--- title: "Freeing women from being prisoners of their pain" episode: 36 date: 2021-07-15 guest: "Diksha Chakravarti" canonical: https://inclusionbites.co.uk/podcast/36-freeing-women-from-being-prisoners-of-their-pain audio: https://cdn.seech.uk/podcast/episodes/ibs-036/audio.mp3 --- # Freeing women from being prisoners of their pain Diksha Chakravarti, a long-practising therapist, explains how she uses “pain” as a wide lens that includes physical discomfort alongside emotional, mental, societal and spiritual suffering. She describes an integrated approach that brings together bodywork, mindfulness and hypnotherapy to help women meet their pain directly, understand what sits beneath it, and find a way through rather than around it. The conversation explores how fear can keep people stuck, how vulnerability is often misread as weakness, and how confidence grows when someone is able to live more authentically. Joanne and Diksha also discuss the pressures created by patriarchal expectations, internalised competition between women, and the ways status and achievement can become substitutes for self-worth. Diksha shares significant parts of her own story, including leaving Uganda during Idi Amin’s expulsion of Asians, experiencing dislocation and bullying, and later navigating racism in the UK. She reflects on how trauma and disconnection shaped her early life, and how resilience, spirituality, and support networks have influenced her work and mission to help women feel less alone and more able to ask for help. ## Chapters - 00:00 — Inclusion Bites podcast: conversations on inclusion, belonging. - 03:12 — Integrated hypnotherapy for pain management and empowerment. - 06:21 — Patriarchy and internalised biases hinder women's progress. - 12:47 — Embrace failure, learn, and face difficult conversations. - 14:14 — Fear of letting go causes identity pain. - 20:03 — Desire for accomplishment; women challenge motivations. - 22:07 — Transitioned, found self, prioritised identity over materialism. - 25:22 — Embracing authenticity; overcoming fear and financial constraints. - 29:34 — Lovely childhood in Uganda despite societal inequalities. - 33:41 — Convoy unscathed; awkward airport immigration encounter. - 34:57 — Proposal of marriage rejected during airport incident. - 39:37 — Struggled with belonging; identity confusion in Uganda. - 42:36 — Strange move to UK; father's passing followed. - 44:47 — UK faced racial tensions and racism in 1970s. - 49:21 — Spirituality sustained me through a challenging journey. - 51:30 — Trust breakdown causes paralysis in toxic relationships. - 55:10 — Easy to talk to, empathetic and compassionate. - 57:25 — Subscribe, share your story, feedback welcome. ## Key takeaways - The impacts of violent and racist experiences faced by Indian families during the influx from Uganda, with reflections on cultural integration challenges. - The role of reading and mental escape as coping mechanisms during childhood trauma and household violence. - How resilience developed from trauma can fuel a passion for supporting others, specifically through integrated well-being services for women. - The importance of trust in overcoming toxic relationships and the barriers fear creates in leaving harmful environments. - The societal and patriarchal pressures that drive the pursuit of wealth and status, contrasted with the joy found in simpler, more authentic living. - Overcoming fear as a crucial step in realising one’s potential and the transformative power of embracing vulnerability. - Shifts in financial attitudes towards autonomy and making purchases for personal satisfaction rather than societal validation. ## FAQs ### Who is Diksha Chakravarti, and what is her background? Diksha Chakravarti is the guest of Episode 36 on The Inclusion Bites Podcast. She grew up in Uganda and experienced the forced expulsion of the Indian community under Idi Amin's regime. Her background is rich with experiences of resilience and adaptation, having faced racial and cultural challenges both in India and the UK. Diksha runs a company called FIXme, which provides integrated well-being services for women. ### What inspired Diksha Chakravarti's mission to support women? Diksha's passion for supporting women stems from her own traumatic experiences, including witnessing domestic violence in her household and facing societal pressures. Her resilience built from these traumas fuels her dedication to offering consistent support and helping women to overcome resistance and pain. ### What services does Diksha Chakravarti offer through FIXme? FIXme provides integrated well-being services focusing on stress management, anxiety relief, and pain alleviation. Diksha incorporates various techniques like clinical hypnotherapy and massage in her therapeutic practices. Her services are tailored to empower women to confront their pain and live authentically. ### How does the podcast explore the theme of overcoming fear? The podcast delves into the idea that overcoming fear is essential for personal growth and authenticity. Both Diksha Chakravarti and host Joanne Lockwood discuss how fear can prevent people from making necessary changes in their lives, and how confronting these fears can unlock one's true potential. ### What are some key reflections shared by Joanne Lockwood in the episode? Joanne reflects on her life changes, including selling her business and transitioning gender, which helped her find happiness in simplicity and authenticity. She emphasises the significance of shedding societal expectations and materialistic desires to live a more fulfilling life. ### How does Diksha Chakravarti relate to the story of a successful dentist featured on an Oprah episode? Diksha references an episode of Oprah where a wealthy American dentist found true happiness after giving up his possessions and working in a prison. This story resonates with Diksha's own journey of realising that true contentment comes from within, beyond societal expectations of wealth and status. ## Transcript Joanne Lockwood: Hello, everyone. My name is Joanne Lockwood, and I'm your host for the Inclusion Bites podcast. In this series, I've interviewed a number of amazing people who simply had a conversation around the subject of inclusion, belonging and generally making the world a better place for everyone to thrive. If you'd like to join me in the future, then please do drop me a line to jo.lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk, that's S-E-E Change Happen dot co dot uk. You can catch up with all of the previous shows on iTunes, Spotify, and the usual places. So plug in your headphones, grab a kneecap and let's get going. Today is episode 36, the title, Freeing Women from Being Prisoners of Their Pain. I have the absolute honor and privilege to be joined by Diksha Chakravarti. Diksha describes herself as someone who provides integrated well-being services for women. How can they manage their stress, anxiety and pain? When I asked Diksha to describe her superpower, she says she believes that she can achieve anything that