The pundits of doom blame everything on Kaliyug – natural disasters, sickness, poor marks, relationship break-ups… Hold it!

Times don’t make us, we make the times. So, maintain your bounce. Decide to put your best foot, your sharpest grey cells, your greatest self forward.

Decide to care, share resources and knowledge. Realise you’re here not to compete with others but to complete yourself. And it’s “Goodbye Kaliyug. Welcome Coolyug!”

It is Coolyug when you energise and uplift yourself. When you workout regularly, you literally create higher, healthier states inside you. When you will your muscles to move with synchronised beauty, make your limbs more agile, heart stronger, overall you endow your body with a superior plasticity and stamina it doesn’t naturally possess. You make your life exaltingly livable.

It makes studying a breeze too. Exercise enables each heartbeat to pump optimal blood through the body and ferry more sugar and oxygen to the brain.

This boosts the brain’s ability to concentrate, retain what’s read and commit fewer mistakes.

You can’t get out of spending long hours in the classroom, but you can make the best use of them. Here, it helps to have a mentor who believes in you.

One of my students once told me, “It’s your faith in me that brings me to class every day.”

I learnt a lot in that special moment.

Between classes, keep your flag of alertness flying. Thisaway:

Breakfast like a champ. Eat protein for breakfast – eggs, paneer, whole grain bread/dosas/idlis, milk. Protein energy goes a long way.

Lighten your lunch. Heavy, greasy food dulls you.

Go for raw salads, buttermilk, fruits, nuts, sandwiches, sprouts.

Tip: Eat outdoors. Fresh air and sunshine undo the fatigue caused by stale air and dim indoors.

Exercise between classes. 25 jumping jacks freshen.

So does a quick sprint across the campus. Inside the classroom, tighten the muscles of your entire body, tighten…tighten… then relax completely.

Stand, clasp your hands together and reach for the ceiling, then bend slightly backwards. Hold the s-t-r-e-t-c-h for 10 seconds; relax.

You’re revved, you’re ready for class and… for a super new year.

(The writer is co-author of the book, Fitness for Life .)

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