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DHI Alchemy: Inside Dr Manjula Shroff’s New Book

Dr Manjula Pooja Shroff’s “DHI Alchemy” Explores Mental, Physical and Spiritual Well-Being

Dr Manjula Pooja Shroff presented her latest book, DHI Alchemy: Reset Your Body’s Energy, Frequency and Transform Your Life, during an Author Unplugged interaction with media representatives in Ahmedabad on Thursday.

Published by Rupa Publications, the book looks at personal well-being through a method called DHI, based on the Sanskrit concept of धी (dhi). The method uses three stages, Delete, Heal and Install, to help readers examine their habits, beliefs and emotional responses and make deliberate changes in their daily lives.

The book was earlier presented in Thiruvananthapuram in the presence of Kerala Governor Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar. Rupa Publications describes DHI Alchemy as a book about moving from unconscious reactions towards greater awareness and purposeful action.

The title DHI Alchemy may remind many readers of Paulo Coelho’s international bestseller novel “The Alchemist”. The similarity, however, is mainly in the name only “DHI Alchemy.” When you read the tagline and understand the book’s central idea, it becomes clear that DHI Alchemy follows a completely different path.

DHI Alchemy Inside Dr Manjula Shroff’s New Book

The Ahmedabad interaction gives the book a local launch moment as Dr Shroff takes its ideas to readers through conversations with the media. The book covers mental, physical and spiritual aspects of everyday life, with subjects ranging from anxiety, money and goal-setting to nutrition, fasting, exercise, sleep, meditation, failure and gratitude.

At the centre of the book is the DHI Method. The first stage, Delete, asks readers to identify beliefs and patterns that may no longer be useful. Heal deals with emotional and mental issues that require attention. Install focuses on building new habits, thoughts and responses.

Dr Shroff explained the idea during the interaction:

“We spend years preparing ourselves for the outside world but rarely pause to understand our inner world. DHI Alchemy is my invitation to make that pause to recognise what no longer serves us, heal what needs attention and consciously choose what we want to carry forward. I believe real transformation begins with awareness.”
“DHI” is a Sanskrit word, and it is very hard to explain. So, I will use some examples. You might have heard words like Buddhi (mind), Shuddhi (purity), Samriddhi (wealth), and Samadhi (deep focus). The DHI part of these words gives them their meaning. This DHI part lifts the word up. This DHI part completely changes the meaning of the word. That is the meaning in Sanskrit. In English, it perhaps means deep thinking, looking inside yourself, or reflection. There is nothing shallow about it. It is all deep. You already know the word Samadhi. What could be shallow in that word? The Hindi match for it would probably be wisdom or intellect. If there is so much power in a word, you can imagine how much power there is in the work itself. But the hard part was figuring out how to make that work simple.
So what is alchemy? Let me explain that using an example. You know what sindoor (red powder) is, right? You know how important it is. It is offered to God. It is a sign of marriage. You take some turmeric, some lemon, some baking soda, and limestone powder. When you mix them together and keep them in the sun, they turn into sindoor. Now look, all three of these are very normal things. Lemon is very normal. Turmeric is very normal. We do not even eat limestone powder. It is not even normal; it is just a useful item. But when you mix them together, can you imagine how much their value goes up? How great it becomes. That same process is called alchemising. When something makes you so great, and your worth and glory grow, we call that process alchemising.

The book’s use of the word DHI comes from the Sanskrit धी, associated with intelligence, understanding, discernment and the ability to make considered choices. In the book, the idea is applied to everyday decisions rather than being presented only as a philosophical concept.

A distinctive feature of DHI Alchemy is its scoring system. The book divides its material into three sections: Mental, Physical and Spiritual, or MPS. Readers receive a score for each section and an overall DHI Score. The aim is to give readers a way to review which area of their lives needs greater attention at a particular point.

The scoring approach also means the book is intended to be revisited. The material suggests that readers may return to their scores after about six months as their circumstances change. This makes the book different in format from a conventional one-time read, with the exercises intended to be used again at different stages of life.

The Mental section examines subjects such as the effect of words and silence, money, self-care, anxiety, open-mindedness and setting goals. The Physical section moves to longevity, food, fasting, exercise, hobbies, personal plans, sleep and the body’s daily rhythm. The Spiritual section covers energy, meditation, solitude, living with memories of the past or concerns about the future, failure and gratitude.

These subjects place the book within a large and growing field of books and programmes dealing with personal well-being. The difference in this case is the attempt to combine the three areas in one system, while drawing on Indian traditions including Ayurveda, Vedanta and Yoga, alongside the author’s experience in education.

Dr Shroff has spent more than three decades working in education. She is the Founder and Chairperson of the Kalorex Group. Rupa Publications currently describes her as the creator of the DHI framework, which is also taught through DHI Academy. The publisher says her work in education has reached more than 140,000 students. Her own website gives a higher current figure of more than 190,000 students across more than 80 institutions, showing that the reported reach has changed as the Kalorex network has expanded.

Her earlier books focused mainly on children and teenagers. Baby Steps to Big Dreams, published in 2023, dealt with parenting, communication and the emotional development of children. The book was registered in India’s copyright records in 2023 under Dr Shroff’s name.

Her next book, Safe Teen Steps, addressed issues faced by teenagers and their parents, including online risks and difficult situations during the teenage years. Dr Shroff’s website identifies it as a sequel to Baby Steps to Big Dreams and says it was co-authored with Ragini Bharadwaj.

DHI Alchemy takes the subject into adult life. Instead of focusing on the parent-child relationship, the book asks adults to examine their own routines, beliefs, emotional experiences and choices.

That change also reflects Dr Shroff’s wider work. Alongside her education work, she has been involved in writing, speaking and programmes related to education, parenting and personal development. Rupa Publications lists Baby Steps to Big Dreams and Safe Teen Steps among her earlier books.

The publisher says DHI Alchemy is available through Amazon and other major book platforms. Rupa Publications’ current book listing identifies the work as being by Dr Manjula Pooja Shroff and describes the Delete, Heal and Install method as its central approach.

For readers in Ahmedabad, the media interaction offered an opportunity to hear directly from the author about a book that connects her long work in education with questions around adult habits, emotional health and personal choices. The wider test for such a book will be whether readers use its exercises and scoring system beyond the first reading and return to them as their circumstances change.