friendship Archives - My Inner Shakti

Naples, FL – Food, Pool, Fun

A couple of weeks ago, Vishnu and I, along with 18 other people, headed down to Naples, FL to celebrate a bunch of people in the group turning 40 this year. This trip was like a year in the making and the celebration definitely exceeded any expectations any of us had.

Here’s a snapshot of where we stayed, what we did, and where we ate!

P.S. This may look like a really simple vacay, but that was by design. The goal was to spend time together and just have fun. Our good friend Naveen planned the entire thing…down to the beautiful personalized menus at every dinner. If you need a party planner, I know an amazing one!

Where we stayed

We stayed at the Ritz-Carlton Golf Resort. Everything about this property was on point. From the clean and spacious rooms, to the breakfast restaurant, to the accommodating staff. It was truly a luxurious three nights!

And if you’re a beach person, there’s a shuttle that departs every hour on the hour that takes people to the Ritz beach resort.

What we did

For two out of the three mornings we were there, my best friend Roshni and I got up and worked out. The gym was nice and included everything we needed to do a couple of sweaty workouts.

Then, after a leisurely breakfast the hotel restaurant with a larger group of people, we would all head to our rooms to get ready for the pool. We literally spent 5-6 hours at the pool on both Friday and Saturday. There are plenty of pool chairs for guests, but we had a couple of cabanas, so it worked out well.

Then, we would go back to relax, shower, and get ready for dinner.

On our second night (dinner was at the Beach resort), we had a dance party that lasted until 2 am! It was THE best. One of our friends was the DJ, and we danced to everything from pop, R&B, rap, hip hop to garba and Bollywood. IT WAS A BLAST!

And on our last night, we played Empire in the hotel lobby for a couple of hours. SO fun!

Where we ate

Ria – delicious Latin American food; restaurant located on property

Lemonia – where we started every morning…with a delicious breakfast. You can order a la carte or opt for the buffet.

We had dinner at the beach resort, but it was more of a special event than a restaurant. If you’re going with a large party, I highly recommend contacting the hotel to see if they can arrange a special meal just for your party. It was quite the dining experience with multiple courses and wine pairings too. And as delicious as everything was, the dessert was the MOST delicious. A small trio of chocolate desserts – right up my alley!

Sails – our last dinner was at Sails. Naveen organized the menu ahead of time, and all of the options were delicious. The food had a blended European vibe, and the ambiance was very elegant. A lovely way to end our trip

And that is our trip to Naples in a nutshell. An amazing celebration of turning 40 and lifelong friendships!

Girls Weekend in Asheville

written by Parita 2 Comments

A couple of weeks ago, I went to Asheville with six of my girlfriends, and it was an absolute blast! We laughed, we talked, we ate, and we slept. Glorious!

In addition to it being a girls’ weekend, we were also celebrating two of our friends 40th birthdays! So this was an extra special trip!

We chose Asheville because it’s a short (ish) drive from Atlanta. There’s great food. And if you’re into it, the hikes and natural beauty of the city and surrounding area are majestic!

Also, and maybe most importantly, the spa at The Omni Grove Park Inn is quite spectacular. We thoroughly enjoyed our half day of hanging out and getting massages.

Where We Stayed

We stayed at The Omni Grove Park Inn because that’s the only way to access the spa right now. The property itself was beautiful and definitely had a lodge feel to it. The grounds are also well kept and really pretty. The rooms were just ok in my opinion. They felt a little outdated, but they were clean and sometimes that’s all you can ask for! I will also say that this hotel has quite a lot of original features – paintings, memorabilia, and even elevators that are manned by someone. It was a fun experience overall!

What We Did

Biltmore Estate – As soon as we arrived in Asheville we had lunch and then. headed straight to the Biltmore Estate for a wine tasting. Priorities! We then drove over to the Biltmore House and walked around the gardens before dinner.

A quick note – if you want to see more of the Estate, plan to spend 6-8 hours on the property. We didn’t have that kind of time, so we chose a couple of things and stuck to those.

A hike – There are so many beautiful hikes of all levels in and around Asheville. We wanted something low key and chill that got us out of the hotel and moving. We hiked Richmond Hill Park and enjoyed it. It’s not the most scenic hike but it was enjoyable. Definitely do your research and get out there if you can.

The Omni Grove Park Inn Spa – This spa experience is what our whole trip revolved around. We checked in around noon on Saturday and left at 5:30-6pm. It was just the medicine each of us need to feel pampered and relaxed. We indulged in most of the spa’s pools and rooms (re: sauna, etc.). We also each got an amazing massage, that if I do say so myself, was the highlight of the trip (well, the whole spa experience)! If you’re staying at the OGPI, definitely don’t skip the spa!

