BAPS Charities HPC 2026 · Vijay K. Ahuja

Notes from
HPC 2026.

By Vijay K. Ahuja · October 2026

In October 2026, I spoke twice at the BAPS Charities Healthcare Professionals Conference in Chino Hills, California: once about my own health journey, and once about more than 40 years of work with retirement plans. Here are notes from both.

The Body Is Not Broken. It Is Communicating.

On Saturday, October 3, I gave a 30-minute talk on what a 25-year health journey taught me about food, the microbiome, and wellness in balance. It was a personal talk, and it kept personal reflection separate from what the scientific evidence can and cannot tell us.

The title comes from an idea at the heart of Wellness in Balance:

“The body is always communicating.”

Signals arise through sensation, energy, mood, appetite, and rhythm. Listening to them is not constant monitoring. It is a quiet form of attention that notices patterns over time, rather than reacting to single moments.

The full account of that journey is in my memoir, The Awakening: Reclaiming Life Through Balance. It describes my own experience. It is not medical advice and is not a substitute for care from a qualified professional.

Financial Freedom for Healthcare Providers

On Sunday, October 4, Dr. Dhaval Shah and I presented a joint session for physicians, dentists, pharmacists, nurses, and allied health professionals, from students to people planning their last year of practice. Our goal was simple: whatever your age or profession, leave with five ideas you can carry.

1. Freedom is choice. For more than 40 years I have worked with retirement plans, and over time I came to a simple definition: retirement is the day when you have enough financial resources to make choices in life. It is not a birthday, and it is never a guaranteed return. For a resident, it may mean choosing training for fit rather than pay. Mid-career, it may mean stepping back from night shifts. Later, it may mean reducing days, teaching, or serving, because money is not forcing the decision.

2. Diagnose before you prescribe. Clinicians know medication reconciliation: one accurate list, checked against every source, before anything changes. A financial diagnosis is the same discipline. What choices matter, and when? What do you own, owe, earn, spend, and insure? What could interrupt your income or force a decision? Then look for shared risk: if one event would hit three items on your list at once, you have found a concentration.

3. Risk before return. For every material risk there are four broad responses: avoid, reduce, retain, or transfer. The point is to make the response deliberate. Risk tolerance is how you feel about uncertainty; risk capacity is what you can survive. For many clinicians, the largest financial asset is the ability to earn, so protecting the earner often comes first.

4. Compare before you commit. The question is never “Which product is best?” It is “What job must this resource perform?” Use the same lens for every option: purpose and time, risk and liquidity, cost and control. Projected returns are inputs, not promises.

5. Coordinate, then act within 90 days. Ask who is responsible for the whole picture, who is paid by whom, and who documents each decision. Then create one inventory in the first 30 days, bring the right professionals together around one priority by 60, and complete one measurable action by 90.

Financial freedom is not accumulation for its own sake. It is the capacity to make thoughtful choices about work, family, health, purpose, generosity, and seva. We asked the room one last question, and I leave it with you here: when your choices are your own, whom will you serve?

My closing words

I closed the session where I began, with the definition that has guided my work:

“Retirement is the day when you have enough financial resources to make choices in life.”