We spoke with Tejal, about her experiences working in the sustainable development and tourism industry and transitioning from corporations to social enterprises
I am a South Asian female and my background is in hospitality and tourism.
What inspired you to act as a catalyst for sustainable practice? Is there a particular story you can share?
For me, it was about a couple of things. Firstly, I have always thought about how to make incremental improvements to our world. I really liked the tourism industry, but because I was so entrenched in it, I could also see its flaws. So I thought, why not pick an industry and see how I can make it better serve society. That’s kind of how my initial interest in social enterprise and sustainable development began. Secondly, I really hate waste.
Can you tell me about your work in Sustainable Tourism Development and how you got into it?
My career started in hotels (literally from the age of 16). I studied hospitality for my undergrad and worked at a big travel tech company out of university. Whilst I was at Expedia, I started to learn more about tourism development and how it can be done well or not well.
That’s when I decided to go back to uni for my masters in Tourism, Environment, and Development at King’s College London. After that, I worked for an international development consultancy where I worked on a couple of sustainable development projects. My focus now is on social enterprises in the sector.
What have been your biggest successes and learnings to date?
I don’t know about the biggest successes, but there have been a lot of learnings. I think the most important thing is to really listen to that voice inside you if it’s telling you that something is not quite right or if you are looking for more.
Corporate jobs are cushy – they pay well and have benefits which make it hard to leave, but that’s not all there is in life. There is a lot of fear and uncertainty when trying to figure out what your passions and goals are, and I am still going through that now, but I have a lot of peace in the fact that when I think back to my corporate job (which I really liked!), I have no desire to go back. It means I am slowly moving in the right direction for me.
Being South Asian, did you face any backlash about switching to more sustainability-led work from family, friends or society at large?
This one is interesting to me. I think there are societal pressures to be doing something that is traditionally ‘successful’, and I have experienced them as well, even though my family is super open. For example, when deciding between two job offers earlier this year, one thing that weighed on my mind was ‘which will be easier to tell people about?’ I, obviously, was so annoyed at myself for thinking that, but it does creep up.
Interestingly, the other thing I really had to get over was accepting the fact that prioritizing money is okay. I think often, people who are interested in purpose-driven career paths are conditioned to feel ashamed of wanting to make a decent salary. When looking for jobs and considering salaries in comparison to the cost of living in London, salary was something that factored into my decision, and that’s okay!
If we break it down further, it’s just capitalism telling us that the only thing that should be rewarded is an endless pursuit for profit and I question why. Why should we have to accept lower salaries just because we want to do something positive for society when the ‘Amazons’ of the world are destroying the planet and getting rewarded for it?
Have you actively changed your daily practice to be more sustainable?
Yes of course! Like I said earlier, I hate waste, especially food waste! I have never really bought much and prefer to have fewer possessions, probably because I have moved around so much, but I am trying to take it one step further by exclusively buying from ethical and small businesses.
Do you feel there is a stigma or lack of understanding of the climate crisis amongst South Asian communities? What do you believe the blockers to be and how would you go about solving the issues?
I think in immigrant and minority communities, there are often a lot of other worries and issues we have to overcome.
I don’t blame people who are trying to make ends meet for not worrying about the climate crisis, because let’s be honest, they are also probably the smallest contributors to climate change.
However, South Asian communities specifically do have a lot of social and political capital. I think our generation has a lot of untapped potential and I do get disappointed with the general lack of social and political engagement of the youth in the South Asian community.
Culturally, we are generally taught to not ruffle feathers and to keep our heads down and work hard. Frankly, change isn’t made by not ruffling feathers. We have a lot of skills, capital, and ideas in our community, it just needs to be harnessed in the right way.
You touched on feeling like your previous consultancy work didn’t give you the same amount of satisfaction or purpose – would you now say feeling purpose from your job is vital for you?
Purpose in my career is vital for me. I am not sure if it’s the workaholic American in me, but I really don’t subscribe to the ‘I work to live’ philosophy. We will, inevitably, spend a LOT of our life working, so why would I not search for something that fulfills me?
I never want to live a life where I am watching the clock so I can leave at 5pm. I do want to be excited to get up on Monday morning. I can’t live a life where I spend 40+ hours a week just waiting for them to end – that sounds so miserable! I will say, it is important to remember that work is only part of life and whilst work is important, it’s integral that your work doesn’t come at the expense of your relationships and the rest of your life.
Being carbon conscious in a practical day-to-day sense can be quite costly – how can people easily and cost effectively make a difference? Do you think being sustainable is accessible to everyone?
I actually get really annoyed at the climate change rhetoric that places so much responsibility on the individual and especially on minority communities and communities in the global south. Really, we should be fighting the handful of companies who are responsible for the majority of global emissions.
When it comes to reducing waste, I actually think that minority communities are models that the rest of the world should learn from. It’s about being resourceful rather than buying things to fit our convenience. This is actually something that South Asians are known for!
Have you heard of ‘jugaad’ innovation? I’ll give an example. It feels like a lot of sustainability rhetoric in the west is actually commodified. For example, we see bloggers shaming people for not having the right reusable containers or the new ‘it’ ceramic non-stick pan? In comparison, immigrant families have been saving yogurt containers to transport chole (chickpea curry) and using durable stainless steel cookware for generations!
With transport and particularly air travel being a huge contributor of carbon emissions on a global scale, do you believe tourism and travel truly can be sustainable?
Well, there are multiple parts of sustainability, right? I believe that the problem tourism helps to solve for our society is the social and economic aspects of sustainability.
Tourism, when done well, provides opportunities for people to learn about others, connects families, provides sustainable jobs for people in even the most remote parts of the world, for example. For a sustainable development practitioner, the goal is to figure out how to encourage all of those things happening whilst minimizing the environmental backlash.
Also, it’s kind of a fallacy that air travel is one of the worst contributors to global carbon emissions. Human air travel contributes to around 2% of global emissions, whereas emissions from livestock alone accounts for 14.5%. (Gerber et al., 2013).
Recently, local tourism is becoming more and more popular. This form of tourism does involve fewer emissions and still creates the same benefits of international travel (i.e. creating community, exploration, job creation). I see this as a way forward for the tourism industry, especially with the pandemic.
Again, you’ll notice that the rhetoric around reducing emissions are very individual-focused. While there is room for improvement on the individual level, I have to ask the question as to why we aren’t going to our governments and the big oil companies and demanding incentives for greener technologies and taxes for carbon-emitting ones? That’s where I think our focus should be.
