Check Out Kalika Kanitkar’s Story

Today we’d like to introduce you to Kalika Kanitkar.

Hi Kalika, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I grew up in Concord, a suburb in the East San Francisco Bay Area. Both of my parents immigrated to the US as adults from India. Growing up I loved to dance and swim, and coordinate school and social events. I chose to study Cognitive Science at UC Berkeley after discovering my insatiable desire to understand the people around me, make sense of my life experience, and apply the latest developments in neuroscience and psychology to help other people.

I worked as a bartender throughout college and beyond, while also working in applied behavior analysis. After moving to Colorado in 2020, I continued to follow both career paths, not feeling the need to choose and being able to honor the different interests and skill sets I held. Mental health support, specifically equipping professionals with education and tools to be able to care well for their brains and minds, had become a major passion project of mine.

I launched Alignmental Wellness, my own mental wellness coaching practice that grew organically from a need I saw among my peers. Bartending at Avanti F&B Boulder has been an incredible opportunity to get to know my new community, be involved in events in the heart of Boulder on Pearl St., and become better at a craft I was talented with and enjoyed doing. This opened my eyes to a void in local services available in the events industry.

In a post-pandemic world, where more families, companies, and social groups were meeting in smaller, more private settings, huge networks of people didn’t have access to a professional bartending service to bring a real, craft, bar experience to their social functions. My boyfriend’s brother Ryan, an experienced bartender as well, put our heads together and built Team Blessed Bartending, realizing we could create top-of-the-line experiences for our clients. Today, I enjoy spending most of my work days developing both businesses on foundations of integrity and excellence of service.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
The road has been anything but smooth. But every bump shaped my journey. My biggest struggle was losing my mom to a rare and aggressive breast cancer when I was nine years old. Growing up with my traditional Indian father led to its struggles, from failing to meet unrealistic expectations, to moving out on my 18th birthday to follow my path and his remarriage to eventual divorce. The tumultuousness of my upbringing is what led me down the path of understanding the human mind and why people do what they do.

My father was diagnosed with colon cancer in 2018 when I was working as a behaviorist and as a bartender. I couldn’t juggle both jobs and take my dad to his appointments and treatment, so at the time I resigned from my behavior consulting agency; being a bartender allowed me much more flexibility and was better pay for fewer hours. Although bartending doesn’t always sound like the most glamorous job, I don’t know what I would have done if I didn’t have it as an option to fall back on. Little did I know I would eventually create a unique business from this skill.

After deciding to relocate from California to Colorado, the global pandemic shut the world down two weeks before my scheduled move. With it, it temporarily made obsolete the one job I thought I’d be able to find anywhere – bartending. I knew my future was here in Colorado, so I made the move anyway, not sure what I would be doing but determined to figure it out. This is what led me to start my coaching practice: a desire to be helpful in the face of a mental health crisis, and a way to create a career path I was passionate about.

My father passed two months ago. I took some time off and I was fortunate enough to be able to spend his last two weeks with him and I’m so grateful for that. I wouldn’t trade that time for anything and I’m glad I slowed down to be there. I would be lying if I said it didn’t pose some challenges to nurturing two relatively new businesses. I’m thankful for the support I have in my business and personal life to share the load.

These are a few of the major obstacles that I’ve overcome on my journey. Each of these and many others can be characterized by making the choices that aligned my behaviors with my values, even though I didn’t know always know where it would lead. Often it wasn’t the easy or comfortable choice, and I wasn’t sure where it would take me. I share these experiences because although they were unexpected and far from ideal, the drastic detours led me to the life I have today, which I love.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
My work is a balance between expanding my mental wellness practice and providing a craft bartending experience for private events. Alignment Wellness is all about education on brain and mind care. Most of us grew up without properly understanding what this complex organ needs and how it works. We weren’t taught the benefits of sleep, movement, and nutrition on our brains, how to process our emotions in a healthy way, how to build habits that help rather than hurt us, and what influences our thoughts about our life experiences and our place in the world.

My mission is to create resources that make this information mainstream and to help people feel empowered to self-assess and self-regulate with strategies that work for them in their unique situations. My emphasis and what I believe sets me apart from others is my focus on autonomy. Rather than teach people what I believe is ideal or what works for me, I provide tools and methods for them to test and determine themselves what works best for them after critical thinking and evaluation.

Team Blessed Bartending is a premium, professional bartending service. We bring a real bar to in-home parties, corporate events, weddings, and other celebrations. We are proud to create an elite experience with every customer we serve and every cocktail we create. With painstaking attention to detail, we strive to make every interaction memorable, from quality service, intentionally sourced ingredients, and balanced flavors, to beautiful presentation.

We don’t just show up and pour drinks, we bring energy back through 30+ collective years of experience and our passion to bring our best. Our packages are highly customizable for each occasion and can include curated menus, non-alcoholic options, seasonal themes, as well as craft extras to take a party to the next level and wow our guests. We are raising the bar for private events in Colorado and beyond!

How can people work with you, collaborate with you, or support you?
Alignment Wellness: I create free mental wellness resources that I share on social media @alignmentalwellness or through my newsletter. I provide coaching to a limited number of clients who would like to work with me for six to twelve weeks regularly for additional accountability, habit-building, and ongoing support.

My current project is creating a self-paced course for professionals to learn mental wellness basics and strategies, and how to implement them. It will be offered as a live workshop as well. Stay tuned for more details! All links to social media, newsletter subscription and coaching inquiry forms can be found at www.alignmentalwellness.com.

Team Blessed Bartending: Generally, hosts prefer to hire us directly. If you are planning to host a party, please contact us and we will provide a complimentary planning call to discuss the details of your event. If you know of someone who may need our services, we also have a referral program as a thank you for spreading the word.

We like to collaborate and partner with local venues, who can independently contract us to handle the bar service instead of staffing it themselves. We are actively looking to meet local vendors, venues, and other suppliers in the event services industry, as we like to recommend great companies to our clients for other services they may need. Please connect with us on social media @teamblessedbar, and inquire with us at teamblessed.com!

Contact Info:

• Website: www.alignmentalwellness.com, www.teamblessed.com/bartending
• Instagram: @kalikakanitkar, @alignmentalwellness, @teamblessedbar
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kalika.kanitkar/ 
• Twitter: @KalikaKanitkar