Josephine Atluri - Meditation Expert & Podcast Host
Josephine Atluri
Josephine Alturi is an expert in meditation and in overcoming adversity to find joy. Through her unique journey on her path to become a mom of five, Josephine weathered many ups and downs with IVF, international adoption and surrogacy. Channeling her experience to find calm and courage and to focus on perseverance, she now helps others navigate life’s curveballs, through group and individual online meditation training and her “Responding to Life” podcast.
During this time of extreme isolation and stress, Josephine can share practical tips for your audience, including tools to help ground yourself, reduce tension and tune into your body with simple breathing techniques, body scanning and affirmations. Through this health crisis, Josephine is offering free fifteen-minute guided meditations on Wednesdays at 1:30pm PST. She also offers free monthly meditation videos at www.jatluri.com or sign up HERE
I’m so excited for you to connect with Josephine, check out work, and follow along as she continues to help others stress less and live more joyfully.
I'd love it if you'd introduce yourself, what you do, and what you're working on.
Thank you for this opportunity! I’m so excited to share some joy with all of you today. My name is Josephine Atluri and I currently live in Los Angeles with my husband of twenty years, my 13 year old son, my 11 year old twin son and daughter, my 4 year old twin boys, and our cockapoo (who is our original first born)! Through my unique journey on my path to become a mom of five, I weathered numerous ups and downs resulting in IVF, international adoption and surrogacy. Channeling my experience to find calm and courage and to focus on perseverance, I now help others navigate life’s curveballs, through group and individual online meditation training and my podcast, “Responding to Life: Living Reflectively through a Journey of Health, Fertility, and Parenthood.”
My group and individual meditation sessions, both online and in person teach simple and practical coping mechanisms for stress, anxiety and loss to help improve the balance of mind, body and spirit when facing health and fertility struggles as well as other life challenges. I also teach corporate meditation sessions throughout LA which are specifically designed to support teams working on productivity, focus, teamwork and creativity issues as well as more universal challenges like stress.
My podcast, “Responding to Life,” highlights learnings from my thirteen-year journey of love, loss, resilience and hope to create my family. My podcast highlights a candid and unique comparison of the three paths to creating a family including IVF, international adoption and surrogacy as well as the emotional impact of miscarriage, giving birth to two sets of twins and parenting a blended family. Featuring noteworthy guests who have also overcome obstacles with positivity, I provide thoughtful insights and weave comparisons to my own journey of loss, perseverance and mindfulness.
In addition to teaching meditation and hosting my podcast, I am also currently writing a book that not only highlights my personal fertility story of courage and resilience, but also features lessons learned, inspirations, tips and meditations for anyone who is battling infertility, stress or loss.
How did you get started?
Prior to my meditation training, I worked for a fitness company based in Boston overseeing operations management and business development. In an effort to provide total wellness for our members, I signed up for a meditation teacher training program so I could learn how to weave mindfulness into our offerings. As it turns out, months before my training course started, I left the fitness company. It felt like a good opportunity to proceed with the meditation training program as a way to expand my personal practice. At the time it felt like a risky decision, but I am so glad I made that decision! During the teacher training course at Unplug Meditation, I trained under the renowned meditation teacher, davidji, and the founder of Unplug, Suze Yalof-Schwartz. Not only did I advance my personal meditation practice, but I walked away with a desire to teach others how to incorporate meditation into their own lives.
I slowly built up my corporate clientele while at the same time formulating the ideas for my book about my fertility journey. I couldn’t wait for my book to be published to share my story about resilience and positivity, so I decided to also create the podcast, “Responding to Life.” The podcast has been a great way to share both my story and the story of other inspiring individuals who have overcome tremendous obstacles in their lives in a positive way.
What inspired the work that you're doing?
My fertility journey was the impetus for my current work as a meditation teacher and creator and host of my podcast. My arduous experiences navigating infertility tested my resolve to become a mother over and over again. In spite of the hardships that I endured, I faced my challenges head on at every hurdle, buoyed by my unyielding optimism and ardent determination to have children. Eventually, we created our family of five children through a combination of nontraditional methods. It was this impassioned journey and a belief that my experiences served a greater purpose that propelled me to help others learn how to overcome their own adversity and find joy in their lives. I now have the pleasure of reaching out to others to offer my support via my podcast, meditation trainings, and upcoming book on my fertility journey.
What is your biggest passion? Do you feel like you're living your passion and purpose?
My biggest passion is to live life positively (even throughout the difficult times) while sharing this approach and my life experiences with people who need help rising above their own hardships..