What advice would you give to younger generations in relation to sustainability and the environment?
To me, being socially and environmentally conscious should just be inherent for our generation moving forward. When making decisions about your career, about your purchases, about anything, sustainability should be on our minds. This is how we make change, by voting with our wallets.
Given that we live in a capitalist society, we can make a difference by choosing to support small businesses, to buy less, and to choose more sustainable alternatives when possible. When picking a job, even a corporate job, see what opportunities there are to get involved in CSR, understand the company’s ethos. This should be important.
Being in corporate consultancy before and switching to sustainability-led social enterprises now, would you say it’s just as viable and economically stable? Have you faced any challenges?
I work for a startup that is mission-driven now, but I used to work for an international development consultancy, where the company contracts with the government. Naturally, there is more stability in a job like that, especially during the uncertain times we are in right now.
However, I think it is also harder to move up and learn more at a faster pace in those environments. I actually earn more now than I did in my old job, have more responsibility, and I am learning a ton. Sure, it’s less ‘stable’ than working for a government contractor, but I think you also have to bet on your own intuition as well as your skills and talents.
Can you share one life story which has deeply impacted you?
Ha! I am not sure if I can think of any one thing. I think learning about sustainability and social impact is a slow learning process. Unlearning mistruths that we learned as a kid and exploring more sustainable ways of living takes time and is a life-long process.
We caught up with Sustainability Campaigner and Corporate Social Responsibility expert, Nina about her global experience in community development and implementing SDGs in the not-for-profit sector
What is your ethnic, academic and professional background?
I am British-Indian and both my parents are from and were born in Punjab. I have a BA (Hons) in Economics from Manchester Metropolitan University and an MA in International Relations Theory from Warwick University. Professionally speaking this is more difficult to explain! I have a cross-section of experience but, I suppose you could say I am an experienced policy and campaigns generalist in the not-for-profit sector, working my way up to manager roles. The subject areas of which I have experience include community development, CSR and sustainable development issues including the United Nations SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals).
What inspired you to act as a catalyst for sustainable practice? Is there a particular story you can share?
When I was studying my MA there was one module called International Business and it explored the role of business as a global citizen. At the time the premise of CSR (corporate social responsibility) focused on the roles of big businesses operating in foreign countries so the likes of Shell, BP, Nike. Their supply chains and the impact they had on local communities was only really articulated by the likes of Transparency International and Greenpeace – hardline campaigns which acted to raise public awareness of issues very rarely addressed by big business or in the media.
This led to me writing my dissertation on the role of the media and CSR and whether or not the media is a hindrance or support for good. After I completed my MA I looked for intern roles in London for organisations ‘that were doing that sort of thing!’ My first sustainability/ CSR role was as an intern for AccountAbility.
Can you tell me about your career in CSR/ Environmental consultancy and policy and how you got into?
It started from my role as an intern at AccountAbility (3 months long). Once that role finished I had to find a paid role to stay in London and managed to get myself a policy officer role for a consumer watchdog called Postwatch (part civil service but no longer exists). This was a stop-gap. It enabled me to stay in London and gave me much needed work experience, but the issue itself wasn’t of massive interest to me.
Whilst there I went on a one month course about international development issues from the perspective of a developing country; 20-25 graduates and non-graduates met in Mysore, India for a 4 week course led by fantastic development experts from India. I came back fired-up wanting to change the world. My line manager at the time told me she didn’t want to see me at Postwatch when she came back from maternity leave. Within 3 months of being back, I got myself a role as a researcher at New Economics Foundation and the rest is history really… I moved onto other roles for a variety of reasons (redundancies, leaving the UK, coming back to the UK etc.)
What have been your biggest successes and learnings to date?
On a personal level, building up a cross-section of experience that has enabled me to move into different types of organisations at home and abroad. I used to think this was a disadvantage – not being specialised in one particular area but recently found it isn’t! On a professional level delivering and running the leadership programme in Mysore, India (I went back there in 2012) for the Global Institute for Tomorrow’s executive education programme. Taking 25 middle managers and executives from across Asia to India and organising a 2 week programme of lectures and field trips. To be able to reignite the networks and friendships I developed all the way back in 2005 was very rewarding as well as useful to other roles – a key learning.
Another key learning is that the range of commitment and understanding of sustainability is vast and it’s really important not to feel intimidated by those around you who appear to be fully ‘woke’. Being interested in sustainability isn’t a competition. If you don’t want to give up meat, it’s okay!
Being South Asian, did you face any backlash from family, friends or society at large for choosing to take a niche/ unfamiliar career path? Has it been challenging or isolating over the years not having your peers fully understand your job?
I wouldn’t say backlash at all, just more indifference and a look of concern mixed with confusion. As I write this it does make me laugh. The lack of apparent interest in my work did annoy me when I was younger, you do feel a bit left out.
My parents had such low expectations that completing my MA was more than enough for them and living in London without needing their help was also quite satisfying. If anything it was the fact I lived away from home which probably concerned more them than anything else. I suppose I was also lucky in that we were very much a nuclear family – unusually the majority of both my parent’s families all stayed in India, so there was far less pressure surrounding myself and my brother.
Yes, I would also agree that not being able to explain what I do, or present a really clear job title was and is sometimes still annoying. Once I moved into campaigning roles that was all a bit clearer!
How have you actively changed your daily practice to be more sustainable?
Hmmm… Not massively. I don’t like to waste food and use my own shopping bags.
Do you feel there is a stigma or lack of understanding of the climate crisis amongst South Asian communities? What do you believe the blockers to be and how would you go about solving the issues?
I think it’s definitely a lack of understanding and dare I say a lack of priority for them (when I say them I am thinking of the older generation to some degree). No matter what, South Asians will fly home to see their families and visit for weddings etc. I would counter, that for specific communities in Asia there is more awareness. My family are traditionally farmers so they see the direct impact of climate change. Climate refugees in Bangladesh are on the rise each year. For those in developed countries their attitudes are somewhat removed and the issue is not so relevant.
Blockers – the mediums which they communicate and live within maybe don’t talk enough about climate issues. Zee TV and all those other channels just don’t emphasise the role individuals can play and how they impact. Businesses, and suppliers advertising on such channels should also perhaps make more on environmental credentials – consumers see these brands as an extension of their lifestyles.
For the younger generation, I’m not so sure the stigma is there. I actually think they often seem slightly envious that someone has chosen their own career path, rather than following the path set out for them/ be approved of by their families.