Elaine’s Piano Bar – Elaine’s is located in the OGPI, so it was an easy after dinner activity…and fun too! There was plenty of space, and the two pianists were a blast to watch as they dueled their way through different songs. And while you can put in requests, I will say that most of the music fell on the country side of the spectrum, so don’t expect anything too wild and crazy!

Where We Ate

White Duck Taco Shop – Tacos of all kinds (vegetarian options were plentiful), delicious and refreshing drinks, and lots of fun sides to indulge in too. I especially liked the low-key, fun vibe of this place. 100% felt like we were in Austin (one of my favorite foodie cities!). Definitely time your visit right because the lines can get long at peak times.

Plant – This was one of my favorite meals of the trip. Plant is a vegan restaurant that serves delicious, fresh, and unique dishes that anyone and everyone will love. HIGHLY recommend checking this place out. Oh and don’t skimp on the dessert – it was DELICIOUS!

Curate – I wanted to love Curate but honestly found it mediocre. The menu includes a good number of vegetarian tapas, however, the food was nothing to write home about. It was good but not great. One positive thing – you can’t beat the location – right in the heart of DT Asheville.

RosaBees – Rosa Bees was one of my favorite brunch experiences EVER! It’s a Polynesian restaurant so definitely didn’t know what to expect, but everything we ordered was scrumptious! The egg dishes were perfectly balanced, the biscuits were buttery and so soft, the banana French toast was sweet, dense and dessert like, and the drinks were super refreshing. HIGHLY recommend making a reservation here.

And now I miss my friends and our fun weekend in Asheville! I hope this is helpful if you ever visit the city and need help planning.

Weekend Recap – Brunch, Good Friends, and Productivity

written by Parita 12 Comments

What a great weekend! I feel like I crossed a few things off my to-do list, laughed a lot, ate some delicious food, and even got some time to myself (I credit the beautiful weather!). I also feel like for the first time in a long time, I was more exhausted than ever. I took multiple naps and could’ve slept for a lot longer than I did. The baby must be going through a growth spurt!

Here’s what the weekend looked like when broken down a bit more…

FRIDAY

Friday consisted of working…a lot. We have quite a few big projects running simultaneously right now, and with that, there’s no shortage of things to do. I worked until 5 pm and the logged back on a few hours later to finish up a few things. Ay!

Vishnu worked a 12 hour overnight shift, so I was on my own from about 6:30 pm to 8 am (Saturday). While I didn’t have an exciting Friday night agenda lined up, I also didn’t expect to fall asleep on the couch while watching Friends. But that’s what happened!

SATURDAY

I was up and at it at 6:30 am on Saturday morning. Why? Because I had big plans for the day – cleaning (ok, so this one isn’t that grand), brunch with Aparna, and a girls’ evening with my work wife Thea.

After cleaning and putting Vishnu to bed, I headed to brunch at Wishbone with Aparna and her husband. Aparna and I ‘met’ a few years ago through our blogs and have been trying to meet up in in person for almost two years. We finally had the opportunity this weekend when her and her husband were in town for her nephew’s birthday party. I know this is going to sound really strange to all the non-bloggers out there, but I truly consider her a good friend. And our meet-up proved exactly why. Even though we’ve never met in person before, I truly felt like I was catching up with someone I’ve known for a really long time. She’s exactly how she appears on her social media channels – thoughtful, kind, energetic, etc. I wish she lived closer and not four hours away in Michigan!

Sadly, this is the only picture I (well, technically Aparna) captured this weekend!

After brunch, I came home, hung out with Vishnu for a bit (before he went back to sleep because he had to work all day Sunday as well), and watched more Friends/napped on the couch until my friend/co-worker Thea messaged me and said she was downstairs.

For those who haven’t been reading MIS for very long, Thea and I work together and have known each other for almost five years. And over those five years, we’ve gone from being just co-workers to growing super close. I honestly can’t imagine my time in Chicago without Thea, and our girls’ night was a great example of why. We literally sat around our kitchen island and chatted for over five hours…nonstop! We chatted about everything from work to makeup to our families to you name it. And mind you, we talk on a regular basis – not always about personal stuff, but Thea is a constant in my daily life!

Vishnu, Thea, and I ended Saturday with dinner at Seoul Taco. So much yum!

SUNDAY

Sunday started with another 6:30 am wake up call because that’s when Vishnu’s alarm went off. Like I said, he had a full day of work ahead of him, so I figured I’d get up and start my day too.

After a quick bite to eat (2 of these muffins), I headed down to our gym for 20 minutes on the EFX machine + this pregnancy kettle bell workout.

Next on my list of things to tackle – Target + grocery shopping.

And then it was sister time. Aekta came over and we quickly headed to brunch at Beatrix. It was such a fun way to spend the afternoon/early evening and reminded me of how lucky we are to have Aek and Adarsh SO close.

