As part of our quest to identify and share some of the meaningful stories from India and around the world, this week we invited yet another passionate women entrepreneur Jyoti Patel to share her motivational story with us.
Jyoti Patel is a storyteller, change maker, entrepreneur, author of 6 books, world record holder and global goodwill ambassador. Her mission in life is to impact as many lives as possible through her work and her life experiences. She is also a blogger, a poetess and ardent lover of western and classical music. Jyoti Patel is the recipient of awards like, ‘Influential Author 2018’, ‘Author of the Year 2019’ & ‘Genius Indian Achiever Award 2019’. She is the core team member of ‘Yes! I Am Happy’ – an organization working towards the welfare of children. Let’s learn more about her interesting journey, way forward and her advice for our growing community of aspiring individuals.
Excerpts from our exclusive Interview with Jyoti:
Talk us through your background and your journey so far and also share a little bit about your books, please;
I was born in a small town named ‘Tandur’ in the state of Telangana and I spent 14 years of my life over there. I remember I was great academically until my 6th grade but, like many, I’ve always disliked Mathematics and have never been good at it. I was good in other subjects and most especially, In English and Telugu languages.
In addition, I had great handwriting. Leaving it aside, I was an active child; I was good at sports and always loved the competitions. Kabaddi, Kho kho, Running, Badminton were my favourites. Whenever I had the chance I never missed participating in school, city and district level athletics.”
My first book ‘Sensation of a Soul’ was released in the Year 2016, the second book ‘The Mystic Soul’ in the year 2017, the third book ‘Whispers of the Soul’ in the year 2018, ‘The Curved Rainbow’ & ‘The Forest of Feelings’ were released on the same day in the year 2019 & my latest book ‘ANAMIKA’ was released on Valentine’s Day 2020. I write Poetry, Stories, Articles, Micro Tales on the subjects of life, love, relationships, family, abuse, depression, women empowerment and such themes.
Why did you choose to be an Author over taking up a regular job?
My writing journey has started around 7 years ago. To be honest, I never really thought that I would become a writer someday. Around 6 years ago, I found an online platform to read amazing books and to share my short stories, poetry, and novels. This gave me the chance to publish my works instantly which were available to a wide and varied audience from all around the world. The votes and comments came flooding every time I published my poems and stories. I’d never experienced anything like it before.
Each day, I woke up to messages of encouragement from readers wanting to know ‘what I’m writing next’ & saying ‘how inspiring my books are’ so, that’s how my writing journey has been started.”
As days and months passed, I’ve received so many opportunities to publish my works and I started contributing to many anthology books. I was very much happy with the response by my readers and so, I decided to write and publish my first solo book.
What gets you out of bed in the morning i.e. what’s your source of motivation?
My poetry, stories, articles or anything I write on mostly based on human emotions and feelings. My source of motivation is my own life, lives of people around me. I believe every person we meet, every story we hear, everything that happens to me & around me has a deep purpose. Everything I go through in my life, each experience I’ve had until now helped me to write more. I always have something to take from everything. I learn, from the falling of a leaf to death of a person. All the little things happening in this world gives me a new story to write.
What challenges/obstacles did you face in your journey so far?
Throughout my writing career, I had tough times, extremely good days, lonely nights, depressive months but, it’s all part of the process. I dearly admire every experience that helped me to be a better writer.
Tell our audience more about your failures? How should one bounce back?
There are no failures only, experiences and lessons.
I hit the lowest point in my life innumerable times. I was extremely depressed for months, I cried myself to sleep almost every night. I had no motivation and nothing felt fun for me.
I was always in a bad mood with no energy and on such days, I was a girl who constantly had the thoughts of suicide scenes running in mind. Even on such days, I tried my best to act as everything is going well in my life. I pushed myself a little harder, I started reading and writing, I joined in various writing communities online and, I must say I was the only person who helped me in all those months and years.I never really had anyone with whom I could share my feelings and who could listen, understand and help me without judging.”
Going through deep dark days changes us completely, from being depressed to being a happy person took time for me. Overcoming the pain, the loss, and the tears are tough. There were times when I just wanted to disappear and never see the world again but one day, I decided that I would help myself and then, not only did I help myself, but I helped everyone who reached out to me. I motivated myself by reading books, I joined in music classes, and I went through lots of encouraging talks and motivational stories to heal myself. Now, when I look back at my life, I truly feel that paying attention and doing the little things as such is very important when we are down and suffering.
How do you handle the pressure and manage stress?
I always try to handle and manage with music, by reading books, by singing, by taking out time to relax a bit. I cook almost every day, I love exploring different places. To be honest, being carefree & not involving in any kind of work gives me more pressure and stress!
What advice would you give to someone starting out as an aspiring Author?
Don’t be an ‘aspiring writer’ for years, instead just write! I feel the aspiring writer is someone who wants to write but doesn’t. If you want to write well, if you are in need of motivation to write more, you must read, read a lot. In the process of creating your own book, trust yourself, support yourself and go for it, it’s important that you focus on giving your hundred per cent and lastly, try whatever you want, explore different genres, you don’t have to think about publishing your work and to make it big instantly! It doesn’t work that way for many people thus, Just sit down and start writing, learning and begin to explore.
BrilliantRead is committed to bringing stories from the startup ecosystem, stories that reshape our perspective, add value to our community and be a constant source of motivation not just for our community but also for the whole ecosystem of entrepreneurs and aspiring individuals.
Note: If you have a similar story to share with our audience and would like to be featured on our online magazine, then please write to us at [email protected], we will review your story and extend an invitation to feature if it is worth publishing.