she puts her efforts into. Hello, Diksha, welcome to the show. Diksha Chakravarti: Hello, Joanne. Thank you so very much for having me on your podcast. I feel it's an absolute privilege to be here. Oh, thank you for joining me. We first met probably Joanne Lockwood: just over a year ago online, right? I produced the #TruInclusion Conference and you took part as part of the facilitators. So that's how we met, isn't it? That's correct. It was an eye opener. It Diksha Chakravarti: was made me feel very happy to be part of such an inclusive community that were present over there. So, yeah, it was a wonderful event, well done. And I can't believe it's a Joanne Lockwood: whole year ago. I know. Yeah. I know. It's been a traumatic year. Diksha Chakravarti: It's it's it's flowing past in some ways and it's dragged in other ways, you know, but I I can't say that I would be sad to see the path of this. No, for Joanne Lockwood: sure. So when we were talking earlier, Dixiel, we set the thought up to be freeing women from being prisoners of their pain. So tell me what that means to you. Diksha Chakravarti: Okay. So Joanne, I'm using the word pain as a generic term to include, physical, emotional, mental, societal, spiritual pain. So that's how I view pain today. I am essentially a therapist. I have been in practice for 23 years. I started my life as a McTominay practitioner and, I added to my skill sets, so, you know, various different soft tissue techniques, different types of massage, fascial release. I'm also a clinical hypnotherapist and an ergonomist as well. So I added to my skill set as I went along because I qualified and provided help that my my cohort of clients needed me to. And it's when, I decided to train in, clinical hypnotherapy, that's that's the time I made the decision to provide, formally provide I've been doing this informally but formally provide a truly integrated approach to pain management. So my clients now come in to see me for physical pain, for anxiety and stress and I am able to come in to see me for physical pain, for anxiety and stress, and I am able to provide body work for them through mindfulness, we work through calming them and relaxing them. Using hypnotherapy, we deal with, you know, long standing PTSD and demons in the past. So and then when this the coaching part of my work is actually enabling them to actually find out, dig deep within themselves and find the strength that they actually have but haven't been able to access due to societal pressures, due to family pressures. So for me, I see myself as a facilitator more than anything else because I I don't do, I don't use the word cure at all because I don't believe the cure exists. I I don't enable women to find their own strengths. So that actually means looking at the pain, that actually means sitting with the pain, that actually means honouring and embracing the pain. Because unless you go through this dark tunnel, Joanne, you're not gonna find the light at the end of it. And granted, sometimes there's long dark tunnel, trust me, I know, is very long and dark, but there is light at the end of it. So I feel, that if we are able to empower and enable women to get in touch with the pains that they are experiencing, as I said, in whichever front or however many fronts they are challenged by, if we can get them to access it, to face it, to embrace it, to honour it, to work through it, then they can come out to live their true potential and their lives. Now that I'm not saying that every woman should train as a consultant surgeon or go to become a PM of a country, not for a moment at all, but what I they will live their truth rather than living the truth that society forces upon them, they will live their own truths. That's what I mean by freeing women from being prisoners of their pain. Joanne Lockwood: So picking up on what you're saying there about societal pressures, I'm assuming that what you're implying there is the way women are often socialized from birth through childhood with limiting beliefs, expectations of being less than they can be, a baby machine, a wife. So so how how much responsibility do you think society has to play in this? It must be huge, isn't it? It is a a big Diksha Chakravarti: responsibility. I am not I have to say frankly, I have to say that I have nothing against men, you know, I some of my very good friends are men as well, but there is no discounting, I don't think. There is no discounting that we live in a very patriarchal society. We live in a very hypocritical society, and sadly I also have to say that sometimes women are their own worst enemies. So in leadership roles, I have often heard of my clients, senior women coming in, and the biggest problems they have, the biggest obstacles they have are other women who are trying to keep them down as well. So if you look at it, women, unfortunately, if you look at the whole situation as it is, patriarchy has kept women suppressed for so long. Those who are coming up, they haven't got to the point, some of them, of course, they haven't got to the point where they feel safe enough where they are to actually welcome others in. So it's almost they're in a protective mode at the moment. What happens if she comes in and maybe I'm gonna have to go out? Because we are so new in this role, because women are so new in this role and this situation, I think it's a minimum forces that's gonna take place but hasn't yet taken place. Joanne Lockwood: Yeah. I I I've heard of these kind of studies and this is phrase, you know, the the crabs in the bucket syndrome where a crab tries to escape, all the other crabs pull it back down again. And there's an author called Margaret Hefferman and she wrote something at the super chicken where what happens is a woman in the senior leadership role will often peck at the the women coming up, destroying their self esteem and credibility and and and basically pull their feathers out for one of the better way of putting it. So as you say, women are often pushing down other women because they're trying to elevate themselves to compete in that world. Absolutely. And they will see other women as damaging their brand or damaging their credibility, don't they? Exactly, because they're not safe yet. They're Diksha Chakravarti: not yet safe enough in the position that they are in, and that's where, this is coming reverting back to what I mean by pain and fear is something, Jack Canfield said, everything we want is on the other side of fear. Now fear, for example, with the pandemic right now, I mean, you know, the reason why we are as we are is because we are so fearful of so much that is going on. Some of that is true, of course, it is, but some of that is made believe. Some of that is generated through from our own selves listening to what the media has to say. So fear is something that completely disables us. It completely ruins the balance in ourselves. If we are fearful, we cannot be generous. They are contradictory. So unless we deal with the fear, and that is again sitting with the pain of fear, Unless