After Aekta left, I finished a few more errands and then settled in to watch the last two episodes of Spring Baking Championship on Food Network. I love cooking competitions!

And that was my weekend in a nutshell (aka blog post)!

Happy Monday! Make it a good one. 🙂

Making and Maintaining Friends as an Adult

written by Parita 24 Comments

I’m not going to sugarcoat it. Making and maintaining friends as an adult is hard. Very hard.

With that, I’m going to put it all out there and be a little vulnerable with today’s post. I’ve been thinking about this topic a lot lately given that we have yet another big move on the horizon.

Let’s put childhood friendships on the back burner today and fast forward to our early to mid-twenties. Personally, I found it fairly easy to make and maintain friends at this age. A lot of this can be attributed to similar interests/life situations and constant contact with specific groups of people. The odds of finding/being surrounded by good people were always in your favor.

Here’s my story. Seven months after graduating college, I moved 50 miles south to the big city of Atlanta. I lived with one of my best friends, lived near lots of other close friends, and met awesome people quite often. We would go out to eat together, go out dancing together together, and generally, spend a lot of time together. It was so simple.

Now that I’m in my 30s, I find that making friends is much harder. Putting our moves aside, meeting people who share similar interests and who are in the same phase of life is a difficult task. And to make things just a tad trickier, I’m also throwing a need for similar values on the table.

Maybe it’s just me, but everything feels like a balancing act right now – husband, work, family, personal time, and friends. On top of that, with our time being so limited, I want to ensure we are spending it with the “right” people (not saying this is the best approach but I look for that instant spark/connection when meeting people now!). With every year that passes, I’m becoming pickier and pickier about who gets my time.

As I already mentioned, maintaining friendships in my early to mid-twenties was easier too. Not only did I live near most of my friends, but my responsibilities at that time could be summed up in one short sentence – pay rent and bills on time. Time just wasn’t an issue back then.

Nowadays, maintaining old friendship as well as new ones takes a lot of effort. Specifically in the case of old friends, it’s hard because we now live all over the country. In some cases, the effort is well worth it (phone calls, texts, FaceTime, emails, visits), and in others…not so much! This piece of the puzzle brings me lot angst because in the past few years I’ve actually phase out some friendships that meant a lot to me at one point. The main reason for this is that I didn’t feel like the other person was putting in as much effort as I was. Or in some cases, we both stopped putting in the effort and the relationship just fizzled out. I’ve finally come to terms with the fact that not all friendships are built to last and that’s ok.

What I’m having an even harder time coming to terms with are the friendships that are put on hold because of uncontrollable life changes/events. This one often brings me to tears, but I’m hoping that with time these people come back into my life…and soon.

Over the years, and more so recently, I’ve learned that just because you were very close to people in the past doesn’t mean you will stay or have to stay just as close in the future. People change and so do friendships, and again, that’s normal…and ok. Another hard lesson for me because I want to stay close with everyone. On the flip side, I have a couple of close friends now who weren’t a huge part of my life in the past but now they’re very important to me!

And don’t get me wrong. I still have lots of friends in my life that I’ve known for 10+ years. I never feel disconnected from them regardless of how busy and crazy life gets. With these select people, I always pick up where I left off. Even if a whole year has passed. It’s a beautiful thing.

I’m not quite sure I ended up where I wanted to with this post. All I know is that at the end of my adult day, I want people in my life who get me – the real me. The me who loves deep conversations. The me who loves fancy meals out but would equally be as happy with take-out pizza. The me who, above all else, loves shared laughter.

With that, have a wonderful Friday and an even better Saturday and Sunday! And thanks for reading my rambles! 🙂

New Country, New Friends – Pink by Ruchi

written by Parita 2 Comments

Ruchi is back! And this time she’s sharing about her journey to making friends upon moving to India.

Personally, I love this post. This is a topic I’ve been thinking a lot about lately. Maintaining old friendships and making new ones as an adult is just plain hard. I plan to share my thoughts in a future post, but for now, I hope you enjoy reading about Ruchi’s experience.

* * * * *

Gee, I’m almost 30 years old, and I have to make a whole new set of friends, in a whole new country. Should be interesting.

This is one of the first thoughts I had when I moved to Kolkata. My automatic assumption was, ‘Okay, I can just become friends with Jai’s friends’ wives.’ Then, we realized, most of Jai’s childhood and high school friends had left Kolkata. (In most cases, if you didn’t join your family business, you left for another city for more opportunities). All right, let’s re-think that one. Well, I guess it’ll just happen.

Think again. Making friends is hard! When you’re in school, it does just kinda happen. You find people you have things in common with – through extracurricular activities, through social groups, sometimes your roommates, you know.

