Search Results for: karma

August 22, 2016 By Trishala Chopra 1 Comment

Raksha Bandhan Challenge to GOQii Players

This festive season- Health is my Priority!

India could not have got a better gift on ‘Raksha Bandhan’- (a festival to celebrate sisters and protect them) with PV Sindhu and Sakshi Mallik bagging medals at the Rio Olympics and not to mention Dipa Karmarkar who put Indian Gymnastics on the world map.

At GOQii as we celebrate women power and congratulate PV Sindhu, Sakshi Mallik and Dipa Karmarkar for making India proud, in the same breath, I would also like to applaud my players who have taken their health seriously and are following every bit of advice given to them. They took up the challenge to make this festive season healthy for themselves and their family.

Managing health of their players during festive season is a big task for coaches! I therefore threw a challenge to my players on ‘Raksha Bandhan’. I asked them what they plan to gift their siblings apart from a box of sweets. My players came up with wonderful ideas and also me with their changed outlook towards health.

Here is how they did it…….

Krishna Dalal: – her idea came as a surprise package. She made everything at home with complete control on what type of ingredients she used and why? She not only sent me the pictures but, gave a complete explanation about why she chose this ?

Recipe-1 –Gol Papdi

This is Gol Papdi which is made of wheat flour, jiggery, dry fruits and ghee. This is completely healthy and hygienic. Made out of organic jiggery and no added preservatives or colours or flavours, these sweets are low in calories and high in energy.

Recipe 2:-

This is coconut dark chocolate balls. These are made of honey milk and grated coconut with garnished dark chocolate and little ghee. The sweet does not contain sugar and is healthier.

2) Dinesh Mestry: – He always gifted his sisters a box of celebrations but, this challenge made him do something out of the box! This is what he gave his sisters which came as a complete surprise to them as well!

3) Shailesh: – Well, after winning the healthy eating challenge on 17^thof august, he decided to make her sister also follow the path of healthy eating! This Rakhi, he decided to give his sister an air fryer so that she can make her favourite dishes without compromising on health. Isn’t this simply amazing?

The bond between this brother and sister is quite healthy!

(4) Bindu: – A pack full of healthy dry fruits is what she has selected for her brother! Invisible good fats were what she wanted for her brother.

(5) Prash: – He gave a fruit basket to his siblings with a packet of dates. This is the first time that he has given something like this to his sisters because he has joined GOQii and is on his path towards healthy diet and wants the same for his near and dear ones!

6) Tejas Master: – He is a complete fitness freak. He wanted something similar for his sister as well so he went and got her granular bars and some dry fruits this Raksha Bandhan as against the tradition box of chocolates.

(7) Shailesh Shinde: – He decided to give his sister a plant. He believes that plants can protect us from global warming too. According to him, women can take care of our environment like she takes care of everybody.

I think this was a very thoughtful gift for a sister from her brother.

(8) Neharika sahani: – She gave her brother an all new GOQii version 2. She has already taken a step towards her health, now it’s her brother’s turn.

(10) Priya Gokul: – She made a jaggery and moong dal payassam for her siblings. This is such a nutrient rich food!

This Rakhsa Bandhan has been a big learning for me. My players came up such interesting gifting concepts that was very healthy. I am proud of my players.

August 2, 2016 By Ruta Satam Leave a Comment

GOQii supports children affected during terror attacks through Ratnanidhi

Mumbai has seen some gruesome terrorist attacks in the past few years. As a result many families have lost their loved ones to these inhuman activities. Most children of these families have lost their financial support and were left with an unstable future. Given this background, the first thing that takes a back seat is always the child’s education.

Let me cite an example of one terror affected family……

“At a tender age of seven, Anjali lost her father during the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks. A garage worker by profession was shot in his head at Chatrapati Shivaji Terminal Railway Station. Fortunately his mother survived the attack but, was critically injured. Anjali’s younger sister Nikita was just two year old during that period. Her mother Savitri’s world came crashing down with the sudden loss of her husband leaving behind to single handed take on the responsibility of two young daughters and ailing mother in law.

Savitiri with a limited family saving couldn’t see a way to support her daughters education. Here is where an organisation called RatnaNidhi Charitable Trust (RNCT) stepped in as a saviour. She was provided scholarship for her two daughters through RNCT’s Education Sponsorship Program.

With the support of this program, Anjali has now reached to Class 9 and ranks second in her class. While her sister Nikita is happily studying in Class 4. Watching her two daughter study, Savitri was also motivated to continue her education. She has now completed her 10^th from a night school and works with the India Railway to support her family”.

RatnaNidhi Education sponsorship has been working in the field of education. This Program was commenced understanding the need to support children and families of terror attacks. Through this project, Ratnanidhi strives to break the barriers towards acquisition of education for the deprived and underprivileged section.