we sit with the pain of fear and work out where is this coming from, why am I feeling the way that I am and the final step, what can I do about it? Unless we are able to look at our fear in a very honest way, our authentic self will not come out and unless our authentic self comes out, we cannot be confident because we won't be living our truth. We will be living a truth that is not ours. So of course, we're not gonna fit in there. Of course, we're not gonna fit in there. Joanne Lockwood: I love that soundbite. I'm gonna repeat it because I think it is wonderful. Everything we want is on the other side of fear. How powerful is that? Jack and feed. Yeah, Jack. Yeah, Jack. Yeah, how often does fear of change, fear of going for something, fear of grasping that opportunity, fear of being humiliated or rejection, how often does that stop us truly embracing what we could be? Absolutely. If we could get past it and that is a really insightful statement and I love that because I look back at my own life and think all the things that held me back and it's that. We perceive it to be a 1000 foot drop, but really it really is 1 inch step, isn't it? And that's that's what we've got to realize is that there is no big huge fall off and there are people there to catch and support us. Yes. We're never alone, are we? And that's that's what Diksha Chakravarti: we have to remember. No. You know Joanne, one thing that society has always looked down upon is vulnerability and it's only really strong, authentic people who can be vulnerable, you know, I mean, you know, how often I'm a member, I'm having coaching by this phenomenal company called Heart Centred Business. It's run by a husband and wife team called Chris and Corinne, and they run this business and they they help therapists elevate to running practitioner businesses because as therapists, we are terrible. We are terrible with money, particularly. Oh my god. I can't charge that much. But I'm in pain I'm in pain relief. Oh my god. I can't charge that much. But what they are teaching us very successfully in a heart centered way is that you can have both. And that comes down to money mindset. What is your money mindset? What is because, you know, I grew up I grew up hearing money is bad. Everybody who makes money is bad because they do it in a bad way, so money is bad, bad, bad, bad. And so if I want to be within conditions a good person, I can't have money, but that's gonna make me a bad person. So they deal with with with all of that. And one of the things that they encourage you, a partial for, one of the encourage they they encourage us to be truly honest and stand up and say, you know what, guys? I'm struggling. You know what, guys? I just got an idea of time. You know, guys, I don't know what to do about it. Now when I started, I'm one of the older, students on there, most of them are half my age, and I thought, oh my god. How can I turn around and tell them that I'm struggling? I'm old enough to be the mother. What kind of what? That fear that fear that I can't say I'm having a shit day, help me, asking for help is that. It's a sign of weakness. But if you embrace our weakness, that's when we become strong. That's when we become strong. I think back to my own Joanne Lockwood: history and I've probably had 3 or 4 failed businesses for various reasons over the last 25 years. And at the time, you feel so much shame of admitting you're failing, so much anxiety about the unknown and what comes next, so much, it's just that internalization of that real sense of failure. And I remember hanging on to one of the businesses much longer than I should have because it fundamentally lost its ability to dig itself out of the hole it was in. And I went too far with it. And one less I learned is you got to grab these moments where you're anxious, you have fear and really look on the other side of it and go, I have to and I've got to learn that and I've learned about not bearing things onto the carpet, not avoiding these conversations. And that's a life experience we all know, isn't it? And I think, yeah, without giving your age away, you're probably a few years old older than me and I'm in my mid fifties. So, we learn this when we get to a certain age. We've made these mistakes. We've learned that the world doesn't stop turning. The sun still comes up in the morning and we brush ourselves down and think could be good again. But we we have to do that several times in our life before we really make sense to Styx, doesn't it? This is it and that's another Diksha Chakravarti: one of the pains that I was talking about. So for me, that constitutes a pain, That constitutes a a pain of identity. That constitutes a spiritual pain. But, I mean, if one is fearful, like I spoke about my money mindset, if one is fearful of letting go, what's stopping us? You know? What's stopping us? And just like you said, if we sit down and say, why why am I holding on to this business that is failing? Why am I grasping? In Buddhism, it's a temple grasping, and grasping is a reason why we suffer. Yeah. You want to hold on to something like you just saw a little crunchy put. You're holding on to a business that has that is failing to deliver. It's it's past a sell by date and you're still holding on to it. The pain there is why. Why, during, are you holding on to this? And that's the work that needs to to to happen. On in my life I have a very dear friend. I love climbing mountains. I love mountains, they don't love me because every time I try and climb them something happens and, you know, I I sprained my ankle or yeah when I tried to do, Kilimanjaro in the morning of the night they were going to summit, they had to stretch me down. Not only was not only did I have altitude sickness, high DUTI, and bronchitis as well, so I was very sick, very, very sick indeed. But I still went on. I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. And, Joanne, for a whole year, I could not forgive myself for not submitting. I could not forgive myself for not submitting. And a very dear friend of mine said to me, she said, Tisha, what is it with this? Because you always want to do big things. Why aren't small things enough? And that is because in my life or a very large part of my life, Joanne, I felt I was a failure. I hadn't succeeded in what I had set out to do. I was a failure. And even as I speak to you right now, it makes me feel quite emotional because I tortured myself for years with thinking I'm a failure. So when one views oneself as a failure, one always tries to achieve bigger things, hoping that that's gonna plug the hole, but it doesn't plug the hole. You're just looking for the next thing to see. Yeah. But that was that. I'm still not satisfied. What else can I go for? You know? And for years, I suffered with global depression because I was, I was walking through treacle. I was constantly walking through treacle and I kept thinking this is going to make it okay. Yeah. I'm a course start. I do so many courses because I'm thinking if I have more letters after my name, that's