our power to choose, to think, to be and to do what we want.

Willpower plays a crucial role in overriding any sanskar—regardless of whether we have carried them from past births, created them with our family’s influence or formed them due to our present environment.’ Why not make this book your companion over the weekend?

Reeta Ramamurthy Gupta is a columnist and bestselling biographer. She is credited with the internationally acclaimed Red Dot Experiment, a decadal six-nation study on how ‘culture impacts communication.’