I am currently in Hyderabad, and the winter season here brings out the Nuvvulu (sesame seeds). You see them in Chimili, in laddus, and in the preparations for Sankranti. It is a warming food, rich and heavy.
But if you try to hand a sesame sweet directly to a traditional elder here, they might recoil slightly. They will gesture to the table or a plate and say, "Petu" (Put it down).
To the uninitiated, it feels like a rejection. It looks like they don’t want to touch you. But the intent is exactly the opposite. They are protecting themselves, and strangely, they are protecting you too.
The Transfer of Shani
The logic—if you ask a priest or an astrologer—is rooted in the association between sesame seeds and Shani (Saturn). In Vedic astrology, Saturn represents heavy karma, delay, and hardship.
The belief is simple: If I hand you the sesame directly, I am symbolically—and perhaps energetically—transferring my Shani, my difficulties, to you. By placing it on a neutral surface (a plate or a table), I break the circuit. You pick up the object, but you don't pick up my baggage.
The Science of "Runanubandha"
There is a deeper layer to this that goes beyond planetary fear. It touches on what yogic traditions call Runanubandha—the physical memory of relationships.
According to mystics like Sadhguru, certain substances are highly conductive of human energy. Salt, lemon, and sesame seeds are considered able to absorb and hold the energy of the person touching them. The tradition suggests that handing these conductive materials skin-to-skin creates a karmic entanglement—a debt—that neither party actually agreed to.
We treat this as superstition, yet we feel the truth of it in our modern lives every day. We just call it "stress transfer."
The Missing Buffer
I have been thinking about this "sesame protocol" in the context of how we work and live today. We have removed all the plates. We have removed all the tables.
In our digital lives, we hand everything directly, skin-to-skin, mind-to-mind.
- The Panic Forward: A manager gets a stressful email from a client. Their heart rate spikes. Instead of digesting it, placing it on a "plate" (a plan or a brief), they forward it immediately to the team with a frantic "???" attached. They have handed the sesame directly. They transferred the anxiety, not the task.
- The Venting Session: We confuse friendship with being an emotional dumping ground. We unload our raw, unprocessed anger onto a partner without warning. We create a debt they didn't ask for.
The wisdom of the nuvvulu custom is that it forces a pause. It acknowledges that human connection is powerful, and sometimes, it is too conductive. We need a ground wire.
Creating Your Own "Plate"
You don't have to believe in Saturn or karmic memory to see the utility here. If you are dealing with something "heavy"—a difficult project, bad news, or high-stress feedback—don't hand it directly to someone else.
Put it on the table first.
Write it down. Frame it. Strip the emotion out of it. Let it sit on the neutral surface of a document or a scheduled meeting. Let the other person pick it up when they are ready to hold it, rather than forcing it into their hands when they aren't looking.
We think intimacy means having no boundaries. But sometimes, the kindest thing you can do is put the burden down, step back, and let the other person lift only what they can carry.
Where are you handing "heavy" things directly to your team or family? What would it look like to place them on the table first?
Sources: Concepts of Runanubandha referenced from Sadhguru/Isha Foundation teachings; Astrological associations of Sesame (Til) and Saturn (Shani) from Vedic tradition.
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