going to give me credibility. I'm going to become somebody in society. I am going to be respected in society, and I'm Indian. I'm a Bengali. Bengalis tend to be incredibly bright academic people. If I look around my society right now, you know, most Bengali, most Bengalis, all Bengalis are professionals in one way or the other. Yeah, medics galore, you walk into any hospital, you know, you find Bengali doctors, you know, there so achievement was academia. Achievement was academia. Achievement was being a surgeon, being a consultant, you know, being a, a lawyer, a partner in a big city firm, you know, being an accountant with a thriving practice. So that's what I grew up with, that's what expectations of me were but when these expectations sound, they deemed to circumstances, did not come to fruition, there I was, I'm a failure. I'm a failure. So, I've got to achieve big things in order to make myself feel good but guess what, Joanne? It's temporary. Mhmm. It's that fix, isn't it? Joanne Lockwood: You get that high Yes. Yeah. Yes. Many years Diksha Chakravarti: ago, I I caught an episode of Oprah and she was talking to this guy. I don't remember the names. I just find his name. I just remember the details. So this guy was a dentist in America, a thriving dentist. And, he was doing very well. So from one small house became one big house, one big house became 2 big house. So from 1 car became 2 cars, then became 3 cars, then became 3 expensive cars, then became a yacht, then become a a private play, exquisite jewelry for his wife. He would choose the jewelry she would wear when they went out, etcetera. So she was the door. She was a symbol of his wealth and achievement and position in society. And then she left him. She had had enough. She left him. That was his wake up call. He sold everything he had. And when he came on Oprah, he was a prison dentist living with prisoners, eating their food, and he said, I've never been happier in my life. Joanne Lockwood: This is kind of size expectations when we're young to get on this conveyor belt to success Yeah. To growth. We want to acquire assets and property and status, don't we? I don't know, is that a patriarchal thing? Is that a female trait as well do you think or is it a societal pressure fed by, if you like, the macho success need? I Diksha Chakravarti: think it's a macho success need, I think, and I think I could be wrong. There are there might be some women who particularly want that of their own of their own back, which is absolutely fantastic, not a problem. For some women, it could be like my daughters challenge me all the time, Joanne. And my daughters actually did say to my is it that you don't like this is because you can't have it or because you can't afford it? Is it because truly you don't want it? You know, I love I love driving. One of my dreams is to actually take a 4 by 4 and go on safari on really rough terrain things. I love driving. So the question is, would I if I could afford a 4 by 4, and I guess if I wanted it badly enough, I could afford it. Would I want it? My point my question is, yes, I would want it, but not to stand outside on my drive. I would want to take it on safari and use it in that way. So coming back to whether women want it. So some people some women like me would want it, not because it's a status symbol. It's because they really do love it and they want it. And I guess a lot of men are like that as well. They love driving their sports cars and, you know, really enjoy it. So for enjoyment rather than status symbol. But, again, I think a large majority of women, I would say, have have taken on this patriarchal cloak. And so they feel as if they they need all the status symbols to be somebody because that's what they're grown up in, that's what they're grown I mean, you know, it's the the the analogy that I said with with being an academic. I mean, you have to be an academic to be a success. So for me, being an academic is successful. You know? Whether I'm clever or not, whether I have the ability or not, if I'm not, then I'm a failure because I can't be an academic. The same thing I think, the same thing I think applies to material goods as well. Yeah, I think back Joanne Lockwood: to my life 5 years ago when I sold my business, I gender transitioned. In that moment, I kind of shed a skin, shed everything that I kind of valued because standing on this side of fear and the other side of fear was the realization I had to let go of all of these accoutrements and trappings and statuses that suddenly became unimportant in my life and actually the really important thing was finding myself. That became worth more than everything I'd acquired over my lifetime with the exception to my family. Obviously, my family wasn't sacrificing those relationships. But I went from big house, status symbols, cars, BMWs, Audis, lots of they spent lots of money, and a lifestyle that was probably beyond my means most of the time to a much more simple life where I live on cash. I paid for my car outright off of a Facebook ad. It's a small mini convertible. It's it's a bit clunky. It's a bit rattly. It cost me £2,000 and it cost me about 5, £600 a year to keep it on the road. But I love it. And it's so simple. And I've never had so much fun driving a car as that car had in years, all the BMWs I've spent 1,000 and 1,000 on and lost huge amounts of money on depreciation. And so I really do appreciate now this simpler life, but it took me this realization that I had to let go. I had to all those expectations, all what society told me. I'd set myself up to be this person with my friends and my peer group to compete. And then I realized that it was a false, it was a falsehood, I didn't need it. There was anyone who was truly my friend didn't need that from me. And once I let go, the people who stayed with me in my life are the people who saw me for me, not because of what I had and the stateside of the crowd and it's listen to you speak. Letting go of that, being a prisoner of my own expectations, my own forcing myself into being somebody I wasn't. And then once I realized that was the freedom of letting that go, just dropping that shell on the floor, emerging, okay, it's amazingly empowering. And I now find that my brain is simpler, my thoughts are simpler, I don't have such complication going on. I can see clearly now where I'm heading. And if I get lost, it doesn't matter. I just sit down, have a sandwich, get up and have a walk off somewhere else. And I don't have this destination where I must have this, I must have that, I must have that. And yeah, listen to you speak and that's being I was a prisoner to my needs, if you like. It's not necessarily your needs Diksha Chakravarti: but your wants. Yeah, expectations, right? Yeah, Joanne Lockwood: expectations and I- I feel for myself, yeah. Yes. Diksha Chakravarti: And and that's the pain. This is another one of the pains that I'm talking about and I and like yourself, I mean, there's been a certain I'm still very much a work in progress, but I'm getting much