Attitude of Gratitude

a very good evening to one and all

gratitude in advance is the most

powerful creative force in the universe

i happen to read these lines in a book

which was given to me to read in my

recent visit to kerala

and it really struck me

in the last one year we have seen a lot

the whole world was put to a standstill

what helped me to not break down

and to look up to each day was the

attitude of gratitude

when i used to feel completely lost and

confused

i used to just think about the things

that i’m blessed with

and that would give me the confidence to

look up

and face the day as it was

as a seven-year-old child when my father

walked into our home at 12 30 in the

night

he was surprised to see me watching tv

he asked me what i was watching and i

looked at the screen

i looked at him and i said i will be

miss india one day

i was watching the coronation of

aishwarya rai and sushmita sen

when my dad heard that

he just turned off the tv he asked me to

go to sleep

and said that you’re too late you have

to go to school tomorrow

he thought that i would sleep over it

and forget about it but little did he

know

that that dream would grow with me

fast forward to 2006

and i got the opportunity to work

with the men that had groomed the likes

of aishwarya rai priyanka chopra

diana hayden yukta mukhi

hemant trivedi

he looked at me and he said that you

should become miss india the day i heard

that

i saw that seven-year-old me who had

told my father that i will become miss

india one day

since then i realized that

every time i dreamt of something

and i worked towards it i would achieve

it

and that’s what i want to tell you guys

today

that dare to dream and dream with your

eyes open

there is a picture outside this

auditorium as you walk in

of bharat ratna sri apj abdul kalam

and there’s a wonderful quote of his

where he says

dreams are not those that you see in

your sleep

dreams are those that do not let you

sleep

his court has been my anthem

and i want you all young minds to dream

with your eyes open

when i was young i was extremely active

i loved to play outdoors

and one of the evenings

a girl a little older than me

called me a villager i was a little

stunned

why would she call me a villager

the reason was because i could not

communicate with her

in proper english

when i heard that explanation from her i

just smiled and i said

yes but i speak malayalam at home which

is my mother tongue

i read and write in that language i

communicate with my friends in school in

hindi

and the other language that i am taught

is marathi

english is the last language that i use

to communicate with people

so yes i’m not as good as you

but think about it you were born in a

family where english is your first

language

you go to a convent school where english

is compulsory

so yes your english is much better than

mine

she didn’t have an answer to that

as i grew i was subjected to

a lot of comments because i used to be

very skinny

so i was called chicken legs because i

had long legs

but then i took that in my stride

because that

became an advantage when i got into

modeling

i was told that i should not smile the

way i smile because my smile is too wide

i was also told that my laugh is too

loud

but i didn’t care because i know that

when i smile

i connect with people and when i laugh i

laugh from my heart

when i wanted to get into films i’ve

heard some really funny excuses

right from you’re too tall i’m only five

nine by the way i’m not

six feet nine that i’m too tall i’m too

skinny that i need to put on weight

i don’t look like a south indian and

the most funny one i’ve heard is that

you cannot be an actress because you’re

not a dancer in distress

that got me thinking and actually made

me feel powerful

so the lesson i learned from all these

incidences in my life is that

the world will try to bend you

and they will try to break you but they

can only do that if you let them too

so don’t feel let down by people’s

opinions

you are better than anyone else

and that is possible when you have the

confidence from within

we are as students and

as you know grown-up people we all love

the taste of success

right am i right or wrong

how many of us likes to fail anyone

no one no one likes to fail right

but failure happens life

can never be a steady line that can only

happen when we are dead

life will always be ups and downs

so failures are bound to happen

we have been taught of that word as

something as a sin

you can’t fail in examinations you can’t

fail in relationships

you can’t fail in life

and there’s so much of pressure built

into us right from childhood

i felt the same in fact i felt like my

world has come to an end

the night of the coronation of miss

world

when my name was called out as first

runners-up

i could not move for a few seconds

because i had expected to win i had

worked hard

i was told by my contestants

