00:00:06 Archita: People imagine empowerment as loud confidence, bold decisions, or standing on a stage telling the world who you are. But what if real empowerment begins in quieter moments? The moment you realize you're allowed to choose your own path, the moment you trust your own voice a little more than the expectations around you. And maybe the most powerful question of all is this how do we help both women and young people discover that inner voice before the world tells them who they should be?

00:00:42 Archita: Hello and welcome to Inner Light, the space where we explore the inner strength, purpose, and wisdom that quietly shapes our lives. I am your host and today we are joined by Vanita Prashad Daryanani, an empowerment coach and the founder of Broaden Minds. Vanita s journey spans continents and life transitions from early marriage and motherhood to entrepreneurship, each step teaching her the power of conscious choice and inner clarity. In this episode, we are exploring women's empowerment and youth empowerment and what it really means to help people trust themselves and choose lives that feel aligned. Vanita, it's such a pleasure to have you here.

00:01:31 Vanita Prisha Daryanani: They are listening to all.

00:01:43 Archita: Yeah. I'm really, really glad that you're here as well. And without wasting any time, let's dive into the conversation because I really cannot wait to learn more about you because it's, it's rare to find, you know, um, not so rare nowadays, but yeah, it used to be so rare to find, uh, empowered women such as yourself. So it's, it's really a pleasure to host you today and to get to learn more from you and Vinita. I'd love to begin with a moment from your own life. Looking back at the transitions you have navigated from marriage and motherhood to building your own work, was there a particular moment when you realized how powerful your choices could be.

00:02:32 Vanita Prisha Daryanani: I think when I was faced with the decision. That I had an aha moment. Because really take time to understand why we make decisions until a point. It feels like it's too late, and then you just have to go with it because now you've made that decision. So what happens is in that situation, a lot of us are we're humanly designed to the situation. You know, that fight or flight that is, uh, internally built. Instead. I activate my parasympathetic nervous system. In this moment. Look at all the decisions that I've made and how can I change my perspective towards it? I.E. in the case of my business, I felt like a real failure when I had to close because I grew up with the idea, thinking that I could do anything and everything. And then when something doesn't go according to plan, you really are faced with yourself and faced with the decisions you've taken. I think that was the most pivotal moment for me. The the day I realized that, quote, I failed, unquote, because you have to get out of that, then, you know. So the moment you have thought, I think it's pivotal in your life. Yeah.

00:04:14 Archita: That is so beautifully said. I absolutely agree. And, you know, it really sets the tone for this conversation as well, Anita. And that brings me to the question that I started this episode with, that when people, people hear the word word empowerment, especially women's empowerment, it often sounds like something external, like titles, achievements, or independence in a visible way. But I'm curious, um, from your experience, what do people often misunderstand about empowerment?

00:04:51 Vanita Prisha Daryanani: Definitely. Like you said, it's perceived as something that needs to be really loud and really big. But I want to challenge that and say it could be something really small that just makes you feel like you have control most often than not. We want to feel like we have control of our lives, and when things are disrupted or when there is change, we feel so chaotic and we feel a lack of control, i.e. a lack of empowerment, as if our choice has been taken away from us. So I do feel like we need to redefine it for ourselves. Yes, it's true. Empowerment to some people needs to be really big, and that's the way they break out of their comfort zone to realize that they have choice. But for me, it was something that was a really small shift, that noticing the moments of where I have choice, how I can be seen. And that to me, true impact of knowing that first choice. Yeah, I think we need to redefine it. Um, like you said, uh, I feel with aggression or all these words, we've kind of Collectively decided what it should mean. But when you sit down, especially when I've sat down with my clients on a one on one, we really try to explore what that word really meant, if it's necessary for it to be so big and so more often than not, they already know what they want from the words. But there are other opinions and voices externally that have made them feel like they be something else. So my challenge is that people need to really sit down what these words mean to them. And for example, if that word doesn't work for you, like empowerment, you just cannot get it out of your head that it needs to be. It could be something small. Then find another word that can help you with it. Yeah.