better, at just being who I am and, not not being fearful of showing my true face to the world and, not being frightened of making mistakes, not being embarrassed to say or do the wrong thing. But the other thing is also quite true, so my money mindset and all my years whilst I was married, it was always we don't have money, we don't have money, we don't have money'. So my spending was very much do I need it? No, I don't, so I'm not going to buy it. So the buying for want just to just because I want to, just because I like it, just because I feel like it, not because someone's pressurizing me. So I have learned to do that with myself. So it's completely the flip of saying I'll only buy what I need, I'm not gonna buy what I want because I can't afford it, even though we could, But the pressure was, no, we can't afford it. The control was such that, no, we can't afford it, so you can't have it. So now it's the the freedom that I have got, Joanne, is just to say, you know what, Dixit, you can afford it, buy it. You can't afford it, but and that freedom to walk in and actually buy something because I like it. It's an impulse buy. I like it, and I'm gonna buy it. It's great. Not that I'd walk in and get a Ferrari for £700,000. That's that's not what I'm talking about, but in my little world, I I am free now because I spend money as I want to rather than as has been imposed upon. See, and that to me is a freeing on the other side for me. Joanne Lockwood: I love that. So, yeah, I've realized that now when I want to buy something, I don't have all the other pressures that I'm servicing. The money really is free to spend as I wish. Yeah. And if I don't have it, I don't spend. If I do have it, I can decide to spend it or not. Yeah. And I have more freedom of choice over how I purchase because I'm not servicing private schools, big house, lots of cars. Basically, I've maintained the facade of life that I had for so long. And yeah, it's been really empowering. My wife and I, we've moved home recently and we have a fantastic home, we love it. So we're not poor by any means but we've readjusted our whole outlook on life and what we see as necessary and just become simpler. And when we spend more time with each other's company, then the big statements all the time, which is really powerful. I mean, I was looking at your bio and you grew up in Uganda. Yeah. At a time where it was a different world, I'm assuming the culture of the world. And I'll let you tell the story, but you left Uganda in 1972, which would have been around Idi Amin's time and some of the civil war or the atrocities that went on at that point in time. So that must have been a really traumatic upbringing because you're what, 15 or so at the time. Tell tell us a bit about that time of your life. Diksha Chakravarti: Yeah. Absolutely. Well, Uganda is an absolutely beautiful country, beautiful. It's Bangladesh on the equator. We were right on, the banks of Lake Victoria. Beautiful, beautiful country. 3 miles out of the township you are into wilderness. Absolutely gorgeous. So, when I went to Tanzania to climb into my jar room, my daughters asked me, 'Mum, why don't you just hop across the border to Uganda?' because I was just literally a stone's throw from Uganda. I didn't because I feel if I ever go back to Uganda, I'd like to take my daughters with me so they could see where I grew up. So it was really quite, a charmed life we led there, very much so. Unfortunately, I was obviously, you know, I was I was a youngster then, but the Indians and the white people in Uganda lived child lives, but the indigenous people, the African Africans were suppressed and did not have any rights whatsoever. That makes me extremely sad that I was part of the population that made that happen. And one of the reasons why Idi Amin did take the action he did against the Indians, and in my view rightfully so, is that the Indians had monopolised the economy of the country and to unfortunately and disadvantaged the population as, you know, the Africans said. Okay, the way he went about it was totally incorrect, but nonetheless, you could understand the sentiment as to why he did that. So it was a lovely life, you know, we went to school, the weather was phenomenal, during the day we need to get fans on because it was so hot in the evening, we just needed a slight, very light duvet on or a blanket on, so it was a beautiful beautiful life. And then Idi Amin in 1972 gave the Indians 90 days to leave the country. Now my father was a teacher in the local school, local senior school, so as a civil servant he was actually exempt from from the Exodus but it became very dangerous for Indians to to remain there because really, the EDME has given had given carte blanche to the to the army so, you know, they were raping, seething, and pillaging so it was extraordinarily dangerous and of course they were targeting Indians, you know, So so my my, family decided overnight that they I had to leave the country. Now my father was a disabled man, so mother had to stay behind to look after him. And I was 15 at the time, my brother was, Petit Mustase, he was 23. So literally, one Monday I was told that on Saturday I was gonna fly out of the country. And I was sent to India which is where my extended family were. Now I have never ever ever been away from my family. I mean, I've been away for a couple of nights when I go and have Zico was with friends, but I've never left my family to go abroad. I've never been on an airplane before and I was going to have to travel all alone across to India where I'd only been once before. I knew the family but, you know, they weren't family family to me. The journey from home, to the airport was very traumatic because at every kind of checkpoint, the soldiers are usually drunk, and they were assaulting Indians, and they were taking the jewelry, they were taking money off them, they were beating them at the side of the road. So the Indian people had to travel in convoys. Not that they that protected them, at least they felt some security by having, more than just their their only family there. So it was a fearful journey, we were stopped at checkpoints, my brother had some cigarettes that he, you know, just my brother was a people person and he spoke Swahili, the local language, fluently. So as soon as we got to checkpoints, we would jump out in a in a very gregarious manner, say, you know, jumbo wana, how are you doing to the soldiers and all of that and give them cigarettes and all. And somehow we managed to get to the airport quite safely. Our convoy our convoy wasn't assaulted or wasn't attacked in any way. And then we go to the airport, and, before I knew it, I was saying goodbye to my parents and then, my brother just opened one set of double doors and shoved me inside and this was the immigration hall. So I walked into the immigration hall and I just looked around and there was nobody there other than one immigration officer who was sitting in one corner behind, a kind of a glass screen and he was just swinging back and forth on his