The success story of a girl from Bangalore

[Applause]

so

i have a couple of different things in

life

very early on i studied dance i’ve been

studying for over 10 years

later on i went on to witness india and

i have a lovely crown with me now

and i also post winning miss india got

into entrepreneurship

so there are all these different sort of

um

spaces that i got into and heroes that i

got into really taught me many many

things

so let’s begin with where i started

first

uh with dance specifically i got into

dancing in 2019

where i happen to see somebody in school

perform

excellently she was really good at what

she did so i asked her when did you

learn dance

she said i learned from this one

specific school in niger

they’re actually all over the country

they’re called shaman covers institute

so i was very decided with oh you know

there’s a new institute in town

i really want to go and try out what

this and so i went to my first class

so six months later after going to this

class

i think the people who haven’t edited

this class would know of it they have

a series of special performers they

comment through

and they perform for different events

across the country

so when i saw these people perform i was

awestruck

because the way they performed the kind

of musicality tonality perfection

it was it was just mind-blowing so i

told myself

i wanted to get here but back in 2009 if

my right hand moved

my left leg didn’t and my left hand

moved my head taken

so i honestly didn’t know how i was even

going to dance

and so i started going to classes that’s

the first thing i did

and six months after going into classes

they called me said okay why don’t you

at least try and audition

and so i went very confidently and you

know all pumped up saying i do want to

go for this competition

and then two weeks later they called and

said uh no you will not take

you and i felt rejected i said okay

maybe i am i really can’t dance but at

least i have fun doing it so i’m going

to try doing it again

so went up to class and i kept dancing

and i kept dancing and six months later

they called me yet again they said why

don’t you come and try audition again

and this time it’s oh it’s my second

time so maybe this time you know

my chances are good i’m going to try and

so i went for an audition

just that same all pumped up and food

saying yes i want to dance

and i got a call back two weeks later

saying

you didn’t get it um and this went on

for

eight times over two years where

all i heard is uh during it

but it was really the eighth times

and the fact that i did try eight times

that the eighth time the call came in

and said

sushi you got it this time and that

moment

made me literally get goosebumps

and so there are quite a bit of

learnings that i had

through this journey right the first one

saying that if you never really drive

don’t even take that first step you

never really know where you’re headed

so it’s very important that in any

journey that i take going forward

as scared as i am to do it i at least

take that first

date a lovely birthday and so

i went on to my second journey right

um and this was miss india now all of

you see me here today and you might have

your own perceptions of me but let me

just quickly take you back

to a couple of years ago that was me

that was me and my friends placed on a

sleepover now

looking at that girl i would have never

thought that this girl could ever become

a miss india

i would go to college wearing my

brother’s t-shirts comfortable jeans

and slippers on my phone that’s about it

i knew nothing about beauty i knew

nothing about entertainment

and so it made me wonder at that point

saying

how can that girl of all people in the

world become a miss india

but then here i am right so how did that

really happen

a friend of mine said you know you

should really give it a try and again i

was scared i was worried

somehow she managed to convince me

saying i should go for this audition

and i did i cleared the first round of

audition i went to bombay

i cleared the second round of audition

and i got into the main fashion

right that was me barely knowing how to

walk in my heels

owning one pair of black dress because

that’s sort of the mandate for the

audition

and i probably had one eyeliner and one

lipstick

now i don’t think that’s good enough to

become beauty queen but there i was with

a big dream in my heart

and probably four things in my you know

little strawley

to make this dream happen after i got

through all of these rounds of audition

i ended up with this beautiful group

of 21 people i don’t even think you guys

can see me then because i was

practically trying to hide

so if you see that picture there are 21

beautiful girls

who knew exactly what they were doing

and i was competing with these girls

how with my one dress one pair of

needles one lipstick and one liner

how could i even do it so i walked into

this competition

petrified i was so scared of what i was

going to be doing

and i think on the day of the winner

it actually hit me i was never going to

win

because i entered the pageant unprepared

i had no clue what was happening i was

completely unaware

of what i was leaving the pageant but

i was set right this one year

what it really taught me though is what

all of these other 20 girls did

because three of these girls did end up

winning so what is

what is it that you know they did

differently from what i did

and what can i do what can i do

differently and learn

and win so on the day of the pageant i

actually did

this is back in 2015 and i went back

home

crying so i went home crying

and i told myself maybe i’m not pretty

maybe

i don’t know how to talk on stage i’m

still very scared of talking on stage

but back then

i was probably 100 times more scared so

i don’t know how to talk on stage

i didn’t think i was pretty i don’t know

how to dress up but i really wanted to

win miss india so

