Page 42 - Khabar Magazine (February 2020)

People

QA
&

with
Chandrika Tandon
Receiving the Gallatin medal, Tandon checks out the innovation of the students at
NYU’s highest honor Tandon School of Engineering. At a recent performance of
Shivoham at the Kennedy Center,
the Hindu Temple Society of North America. She has Chandrika Tandon spoke to Khabar
also founded the Hindu Community Outreach Initia- about life, music, and spirituality.
tive for youth and seniors, donating buildings and How do you reconcile your business world and
program support for after-school classes, health, and spirituality?
community building. Naturally, my view of business is altered by spiri-
“My family belonged to the Samaveda lineage, tuality, but the two worlds are not in conflict except in
where ancient Vedic mantras are sung with a tune and terms of time commitments. Business, social, and phil-
meter in a most breathtakingly beautiful way,” she re- anthropic commitments occupy a lot of my time, and
calls. “Chanting was all around me. We grew up in a it’s often very hard to allocate that.
very simple home in a very old city, where Vedic tradi- On the other hand, my spiritual practices have
tions are performed to this day. All the major prayers changed the way I view people, problems, and rela-
like the Vishnu Sahasranamam were chanted in our tionships; they have altered my view of success and
home every day.” perfection in both life and business. I have become a
Business, arts, and philanthropy have all perco- lot more centered and able to let go of outcomes and
lated into Tandon’s life and she has embraced each of concentrate on the work and the journey. My spiritual
them into a balanced lifestyle. She serves on the Board practices also make me realize viscerally how much
of Trustees for the Lincoln Center for the Perform- the Divine is of everything we do.
ing Arts and the President’s Advisory Council for the How is music a spiritual practice for you?
Berklee College of Music. She has opened new musi- The best music comes when I don’t exist. I see this
cal worlds for students through the Berklee Tandon again and again—in myself and others. I am on a quest
Global Clinics that offer workshops, artist residences, to lose myself. It is accelerating the inner transforma-
scholarships, and courses in contemporary music— tion to find the light inside, and stay in. And it affects
many pilots have occurred in India, impacting thou- all parts of my life—my business, my family, my friend-
sands of students. ships, everything.
For Tandon, the joy is in being able to mentor so Music harmonizes me as a person. It is hard to be
many young people in the schools and colleges she down when you are singing. Intensive practice is medi-
supports. She points out that NYU Tandon, with over tation. It is like quieting one’s mind and internal chat-
5,200 students, has many students from first genera- ter for concentrated periods of time. It permeates all
tion immigrant families, many students on aid, and aspects of my being. Keeping a focused, calm, and cen-
many female students. She says, “We are changing not tered mind is, to me, the most important attribute of
just individual lives but we are changing generations.” living my everyday life. Music enables me to get there
For this high achiever, nurturing a rich inner life is most of the time.
as important, if not more so than material accomplish- Music has made me understand perfection in a
ments. “If I had to rewind my life, I would add more wholly different way. Having spent a lifetime striving
compassion to it. For me, it’s become almost a medita- for perfection, you really understand you are perfection
tion. I try to apply it in everything I do. It really changes today, right now, right here—that different people make
the way you think about people, how you spend your different forms of music, and they are all beautiful and
time. It changes relationships within the family and it perfect. If the forest were only filled with nightingales,
changes the relationship with yourself. Compassion al- it would be a very boring forest indeed. This has be-
lows you to give completely of yourself.” come the prism with which I view my whole life and
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40 • FEBRUARY• 2020 KHABAR MAGAZINE