The magic of self love and forgiveness
i aspire to inspire till i expire hi
folks my name is mannini day you know me
as a film and television actress i’m a
voice artist i’m an empath a parent a
healer and i work for animals for
children and for women’s rights
you know today is a very very beautiful
day that i am getting to share my story
with you which is no less than a 70 mm
film yes
there is nothing small about my life for
sure from the time that i was born i was
born in the seventh month
my mother was told not to get attached
to me because i may not make it but my
mother saw me in that incubator with my
feisty little thin arms you know
absolutely uh should i say boxing in the
air and and being really feisty and my
mother said this kid is definitely going
to make it
ever since
that time my journey has not been a very
easy one i’m not going to give you some
sort story because my life is
nothing close to a stop story it has
been a story of a warrior of somebody
who has learned to surmount
somebody who stands in her power in her
magnificence in self-belief
did it happen overnight was i born like
this no no far from it i was a very
underconfident child i was always told
that i’m not goodly looking enough i was
told that i don’t fit into the boxes of
society i have to behave this way i have
to sit that way oh my god my natural
exuberance is too much for people to
take why am i so sensitive oh my god why
am i so emotional why am i so empathetic
you know these wise wise wise really
used to trouble me and i used to think
i’m an alien who’s been dropped on this
planet at the wrong time by the wrong
person
right at the wrong address
but by and by i realized that i was not
ever meant to fit into boxes
i’m a genie in a bottle trust me i feel
like a genie and the day this genie
actually came out of the bottle
everything that she was told about
herself got deconstructed broken smashed
and that’s the day i realized
that i
am unique like each one of you i have my
own life path my own purpose
mark twain said that the two most
important days of your life are the day
you were born and the day you realize
your purpose
when i was born i realized my journey is
not going to be an easy one and trust me
it isn’t it wasn’t
but my purpose when i started finding
that out after a lot of questioning to
the universe was simple
love
i was here to spread love i’m here to
be compassionate to have empathy to be a
sense of
you know
how do you say sense of uh to give you a
sense of security to strengthen you to
empower you to make you believe in your
own magnificence because my story is
one
that actually exemplifies
courage
under
fire or grace under fire so i begin from
my childhood uh my parents uh
you know upper middle class uh we lived
in delhi my mother was a bureaucrat
father was a businessman um all the
possible comforts were given to us uh
but i went through something in my
childhood
and that
was a certain kind of an abuse which
changed my entire perception to the
world
i went through uh sexual abuse at the
hands of somebody who was known to the
family and that really sort of impacted
my uh my relationships later on uh the
fear that you know people said oh
because you’re so exuberant that’s why
you attract this kind of attention
that’s not true that is not true
i did not know how to have uh
boundaries i was too young nobody taught
me that this is not right or that is not
right and i lived in fear
and that fear really took away all my
confidence it took away all that
exuberance that i had and i i fell in
love with books i lost myself in
literature i lost myself in
in a make-believe world i had
make-believe friends i had imaginary
companions and it was great because
i couldn’t really relate to real people
because either they were too harsh or
they were too judgmental or they didn’t
understand uh why i think the way i do
or the way that i i i speak and i’ve
been a monkey since my childhood now you
would say what’s a monkey monkey
somebody who can copy very fast if i see
something i immediately catch it i i can
i can
you know um
kind of uh
sort of
imbibe it very fast i used to uh enact
certain conversations that i had heard
snatches of it in front of my
colony kids okay and they used to find
me very amusing so i realized that
despite being told that i was not
conventionally good looking i was bad at
maths it means that i was not sharp
enough or bright enough i had this one
gift within me which was basically that
i was an entertainer within me i was
very lonely i was i was
miserable i didn’t know what to do but i
have always transmuted all my pain into
my power
and that is my superpower because uh
any any rocks that have been thrown in
me i’ve built a castle out of that
so you can’t keep me down for too long
my my spirit is too strong too feisty
too amazing you can’t keep me down and
nothing and nobody can do that to me um
when i was growing up
because i didn’t understand what
self-love was i started attracting
many kinds of people you know who who
would uh kind of
take a lot away from me and i i just
wanted to please them i was a people
pleaser today in hindsight i i
understand that how detrimental it was
to my mental health so i i took up a
course i studied cognitive behavior
therapy because i wanted to know who i
am until i get to know who i am i
wouldn’t be able to help anybody and
that kind of opened my life you know
understanding somebody’s psyche that
that wounded people or hurt people hurt
people so you can’t be judgmental which
is not to say that hurting somebody is
right i’m not justifying it i’m just
saying that certain people who hurt you
a lot need a lot more compassion than
the others maybe they’re not able to
express so your childhood is your
foundation if your childhood is scarred
or marred or if it is it is not healthy
mentally
it impacts the rest of your life your
relationships your entire worldview your
perception and that’s exactly what
happened with me
well
i decided i am not going to cry over it
i have thrown a lot of pity parties to
myself trust me i’m not going to lie
here stand here and say oh i’ve always
been very very strong no no no no no
there have been moments when i’ve sat on
the floor uh laid on the floor cried
scrammed prayed every possible thing but
you know what the only answer was baby
girl your own savior you are your own
savior you are your own rescue
and then one day i told myself enough
enough of begging for love enough of
begging for support i am going to be my
own superwoman
and this is where i stand today this
journey has been one of ups and downs
that you can can’t even fathom i’ve been
criticized i’ve been called names i mean
like all of us right and i didn’t fit
into any box so i was not good enough