The Organization works hard to provide a fair chance to every child of this project, especially to the most deprived. There are more 60 children who are still in the process of completing their education and require guidance.

GOQii is currently supporting the cause through its Karma Platform and is looking for support from one and all. Walk, Run as much as you can and earn your karma points and donate them towards this wonderful initiative of educating those lesser privileged kids affected by the gruesome terror attacks.

To know more about the project visit http://www.ratnanidhi.org/Category/educational-sponsorships-for-terror-victims.

April 28, 2016 By Anusha Subramanian 1 Comment

‘GOQii has been a great enabler for me to get back to an active lifestyle and I am enjoying this positive change”

Ashwani Sood and his Oxfam trail Walk experience captured beautifully

He is lively and young at 55 and can put any youngster half his age to shame with his enthusiasm and zeal for life. From being an inactive person to a completely super active in one year is worthy. Despite being a member of the senior management he finds time on a daily basis to do his workout no matter where he is. He is a great advocate of Active Sunday and does not miss it irrespective of which city he is in. If he is in Delhi he attends the active Sunday’s in Delhi.

Let’s hear Ashwani Sood’s story in his own words.

I work with a French multinational Pharma Giant Sanofi. I am on the board of management of Sanofi India and part of the senior management team. Until one year ago my life was that of a boring corporate professional without any physical activity whatsoever. I would come back from work and feel exhausted so much so that it left me no energy to do anything. So I would just lie around on the couch and watch TV.

Prior to that life wasn’t any good either. For 15 years I was based in Gujarat and 400 people were working under me and we used to have these annual health check-ups. I was declared overweight and I was asked to reduce 5-6 kg. I tried but nothing worked.

2014, I got posted to Mumbai. Here I was staying in a gated community and the environment was conducive for me to work out. The environment was a booster in the sense that I would see so many people exercising and going for runs or walks and that interested me in working out or exercising. It came as a big game changer in my life.

Just as I was getting used to the idea of getting fit and changing my lifestyle for the better, GOQii band came as a boon. We were given the band in office and asked to try it out and give feedback. What started with trying out the fitness band, has today become a part of me. GOQii has changed my lifestyle for the better. I came on board GOQii in March 2015. My health goal was to get a disciplined routine in my life and reduce weight and also I would like to run a marathon. Clearly, I was confident of achieving the first goal to begin with.

My coach NahidKhilji, gave me my first challenge which was to start with clocking 8000 to 10000 steps daily. Initially, it was a tough task. But, soon I was able to achieve this goal. I had stopped taking the elevator to the office and also started taking small walks. I would try and see to it that I complete the required amount of steps daily. This eventually led to increasing my activities. I started swimming regularly, playing badminton. From being sluggish, I was back to being active. “If there is a will there is a way.’ I had only one motive when I started on GOQii to clock 10,000 steps.

I used to also get constant reminders for ‘Active Sundays’ but I never went for it. Then one day I decided to go and since that day, there is no turning back. I try and attend every Active Sunday when I am in town and if I am in Delhi I go for Active Sunday’s even there.

Just as I started doing all of these, my coach then threw another googly at me and told me why not do the 100KM trail walk challenge and I was all game for it. I wasn’t sure I would be able to do it but, my coach was confident and that gave me confidence in myself. I went for a practice session in Mumbai. It was a 25 Km walk to Haji Ali. We started the walk at 10.30 pm and I was among the first few to complete the walk. It was an amazing experience. The walk was brilliant I could easily manage it and above all having been in Mumbai I had never experienced the city in thick of the night and believe me it was beautiful and an eye opener.

This boosted my confidence and thereafter I went for all Oxfam Practice sessions. I participated in Oxfam Trailwalker- Team GOQii Yankee. We completed the 100 Kms within 48 hours. It was challenging but mentally we were all strong to be able to push ourselves, motivate each other and go forward. The trail walker I realized it was a ‘game of mind over body’. After Oxfam, I upped my target to 12000 steps daily.

GOQii has been a great enabler for me to get back to an active lifestyle and I am enjoying this positive change. I have lost 3 kgs and I am drinking 2 liters of water daily. My wife has also been very supportive in helping me follow my diet plan. In fact, I have learned a lot in terms of diet. What to eat, when to eat etc. I have, in fact, removed all items that had sugar in them.

My biggest achievement apart from my goals has been that I have also been able to inspire a lot of my colleagues. Many of them have now become part of GOQii family.

And last but not the least I would like to say the karma points is another big motivator. The whole aspect of Karma brings unique positivity to help the society.

I have so far donated about 11000 points to about 9 causes, walked 4.5 million steps and 2800 plus KMs.