00:07:14 Archita: Absolutely. I definitely agree. I think it's it's a very outdated definition of empowerment. And it needs to be redefined because empowerment can be quite as well. It doesn't always have to be loud. And, you know, um, that's really meaningful because it shifts the focus from proving something to the world to being honest with ourselves first. And I think that shift is especially important for younger generations who are growing up surrounded by constant comparison. And that brings me to the question. Many women and young people struggle with self trust. They second guess themselves or feel pressure to follow certain paths. Uh, from what you have observed, where do these patterns of doubt usually begin?

00:08:06 Vanita Prisha Daryanani: I think it it begins the minute you are faced with any external connections, especially with families and schools like the schools and the family structures that we have. They tend to tell us when we're right and we're wrong, instead of really finding out and going deeper as to why we made certain decisions or what guided us to do those things. And, um, what happens is we create a narrative for ourselves to all those little things that went wrong or that we were told in our lives. Coming to the fact that when you start really valuing, um, friendships, then those friends also play a big part in how you see the world. Because I think there's a saying that you are some of the five closest people to you. And that just goes to show how impressionable we are throughout our life. But definitely the younger we are, the more impressionable we are. And that's one of the biggest issues that I've seen. When we're younger, we don't really give our kids and the younger generation space to figure out what is really important to them. Our conversations are based on, okay, what are you doing well in school? Or, you know, what's your homework like? Or how much time are you spending on your devices? And this shouldn't be done like this. And we're telling them a lot of things, rather than letting them make decisions for themselves and understanding why they want to make those decisions. Let's look at something like discipline. For example. We may have a certain idea of what discipline looks like for us, especially those who are from military backgrounds, right? We believe in that very structured day. But sometimes discipline could also be just being really committed to something. And when we have those kind of parents or those kind of leaders or those kind of school structures there. We tend to absorb those definitions. Now sit down with a child and ask them, what do you really value? They have absolutely no idea. Or they it may be as simple as, oh, I really like to sit on my computer and watch videos or something like, like that. And we don't want to spend that much time to really find out what's important to this child. Rather, we're telling them this shouldn't be important to you and this should be important to you. So I think from the very beginning, we need to change the way that we're communicating with people, especially if we want to raise very self-aware children or the next generation or even the next batch of leaders. As a manager, you have to have these type of conversations with your Staff and with your employees. So I do think that structurally, the people you are in contact with and your family, your society, they all create this kind of misconception of these words and this narrative that we carry throughout the rest of our lives.

00:11:34 Archita: That is so true. And I think it should be something that should be incorporated into school curriculums as well, because it's really important for people to, for young children, especially to learn about these things. And definitely, like you said, I think we need to mind our the conversations that we have around young children, especially to prepare them from, you know, for the future and also to protect them from these kind of false narratives that's already been created by the society. So yeah, because I mean, it sounds like empowerment is less about teaching someone what to do and more about helping them remember that their voice matters in the first place. So yeah. And now let's let's bring. Yeah. And now let's bring this into everyday life. So when someone, whether a young person or a woman, um, navigating life transitions feels disconnected from their inner voice, how does that usually show up in their choices or relationships?

