“As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.”   ~John F. Kennedy

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving surrounded by family and friends, and had a chance to reflect on your many blessings! No turkey nor family for me, but here’s some highlights from my past week that gave me inspiration, consternation and food for thought.

• While India boasts of having the most post offices in the world, its service to deliver mail is woefully dismal.  I have been waiting over three months for a new credit card delivery from my bank – they’ve sent it twice!  This is not the first time mail sent has not reached me, but this is a huge inconvenience!  On the upside, I don’t have stacks upon stacks of junk mail and circulars lying around! (Thankful!)

• Reading “Escape From Samsara: The Wheel of Birth and Death” by Amy Williams, a first book by this author, and an autobiography that delves into the cult of the Hare Krishna movement in the early 1970s. Besides being an eye-opening look at the corruption inside the movement, which continues to this day, I get to personally chat with this fascinating women about her life journey as she lives right here in Vrindavan and we meet up a couple of times a week.

• Living and learning – I offered the sweeper woman on my street coffee and cookies one morning – I like her, she’s a feisty woman, always smiling.  But my ladies were aghast that I served her on a plate used by them.  They informed me that the plate was now unusable by them as the sweeper was a dalit (untouchable).  So I had to go buy all new plates for them.  The next day they asked me, “didn’t we have a caste system in America?“

• Speaking of learning – I love to learn new things, and the best advice I got this week came from a webinar (since removed, sorry) by Jason Fladlien of Rapid Crush Inc.  He said, “your learning to doing ratio should be 1:1“; one hour of study should be followed up by one hour of implementation, this in regards to blogging and online marketing.  I usually spend a lot more time learning than doing!  Must change that!

• And finally, a new collaborative product development is coming to fruition!  Mahima Creations as been working with Heidi McLaughlin of Fearless Rider Inc to come up with a line of cowgirl jewelry that complements and expands her brand, “Choose Courage”.  We’ve got some prototype bracelets ready to go to the National Rodeo Finals in Las Vegas this December where Heidi will be exhibiting. If you’re going to be there, please stop by and say “hi” to Heidi and me, I’ll be there working the booth with her!  Great shopping experience at the NRF!

Regarding the refugees in Syria, Europe and elsewhere, “I’d rather err on the side of compassion than fear.”  And that’s a quote from me!

What are some of the highlights from your weekend?  Would love to hear from you!  Please comment below!