She started working at 21, spent 15 years in leading MNCs across India and the USA, navigated the pandemic across China and India, and then took a 13 year career break. 

At 50, she came back - as a Trauma Informed Certified Coach, author of The Khudi Trilogy, and a woman who has turned every season of her life into something meaningful. 

We talk about the Defence childhood that taught her to adapt anywhere, the career break nobody warns you about, the miracle daughter who arrived after 11 years of marriage, the comeback that became one of her proudest moments, and the book she wrote as a tribute to her late father. 

This is a story about resilience, reinvention and rediscovering yourself - at any age. 

🎙️ The Woman Next Door - real, honest conversations with remarkable Indian women.

▶️ Watch on YouTube: www.youtube.com/@Thewomannextdoortalks

📸 @thewomannextdoortalks

Saakshi left a corporate job that didn't fulfil her, took a solo trip to McLeodganj that changed everything, and became a digital nomad travelling the world. Then she lost her father — and built a travel company in his memory. Today she runs The Original Travel Company with her husband, curating trips for 50+ travellers — mother-daughter groups, solo seniors, couples — at a time when most travel brands build only for the young. We talk about grief, reinvention, building a business with your spouse, and her message to every married daughter trying to do right by her parents. 

🎙️ The Woman Next Door — real, honest conversations with remarkable Indian women.

▶️ Watch on YouTube: @thewomannextdoortalks

📸 @thewomannextdoortalks

She didn't set out to be a founder. She set out to solve a problem nobody else was solving.

Meenakshi grew up in Mandsaur — small town- father who ran a tent business. She studied hard, got into a top MBA, spent 10 years learning the startup ecosystem from the inside — Myntra, PharmEasy, ShopClues, Reliance Retail. And then one dinner table conversation changed everything.

Nobody was building bags for women. While women happen to be the primary consumer of bags.

That gap became Nori — a bags to baggage brand built for women who have hard earned money and deserve something that is both fun and functional.

In this episode we talk about:

The Accidental Entrepreneur — zero plans, zero ideas and how it all came together anyway.

The Insight — from Ladybird cycles to Scooty Peps to 40 million Indian women now flying and buying their own luggage.

The Fundraise — 30-35 rejections, why each one kept her going for almost 6 months and how she finally closed $350,000 in pre-seed funding.

Being Taken Seriously — how preparedness beats confidence every single time in any boardroom.

The Questions Nobody Asks Men — family planning, managing a home, in-laws. Yes they asked. Here's how she answered.

Two Founders Under One Roof — what it's really like when both partners are building something simultaneously.

"Selling anything is a statistical inevitability. If you knock enough doors — one will open." — Meenakshi

Instagram:

Follow us: @thewomannextdoortalksFollow Meenakshi @meenakshi.v1790 & Nori @mynori.com_

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She was never scared of life itself. Just the small things.

My ex-flatmate Urvashi and I go back to our Bombay days — Wai Wai noodles, cheese slices, green chillies, red wine and very questionable life decisions. 😄

Between then and now she has become one of the most multidimensional, self aware and unapologetically herself women I know.

From a lonely childhood in Lucknow to NIFT to pivoting to PR, moving to Bombay at 21 with ₹25,000 and a lie on her resume — Urvashi has always figured it out herself.

Today she manages three Instagram pages, practices Reiki and Vipassana, has scuba dived despite being terrified and chooses to spend time with her parents out of love — not obligation.

We talk about courage, self discovery, inner work, travel, content creation and what it actually takes to become your own favourite person.

"Travel shapes my curiosity. Pain pushes me inward. Meditation makes me self aware. Content creation communicates it all outward."