00:12:48 Vanita Prisha Daryanani: Um, that's a very good question. I've seen that, uh, a lot of individuals who are feeling they don't have an inner voice anymore. You'll see them become really complacent or very like in a state of blaming their surrounding, right. I, you know, this has happened. Okay. What are you doing about it? No, I can't do anything about it. It's just the way it is. It's kind of like I give up attitude that comes in or there's no way out. They become quiet. Um, they might tend to cut off connections with other people, or they may even go to the other extreme as to be very loud and boisterous about small things, like very irritable about even small things that they would never have been irritable about before. So there's no specific sign. But I think if your personality is starting to change from what you knew of yourself, it would be a sign that maybe sit down and figure out what is really happening. If there's something you're unhappy about, a lot of the time, we don't take the time to sit with with what we're feeling. Mostly because we feel like we don't have control over our circumstances. Uh, the kind of metaphor I like to give is if you feel like you have stopped writing your story and someone else is writing it for you, then it's time to have a look at what's going on in the sense that now your character and your story and you're being told to go right and you're going right, and then you're being told to go left and you're going left, and then you're being told to jump up and down and you feel like this puppet. And it's extremely frustrating when you feel like that, you know, in bringing it to practicality, you know, when you have a very small child and you're there to nurture this child. And so you're every time your child wakes up and cries, you jump up and you attend to the child. And of course, that's like the motherly nature of a human being, of a mother to do that. But when you start doing this for every single thing in your life, in the sense that now I'm having to take off everything in, in my life, in your life, in my spouse's life, in my work life and my in-laws, in my friends, it becomes so overwhelming that you don't even know why you're doing it anymore. And in the case of the mother with a child, you know why you're doing it. After some time, you forget why you're doing it. So ask yourself, why am I doing this? And if it's a not clear answer, if it's not a one line answer for yourself, that's another sign also that you need to sit down and really figure out what's going on here. Are you trying to maybe feel important? Because a lot of the time we want to leave a legacy. We want to feel important. But maybe the methods are draining you and drowning you of your voice. So definitely, if you're feeling like this, if you're feeling like you're in a rut, if you're feeling out of control, if you're feeling, um, you have no choice anymore. If you're feeling like you're doing too much, then these are all telltale signs that you need to slow down for a minute and just go back to basics.

00:16:37 Archita: Yes. Yes. Because sometimes, you know, taking a break and starting from the beginning, I think that's also really important, like a reboot and what you just said that, um, reminded all of us that sometimes empowerment isn't a dramatic moment. It's a series of quiet decisions where someone slowly starts trusting themselves again. And that is really, really important.

00:17:06 Vanita Prisha Daryanani: um, sometimes, you know, we forget what we really value in our life, right? And it's really important that, you know, when we don't honor a value in our life. For example, if someone values honesty and transparency and they've stopped being honest and transparent, they start to feel it, it bubbles. And maybe not now, but in two years, three years of going on like this, it starts to bubble in you because this is really important. In the same way, you have the same reaction, if you're not getting it from someone else and you feel so discontented, actually. So I do want to urge people to really sit down and think about what they really value in their life and how it's being honored and where it's being dishonored. And that could be a really nice starting point. And of course, if you don't know your values, it's of what you value the most. It's also fine because like I said, we don't have these conversations when we're younger. Nobody in school asks us, do you value success? Do you value getting the best marks? Like, do you value excellence? Nobody asks us these things. So I think it's really important to have this conversation with yourself if it is possible, and if not, then to seek help or assistance in getting that clarity for yourself. Yeah.

00:18:46 Archita: That that is very powerful. And thank you so much for, you know, sharing that with us today, Vanita truly and also Vanita. Lastly, I'd love to ask a question for listeners who may feel stuck right now. So if someone listening feels unsure about their direction, their voice, or their words, what would you want them to remember about their own power?

00:19:15 Vanita Prisha Daryanani: I want them to remember that they are naturally creative, resourceful, and whole. You have all of the answers inside of you. You have all of the solutions, the creativity, the scope, the capability. You just need to be reminded of it and you just need to. Feel it. Really feel it that you are capable. And I really pray for this for the rest of the world. Yeah.

00:19:48 Archita: Beautiful. And thank you so much for all of the meaningful insights have brought today to this conversation. And. And if there is one thing to take away from today's conversation, it's this empowerment begins the moment we start trusting our own voice and allowing our choices to reflect who we truly are. And for listeners who connected with your perspective today and would like to learn more about your work or connect with you, where can they find you?

00:20:22 Vanita Prisha Daryanani: They can find me on, on the web, which is w w w dot broaden minds with a z dot com. Yes, this would be the best way to. Yeah.

00:20:37 Archita: Perfect. And to all the listeners listening today, you can find all those details in the show notes and you can reach out to her whenever you feel like it. And thank you for sharing your wisdom and experiences with us today. And to everyone listening, remember this. The light you are searching for outside often begins as a quiet spark within. Take a moment today to listen to your own voice. Honor your choices and move forward with a little more trust in yourself. This is inner light and I am art. Until next time, keep choosing the life that feels true to you.