Another point – I think the way many South Asians consume food and understand its value is hugely impressive and positive. I think this should be celebrated – fresh, seasonal, cheap food is the staple for many families (lack of meat for many communities) and something other communities can only aspire towards. This is one way they can understand how they are already helping. Daily household chores are also quite carbon conscious without people even realising. The families I grew up with used their own shopping bags and recycled ones well before the trend was to do so!
I think if you break it down, South Asians are actually already doing a lot just by living their natural, cultural lifestyles.
Being carbon conscious in a practical day-to-day sense can be quite costly – how can people easily and cost effectively make a difference? Do you think being sustainable is accessible to everyone?
Firstly, people need to know what being carbon-conscious means. It always resonates more when you can say it saves you money etc. People need to be encouraged to do what they can manage, taking small steps and feel satisfied and accomplished in whatever they can do. In time, they will then learn what else they can do. I don’t think it’s costly in terms of money. It is costly in terms of research, understanding and then implementing it in your own lives. I think being sustainable is accessible to everyone – within their own parameters of how they can live.
You touched on representation and generally only finding South Asians (majority women) working in D&I, but rarely ever in the environmental/ sustainability sector. Why do you think this is? Why is it important for there to be more representation in this sector?
I think it’s about some of the things I have mentioned above. A lack of peer networks going into similar careers but also I think a lot of it is down to understanding the types and breadth of careers you could have. It’s much easier to envision a career path as a doctor, optician, accountant etc.
It is really important to have representation in the sector to develop practices and research that can be applied across social and ethnic boundaries to affect change at a faster pace.
If you don’t have BAME representation you are perhaps less likely to get BAME engagement across the board through communities, business and families.
You’ve worked in policy and community regeneration, across corporations and even in Hong Kong – what has been the most rewarding for you?
That’s a tricky one! The community regeneration work was perhaps most rewarding because I engaged with beneficiaries more directly, whereas a lot of corporate work is directed to the goals of the company, no matter how ethical those are – it is hard to measure the ‘good’ you have done.
However, working with corporates is rewarding when, as I have, have those ‘penny drop’ moments when a senior executive sees a business issue through the lens of CSR and social justice issues. What’s more rewarding is seeing companies who have those moments make actual change.
Change is much easier and faster to achieve in a corporation than lobbying for local or national policy changes… If only more corporates realised this!
Having worked in such diverse organisations, can you confirm the industry is just as economically viable and stable as those of your peers?
Absolutely, if anything I would say it’s probably the safer long term industry than many others given COVID and the increasingly alarming impacts of climate change.
The insecurity of the industry lies in the roles that are in-house corporate ones. These roles are solely dependent on the success of the business however, business may well start to prioritise these roles more given the demand from consumers and employees to demonstrate ethical, environmental values. However, the industry operates in thousands of not-for-profit orgs as well as in local and national government agencies.
What advice would you give to younger generations in relation to sustainability and the environment?
I would say go for it if that’s your interest, passion or looking to be the next environmental entrepreneur. No business in the future can operate without understating diversity, environment and well-being. This is where CSR I believe is headed.
Can you share one life story which has deeply impacted you?
One of the executive education programmes I was part of for a company I worked for in Hong Kong took place in Balikpapan, Indonesia. This is one of the last resource frontiers in Asia with virgin forests being chopped down at a pace for their timber and agricultural land. It was an experience of a lifetime. It was a programme for 25 executives and middle managers from one company – a family owned Singaporean shipping company.
The CEO was relatively enlightened for a man of his background and age. He wanted a select number of employees per year to get a better sense of globalisation and open their eyes beyond their conventional business education. The trip was to the family-run new arm of the business – a palm oil plantation in what was once a virgin Indonesian jungle.
It was heartbreaking seeing hectares upon hectares of plantations all owned by different companies, the scale was breathtaking. It made me realise how much work needed to be done (or impossible to do) to accept that resource exploitation won’t end anytime soon.
The role of some of Asia’s biggest paper and oil manufacturers are on a whole other level. On the one-hand it made me think CSR is perhaps a futile exercise, on the other it made me realise how amazing it is when smaller companies can demonstrate the provenance of their products, at every point in the supply chain versus those who require a global supply chain where transparency will always be compromised.
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
I think I have said enough! Although I have sometimes felt despair at doing something that can feel like you are hitting your head against a brick wall, whilst also having to contend with the fact that you mates and your family don’t even know what you do! It is an industry which is finally having its day of reckoning. If it wasn’t for CSR we wouldn’t have seen Sainsbury’s taking the plunge (although that is a ridiculous way to describe it) to have a Christmas advert featuring an all black acting cast; we wouldn’t have a modern slavery act, a constant push to close the gender pay gap and a recognition of workplace well-being.
CSR has come a long way from the days of greenwashing; although it is still out there, social media and activists in particular are constantly keeping companies on their toes in their responsibilities towards consumers, employees and shareholders and this is perhaps the best we can hope for!
We spoke to Shilpa, Creative Director and Founder of House of Bilimoria about her ancestral roots in tailoring and how she ‘luxcycles’ South Asian textiles
I am Indian, my mother was born in Kisumu Kenya, my father in Mumbai. My grandparents were all born in Gujarat. I have a BA (hons) in Design for Fashion & Textiles and have worked in the fashion industry for the last 15 years.
What is House of Bilmoria, how did it come about and what are your main values as a business?
House of Bilimoria was born from the gifts my ancestors have bestowed upon me – the craft of tailoring and making clothing. I was dissatisfied working within the fashion industry as a high street retailer when I first graduated. I came to very quickly discover that it had none of the energy, or substance that I felt designing and creating should be about. With that in mind, and being pregnant with my first child, I decided to take it into my own hands and start my label.
The values of my label would be all the things I didn’t find in that first job: ethics, sustainability, culture, community and circularity. More detail can be found here.
What inspired you to act as a catalyst for sustainable practice? Is there a particular story you can share?
My inspiration was and will always be my elders, my grandparents, my ancestors. I was so proud of what they did for a living, I was so proud that I had these skills embedded inside me and that they only needed to be ‘switched on’ in a sense.
The story I always come back to is when I was first gifted a toy sewing machine, I must have been about 8 years old and so excited! I quickly went to use it, but was so frustrated, that it wasn’t actually stitching. It had a needle, foot pedal, and was battery operated. What was going wrong? I took the machine to my Dada (grandfather), and he looked at it, and said to me “Shilpa, there’s no bobbin.” I was so disappointed. I can remember the shock, and being so stunned at how quickly he knew why it wasn’t working. He explained what the bobbin’s job was and I understood, and swiftly went on to use the actual sewing machine my Mom had – no more toys! I love this story because it was my first glimpse into the real technical side of sewing and the craft. I knew then I would need to know all of the parts of the machine and how it all worked. You could call it the moment that the penny dropped.
