Behind the Scenes Birthday Reflections

April is birthday month for me (I turn 48) and for my businesses (Bhakti Rose turns 6, and Bhakti Business turns 3). It's a good time to review where I'm at and how things are progressing. 

When I look back, I can see clearly that there is a body of work that I feel proud of and humbled by, because none of this was built quickly, and certainly not with certainty, and there were many moments, especially in the earlier years, where I did not know if any of it would hold or stabilise in a meaningful way, and yet, over time, it has.

It is easy to dismiss numbers as superficial, but I have come to see that they do tell a story, not of success in the way it is often framed, but of consistency, of showing up, and of the cumulative impact of small actions repeated over years, and when I look at Bhakti Rose through that lens, I see that Ayurveda Goddess has now served over 600 women, Yoga of Birth has supported over 400 women online, not including the many I have worked with in person over the years, Bhakti Club has held over 300 members, and more than 6,000 women have been supported through free offerings, alongside a steady rhythm of in-person work including three India retreats with another sold-out retreat upcoming, three yoga teacher training programs, and countless long weekend retreats at Krishna Village in Northern NSW, and in the midst of all of this, I have also published three books.

Bhakti Business, although younger, has developed its own depth and momentum, with 156 women having moved through the Group Program, 75 women currently inside the membership, and 14 women writing their books with me right now, which has been one of the great joys of this work, alongside dozens of one-to-one sessions over the years, thousands of women supported through free trainings and programs.

I've also run multiple summits including five Bhakti Women Summits, two Bhakti Business Summits, and two Reclaiming Birth Summits.

I am proud of all this and I worked hard for it, and I also share it because I know how important it is for women to see what is possible, particularly if they are in the earlier stages of building something of their own, as I remember very clearly a time when money was not stable and these businesses were started on a shoestring, with far more resourcefulness than resources.

The first three years in particular were shaped by a persistent sense of financial doubt, not dramatic, but present in the background of almost every decision, where I was constantly assessing, recalibrating, and wondering whether it would stabilise. During that time there were many things that did not work, (including a Christmas sale which sold almost nothing, which in hindsight makes complete sense!), as well as more backend technical problems than I can count, and periods where I overcomplicated things that would have been far better kept simple.

There has also been the mental load of holding multiple moving parts at once, and the ongoing responsibility of knowing that this work needed to support not just me, but my family, and at the same time, I have never truly done this alone, and I want to acknowledge that my assistant Tabinda Batool has held so much of the day-to-day with care and competence, Edwina Peden has been a steady and trusted collaborator in Bhakti Business, and my children have been patient in ways that I do not take for granted, so even when it has felt like a solo endeavour, it has not been.

Around the third year, something began to settle, and I started to understand recurring revenue not just conceptually but in an applied way, and I stopped chasing and began structuring, and in doing so I could feel a shift in the quality of my decisions, as the underlying sense of urgency and fear began to ease, and from that point, the businesses became not just viable, but stable.

Stability changes everything, because it creates space for more enjoyment in the work, more room to experiment, and a greater willingness to trust what you already know.

What matters most to me, however, is not the scale of what has been built, but the substance - in Bhakti Rose I have seen women return to simple, sustainable practices that support their digestion, their energy, their pregnancies, and their transitions through different stages of life, and in Bhakti Business the impact has been equally tangible, with websites being built, ideas being turned into income, and mindset shifts leading to real financial change, and beyond the individual level there is also something collective, as this work places money in the hands of women who will use it well, supporting families and communities, and contributing in a grounded way to wellbeing. Over the years there have also been many collaborations, too many to name, most of them deeply positive, and that spirit of collaboration over competition has remained an important thread throughout.

If I distil what I have learned through this process, a few things stand out clearly, and one of the most important is that sustainability matters more than growth, because building something that you can maintain over time is far more valuable than building something that burns you out, and alongside this, human connection continues to outperform automation in the long run, because people can feel the difference, and simplicity consistently proves itself, whether in Ayurveda, yoga, or business, as complexity is often a sign that something has not yet been properly understood. Recurring revenue creates stability, which in turn leads to better decision-making, and perhaps most importantly, depth matters, because while there are faster and more scalable ways to make money, depth is what builds something that lasts.

At the heart of Bhakti Rose are values that have been consistent for over 25 years, long before the online space existed and long before I had language for what I was building, and these are:

➡ Affordable

➡ Accessible

➡ Authentic

➡ Applied

Affordable reflects my belief that these teachings should not be reserved for those who can pay the most, accessible reflects the understanding that depth is best served through clarity and simplicity, authentic reflects my place within a lineage that I did not create, and applied reflects the reality that information alone is not enough, and what matters is the ability to live what we know over time.

Bhakti Business is grounded in complementary principles that have become clearer through the work itself, including:

➡ Simplify

➡ Serve

➡ Scale

Simplify, because successful businesses do not need to be unnecessarily complex, serve, because a business must genuinely solve a problem and provide a good service, and scale, because profitability matters, but should support integrity of all kinds rather than override it. Across both brands there is a shared understanding that this work is meant to support sattvic living, not consume it.

At this stage of my life, with two established businesses, I feel less interested in expansion for its own sake, and more drawn to steadiness, refinement, and continuing to do meaningful work with people I respect in a way that is sustainable over the long term. There is more space now, which feels valuable, and it has become clear to me that not everything needs to grow, and that some things are simply meant to deepen.

In the past few months, I have had two new business ideas come to me, both of which were strong and genuinely compelling, and for a moment I felt the pull to pursue them, to begin again and build something new alongside what already exists, but after careful consideration I chose not to, because I can see clearly that this is my work, and this is my lane, and to step away from what has been built in order to start something new would not be expansion, but a form of distraction (and potentially even self-sabotage). These new ideas are good but my energy is finite, and I do not want to be so occupied with building that I miss my children growing up, as that cost is too high and not one I am willing to pay.

What I have is enough, and from here, the work is not to begin again, but to continue, to deepen, and to stay with what is already working, allowing it to mature over time.