Skip to main content

A guide to good health

Book Review

Title: Weightless: Unburden

Author: Dr Mickey Mehta

Publisher: Popular Prakashan, Mumbai, 2023

Pages: 240

This is not a book to be read. It is a set of instructions that are to be put into practice if you wish to have long life with good health. Let me tell you at the outset that practising what the author is asking you to is going to be tough, as tough as becoming a genuine yogi. If you want to enjoy some of the simple delights of life like a weekend drink, then you’d better forget this book and go ahead with a wellness programme of your choice.

This book can make you a saint. In fact, it intends to do precisely that. In one of the last pages, introducing the author to the readers, the book says that Dr Mickey Mehta’s vision is “Connecting with 8 billion hearts to make wellness the religion no. 1.” Wellness is indeed a religion in Dr Mehta’s vision.

The book starts with a theoretical framework which is founded entirely on Indian philosophy, essentially Yoga and allied practices. Health is not just a matter of the body, obviously. Your mind and your soul play a crucial role in your overall wellbeing. I am not a religious person and so when I say ‘soul’ it might need clarification. I don’t mean soul in the traditional sense of something that survives the body after our death. I mean something like our consciousness+. What is that plus? I can’t explain though I know it in the core of my being. Now, that ‘core’ is the soul, I’d say.

Dr Mehta takes care of the body, the mind and the soul. The lion’s share of the book consists of diets and exercises that you should follow if you’re going to embark on the spiritual trail blazed by Dr Mehta.

I’ll provide pics of a few pages here which will speak far better than my description of the book. I hope I’m not violating any copyright rule by doing this. If I am, I hope the publisher or the author will let me know and then I’ll remove these pics. Otherwise, I hope these pics will offer a clear idea to the reader about the nature of the book.






 

 

 

Labels:

Comments

  1. Yamini MacLeanJanuary 12, 2025 at 7:30 PM

    Hari OM
    ...I trust he put all the caveats of "consult your personal health practitioner if intending to undertake this regime"? If you are already in decent health and fitness, then all good and well... YAM xx

    ReplyDelete
  2. Liz A.January 13, 2025 at 3:18 AM

    Ah, the book which tells you what everyone should eat. These always make me laugh, because at least half of what they recommend are things I cannot or will not eat. (Salad? My stomach hates lettuce. I mean, it's bad. Throwing up all night bad. Tea? I hope it's caffeine free. Otherwise, I'll have a headache all day.)

    Wellness is great. What works well for one person might not work for another. Allergies. Lifestyle issues. (I get irritated by books like this. Sorry for the vent.)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalJanuary 14, 2025 at 12:25 PM

      I didn't take the book seriously either. In fact, I found it funny in some places - the recipes, for instance - for reasons similar to yours.

      Delete
  3. sathishJanuary 14, 2025 at 8:21 PM

    Osho says "Our body is the visible soul and the soul is the invisible body" the wellness of both has become important these days with the hybrid lifestyle ! Books like this cannot be followed like hard and fast rules but trying to take what is feasible would improve the health i feel. Thanks for bringing such book out with your reviews Sir!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalJanuary 14, 2025 at 9:47 PM

      This body-soul polarity is a bit outdated, isn't it, dear friend?

      Delete
    2. sathishJanuary 14, 2025 at 10:38 PM

      of course polarity is outdated sir... we have to start looking it as one

      Delete
  4. Dr Srishti MahajanJanuary 16, 2025 at 3:01 PM

    A guide to good health comes with focusing on the importance of balance, which will cover physical, mental, and emotional well-being. This can include practical advice on nutrition, exercise, sleep, stress management, and prevention care. Also, one can include tips and evidence-based practices which can make the article more engaging.

    Dr. Srishti
    top homeopathy doctor in delhi

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl
47 comments
Read more

Taliban and India

Illustration by Copilot Designer Two things happened on 14 Oct 2025. One: India rolled out the red carpet for an Afghan delegation led by the Taliban Administration’s Foreign Minister. Two: a young man was forced to wash the feet of a Brahmin and drink that water. This happened in Madhya Pradesh, not too far from where the Taliban leaders were being given regal reception in tune with India’s philosophy of Atithi Devo Bhava (Guest is God). Afghanistan’s Taliban and India’s RSS (which shaped Modi’s thinking) have much in common. The former seeks to build a state based on its interpretation of Islamic law aiming for a society governed by strict religious codes. The RSS promotes Hindutva, the idea of India as primarily a Hindu nation, where Hindu values form the cultural and political foundation. Both fuse religious identity with national identity, marginalising those who don’t fit their vision of the nation. The man who was made to wash a Brahmin’s feet and drink that water in Madh...
22 comments
Read more

Helpless Gods

Illustration by Gemini Six decades ago, Kerala’s beloved poet Vayalar Ramavarma sang about gods that don’t open their eyes, don’t know joy or sorrow, but are mere clay idols. The movie that carried the song was a hit in Kerala in the late 1960s. I was only seven when the movie was released. The impact of the song, like many others composed by the same poet, sank into me a little later as I grew up. Our gods are quite useless; they are little more than narcissists who demand fresh and fragrant flowers only to fling them when they wither. Six decades after Kerala’s poet questioned the potency of gods, the Chief Justice of India had a shoe flung at him by a lawyer for the same thing: questioning the worth of gods. The lawyer was demanding the replacement of a damaged idol of god Vishnu and the Chief Justice wondered why gods couldn’t take care of themselves since they are omnipotent. The lawyer flung his shoe at the Chief Justice to prove his devotion to a god. From Vayalar of 196...
10 comments
Read more

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...
19 comments
Read more

The Real Enemies of India

People in general are inclined to pass the blame on to others whatever the fault.  For example, we Indians love to blame the British for their alleged ‘divide-and-rule’ policy.  Did the British really divide India into Hindus and Muslims or did the Indians do it themselves?  Was there any unified entity called India in the first place before the British unified it? Having raised those questions, I’m going to commit a further sacrilege of quoting a British journalist-cum-historian.  In his magnum opus, India: a History , John Keay says that the “stock accusations of a wider Machiavellian intent to ‘divide and rule’ and to ‘stir up Hindu-Muslim animosity’” levelled against the British Raj made little sense when the freedom struggle was going on in India because there really was no unified India until the British unified it politically.  Communal divisions existed in India despite the political unification.  In fact, they existed even before the Briti...
16 comments
Read more