Being South Asian, did you face any backlash about your career choice from family, friends or society at large? How did you overcome it?
I did. I had people in my immediate family that were not supportive of it at all, that this was ‘going backwards’. If I really wanted to make any money and be stable I should be an accountant. That negativity was and has been one of the toughest things to navigate through, as all you really need and want in life is to be supported and believed in by those that are the closest to you. With the burden of failure already implanted into my mind, it had become a barrier to starting with the strength and belief in myself that would have been a great gift. But on the flip side, it made me even more determined. I would do this, and I’d do it with all the ideas they had which were so wrong about the industry in the first place.
Alongside that, I must give total credit to my Mom and some of my extended family who have actually been nothing but supportive. I mean my Mama & Mami (uncle and aunty) were the ones that gifted me the toy sewing machine in the first place. I have many that are so proud and happy to see that this craft and legacy is continuing. This is how and what I use to overcome the negative aspects; being very in touch and in tune with my why – which is continuing my ancestors legacy, and that over any opinion wins, always.
How have you actively changed your daily practice to be more sustainable?
There are lots of things that I have changed and continue to do so slowly. It is not an overnight thing. I consciously choose our detergents, soaps, and cleaning products to ensure they are not harmful to the environment. I have grown up wearing and loving hand me downs, so this is something that has continued in my own home. My girls wear clothes that have been passed down to them, and even more special that they have also grown up wearing the very dresses I had worn, that were made for me by my grandparents. We don’t own a car and use public transportation. I also have a lot of second hand items of furniture in our home! Before I look at new things, I always check if I can source second hand items.
Do you feel there is a stigma or lack of understanding of the climate crisis amongst South Asian communities? What do you believe the blockers to be and how would you go about solving the issues?
I don’t feel it is a stigma, I think it is more the lack of understanding, alongside a cultural and societal success benchmark which is very materialistic. If we look intrinsically at many of the habitual practices we have at home and have grown up with, they are things like saving the empty yogurt container to use for leftovers. I am sure there are homes that have cupboards full of these ready to reuse. I am sure that before this boom of fast fashion, many have also grown up wearing hand me downs too.
I think the blocker is now having a greater consciousness and connecting the dots backwards, as to where and how the products we buy are made.
It doesn’t take much to see that the products we consume are and have been made with the lives of our own communities and people on the line. Once this connection is made, I believe that it would be hard to look at things without thinking about them.
The South Asian community is very fixated on the idea of what ‘success’ outwardly looks like and maintaining that picture to the world. This though is an outcome of what the generations before us have been through, it’s something that I am beginning to unravel for myself. I believe that it’s once this work is shared and done, that our communities can look at starting to break into these cycles, which will in turn have an impact on how they live their day to day lives and becoming present to the issue of climate change and what it is a bi-product of.
Do you find such lack of understanding makes having a sustainability-led business like yours more challenging?
Short answer YES! Educating our audience is 75% of the work, but I am happy to do this, and it is what I am passionate about so… I also see it as a challenge that I am ready to be up against.
What advice would you give to younger generations in relation to sustainability and the environment?
Choose and start with ONE thing that is important to you, ethics, animals, air, water… Start with that and see what you can do to live in line with ensuring that you approach life and purchases being conscious of that. Once you have got one working well, add another. You will often find that with one, others come automatically too. It’s a win win!
Can you share one life story which has deeply impacted you?
I lost my older sister at a very young age. She used to talk a lot about the environment, about not being wasteful, I can remember brushing our teeth. She would always tell us to stop running the water in between – it’s wasting. To cut up all the plastic rings the cans of soda used to come in back then because they would end up strangling birds…
As much as my grandparents inspire my deep love for craft. My sister inspired and instilled my passion for sustainability. It’s also a part of her I can keep living on.
In many ways she was a spirit that was here well before her time (this was in the early 90’s), and she left me messages that I can live through and by everyday.
Is there anything else you’d like to share?
I love to share, exchange ideas and collaborate with like minded people! Don’t hesitate to contact me or DM!
What is your ethnic, academic and professional background?
I am British South Asian born and brought up in London to Punjabi parents. I’m a performing artist, choreographer and movement facilitator and hold a BA Degree in Humanities and Innovation.
Trained at The Royal Ballet School, my dance career has taken me to work and perform with dance companies across Europe and U.K – Zürcher Ballet, Victor Ullate Ballet, Ballet black, Scottish Ballet and Compañia Nacional de Danza, touring internationally in a range of classical and contemporary repertoire.
I choreographed ‘Capture’ for the Zürcher Junior Ballet, ‘Synergy’ for Ballet Black and ‘Anjaane Ajnabee’ as part Young Choreographers of Compañia Nacional de Danza. I was commissioned to choreograph and perform for Television for Environment (TVE) Global Sustainability film awards and I co-created and performed with Flux in the collaborative work “In Other words” at Kings Place, London.
I embarked on my freelance journey in 2017 to focus on creating my own work and to explore more collaborative work. I have since collaborated with Beta Publica in Madrid, Sujata Banerjee Dance Company, performed with Adrian Look Tanztheater and with The Royal Opera house for their family events. I choreographed the solo works ‘Sundown’ and ‘Rainsoaked…’, the duets ‘Lightweight’ and ‘Umbra’ and most recently choreographed my latest collaborative dance film ‘Returns to Nature’. I assist artists in movement direction and dramaturgy and I have been teaching and facilitating a range of dance classes and movement workshops for over 10 years, across age groups and in various environments.
You recently created a piece of work on nature and connectedness. How did it come about?
Over the last few years I have felt increasingly inspired by nature in both my creative and teaching practices and simultaneously began to develop a curiosity and awareness towards its connection and relationship to our human race, our human nature and our health.
In 2020 I was commissioned to create a new work for ‘The Naked Truth’, an online fundraiser for World AIDS day to encourage awareness around HIV. Motivated by the year we were having, despite the pandemic restricting access to studios to create work and the use of stages off limits, my most natural instinct was to embrace the great outdoors as my creative playground and performance space in this new work. I was excited to explore different natural terrains under my feet and the different spaces I could move in and interact with. In deciding to manifest the piece outdoors with nature for company, I was presented with a fresh experience of scenery, backdrop and offering of props!