that they see me as miss world so when i

was called as the first runners-up

i i was devastated

that journey one year from then

made me realize a lot of things

that in prosperity people know you

in adversity you know the real people

suddenly all my well wishers had

vanished

and i was left to fend for myself

thinking has my world ended

and then i realized there are so many

things

that i can do other than this

and i started exploring so

failures are not

the end of your world failure

is a mere pit stop for you to refuel

rethink and move towards your goals

there is an incident that happened on

the night

of the crowning when my name was

called out as first runners-up i looked

into the crowd

and i saw my mother and my father

my mom knew immediately that i wasn’t

happy

but she signaled me from the crowd to

keep smiling she was my strength

and that strength gave me

the ability to keep smiling through that

night

that made me realize the simplicity with

which

my parents had grown up

and that is the value that they had

taught me

so keep it simple and keep it real

it’s very easy to connect with people

when you’re open

to knowing them and they would want to

know you even better

there’s another very strong

experience that changed my viewpoint

about

the way i look at people my mother and i

were walking out out from subway

my mother was holding a can of coca-cola

with her

and a little boy wearing black shorts

looked very dirty might have not

showered in days

came up to me and he said that he wants

money

i ignored him he went up to my mother

and he said that he’s hungry that he

wants some money

so my mom just handed over the can of

coca-cola

he said auntie i need something to eat

usually what kids do is if we buy them a

packet of biscuits

they just return it back to the store

and get the money

so my mom went to the pawn shop nearby

bought him a packet of parleji

opened it and gave it to him the little

boy

sat down right in the footpath dunked

the parleji in the coca-cola

ate it and the gleam he had in his eyes

i still remember and that

completely broke me

because i realized how genuinely hungry

he was

and how privileged i was to be able to

eat whatever i want whenever i want

from that day onwards i used to always

carry a packet of biscuits

or chocolates with me in the car and

give it to the kids

and i’ve seen some of the most genuine

smiles on their faces

it takes a lot to actually get out of

your comfort zone

and do something absolutely new

because once you get into the whole

cycle of

doing something you’re very happy in

that whole process

but i was never brought up to just

settle

i was always told to do what i feel like

and that gave me the opportunity to

experiment and explore

after decade of being in the fashion

industry when i realized that i was not

happy anymore

i decided to leave everything and move

to new york

and study food which has been my passion

since childhood

and there i learned

[Music]

the amount of wastage that happens in a

hotel industry

the amount of food that we waste in our

homes

because we have so much food in excess

there are different parts in the world

where people die of hunger

so my work is towards bridging that gap

we all can be part of it if we make sure

and make conscious decision about the

food we eat

go back to our roots and understand the

food that our

grandparents ate why they ate it

why they ate food according to the

seasons

it is going to make a great impact in

the future of this world

and having said that i want to say

that you young minds

are the present of this country you

are the future of this world

if you want to see a change in our life

in the world outside we have to bring

that change within ourselves

so the change has to start from you

university degrees yes can earn you a

good job

give you a good salary but it cannot

earn you

something that’s priceless and very

uncommon and that’s common sense

i see a lot of people who are educated

illiterates they’ll have a lot of

degrees

but they will roll down their windows

throughout the garbage from their cars

they will have fun and they just spit on

the roads

a country like india which has

everything

from snow cloud mountains to rainforests

to the desert

to everything you can think of in the

world we have it in our country

and if we consciously make a decision

to make people aware of that in the

world

they will have more respect and they

will look at

us in a different light

i am extremely grateful to be here today

and to be able to share

the things that i have learned in my

short span of life

and we really can make a difference if

we choose to

there is a poem by dr seuss

where he says you have brains in your

head

feet in your shoes you can steer your

life

in whatever direction you choose

you’re on your own you know what you

know

and it is you who decides where to go

on that note thank you very much and

namaste