[2:45 pm, 20/7/2024] Gursharan Kaur: Today I have poet Shreesh Kakkar on my podcast. Shreesh is a lawyer by profession and he has published two poetry books with the third one on the way. His poetry books "Connections" and "Agape" have become quite popular among his audience and have been relatable to many. Today we will be talking about his love for writing, his inspirations for poetry and the art of expression.

This week I have a wonderful person on the podcast who is also an epileptic patient and advocate. We will go through a conversation dedicated to raising awareness on Epilepsy and how it affects a person's life. Naumika will share her journey and her struggles with Epilepsy- a neurological disorder that affects nerve cell activity in the brain causing seizures. It is a serious condition and we still need a lot of awareness around it. Tune into this episode to learn more about epilepsy from a direct survivor

Welcome our young author Manmeet Saini who will be talking about her book "This is not how your story ends" in which she has shared her mental health struggles and her battle with anxiety. We talk about her writing inspiration, her journey through anxiety as well as what helped her through it all. We also talk about her publishing journey and how she became the author of her two books.

This week we will be discussing Self care and what it means in the Mental health sphere. Self care has different meanings for different people. While it is one of the most important parts of mental health, we frequently neglect it either unconsciously or consciously. In this episode a Mumbai based Counselling psychologist Samreen from @doting_hands will talk with us about what self care is for her and how it is an important element of life. We will be discussing everything from myths, beliefs, and opinions of different people around self care and mental health.

This week we have a wonderful and talented author Niyati Gosrani who will be talking about her debut poetry book "Wilted Roses and Rising Suns". In her book she explores the themes of pain, loss, hope and love. Niyati will share her author journey with us and how writing and being vulnerable helped her deal with all the pain and loss that she went through.

Today we will be talking about what are developmental disabilities and how to support people dealing with them. We have Palak Dadwal, a human services professional who has years of experience working with individuals with developmental disabilities. Palak is also studying to become a counsellor and is currently working in a leadership role. She will be talking about the stigma attached to developmental disabilities and how we can raise awareness and increase understanding and support towards people with developmental disabilities.

Today we have two counselling psychologists who specialize in addiction to talk about how families are impacted by addiction. Lavisha and Himanshi from Alpas Therapy will explain how families are impacted by an addiction and the struggles they face and also what can be done about it.

In this episode I have counseling psychologist Aditi Attri who will tell us about what is ADHD , it's symptoms, treatments and the strengths that people with ADHD posses. We will be discussing how it impacts a person's life and how we can support people dealing with it.

Today we have a Mumbai based choreographer Nisha Maloo with whom I will be discussing how art and social media influence us and also help us. We will be talking about the impact of dance and art forms on mental health and how they help us find self expression and joy within.