What does Coach Nahid Khilji have to say about Ashwani Sood

Ashwani is one the most amazing persons I’ve come across. He started with a sedentary lifestyle and today, I am proud to say he is more active than even few of our health coaches. It’s purely his enthusiasm, dedication, and discipline towards fitness that has got him to the spot that he is in currently. I remember from 5-7k steps to 10K steps its 12k steps in a day currently! Now most of his Sundays are spent in super active Sundays. They say age is not a barrier; he has proved it and is much agiler than people half his age. And, trust me when I say this, he doesn’t say no for any kind of challenges. Right from going off sweet for a month, to just have fruits a day to the interval training and super awesome step count. I feel so proud today to be his coach. I have faith too.

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April 20, 2016 By Anusha Subramanian Leave a Comment

“I can run up to five to six kilometers today which I could never do before”

He did have a proactive life in the past being in the development sector but, monotony sacked his lifestyle and health became an unimportant aspect to look after. His body repudiated any form of physical activity after a slip disk issue he had in the past and slowly fear dominated his mind with respect to carrying out any form of exercises. His body kept pulling him down with various other health issues but he decided not to give up. Take a look at what Amit has to say about his journey…

I have been working in the development sector for almost 17 years now and have had jobs that have kept me active but, as I have grown in my career path it’s become more sedentary, with minimal fieldwork involved.

Then came a point in my life around the year 2008 when I had a slip disk and with that came a drastic downswing in my physical activity due to which I gained a distinguished amount of fat especially in the abdomen and the face and eventually fear kept creeping up my body against any form of physical activity.

Moving on, I finally decided to do something about it because my stamina and immunity kept deteriorating, I kept falling ill with every change in season and unfortunately I also had sinusitis. So I summoned up all my courage and went and joined the gym. This was around October 2015.

What happened next? Well, I strained my back badly and two months after joining the gym a friend of mine introduced me to the concept of fitness bands. But, the band that he had was expensive so I did my own research and came across Goqii. When I studied the model and the product, I realised that it comes with coaching which in fact I found very interesting.

The coach concept with a fitness band was so enthralling, to have someone guide and motivate you all the time. You know that you can always count on someone out there who is constantly checking up on you. I immediately decided to discontinue my gym membership because I wasn’t getting the kind of support I needed in that environment.

I took GOQi in January 2016 and I got Saba Mirza as my coach. You won’t believe it but, I literally ensure that I am reading my step counts throughout the day and tend to remain as active as possible. My diet, exercises, and my movements are all tracked by her. The prime thing for me right now is the persistent encouragement that I receive from my coach. I know a lot about my body today and I would entirely give my coach the credit for this knowledge I have gained.

Before coming onto the GOQii platform I wanted to accomplish two health goals for myself:

1. Resolve my back problem for which I have started doing yoga exercises and,

2 to Lose weight

Since January 2016, I have successfully lost six kilos, my stamina and immunity have substantially increased and I am entirely positive about myself. There is so much optimism in me now.

As for my diet, in the past, I used to consume oily and junk food. I also sometimes indulge in over eating. All that has stopped now and my diet today has taken a complete shift. I am eating smaller meals frequently throughout the day.

I am a changed person today. The discipline in my life has changed me completely. I am more energetic and agile now and that is helping me complete all my work on time. So much so that the filing of all my important documents and personal papers which were pending for ages have finally found their right places. People around me have noticed the changes in me. They say that I am calmer and less anxious than before.

I can run up to five to six kilometres today which I could never do before and guess what? The salad is something I am going to eat for the rest of my life!

What does coach Saba Mirza have to say about Amit Gordon?

Amit and I started working on his health goals three months back and since then he has been doing well in every goal and every challenge that he sets for himself. His long-term goal is to get a fit and a trimmed body as well as a healthy mind. Our focus was to resolve his back issues, improve sleep quality, enrich the meals with various nutrients and increase the stamina and endurance for the workout. For this, we follow SMART goals and habits for him

a) Incorporating interval training in his normal daily,
b) Doing Yoga and Meditation daily in the morning,
c) Drinking turmeric milk daily at bedtime
d) Having a fruit before running

And right from day one, he is putting all his sincere efforts to be consistent in this targets. Along with that, I have thrown few challenges in his way such as the sugar-free challenge for five days with which he was so intrigued that he himself extended it to seven days. And most outstanding one was the 500 karma point challenge in 21 days which he with all his determination and vivaciousness, achieved within 12 days.

The uniqueness in working with him on his health goals is his yearning to learn new thing and his readiness to accept the new changes. For example, we have started working on increasing his immunity and to prevent the frequent muscle injury. To achieve this, I asked him to add a rich source of omega 3 fatty acid, either from a food source or in the form of supplements.

He took the suggestion and started on cod Liver capsules daily. As part of his journey, we are also working towards incorporating a healthy lifestyle for him. Within this goal weight loss has become a by-product. We are still working on making his life fitter and healthier than before and putting all our efforts to be consistent with these healthy habits and goals.