The frequent walks I embarked on during lockdown had such a positive effect on my wellbeing, which led the way for me to take my art outside to create ‘Returns to Nature.’ During the creative and performance journey of the work, I recognised how significantly charged I became in improvising and dancing outdoors. I began to listen to the Earth, get closer and more intimate with its textures and movements. I enjoyed working in different dance gear than I’m used to; in outdoor boots as oppose to ballet shoes or socks and I welcomed a chance to dance bare feet on the grass. I am a big believer in the energy transmitted to our bodies from being in direct contact with the Earth!
I was humbled by being up close to the bark of a tree, in all its greatness, supported by the soil and refreshed and nourished by the fresh air I was breathing in.
‘Returns to Nature’ explores a renewed curiosity and relationship with nature, engaging with all its qualities. Journeying through moments of exploration, nourishment, courage and hope, we are reminded of the infinite possibilities we have in returning to the natural world, to embrace our human nature and reconnect to ourselves.
Amidst a global pandemic and the challenges humankind has been facing over the last year, the work aims to inspire a reconciliation with nature and recognition of how it can beneficially impact and influence our physical and emotional wellbeing and our peace of mind. Time spent alone and with others in nature to observe, connect and absorb natural nourishment is healing and an invaluable source of strength. We are all spending our time in different ways according to our personal situations in this crisis.
By sharing this work, I wanted to remind us of the gift of nature, inspiring us to cherish our surroundings, wherever we may be and to stimulate awareness around the environment’s need for a sustainable future. Especially right now, in the moments we find ourselves in. I believe we have been offered a great opportunity to shift and gain new perspectives.
The process of researching and creating this work offered me an opportunity to deeply contemplate and experience how nature can influence and impact my own states of being. I found reflections in the dynamics and movements of nature, which allowed me to relate to what exists within our own human nature. Also how what we think and feel on the inside might be reflected in our actions towards the space and environment which we inhabit. The process became an inward journey of awakening, empowerment and an acceptance of the states within my own self, through observing and tuning into nature’s states, in all their variety, shades, textures and colours.
This awareness has become a guide and a source of inspiration to evolve my own states and realise more within myself. We can find a sense of harmony and presence between our inner landscape and the outer landscape, reflective and supportive of each other in so many ways. I am gaining a deeper appreciation and respect for nature and its benefit towards our perceptions, emotions and actions – how we choose to live and behave. All it took was stepping outside to be with nature, to initiate and spark this new evolution within me!
Nature is literally right before our eyes, every single day, in some shape or form, expressing multitudes on a real life canvas. If we recognise that returning to nature and interacting with it is beneficial to us, we can express our gratitude through our actions by taking care of it, granting us the possibility to the return to the endless wonder and inspiration it continually offer us, day after day. If we can surrender to the power of nature and learn to appreciate and welcome it, in all its diversity, we can reach an acceptance that same power and diversity lies within ourselves and all of humankind.
We are nature, and nature is us, we are not separate but a part of this whole ecosystem and it is our responsibility to take care of what we are a part of and enjoy playing our part. We will only lose out on living well within our own inner ecosystem, if we separate or isolate ourselves from nature’s ecosystem.
By embracing nature I come closer to accepting and valuing my own natural states and cycles. It is an exchange that is vital for our wellbeing and nature’s potential to heal and thrive, supporting the longevity and health of our environment for now, and for generations to come.
Becoming more conscious and relating to nature in new ways last year nurtured and supported my life greatly. I feel I am just on the surface of discovering how much more nature can and will impact my work moving forward and it motivates me to find solutions in how I can work in harmony, in a fruitful exchange with nature in my life.
What has inspired you to focus on the environment in your art form? Is there a particular story you can share?
Since becoming a freelance artist, a collaborator and an independent creator, I am experiencing a growing awareness around costs, creative labour and production processes in the Arts. Especially during the pandemic, we have seen artists go on to create innovatively with a lot less. Hopefully this allows us to reassess how we use our resources – personally, collectively and environmentally moving forward.
Right before the first lockdown, I was beginning to wonder how we could create our work in the dance sector in a more sustainable fashion and felt motivated to re-consider how much material and energy is needed and used to create a theatre production. I also realised how responsible we are in our practices within the industry towards waste and recycling.
When contemplating on more sustainable practice, I think about how we care for the humans – artists and collaborators we work with, how we market and publicise our work, the lighting and materials involved in designing and running a production and how we recycle materials post production.
Last year, I was invited to support difficult dialogues as a Youth ambassador with a focus on the environment in collaboration with TVE (Television for the Environment) for the 2020 Global Sustainability Film Awards. My body and spirit felt ignited and invigorated after coming together with the young activists I met via this platform, from all over the world, tirelessly contributing and finding ways to support the environment and encourage their nations to take action towards a sustainable future.
2020 was a year I felt encouraged to challenge myself to create with less and realise what is truly essential and necessary to express and create a piece of work. I am motivated and excited to continue this journey in sustainable creation and production processes in my own work, amidst the pandemic and moving forwards.
My dance journey started with learning Ballet at the age of four, moving on to creative movement and contemporary styles as I grew older. Swimming was a big part of my childhood where I found the weightlessness of being in water very comforting and liberating, and a welcome balance to the time spent on my feet dancing. When my full time dance training and my performing career began at the age of 11, I encountered challenges such as injuries, stifled creativity and expression and struggles to conserve my energy over long periods of time.
In managing myself as a professional, there came a time when I felt I needed to address and nurture the state of my mental health. I found supportive practices to keep my mind healthy, positive and determined and started to understand how to maintain my energy levels more efficiently.
When I slowly started giving up eating meat around five years ago, I noticed eliminating it from my diet impacted the longevity of my energy levels, overall mood and thinking patterns, finding increased vitality and vibrancy and less stagnation of energy flow within my body. I had always previously believed that I needed meat to supply my muscles with its protein for dance, having a pretty fast metabolism and not keeping weight on easily. I was always trying to eat to put more weight on! In this process I learnt how much protein we can receive from alternative, non-animal foods.
I feel blessed and grateful to have met some incredibly transformational coaches and mentors during the challenging times along my way, who all steered me to return towards natural approaches of moving, thinking and being.
A particularly severe injury forced me to take time off from dancing to heal, rehabilitate and retrain. At this time one of my closest and dearest dance friends introduced to Boglarka Hatala – Embodiment Coach and Physiotherapist in Dresden, Germany, who reeducated and reawakened my body’s potential and capability. She encouraged me to recognise the power my body had to heal itself and strengthen through her blend of biomechanical and psychomotor approaches.