chair and when he saw me, he kind of beckoned, you know, cocked his finger and beckoned me. I had no idea what to expect. I, you know, I just went along there, I could smell alcohol and just held his hand out and I shouted passport. So I gave him my passport, he looked at it, he leant forward, looked at the picture, looked at me and I was saying he smelled of alcohol. And then he said, why?' He asked me, he said, why are you going?' I've been told by my family to say that my grandmother was ill, I said my grandmother's very ill and she's asking for me. And then he said, when are you coming back? And again, I was I've been tutored to say I'll come back when she gets better. And then he says, okay, when you come back I'll marry you. And, and I just gave kind of a little bit of what I recall now, kind of a hysterical laugh and said, yes, yes, yes, yes, of course, of course, of course. And he gave me a passport back and I turned around and I walked away, and thankfully there were people coming to the immigration hall then. And then as we've made our way to the aeroplane, we had to walk because Entebbe Airport is a very small it's like an aerodrome really and we had to walk and as we walked it was, you know, the these porters were sitting, these African porters were sitting there, they were spitting at us and abusing us and they bought they had bottles of the local liquor that they were kind of, you know, throwing at us, basically mocking us as we left the country. And, again, I can understand why they were doing it. And then when I got to the bottom of the stairs, I thought I turned around and waved goodbye to my family and it was dark. You know, in factorial lights are very dark. As I turned around, John, I was so naive. As I turned around, all I saw was lights of the building, but I couldn't see my parents or my family because it was darkness. So I couldn't even say goodbye to them, you know, kind of thing anyway. It took us a while to to climb the steps to the plane because, you know, Indians, most of us hadn't been on an airplane before. When we traveled to India, as most Indians did, we traveled by steamer. We traveled by, you know, by ship. And in the ship and probably by ship, you have no limit on no luggage, you see? I remember Titanic and Kate Winslet's Hummingbird. Yeah. Exactly. So we used to travel like that as well. And I remember it used to be quite an expedition because mom's friends would come to the house before we traveled and they would cook up all these, snacks, Indian snacks to take on the voyage. Big tins, you know, of of and stuff because, you know, we were not like the food on on on the ship, and so we wouldn't stop for 7 days because that's what it took from Mombasa to Mumbai. So they were used to traveling like that. So, of course, they brought in a lot of luggage, and nobody told them they couldn't. So these first, you know, they were sweating trying to accommodate, and these Indians were holding on to their goods because, good god, they lost so much. I thought, am I going to do this as well? They were very fearful. Anyway, somehow, you know, we got on board and then I arrived in, I arrived in Bombay. Coming was early morning, still very dark, very hot. Didn't know what to do. I just walked up the stairs. I was just following people like sheep and then this lovely stewardess came forward because I was an unaccompanied minor and she called up my name and I just raised my hand as if I was in school, and she took me under her wing, took me, got my immigration thing done and all of that, and then touching my hand, she took me to this bus that was waiting outside. And she said, just wait there and other passengers will come. You'll go to our hotel, and, we'll bring you back when it's time for your connecting flight to Delhi. So I started, Joanne, thinking, oh, okay. Other people are going to come on. And I I can't remember how long I was there. Maybe 5, maybe 10 minutes. And the next thing under, the doors are shut. The driver jumps into the bus and takes off, and I'm the only passenger in the bus. And I'm sitting there shaking away thinking, I'm lost. I don't know where I'm going. I don't know what's happening. Anyway, then he saw them and said, you know, don't worry about it. You're you're home now, betty daughter. We look after you. And then finally I went into I took my connecting plan to Delhi to go and stay with some relatives. So that particular journey out of Uganda was frightening. So you've gone from living Joanne Lockwood: a privileged life Yeah. As a parents who are quite be in society providing education services, teaching well respected Yeah. Indian community, holding the power in the in in the country to effectively just being ejected out the back door at risk of safety, even to the point where the the person of immigration was inappropriate for the propositioning you as a 15 year old, very sheltered life, dumped into another country that you don't even have been there once, that that must have been hugely traumatic for you. Absolutely. Yeah. And this thing about belonging, I know, like you Diksha Chakravarti: said, your podcasts about inclusion, belonging and making the world a better place, I never felt I belonged anywhere. When I was in Uganda, they would say, my you know, my friends and family would say, oh, you're a Ugandan? And I didn't like that. I'm not a Ugandan. But I was born in Uganda, so technically, it makes me Ugandan. My family were Bengalis, and there were few Bengali families. Primarily, there were there were a lot of Gujarati families, a lot of Punjabi families. My friends were all Gujaratis, and even though we are all Hindus, they celebrate different things in different ways. At home I had one, you know, I ate one type of food, spoke one language, I stepped out that long I no longer spoke that language, I had to speak various different languages. I mean, it served me well. I speak Hindi, I speak Gujarati, I speak Punjabi. So it it it stood me good in that state, but I remember that when the rest of India celebrates Diwali, Bengalis don't celebrate Diwali quite that way. So I didn't belong. I constantly felt I didn't belong. And then when I went to India, I was this hybrid, you know, I was a Bengali child born of Bengali parents who lived in Africa for 15 years of her life. My father, very strict rule, we have to speak Bengali at home, but, of course, my accent was very foreign, very foreign, and the food was very different. The food was extremely different in India. So and, you know, I had to get used to their ways. Again, I didn't feel I belonged. I went to a school where I didn't understand anything. They did what they called modern maths. I'd only done traditional maths. For someone who was, you know, who's always been used to topping the class, when I start the first test, I came up 3rd from the bottom. And I thought at least I was right at the bottom, there are 2 people who are below me. Yeah. And the girls in the school, I was bullied. I was bullied in the school because I was a foreigner, I was a stranger, I didn't