for everybody but the day i realized
that you know what i can’t please
everybody
let me begin by pleasing myself it’s
very tough for me
self love
aircraft
it doesn’t work like that you have to
balance
you can give but if you don’t know how
to take
you live in imbalance
so my relationships taught me how to
understand how powerful how how amazing
i was and i actually thank each one of
them for showing me one aspect of me
that i couldn’t see you know
plain i mean truth was hiding in plain
sight and i just couldn’t see it so
i always believe that every obstacle
that comes is an opportunity for growth
and i mean every word of what i say
every time that i have received hurt
every time i’ve had a heartbreak every
time that i’ve been criticized every
time that i’ve been you know uh thrown
to the wolves i have come back leading
the pack because i have an innate sense
of
strength i believe in the divine my
currency
is faith i know there is somebody up
there who handles everything so
beautifully
so the divine walks with me i am the
favorite child of god and god said i
want to see how you ace it so here i am
standing in front of you this girl who
was not considered good looking enough
uh became the face of 93 was chosen for
feminism in senior 1994 uh thanks to
sushmita sen i need to thank her because
she was the one who actually believed in
me and she prodded me to fill up my form
thank you sush um i came back with two
crowns miss congeniality miss
personality and my whole life changed
one more thing i need to tell you every
time i said never
ever is when i was made to do it so
don’t tempt faith i never say never
again whatever experiences come i
embrace them even as an actor i believe
that every character has come to me to
teach me one aspect of myself to show me
the mirror about the areas that i needed
to work upon
and some characters absolutely tore me
broke me deconstructed me and some
characters made me
see that strength in me that i had not
seen before
you know creativity is a very create the
creative field is a very immersive a
very very collaborative field
so many energies come together and
that’s when something is made i realize
how important teamwork is i realize how
important it is to be vulnerable it’s
not an easy thing but as actors we show
you the naked self from within the heart
the soul the vulnerability of a
character and that makes me
feel like i am very blessed to be a
an accidental actor because i never
wanted to be an actor and it’s crazy
that everything i’ve said no to i have
become so i never said never another
thing that i realized in life was
you know people who criticize you if you
start looking at it as criticism you
will start hating them but if you see
them as people who are trying to show
you something in you
you will make them teachers
everybody that you meet in your life’s
journey is here to teach you something
some come for lessons
some come in as blessings my mom used to
say that some people come for a season
and some people come for a reason and
some people stay forever i don’t know
about the forever because for me forever
only exists in disney movies
so i live in the moment and it’s been a
tough journey for me living in the
moment i’m here i’m now this is me
so
all that i need to
share with you all all that i want to
tell you is
that please wake up that sleeping giant
within you you are simply amazing you’re
magnificent your passions the way you
are the way you talk the way you you
know you you process information is
unique to you
two thumb prints are not same
so two people are not the same please
understand that you are a unique gift of
the divine from the divine to this world
let’s make this world a beautiful place
by actually understanding that love is
the only superpower you know we can make
nuclear missiles we can make nuclear
fossil we can create i don’t know what
not arms and this and that and the other
but the need of the hour is only love
and compassion
hurt people hurt people so next time
somebody hurts you please understand
that maybe this person is really hurting
from inside which is not to say that you
you uh forgive them for what they’re
doing but
make peace for yourself forgiveness a
very important thing which i used to not
you know it wasn’t even on on the
horizon i realize forgiveness
is for your own peace for your own
sanity
you cannot be somebody who’s who’s
prosperous or fruitful or or flourishing
if you keep things in your heart that
are not for your highest good
so delete
everything that is not meant for your
highest good people will come you will
get hurt there will be heartbreaks it’s
okay you’re human right
this
three-dimensional world is your school
and you’re here to take certain lessons
that you chose so stop blaming the lord
above and start taking responsibility
for the lessons that you need to take
and ace them that’s it
and that’s the day i understood one
thing being humble being grounded being
being um you know
it’s my strength
today having walked through
labyrinths of
labels and and names and i don’t know
what else
holding
a very very firm belief in my heart that
wherever life takes me i will go with
the flow i have stopped
going against the flow
i don’t resist anymore i let go and i
let god so my message to you would be
please look at yourself in the mirror
today recognize how amazingly blessed
you are be in gratitude because it is a
superpower trust me the minute you are
in gratitude the universe shifts and
it’s it’s absolutely amazing there is
cause and effect everything that’s
happening to you has been caused by you
start taking responsibility stop lying
to yourself if there is an issue if
there is an area that you need to work
on address it have no shame you are only
answerable to yourself and nobody else
so end of the day remember one thing
you are you you do you
because nobody else can be you this is
mani day saying thank you to sd college
chandigarh for this amazing opportunity
and tedx is is is a platform that you
know i i’m a huge fan of because i
believe we are all here to inspire we
are all here to
make
many of our fellow men fellow women
recognize their splendor their strengths
their passion their their you know what
they are they’re forces of nature
and the beauty is that when you can hold
each other’s hands and say you’re
amazing never forget that so never let
anybody tell you otherwise you are
simply magnificent you’re the most
exquisite creation
of the divine yes turbulences will come
yes tsunamis will come nobody said they
won’t life is not supposed to be a bed
of
roses
well not no it isn’t
so
now you dance through those labyrinths
and
you make it your magnum opus
thank you so much thank you and god
bless