The process with Boglarka opened up space and opportunity for me to find efficient and empowering pathways to heal, communicate and express through movement. Boglarka’s guidance enlightened me in how I could work more functionally and with a more inclusive approach to my body in motion; taking into account and incorporating my personality, inherent nature, my culture and ancestry to understand my body on a personal level, holistically and within my working context or environment.
She suggested I retrain my ballet technique with Renato Paroni in London who teaches a sustainable approach to the form, (inspired by the late Tina Bernal) where taking care of the health, alignment of our bones and use of the joints and muscles in our body is the priority over the general aesthetic.
Ballet technique, as all dance forms, is extremely demanding on the body, inducing wear and tear on the joints over time if not training intelligently and well. I learnt from both Boglarka and Renato how to take care of my body and train in a sustainable way. This was a turning point in my career, becoming aware and understanding the best ways for me to dance within my body specifically, in both practice and performance.
I am enlivened and renewed by a holistic way of being and doing, in reverence to my spirit, energy and emotions and my body’s longevity, as I evolve, change and grow. I want to be responsible for my health to dance and live as long as I can, rather than the possibility being brought to an end by injury or not taking care of myself, which I have faced on occasions.
My pathway in understanding sustainability is through my body and its movement. In the fast paced society we live in today we want to push the body to the limits and see how far we can go to produce as much as we can, we risk over use, wear and tear and burnout. Just as we need to balance and manage our movement and rest periods for the longevity of our bodies, we can find this parallel in our environment and how we respond to it and to nature, which works around the clock for our benefit – in just the same way, it needs our care, love and attention.
I am often inclined to dig a little deeper and research what I think I know and challenge what I am being told or asked to do living in a western working world. I have missed out on eastern and South Asian approaches to the body, mind and soul in my early training in ballet; initially being away from my family and home at boarding school from the age of 11 and then moving to Europe at the age of 19 for work, all the while in predominantly white institutions and surrounded by cultures other than my own. Later in my career I felt drawn to acknowledge and engage with my own South Asian roots and approaches to movement.
Initiating this responsibility within myself and taking my dance journey into my own hands and feet also meant that as my body changed, my inner world yearned to express itself in different ways. I welcomed the diversity and freedom of contemporary movement approaches in dance, as well as different practices and approaches such as Meditation, Yoga, Feldenkreis, Alexander technique, BMC, Tai chi and somatic processing. These all continue to nourish and support my journey, allowing me to access greater awareness, grace and possibility to discover and explore the diversity of movement within myself.
Yoga and Tai chi – the ancient practices of the body and mind from the east, invite us to connect with nature and move in harmony with it rather than against it. The foundations of Yoga and Tai chi, each in their own ways, take their inspiration directly from nature, human nature and the animal kingdom at their core, allowing us to embody the nature within us and connect to what is around us, becoming a part of it and joining with it through our movements.
These practices help us realise how the effectiveness and quality of our mind and body can be measured by our awareness, not by the length of time or quantity. This gracefully allowed my movement experience and practice to become more sustainable and heightened. To practice these techniques, few materials needed, if any at all, working only with the bare essentials of your body and its relationship to the Earth and the space in and around you. I find movement practices that come to life through nature’s laws and our connection to them to be deeply authentic and organic.
Taking care of my inner landscape has in turn, turned my head and perception to look in different directions and find parallels in how we can take better care of our planet earth and the environment more genuinely.
Learning to understand and train my body as an individual, respecting and honouring both its limits and boundaries whilst developing its capacities, permits me to start to understand this concept of the sustainability of our environment in all its elements and resources.
We can choose what we feed our minds, bodies and souls with from our external environment, we can be shaped and informed, guiding us to eliminate toxic elements from our consumption. In turn, we may become aware of any toxicity we may be contributing to our environment which impacts the quality of the food we eat and the air we breath and water we drink etc.
How are we taking care of what we have? How do we use resources and consume? How are we renewing and replenishing our environment to last, without getting utterly depleted and burned down? I have come to realise that the times when I have been faced with burnout and extreme exhaustion and pain, occurred when I wasn’t feeling entirely connected to what I was doing or the environment I was in.
Transformational life coach Yashwant Patel gently guided me towards observing nature around me and has been a mentor to me in this infinite journey of discovery of listening to my body and soul. Yashwant introduced me to Bhavin Solanki, wellbeing physiotherapist, who brought my attention to Gary Ward’s Anatomy in Motion, at a time in my career when new assessments of how I was moving were greatly needed.
I am so grateful to have met the right people along the way in just the right moments to inspire, support and guide me on this path, as I pick myself up after challenges and keep on walking and dancing forward! It gives me great comfort and assurance that dance, health, life and our environment are intrinsically connected and we can find ways for them to be mutually supportive to live our best lives, in harmony.
At low points in my dancing career, where I felt unsure of what direction to take and yet empty enough to receive, I had the opportunity to meet two incredible pioneering women in dance and movement, whose approaches and practices were holistic and broadly encompassing what it is to be human. Susanne Linke – whose approach to training includes movements of the body inspired by animals, the drive of our emotions and the energy of our spirit and Minako Seki – whose methodology combines the practice of developing a conscious mind, our attention towards nature and a healthy diet.
Movement can be exhausting and draining mentally, emotionally and physically and I learned that in understanding our true inner nature and how we navigate and manage that across the spectrum of being human, we can create and move from a source of joy, abundance and unlimited creativity and expression.
This brings me more sensitivity towards how we exhaust our Earth of its resources and I started to learn more about the nature of our environment and what can contribute to its health. Becoming more individual in my practice and learning about the possibilities in my nature and of the body, made me more aware of the diversity in nature and humanity, along with our commonalities and the power of coming together in our communities to work together and support each element.
We observe and learn about patterns in nature and how each individual part feeds into the whole, to support the collective. This generates an understanding of a similar dynamic, in how each individual’s actions feed into the wholeness of our environment and contribute to climate change and other environmental issues.
The elements, movements and dynamics of nature continue to inspire me in how to take care of my body. Connecting with the elements of air, water, fire, earth and ether influence my practice greatly, inspiring and guiding the quality of movement for a deeper understanding and experience as we learn to embrace and feel our own way through them. The elements give life and quality to our movements, allowing them to blossom and evolve.
We can
Connect to the lightness of air to create and breathe space within us,
Invite the flow of water soft and yet so powerful to gently cleansing away stagnant energy within us,
Develop a sense of groundedness within us through the support and fertileness of the earth below our feet,
Ignite the fire within us propelling us into action
and we can Grow an awareness of ourselves in the space we inhabit and how we interact with it.