see the language very well, I was ragged, I was bullied. My family though were absolutely fabulous. My aunt, my mother's sister was like my surrogate mom. They they could not have done more to make me feel welcome. I always got the largest piece of fish, I always got the largest piece of meat, there was always something special for me before anybody else got it, so gosh they really went out of the way. But I didn't feel I belonged, I just didn't feel I belonged and then my parents joined me about a year after I'd gone. My father was then a disabled well, he was a disabled man, yeah, his health was failing. We spent 2 years when I was 17 and in 1974 my brother would come to the UK when we had gone to India and by then, set up home and got married, got himself a job in the civil service and he said 'right, come on over and we'll be a family again.' So in 1974, yet again, nobody asked me if I wanted to go I was in my final year, you know, up from India to the UK. Very strange experience. Very strange experience. I've just contributed a chapter to an anthology called The New Woman and it's it's chapters that are written by women who have had difficulty that they've come out of and I've written this particular bit in that in that because I I just the sense of belonging, I've always always been on the outside. And we arrived here, struggled a lot with lots of cultural things. Within a month of coming here my father unfortunately passed away and that was stress that killed him. The stress of the exodus, the fact that he was a sick man anyway, it killed him. And things basically fell apart. I went to University, I was having problems at home as well because, you know, outside I was being told 'have you got a boyfriend?' I was 17 'have you got a boyfriend?' And Indian girls at the age of 17 don't have boyfriends. And whilst I I did have the courage to answer them, I said, no. I'm from India. We don't have boyfriends. I would I would just kind of skulk away, and at home, I wanted to know why I couldn't have a boyfriend. And of course that caused issues, that caused big issues there. And then, you know, things fell apart in a big way for me. So I then, I then got married, and I got married completely on impulse. He was a very good man, but we were not suitable to each other. And guess what? When I arrived at my in laws, yet again, I didn't fit in and didn't belong. Joanne Lockwood: So the UK must have been a tricky time, 1972. So the race relations came in in 1976. So there was a lot of racial tension about when there was Enoch Powell, Rivers of Blood that between around that time. It was the tail end, the Windrush generation. Yes. Lots of racism going on in communities and there are lots of people who've who've been bought into the country to rebuild Britain after after the war were now being seen as the the evil job takers and there's a lot of racism on that. So you came here as an outsider from an outsider from an outsider into another country where you were again an outsider and there was no belonging again, I'm I'm assuming? Not at all. My brother, when he first Diksha Chakravarti: came here, he came with the the influx of Indians directly from Uganda. So they were housed in barracks. He was housed in Kensington Barracks, and, a group of of of of friends would go out in the evening and regularly, they were beaten up by skinheads. Regularly, they were beaten up by skinheads. So it was a very difficult time. I remember I was, walking, one day and these 2 women were talking across fences, you know, as as they did, And I overheard one of them say that, oh, these people, they need to have a bath every day. They waste so much water. Where do they think all this water's coming? Why the hell don't they go back to where they came from? You know? And as I passed, I got the dirtiest of looks from them because we were not welcome. We were not welcome. Joanne Lockwood: So do you think at the time as a young woman, you suffered less racism than the young men or do you think it was fairly even? You see, Diksha Chakravarti: confession time, Joanne. My daughters off have often say to me, ma, if racism hit you in the face, you wouldn't recognize it. I've never had that antenna up. When I reflect back, I now see where it was where it was. Now I've my mother's faced racism as an older Indian woman. The the green grocer would try and pound her off rotten, bananas as it was giving the fresh vegetables she was asking for. I've heard stories of of, Indian women suffering racism. I'm I'm not sure whether women suffered less or whether they spoke about it less, whether it was brought to the attention less. So I can't answer that question with any kind of confidence because I have no evidence to support it. But you were kind of in your own little Joanne Lockwood: bubble where you didn't really experience it or you weren't conscious of it? I wasn't conscious. Yeah. I wasn't conscious and again I Diksha Chakravarti: would say it was not it was not a lack of consciousness that was healthy, it was an unhealthy, lack of consciousness. And let me explain. So sadly, I grew up in a very violent household. It wasn't towards me, it was towards my brother. My father was very violent towards my brother. So I grew up, from in a very violent, household and with all the traumas that have happened in my life, I've just I've just continued to shut down. Shut down, shut down, totally disconnect. So when you spend your life disconnected, you are not aware of what is going on, you live in your head all the time. I'm a reader, I love reading, that was my paradise, I could lose myself in books. So that was my haven. So the fact that I was unaware is because I was disconnected and therefore not aware. So it wasn't a healthy way of healthy reason for not being aware, it was simply that I just didn't have the wherewithal, I just do not have the awareness to be aware of what was going on around me. I Joanne Lockwood: noticed when we're talking, Ali, you said that you've had a fair share of traumas of your life which you've just, really shared with with me and it's been really powerful to listen to. But you've you've become resilient because of that. I've knew you've it's made you a stronger person. It's allowed you to, in fact, embrace what you do now and use your strength and resilience to help others who maybe haven't found that in themselves yet. That's how I have that's how I Diksha Chakravarti: use it but it's been one hell of a wearing journey. It's been one hell of a wearing journey. My spirituality has stood by me, I always know there's a reason for going through whatever we go through and, you know, believe in karma, and I I don't stay down for too long. I have learned not to stay down for too long, and that's when I said my my super strength is I go down I go down and, for many, many years, I was a glass half empty. And, again, I understand why I was glass half empty. So I'm still in as I said, I'm still work in progress. I'm still working on becoming glass half full, I believe, but it has been extraordinarily