If you want to pick up the ukulele instead of the promotion — this one's for you. 🌸

She was born with two fingers on her right hand. She was loved, protected and celebrated — and somewhere along the way, that love became a cage she didn’t know she was in.
In this episode I sit down with my literal neighbour Meenal — the woman next to my door — for one of the most honest and liberating conversations on The Woman Next Door so far.
Meenal spent years seeking validation from the world around her — from relationships, from achievements, from anyone who would accept her as she was. A marriage that taught her everything about herself. A divorce that set her free. And two years of quiet, courageous self discovery that brought her home to who she always was.
In this episode we talk about:
Born Special — growing up with a visible difference and the overprotection that came with love.
Seeking Validation — how years of external approval shaped her relationships and her choices.
The Marriage — rushing in because someone accepted her, and what she learned from that.
The Divorce — not as an ending but as the beginning of everything.
Career & Identity — 14 years, 7 organisations, and never letting her special ability define her limits.
The Shift — from “I don’t have 3 fingers” to “I have 2 extra fingers.”
Baatcheet — building a community rooted in connection and self acceptance.
Meenal’s closing words say it all — “I’m a very simple, loving, generous person who thrives on connection.”
She always was. She just needed to find her way back to herself.
What didn’t break her, built her. 

The side of motherhood that doesn’t make it to Instagram.

We sat down to talk about nutrition. What unfolded was something far more important.
In this episode I sit down with my dear friend Sudarshana, a Product Manager turned Nutritionist — opens up about her high anxiety pregnancy, the invisible toll on a new mother’s body and mind, and the rage that nobody warned her about.
It wasn’t the tearful sadness we associate with PPD. It was an intense, frightening rage — thoughts that scared her — that made her pick up the phone and call her therapist.
We talk about the invisible mother, paternal PPD, the floating road to recovery and why even 0.5% of doubt is enough reason to reach out.
Her words: “You owe it to yourself. Don’t wait.”
And mine: Seek support shamelessly. Don’t let your ego come in the way.  Because happy mothers raise happy children.

Struggling with postpartum depression? Reach out to iCall India at 9152987821. You are not alone.

What does it actually mean to be a modern Indian woman? Is it the clothes you wear? The rituals you skip? The traditions you follow?
In this episode I want to challenge that conversation. Because modern doesn’t mean defiance. Modern means informed. And traditional doesn’t mean blind. Traditional means rooted.
I share some of the most personal moments from my own life — a ritual at my wedding I laughed through, a ceremony I researched before agreeing to, a surname we chose that belongs to neither me nor my husband, a fast I don’t keep but a festival I never miss.
And a mother who looked at the word Kanyadan — the giving away of a daughter — and said: why would I give you away? You are still mine.
This one is for every Indian woman quietly navigating the space between who she was raised to be and who she is choosing to become. 

What does it take to walk away from a stable paycheck and follow your creative passion? In this episode, we sit down with Adrisha, a former business analyst turned full-time DJ on the Bangalore underground music circuit. She opens up about the slow-burn moment that changed everything, how she taught herself to DJ, navigating financial uncertainty, and why having the right support system made all the difference. If you’ve ever felt the pull of something bigger, this one’s for you.​​​​​​​​​​​​

What happens when you grow up not fitting the beauty standard? Not the Kamal Nain. Not the fair complexion. Not the lead in the school dance performance.
In this episode I share something I have never spoken about publicly — growing up being called China Gate, hearing cute but rarely beautiful, and the moment on my wedding day when I finally learned that what I had been apologising for my whole life had a name.
I also talk about why India’s obsession with female facial beauty runs so deep — from our ancient texts to British colonialism to Bollywood. This conversation is 2000 years old. And it’s time we had it honestly.
This one is personal. Raw. And I have a feeling it will resonate.
Because somewhere out there is a girl who was never called the beautiful one. This episode is for her!

We grew up on DDLJ. On Kasauti Zindagi Ki. On heroes who moved mountains and women who waited gracefully. Nobody handed us a manual — but somehow we all received the same blueprint. Education. Job. Husband’s home. In that order.

In this episode I share my personal journey of questioning that blueprint. From a 9th grade girl in UP asking her father “then what?” — to witnessing empowered women in Gujarat who showed me there was another way — to refusing to shrink for an alliance, pursuing my MBA, moving cities, and marrying the man I chose at 30.

This one is personal. And I have a feeling it will resonate.
Because somewhere between the movies we watched and the lives we were expected to live — most of us never stopped to ask:
Whose blueprint are you living? And is it actually yours?