Connecting with the elements has helped me find new pathways and uncover intuitive and natural movement within myself. Observing nature I learn about growth, resilience, renewal and rebirth and connect to those qualities and energies within myself. Nature is an endless source of inspiration for us, and one of our greatest teachers. The movement and shift towards sustainable living is an action we can involve ourselves in daily, in how we go about our day and asking ourselves if our choices are healthy for our body and for our Earth. More times than not we find they are one of the same.
Learning about sustainability through my being, on physical, emotional, mental and spiritual levels is like looking at the ecosystem, holistically. Renewing the energy sources of our body, mind and spirit allows us to understand how we treat the resources in our environment. We learn to understand that how we create stress on Earth is not too dissimilar from how we create stress on the joints of the inner Earth of our body, both through a pressure and desire for more.
Just as we become conscious about how we reach exhaustion within ourselves, we understand better how we might be exhausting and taking advantage of our environment. I feel that the practice and experience of dance and movement is about how you manage and use your energy, emotions and ideas and how you express them and go on to keep being able to express them.
Looking and feeling through the lens of the body and how we sustain ourselves, not only to survive but to thrive, we understand how our actions contribute to the quality of resources and how much it actually takes from the earth to be healthy and function at its best. Respecting the elements of nature around us is in turn, good for our health; maintaining healthy soil for crops, clean water to drink, unpolluted air to breathe. It is apparent that caring for our environment serves it well to keep on taking care of us.
Learning to treasure our bodies and human experience within the ecosystem and the part we play in it, creates a deeper, on-going relationship with the Earth.
I do believe that it can work both ways – in starting to become actively conscious about the environment’s health and how we contribute and care for it can in turn motivate one to take better care of themselves and others.
Our environment is here to support, feed and nourish us to live and thrive upon it and to enjoy these benefits, we must value and honour this exchange and find the ways in which we can give back and support its replenishment – if we are to continue to receive nature’s gifts and co-exist in harmony with it. Becoming aware of how we live, how we consume and being more mindful and efficient in our practices, helps us to understand what really is necessary and enough.
In my experience, what is humanly sustainable for me opens up a portal to appreciating what is sustainable in nature. The delicacy of a flower, that can literally break in your hand and yet its stem may have such strong roots that it can breathe new life and flower again- in resilient splendour. Likewise as humans, we can recognise how delicate we are, yet can recover and experience a sense of rebirth within one lifetime and renew ourselves and our own energy resources, before our time is up. Understanding how delicate, vulnerable and yet resilient our Earth is for things to grow, flourish and rebirth too, we must take care of it before natural resources run out.
Just as the current state of many issues have come to light during the pandemic, giving us time to wonder, contemplate and begin to figure out how we can begin to heal the necessary, we have been offered an opportunity to realise just how much we are destroying on Earth and reassess our impact on the planet through our choices and decisions. Has the Covid-19 virus come perhaps as a spiritual signal directly from nature about how we are interacting with it and what we need to improve?
Living with and through nature at our core, humbly with a sense of wonder and appreciation, might just bring us more into sync with Earth for collective benefit and the good health of all species and our environments.
How have you actively changed your daily practice to be more sustainable?
We have all had a little more time to really sit and think about the environmental emergency this last year. A year of different possibilities and a clearer 20:20 vision of so many issues which have come to light, which have existed for a long time and yet still increase and are on the rise. I have been less distracted by a busier lifestyle during lockdown to take more time to digest and feel my responses towards things such as sustainability and what actions I can implement right now.
I progressed a little further during lockdown in eliminating fish from my diet and most animal products. I have found this much easier being at home and preparing every meal I eat, due to time saved in not commuting for work journeys and grabbing food on the go. I hope to keep this up. I would like to be more responsible in how I consume plastic packaging which cannot be recycled too.
Moving back to London in 2018 and reconnecting with the South Asian community, I have been brought closer to its traditions and practices in health. Connecting with Dr Indira Anand, I began eating with more awareness through the Ayurvedic approach to diet and nutrition. The principles of Ayurveda are governed by the elements in nature and connected to our emotional tendencies, mental abilities and physical traits.
Ayurveda analyses our physical, emotional and mental attributes to guide our eating habits and routine with the foods that suit and compliment our nature best. Dr Anand introduced me to the practice of Yoga Nidra – deep rest in the conscious state before between being awake and asleep.
I am encouraged and motivated to take more time to assess and research the products I consume moving forwards, across food, fashion and beauty, learning if products have been ethically sourced and if their production process damages our environment or the animal kingdom.
In beauty, I am becoming more aware of the products I choose to use on my hair to take care of its inherent curly nature, choosing products with less to no chemical ingredients, that are sustainably sourced and produced and therefore better for the health of my hair. In embracing my natural curls I have realised the value of accepting your natural self, and discovering and staying true to your own nature. These are some of my life’s biggest personal challenges, which have helped generate and guide that awareness in me towards nature and the environment. This journey feels so NATURAL and organic!
I have switched over to drinking loose-leaf tea or biodegradable tea bags, shocked by research proving that some brand’s tea bags still contain plastic. It has been encouraging to notice over this last year that packaging from some retailers now come in paper bags instead of plastic. I have yet to research deeply in fashion production processes, but I hope to address how I consume in that area with more awareness moving forwards, towards more sustainable options such as vegan clothing lines, which I see are on the rise and some brands having started consciously made lines of clothing.
Do you feel there is a stigma or lack of understanding of the climate crisis amongst South Asian communities? What do you believe the blockers to be and how would you go about solving the issues?
In South Asian communities as in any community, I feel we can readily explore and journey deeper into our roots, culture and ancestors to help us understand and solve current issues. We can ask more questions – what wisdom can we still access and bring forward, which ancient practices and philosophies are there for us to keep alive and breathe new life into, to support us in today’s world? We can look back at how indigenous tribes survived and managed, when humanity was not over producing things at such a rapid rate and in such large quantities.
This is our challenge to manage in today’s world of consumerism, we can ask ourselves what we can do with less, what we truly need and what is merely a distraction?
We can come together as a community in facilitating and having more discussions, dialogues and talks by professionals and activists in these fields, to educate, bring more awareness and inspire our South Asian communities to move forward. We can engage and take part in activities and projects together, use storytelling to communicate messages in a multitude of forms, share our discoveries with each other, and encourage support and togetherness in our actions.
