In this episode of the Business Blast Podcast, host Tyler Wagner interviews Aseem Srivastava, a conscious business coach, former CEO, and Art of Living yoga teacher. Aseem shares a poignant personal story about his father's death, emphasizing that worry creates problems and urging listeners to live fully. He explains his unique approach of integrating spirituality into every facet of business—from vision and strategy to marketing, finance, and employee engagement—drawing on his experience as India’s first conscious business coach and his Art of Living training. Aseem advises that business should be fun and joyful, and that leaders should treat all stakeholders (suppliers, customers, employees) with love, kindness, fairness, and ethical values, reflecting the interdependence of all parts of a business. He identifies living in the present moment as the key to happiness, recommending Eckhart Tolle’s "Power of Now" and practical meditation or mindfulness practices, including Art of Living courses. His favorite quote stresses accepting people and situations as they are before taking effective action. The episode concludes with Aseem’s online contact details (asimshrivastava.com, angelguide.in, and a consulting email).
Chapters
All right everyone, welcome back to the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner and today I have Asim Srivastava with us. He's a coach and mentor for CEOs in business, a conscience coach, and an Art of Living yoga teacher. So welcome Asim, I'm pumped to have you on, man.
Thank you, pleasure to be here.
Awesome, and so I'll dive right in. The first question I have for you is what's the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?
Well, Tyler, the best story that I have is about my father. You know, around 8 years back, my father went to heaven after diagnosed with cancer. And you know, before that, I was worrying so much about him for many years. And after he left, I realized that instead of worrying about him, I should have lived with him abundantly. You know, there are various situations in life Various people in life that we worry about. I think worry does not solve any problem, it creates more problem. So stop worrying and start living your life to the fullest.
Thank you for sharing that, I really appreciate that. Um, next question is, is what's the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?
Well, uh, I'm the first conscious business coach in India, and I've also done Art of Living spirituality courses. So what I have done is I have integrated spirituality into business a lot. I was CEO of a very large company in India, and I actually experimented with using these practices. So I, I can actually help integrate spirituality right from vision formation, strategy, to element of strategy to how do we, you know, do marketing, finance, employee engagement, uh, you know, which is very unique. So I can help people bring spirituality at workplace with practical results.
And, uh, so, and the next question is, what's your best piece of overall business advice? So not necessarily like industry specific.
I think we should not take business too seriously. We get too serious about doing our business and we actually lose the fun part of it. Doing business, whether you are running your own business or you are a corporate executive or senior, business should be fun and joyful. If there is no excitement in business, then something is missing. Then you should introspect and see what you can do in the business or in the self to make it exciting, fun, joyful.
And if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would it be?
Well, I believe after so many years of experience that We are all interconnected, interrelated, and interdependent. So we should treat every part of business as part of you. So whether they are your suppliers, whether they are your customers, whether they are your employees, treat them as you treat yourself— with love, with kindness, with fairness, and with a lot of ethics and values. So this is the advice that I like to give. My younger self, yeah.
And in your opinion, what's the key to happiness?
Oh, the key to happiness is living in now. We have forgotten the art of living in this moment and enjoying this moment to the fullest. And leave the bigger things to the big mind. The big mind has a lot of potential, but we underutilize ourselves. You know, we don't live in now. As we live in now, we start enjoying small things. What we do, we do the totally opposite. We worry about all the big things and we forget how to live in now. Our mind vacillates in past and future. So live in now. That is the key to happiness.
And so I want to dive deeper into that real quick. So, and I 100% agree with you. If you were to like give advice to somebody who is not in the present moment, like, how, how do you, how do you help somebody who's not in the present moment get into the present moment? You know what I mean?
Yeah, so there are a lot of books that you can read. I recommend a book called Practicing the Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. There are a lot of yoga practices of meditation, and there are mindful practices. Whatever you feel is good or appropriate for you, go and practice. Go and learn from somebody else. See, all the small things in life we try to learn from somebody else, but how to, you know, bring the mind to this moment, we actually try to do it ourselves. Don't do it yourself. There are good practices which are available. Go there, learn from there, and then start doing at home. And it is not very difficult. We believe it is very difficult, but it is not at all. It is one of the simplest things to do. What I found is some of the simple things, we make it complicated. So I suggest you go and read these books, practice yourself, go to some of the courses. Art of Living— I'm an Art of Living teacher. I can recommend you if you can do some courses there. It will really help you live in this moment.
Thank you. Thank you for diving a little deeper there. Next question is, is what's the best book you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from it?
Again, you know, coming back to practicing the power of now. So There is a book by Eckhart Tolle called "Power of Now." I recommend that book. It is very, very powerful. It is life-changing. And what I have learned there is, of course, the art of living in this moment, enjoying and, you know, loving this moment to the fullest.
And what's your favorite quote and why?
My favorite quote is, accept people and situation as they are and then act. Normally what happens, you know, people in situation, they keep on changing in our life. We do not accept them fully and we keep on cribbing about people or, you know, feeling uneasy about situations in our life. What I recommend is, once you accept then the inner resistance will go away. But acceptance doesn't mean that you don't do anything about it. Once you accept, then you take action. In that state of acceptance, the action is far more powerful, productive, efficient, and effective. So you accept people and situation and then take action in that state of your mind or consciousness.
Amazing, man. Thank you so much for coming on. The last question I have for you is, where's the best place for people to find you online?
Well, online I have two websites, uh, you know, one is my spelling, name and surname, which is asimshrivastava.com. A-S-W-E-M-S-R-I-V-A-S-T-A-V-E dot com. The second website is angelguide.in. You can also send me, uh, email. The consult@aseemshrivastava.com.
Thank you very much. I appreciate that, Aseem. And thanks again for coming on, man. We really appreciate it.
Thank you, Tyler. Thank you. It's such a pleasure talking to you.
The podcast you just heard was made using Anchor. Ever thought about making your own podcast? Anchor makes it really easy for anyone to get started. It's a one-stop shop for recording, hosting, and distributing podcasts. Best of all, it's 100% free. Sign up now at anchor.fm/new. That's anchor.fm/new to get started.
