Kaisi yeh Yaariyan Season 3

Because the writer wants to wish you a happy new year..

Another page is waiting to be turned, another chapter comes to an end..2016 will soon roll into 2017 & I came here to thank my family for the year gone by and wish for the one crawling in.

Most of the previous years (and I have seen so many of them), have gone away in the blink of an eye, not this one. I have lived every day, every month and tried to do something worthwhile. A lot has happened for me, in 2016. Personally my career took a lateral shift for the better. I had to put in thrice as much effort as before and though my paycheck is still the same as it used to be, I got to work in a position that let me interact with people from all over the globe. 

Again this year, I took up my executive MBA, which again has been teaching me many new things, and boosting up my confidence.

But the biggest achievement I have had this year is to rediscover writing..and I would take the leisure and liberty to take you along,  as I rewind back to the time it all started and through the journey thereof.

Writing a fanfiction can be challenging, just as it can be rewarding. There is so much difference between writing on your desk for a year, towards a novel, where , you are your sole reader, and penning down a fanfiction (or general fiction) for a live audience on a daily or weekly basis.

Honestly, I did not know I had it in me to come this far. Forget 120, I didn't even think I would make it till 30.  I started small..300 words and with zero readers. I didn't tell any of my friends, I didn't broadcast it on my social networking profiles to get some initial readership. I started anonymously, only letting my pen do the work.

In the due course, I have learnt so much that I think its important I lay my lessons bare for all of you to pick what touches your life.

1. I am a good starter, but a lousy finisher. Half way through a challenge, I lose steam and am tempted to quit. Not this time. Not this time because what's over-ruling my nature is the expectation from you guys that I carry on my shoulders. So I would as well finish in style when the time comes.

2. Story writing is not merely putting the right words in right place and make it sound dreamy. That would be equal to me saying building a house is only decorating it with the right furniture. No, You make the blue print, you fix the plumbing and drainage and electricity, you make the best use of material and space..and when its all done, then you decorate.

That's exactly how it goes for writing. You build a plot, you create characters with their layers, you envision their journey and then you fill in the words, and those words are not always poetic or lyrical, sometimes they have to be choppy and abrupt too. I would take this lesson to my grave.

3. We all are wobbly when it comes to handling criticism. We either absorb it all and go into self pity or get defensive and live in denial. Getting live feedback here and that too from so many of you, taught me a lesson of paramount importance. "Analyse every single feedback, introspect but don't change what you have always believed in. No one knows your craft as well as you do. Yes you might be making mistakes...correct them but never stop believing, both in  yourself and your words. Neither let appreciation go to your head, nor take criticism to heart."

4. "Talent is a misnomer, HARD work is all there is to the world. " I wasn't born a techie or a business analyst or a writer. May be i always had the knack to write, but that's not adequate to take you places. I worked bloody hard on this fan fiction. I woke up at odd hours, i subjected myself to emotional pain, I just didnt write it, I lived it too. And even if a publisher comes and tells me tomorrow that I am writing crap, it won't take away the least bit of credit for all the bone breaking hardwork I have put here. had i been so serious about my studies, i would have easily made it to the IITs and IIMs (not that i regret not making it to them, I am perfectly happy where i am). But the moral of the story is talented or not, you will have to work your butt off for magic only happens when you have done beyond your best.

5. Don't hanker for rewards or recognition. In the course of writing this story, there was a phase where I had hit a plateau. Old readers were leaving, the comments were dying, and other's were rising. I felt insecure and unsure of my ability. I thought, I am done, this is it. And then I had this one reader, my souly ShaoneeChatterjee who kept on supporting me through thick and thin. That was when I introspected and asked myself why was I even writing? 

I wasn't writing for others, I was writing for myself. I have no right to force people to appreciate me. They will read when they find it worth reading. And if i were to write for just one true admirer, I would do it. Something shifted in me that day, not just for writing but something as a whole. I realized, we shouldn't do things for competing with others. the only competitor one should have is himself/herself. Just keep doing what you were doing with the best of intentions and the tables will turn.

6. There has to be balance in life. In the initial days, I used to post everyday. While that brought a lot of smiles, it was draining me out from within. I used to pass out in office, and I had no idea how to manage the writer's block that everyone has to invariably go through. Eventually I realized, I have to be alive, happy an kicking to sustain the momentum and that sometimes taking rest is also part of the process. It was hard but necessary.

7. To get you Manik, you have to be his Nandini. Need not explain this, as I guess we all have learnt it by now.

I had more but I do not want to bore you with my lectures. So I would shift the paradign from lessons to feelings.

You all say and repeat how special I am, you call me you santa, your happy maker. But let me tell you, I have gained more than any of you here. The love you give me cannot be justified in words, and its not just in terms of likes or comments, but I have made personal bonds with so many of you. This feeling of being loved is too precious for someone who has pretty much survived alone all her life. your faith in me, gives me so much confidence, that it reflects in all spheres of my life. I am a lot less fearless than i used to be. I don't chicken out of responsibilities. I don't quit easily anymore. You have given me a place where i can come to when i am happy and when i am sad. you make me feel I am doing something worthy with my words. You show me love cant be confined in time and space, by gender or age. You make me believe, I have the power to heal. And when a friend told me "You will go places", I told him "I already am going places". It doesnt matter that I don't earn a penny from it. It doesnt matter that my signature is not an autograph yet, or google doesn't list me as an author or the KYY team didn't even look at the script. What matters is I am growing each day and I am happy in the process of making you all happy. And this growth, no IIT or no Harvard would have ever taught me.

i owe this year to you all. Cheers !!! wish each one of you, the bestest of 2017.