We can trace traditions and practices which have been recorded or passed on from our ancestors and learn how they managed with what they had. The youth of today can actively converse with senior members across the community to find out what they can share with us from the past to inform their practices and efforts to tackle current environmental emergencies.
I believe it starts with us, as individuals, making conscious changes and improvements and simultaneously coming together to share what we have come up against and the solutions we have found to generate change in our environment with our community.
Our South Asian heritage and culture is ripe in its practices to support our wellbeing in accordance with nature and environment – from Yoga, Meditation and Ayurveda – connecting to our bodies and minds in an essential way, wisely and safely in our own habitat. We can encourage a ‘waste not, want not’ perspective and way of living. I am beginning to acknowledge and value what we can learn from our heritage and ancestors and India’s ancient past. We can choose to actively seek out guidance to understand more about our South Asian roots in education and practices.
I’m not 100% aware of how active India is as a country in being sustainably responsible and how they are contributing to climate change in this present moment with increasing demands and economic challenges, but I feel that all generations of South Asian people globally, can exchange and share ideas of what we have learnt from our experiences and from other cultures to support tackling issues. We can pave a bright path ahead collectively through and across generational learning. We can embrace exchanging practices and knowledge between the east and the west to create innovative solutions.
Meanwhile, currently in India, with the farmer’s protests and the future of farming and agriculture being challenged, one cannot help but recognise the value of this essential connection between humans and the earth and appreciating those who are literally working and caring for the soil and whom have dedicated their life to that mission.
We can understand how essential it is for humans to manage agriculture well, to honour and value their work, and recognise how much is being asked of them and nature to over produce. This is another avenue in which we can improve how this relationship between our selves as humans and our planet can be addressed, in how we care for it and contribute to its wellbeing. I support and can only hope that industrial methods will not win over traditional and indigenous methods of farming in agriculture and how we sustain a decent and good level of human rights and nature’s rights.
Do you find such lack of understanding makes communicating the message through your art form more challenging or difficult?
In the dance industry, being an artist in some instances can mean forming part of a mute culture where not every artist’s opinions and thoughts are always considered or integrated into a creation of a work. It is a challenge for all artists to recognise when this is happening and take a decision if they really want to participate in this and get used to or stuck in it. As a creator in the dance world, you are required to share, verbalise and express your opinion and thoughts via your marketing and publicity, as well as the work itself with your collaborators.
The action of Dance itself being a ‘silent’ non-verbal art form, has immense power to communicate ideas, meaning and messages through movement, yet at the same time, I feel dance artists and creators can always compliment, supplement and support their messages and work via verbal communication in speaking out.
Audiences don’t always get a chance to communicate verbally with the dance artists in response to their work, yet we can create and facilitate this channel to welcome written responses, feedback and dialogue. Voicing and writing about what we do supports the message we are trying to get across and I think dancers and creators in the sector should provide opportunities to verbally express, talk and write about their work and creative processes, research and development and put it out there. You never know whom it could reach and or provide more available access to, to learn about your journey from an inspirational idea to a finished performance.
So I feel, finding our physical voice, as well as learning to express it effectively through movement is important to support and create greater access, inclusion and belonging of our work and the comprehension of our message, in the bigger picture.
I have seen waves of insights and sharing increase over the last year through the lockdowns and art being shared so generously and innovatively, creating space for more interaction and discussions with artistic creators. I look forward to this movement continuing and evolving in the future!
What advice would you give to younger generations in relation to sustainability and the environment?
My encouragement for the youth of today, is to start with yourself!
How is your inner environment serving you and what does your outer environment and habitat look and feel like, how can you serve it better and treat it with the same respect that you could treat yourself?
How are you taking care of your inner landscape and nourishing it – your inner earth, your inner fire, the breath that passes through you? Are you contaminating those elements within and around you with toxic habits? Do you feel you are only just surviving and existing? Do you feel you could thrive more? Ask yourself about it all.
Taking this responsibility towards ourselves in turn lends itself to teach us to become more aware of our actions towards our earth. Check in with how clean you feel the air and water to be around where you live and where you travel to and what actions of yours might be contributing to its quality.
Get in touch with yourself, check in with you how you are feeling in any given moment, how you are nourishing yourself and your nature and replenishing your reserves. Spend more time out in nature and observe and feel what resonates with you, and see if and how that experience might plant a seed and inspire you to have a new perspective, take a new action or direction or simply bring you into an improved state of being.
Evolve your practices as you get older and in conscious ways that feel natural to you. Take care of the renewable energy of the Earth as well as you can of your own. Tune in to the phases of life, its cycles and those of the Earth, like the harvest season, the planting of crops, the energies of the day and the night, of the moon and the sun.
The Earth has to survive and thrive well to support the next generation of humans. If we abuse it here and now, selfishly in our own personal timelines on Earth, we are not supportive of others receiving all the possible resources and experiences in the future, that we may have enjoyed till now. Find joy in being responsible. If you might believe in reincarnation, then think about what your soul will come back to, do you wish for a healthy Earth for yourself or at least for the next generations.
In starting a journey and enquiry for yourself, you may find yourself endlessly motivated. Throughout our lives we may face spells or periods of boredom, and this journey of discovering ourselves, as a part of nature and as an active force within the environment, is vast and I feel it doesn’t lets us down.
The learning process can be fruitful and infinite, through the states of nature we can welcome experience and understand the changing seasons of our life, along with the seasons of our environment. There is so much possibility of evolution that a human can go through in a lifetime, culture goes through over years, society goes through across eras and nations go through over decades and centuries.
Its important for the youth of today to initiate journeys for themselves that can be continual in their education and development, opening up new pathways, avenues, diversions and branches that may lead to new enquiries as they move through life.
Dance has been this evolving and infinite journey of discovery within myself and how I relate to the world around me and more recently merging it with my interest in the sustainability of our environment and its health now only adds to my big adventure!
Is there anything else you’d like to share?
I am soon to launch my website (www.nanditashankardass.com) offering my wellbeing service Welcome Movement which is available to all organisations and individuals. The service provides a range of movement and dance classes or tailored sessions from Organic movement, Yoga, Meditation, Ballet to Creative movement, drawing inspiration and guidance from nature, our human nature to encourage a better experience of ourselves and possibility for our growth and evolution.
I look forward to learning not only how I can create sustainable practices and productions in the future of my work but also communicate messages of the environmental issues we face and spread awareness of the power of nature through my work.
I am passionate about how creative and production processes in the arts can generate a sustainable future, for the environment which surrounds us, and the inner environment of our body, mind and soul.
South Asians for Sustainability 