Knowing others is wisdom but knowing yourself is enlightenment: Pooja Pathak

While addressing the audience at the 4th edition of the annual e4m PR & Corp Comm 40 under 40 Summit and Awards 2022, Pooja Pathak, co-founder and director of Media Mantra spoke on the topic ‘manifesting self-affirming professionals to strengthen organisation’s success’.   

According to Pathak, the topic needs to be prioritised today because we live in a time when mental breakthroughs are as important as physical ailments, and emotional stress is as important as physical problems.

In her keynote address, she also acknowledged the resilience with which the PR industry has bounced back. “In 2023, we are even set to create a further disruption and the years to come we are all set to pave a further path which is full of disruption and creativity.”

She stated that the communication industry's young talent has adapted to new trends like never before, and she believes that the diversification and innovation that they bring with them is creating new and emerging content in the PR industry.

She said that today at e4m 40 under 40 summit industry is celebrating the emerging and the powerful leaders of tomorrow. “As we celebrate their win we also put them in a position of power in which we are also leading and affirming that we take the industry to the next height by only creating positive mindsets and a positive frame of mind.”  

She stated that as we cultivate this positive mindset, it will be a delight to see millennials blend the text of their lives with the context of the PR ideology, and that when you blend the text and the context, you get a life with a dedicated purpose.

“It leads to a life which will have a stronger organization vision. It will lead to overall success of the organization. The Millennials have a huge responsibility to ensure that such conversations stay relevant and they should be discussed on and off.” 

Pathak believes that we should all practise mindfulness. Mindfulness is something that only resonates when despite being successful and having a large bank balance, feel that there is something missing in life, and that is the true way to begin becoming mindful, and once you become mindful, it also helps you achieve your life's purpose.

Pathak spoke about her theory called AAASK and shared some recommendations on how you can become mindful. She said the first is the person should be able to associate with any holistic activities so that means you can practice mindfulness by meditating by undertaking Yoga, or different ways and avenues that you can relate with and resonate with is what you should practice.  The second is you have to alter certain habits of how we perceive things and how we form habits. 

The third A is to ask and self-talk. She stated that we prefer spending time with others to spending time with ourselves, so we know a lot about others but very little about ourselves. As a result, it is critical to accept ourselves and explore some self-talk, which is a fantastic idea. Even if you get to know something new about yourself, it's a fantastic phenomenon that will work brilliantly for everyone.

The next is stillness. We love schedules and sometimes when we don't have plans and we go on Instagram and feel like everyone else has plans, we get fomo, but that's not the case because sometimes no plan is the best plan, so create that stillness for yourself, create that time for yourself where you're not doing anything but still doing a lot for yourself. 

The last letter is K, which stands for keep your thoughts filtered but prioritise what you are thinking. When we are sitting still and have a lot of thoughts running through our minds, we don't know how to prioritise and our mind just keeps on having multiple things and multiple visions at one point in time, so it is important to think whether you run the day or the day runs you.

“It definitely assists you in developing a great curriculum for your life, as well as developing a very relevant and solution-oriented frame of mind, which is very important and self-affirming,” said Pathak. “Knowing others is wisdom but knowing yourself is enlightenment,” she concluded.