My overarching passion in life has always been to help people live a life of joy whether that meant helping people plan big life celebrations, plan events focused on wellness, teach meditation classes, or help people revamp their fitness and nutrition. My podcast, upcoming book and meditation trainings are the various avenues for me to reach out to the world and hopefully provide at least one person with the tools to face life courageously, respond to life’s moments in a thoughtful manner, and ultimately achieve inspired and joyful lives. I feel so grateful for the opportunity to live a life of service to others in need.
What is your joy blueprint? What lights you up, brings you joy, and makes you feel the most alive?
What it all boils down for me is connections with people. Everything in my life that brings me true joy and fulfillment is related to my connections with my family and friends, my students, or even random people. When I spend time with my family and friends, my heart fills up with love. When I am able to help my students destress and tap into peace, I feel so fulfilled. When I can bring a smile to someone’s face by donating my time or resources, listening to someone’s story, giving a gift, offering a compliment or making a joke, I truly feel so joyful to witness another person’s happiness. For example, one of my most favorite things to do is to give someone a surprise gift when I find out about something they really love. When you see someone’s face light up with surprise and happiness because of something you’ve done for them, the positivity you feel in that moment is so powerful and so priceless.
Thus, my joy blueprint is really simple, give love to get love.
How do you live intentionally? Are there tools/resources/practices that you rely on to help you stay mindful and grounded?
As a meditation teacher, I practice living in the moment as much as possible. When you witness the present moment throughout your day, you are practicing awareness. Living with intention happens when we can be aware of ourselves and present in the here and now. For me, living intentionally couples awareness with both my actions and emotions. I mentally outline the path of my day, my week, month, year and I translate that accordingly into how I live my life in each moment. To stay on the path of living with intention, I constantly re-evaluate my vision and goals.
Life can be busy and noisy. It is important to take moments to breathe and take stock of your present emotions and needs. In order to tap into an awareness of the present moment and of the self, I utilize twice daily meditations as well as various self check-ins throughout the day. By sitting in silence, I achieve clarity. After my meditation, I am then able to organize my thoughts and feelings into a manageable plan because I broke through the clutter of my mind. Throughout the course of my day, I also take time to appreciate random moments fully by stripping down all the noise and complexity of what is happening and just appreciating the moment for its true beauty. For example, when my 4 year old twins are running around the house creating a fuss, I take a mental step backwards to become mindful of the moment. Rather than get upset that I cannot control the situation, I reduce the moment down to the joy my children are experiencing and try to appreciate their joy thereby grounding myself in the present moment. You can practice this technique with any moment in your day to help you stay grounded and mindful.
What would your younger self think about what you're doing now?
My younger self would say, “Hold up. You’re doing what now?!” I would venture to say that most of us are constantly evolving into better versions of ourselves over the course of our lives. The Josephine in her 20’s was just starting to define herself in her pursuits, her marriage and life overall. The Josephine that I am today I call version 4.0 (aka the fabulous 40’s.) I have never felt so alive, so fulfilled and clear on my path, so content in my own skin than I do today. This clarity and ownership of my power has opened up so many doors for me to achieve my goals and dreams and live my passion of helping others overcome adversity to find joy. The 20’s version of Josephine would look at me today and would be in disbelief of my journey. Yet, one thing has always stayed constant, if not grown, over the decades and that is my unyielding optimism. So, even though my younger self wouldn’t know how to do what I’m doing today, she would feel excited about the road ahead of her and marvelous opportunities that await her in version 4.0.
Do you have a go-to mantra or affirmation?
Be Here Now. I love these three simple words because it’s my gentle reminder to stay grounded and present in the precious present. In fact, these are the words on the back of my business card. Thus, when I give out my business card, I know I’m helping someone in a tiny way to stay calm and present and mindful.
What is your biggest dream?
I am so grateful because I am living my dream. I plan to expand my reach to help others overcome adversity and find joy. I will do so by publishing my book on my fertility journey, speaking at more events and shows about conquering challenges in a mindful and positive way, as well as continuing with my Responding to Life podcast and meditation trainings, It has taken a lot of hard work, hustle, unwavering determination and optimism to bring my dreams into fruition, but I wouldn’t change any part of my incredible journey. Plus, I’m making sure to appreciate every single moment of this joyous ride by staying mindful and rooted to the glorious present moment.
To learn more about Josephine visit her website www.jatluri.com and on Instagram @josephineratluri and via email jo@jatluri.com. You can find her podcast, Responding to Life: Living Reflectively Through a Journey of Health, Fertility and Parenthood,” here.
Joy Corner is an interview-style blog series brought to you by Seek The Joy Podcast. Our mission continues to be a desire to share your stories, truths, joys and inspiration in your words. We invite you to join our corner, and share your joys, passions, and moments of inspiration as we continue to seek the joy, together. Join this series here