tiring. And one of the things I didn't ever have growing up was support of any sort. No awareness and no support of any sort. So my mission in life is absolutely to support women who need it and actually to tell them around. It's like Cato's Gray cave. Tell them around and say, there's so much available out there. You've got you don't have to do this alone. You don't have to do this alone. You can become free, but reach out. Reach it's okay to be vulnerable. It's okay to be weak. It's okay to say I'm feeling shit. It's okay to say I'm not a single woman. Do not cry and be suitable woman. Take time out. Let's help. Connect with yourself. Look for help around. And that's why I'm so passionate about providing an integrated service rather than go and see this person for this and this person for this and this person for this and you're making all those journeys. You, you know, you're building trying to build rapport with different people. It's it's it's shambolic. Join shambolic. When you build rapport and trust, right, when you build rapport and trust, that's what the the the therapeutic value of having a trusting relationship cannot be overemphasized. Joanne Lockwood: No. You you yeah. You're right. I think trust is fundamental and and we think about when we're in a toxic relationship in our family or even a toxic relationship in our work, the trust is broken down. We're we're basically going through the motions, fearing for the next step, not with we're paralyzed by our circumstances often, aren't we? We don't know how to break out of that because it's again, it's that everything we want is on the other side of fear. What we know, what we've been socialized into, we must feel that sort of Stockholm Syndrome safeness about it, don't we? Yes, absolutely. The other side is going to be better, but there's so much fear to get to the other side. We never break loose. No, we never break loose. That's why many women, many people stay where they are because they don't have that at the tools or the resilience to break through that fear barrier? Absolutely. My younger Diksha Chakravarti: daughter who's had an incredibly challenging life, incredibly challenging life, Maybe you should have her on the podcast. She's, she gave a presentation, about 5 years ago and she spoke about abusive toxic relationships, that's what you mentioned, and how she managed at last to extricate herself from one of those. And there was a woman in the, in the audience who heard her, and she actually went back home and took action. She got out of her toxic relationship just simply hearing my daughter stand up and deliver that presentation and say, you too can do it. Joanne Lockwood: You too can do it. Yes. Powerful words on there. You can do it. Everything you want is on the other side of fear. You just gotta open that door, haven't you? Yeah. And you're not alone. That's the key thing to remember, isn't it? And finally, I will say, Diksha Chakravarti: and this is my very favorite saying from Doctor. Wayne Dyer is please don't die with the music still in you. Oh, that's beautiful. I Joanne Lockwood: mean, it's sad but beautiful, isn't it? It's Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's also good to don't die with money in the bank. Diksha Chakravarti: Yes. You've earned it, enjoy it. Isn't it? Yeah. Absolutely. And that's my that's my passion in life. I want to say to as many sisters as I can, let's you can do it. Let's do it together. Let's do it together, with support team. Powerful. Very powerful. Thank you. Amazing. What Joanne Lockwood: a what a conversation and we should keep going, I'm sure. Tell us a bit more about how people get in contact with you. Okay. Diksha Chakravarti: Thanks. So, my my company is called FIXme, F-I-X-M-E. My website is www.fixme.org.uk. And my telephone number is 07878 148229. My email is diksha@fixme.org.uk and people can connect with me on LinkedIn under Diksha Chakravarti Joanne Lockwood: So you, Diksha, someone to just drop you a line, have a quick Zoom chat, see how you can help? Absolutely. With respect Diksha Chakravarti: to I offer a complimentary discovery call, and if they just email me or pick up the phone and talk to me, I'm here. Please, If there's anybody that's listening and feels they might like a conversation, please don't hesitate, honestly, just pick up the phone and talk, I'd love to hear from them. I can certainly say that, you know, we spoke a Joanne Lockwood: lot last year for the event and we had a great chat about half an hour before we started the podcast. And you're such a a great listener. I could feel you unlocking things for the questions and the just that gentleness about looking into who I am. And, yeah, I felt like I was quite willing to pour my own heart out to you at the beginning of those. So you're very easy to talk to, very easy. And I feel that empathy and compassion from you despite and and the huge smile you've got as well, because you can't tell from the podcast. So thank you so much, it's been an hour I thoroughly enjoyed spending talking to you, listening to you and moved by that story about your early life and as some sadness, it took you a long time in your life to find that sense of belonging, which now you found your passion and purpose. You've got it again and you feel like you're right in the middle and This is Diksha Chakravarti: it. I don't think Joanne, I will not I cannot imagine myself doing anything else. If if I if I could afford to, I can honestly say that's all I would do. I would work with women in refuges, in in, centers like that where I can I can just be there for them? You know, sometimes it's just it's just being there for someone. It's just giving them the hug and say, you know what? I understand. Come, you know, just have a hug. That's, you know, this is it. So this is my life's mission and that's why I like, you know, opportunities for, public speaking, holding workshops on stress management, I'm a stress management trainer, holding workshops for that. But my focus is helping women become free from me, persist to pain. What a pain that is. Even if I can't solve it, I'll find somebody who can. Thank you. Thank you. Thank Joanne Lockwood: you. So if you've been listening, thank you so much for getting to the end for tuning in. Please do subscribe and keep updated for future episodes of the Inclusion Bites podcast. That's B-I-T-E-S. Please do tell your friends and colleagues, share the links. I've a number of other exciting guests lined up over the next few weeks months. I'm sure you'll be inspired with even more so, who knows. So please, please, please, please do subscribe. If you'd like to be a guest, if you've got a story, if you've got a passion you'd like to share, then please do let me know. And of course, I'd welcome any feedbacks and suggestions you may have to jo.lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk. I've always looked for ways I can improve the show. So finally, my name is Joanne Lockwood. It's been an absolute pleasure to host this podcast for you today. Catch you next time. Bye.