But, when you’re out of school, married and in another place, that’s where the challenges are. First off, your priorities and obligations change. In our case, we live in a joint family, so a lot of your free time is taken up there. We also have to travel a lot for work, so when you’re actually in town, sometimes the last thing you wanna do is socialize and make an effort. I know, if you want to meet new people, you have to step out of your comfort zone and try. Our work environment is also very different from the States – we’re the bosses so no making friends there.

We both realized things needed to change. We had to start making more of an effort and not being so uptight. We also needed to break away from the house and, in turn, the family a bit more.

I had joined the Kolkata International Women’s Club but had barely made it to one meeting. I finally decided to take part in a Bazaar showcasing small business owners. Through this, I met a few ladies, and things started taking off from there. Then, we attended our first annual Monsoon Ball and couldn’t wait for the next year where we’d be planning which table to be at. I think it struck me (quite late in the game, but it did nevertheless) that friends were not just going to fall into my (our) lap. No need to be desperate but small steps had to be taken.

Our first Monsoon Ball – fun times all around!

And, the same for Jai. He started playing golf with friends of friends, and he joined a league where he barely knew anyone. I guess these things come easier when you’re a little younger and not so wrapped up in work and life in general.

One more thing. I also realized that we didn’t have to do everything as a couple. It’s funny – in Atlanta, when we were dating, we had very independent lives. Yes, we had some common friends, but we were very good about separating our time, too. After moving here, I just wanted to be stuck to Jai because I didn’t know any better. I was such a fish out of water.

Second point. We both realized (even though we’ve said it many a time before), but quantity over quality. We wanted to spend time with people who we could learn from, who we could be ourselves with, who we could potentially take a trip with, and just order a pizza and hang out on a Friday night.

And the final point. We were hanging onto our American lives too much. The food, the places, the friends, all of it. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But, when you know this change/move in your life is pretty permanent, you have to start adapting to your new place, too. Accepting all the parts that come along with that. Yes, some of our friendships have suffered due to our move, but I also think that’s just the natural shift in life. It gets harder and harder to stay in touch with time differences, families growing, jobs changing and responsibilities increasing. But, this has also forced us to truly appreciate and cherish all the people in our lives, near and far. Sorry, not trying to get mushy on you guys!

It’s tough dealing with so many changes, but it also makes you a stronger person, and I believe deeply in that. I struggled with the friendship part at the beginning and still do sometimes, but I’m powering through and figuring things out day by day.

If you find yourself moving to a new place, try to embrace all your surroundings. It’s daunting at first, but you’ll manage. Join clubs, try to find 1 or 2 people you get along with and build a friendship with them, attend events you normally may not be inclined to, explore.

I’m definitely not an expert, but I’m happy with where I’m at and where I’ve come from in this little journey of mine.

As always, thanks for tuning in! I’m leaving you all with 2 quotes I thought were quite appropriate for this post 🙂

Thanks, Ruch! As always, it’s so nice to read your thoughts and have you on MIS 🙂

Do you think it’s harder to make friends as an adult? Any tips?

How to Know if You’ve Found “Your People”

written by Parita 7 Comments

I’ve moved a countless number of times over the last five years. With every move, I’ve met people who have become good friends, and on the flip side, I’ve met people who I just don’t jive with. It’s now easier for me to accept that not everyone will be a new friend, but that wasn’t always the case. In the past, I was so eager to please and be who the other person wanted me to be. Well, that was exhausting and probably the most inauthentic thing I could’ve done.

To remedy that behavior, I now think of every new relationship in this context – am I my authentic, real, genuine self around this person. If the answer is yes, I’ve found “my people.” If the answer is no, I have a new acquaintance…not a friend.

I recently found myself in a group situation where I was not acting like myself at all. It was so painfully uncomfortable for me, and I felt like I was robbing myself of something the whole time. It took the car ride home to figure out that I was only robbing and hurting myself.

With that being said, when someone isn’t “your people” that doesn’t mean they are mean or horrible in any way. To me it just boils down to this – do I really want to spend my limited time around someone I truly don’t mesh with. The answer to that is no because life is too short to spend your time in a way that leaves you feeling inauthentic. Period.

And trust me, I get it. There will be times where you have to be around people who aren’t “your people.” I’m not denying that. In those situations, I would say suck it up and make the most of it (not something I’m great at…yet).

I’m not one to say that my way of thinking is the surefire way, but in this case, I’m positive it is. My relationship with Vishnu is based on the fact that I’ve always felt like I could be myself around him – both when I’m at my best AND when I’m not so at my best – and still be loved (and vice versa). I’m pretty sure it’s what makes us the strong team that we are. I also think the same goes for my friendships. All of the people I consider close friends are truly “my people” because they get the real Parita.

Bottom line: When it comes to finding “your people,” know this – there should be no inhibition or over thinking…just authenticity, realness, and genuineness. And once you’ve found these people, hold on to them because they really are your gang!

Happy Friday!