how was i going to make this dream

happen

it took me four months to really just

get

over my own misery my own sulking

my own you know pulling myself down

performance late i told myself so you

think if you keep sucking at the problem

you’re never actually going to do

anything about it so four months later i

picked up myself and i said

i am going to win i do not care

what it takes but i am going to win and

then

started my eight month long journey on

trying to win miss india

all over again but this time i did it a

little bit differently

because i had the experience of what

these 20 girls had taught me

so i started off firstly by writing it

down

whenever i have a dream i have this

tendency now

many years later to write it down it

helps me really remember what i started

why i started it and at the hardest

times why not to give up

so i write down my dreams because they

remind me

to not give up they remind me why i

started so i started

with writing a very grand dream i

imagined that i was standing in the

finale stage

and somebody was announcing saying the

winner of femina miss india 2016

is sushi krishna right and that is

eight months before i won and after i

wrote that down

i started to take what all these girls

taught me

in terms of styling in terms of walking

in terms of all the different things

that you need to be imagined

winner and broken down then as i was

going to the gym

i started learning how to walk in heels

i bought more pair of heels so now i own

more than one

i own more lipsticks i own more dresses

i was a little bit more confident with

my public speaking

and it was eight months later that i

went back for another round of audition

with miss india

now i walked in there and i was just as

scared as

all the other 20 contestants but now we

have 20 new contestants

and then in bombay i got selected again

this time my experience at the balance

was very

i felt like i wasn’t being you know i

wasn’t confused

i knew how to handle myself i knew what

it was up and

just the eight months of preparation

allowed me to take that one month of the

competition

much more at ease and then

the day of the finale came i was just as

scared as the first day

i walked on stage and just before i

walked on stage

i told myself you know sir you’ve done

everything you can

you can’t do anything more just go on

stage

walk well smile well answer your

questions well

and leave everything else up there

and so it did and walked on stage so

eight months later

the last five minutes of the competition

i did end up learning

the winner of eminem as india is sushil

krishna

so these two experiences taught me

that for any goal that you really have

or anything that you want to achieve you

can really break

things down into multiple different

steps and if you do follow them at some

level

your chances of becoming successful or

your chances of getting closer to your

goal

becomes higher so i’m just going to

quickly share with you

what those learnings were for me and i

continue to implement them

say in my business in everything else

that i do in life

beyond miss india so the first thing as

i mentioned to you

is really to define your goal most

people

have difficulty getting started because

they are unable to define what their

goal is so when i say define

it means clarity to the last team

right what do i want to do when do i

want to do it

and what do i want to achieve and once

you define it

write it down and stick it in a place

where you can see it every day

the minute you write down your goal it

becomes easy to understand what are your

roadblocks right

so now if i want to say

i want to write a book for example now

i don’t have certain skills to write a

book but there might be a hundred other

things i don’t know but the minute i

know that i want to write a book

those road paths on roadblocks become

much easier for me to identify

these noteblocks are usually of two

nature one

which is an interesting intrinsic

roadblock and one which is an extrinsic

roadblock

an intrinsic one is one which is largely

defined by you

yourself i can’t do it i don’t have the

money i’m from a small town

i won’t be able to do it extrinsic

factors about this beyond you

beyond your control that usually come in

the way

now you need to be prepared for both

then the third step that i would say is

that the minute you take a very big goal

more often than not we all tend to get

very scared of it

we are petrified will i ever be able to

reach there

right and so it’s very important to

break this

big goal down into smaller steps so that

we approach it

with much more needs so the way i break

up my goals

is i firstly build smaller milestones

that help me achieve this goal

and then define incremental actions that

i can implement

on a daily basis on a repetitive mode to

be able to get closer to there

and the third one is i define a timeline

the minute i define a timeline

i know as i’m getting closer to the

timeline that i need to start doing it

much better or much faster

the fourth one is practicing resilience

now

if anybody tells you that you can become

anything overnight don’t believe them

they all have a story of at least six to

ten years

of hard work and perseverance that goes

behind it

nobody wakes up and achieves anything

overnight

there is a lot of practice there is a

lot of

you know roadblocks that come your way

there are things that don’t work out

and you have to be able to persevere

through it you have to be able to keep

pushing yourself

through it so i always say that

if you deliberately practice what you

need to do

it will always supersede the talent that

you have

right so keep practicing what you want

to do

deliberately practicing the difference

is more then you know the purpose of why

you’re practicing

and then it always wins over somebody

who thinks they’re more talented

right and then obviously don’t give up

the more

easily you give up the further away you

go from your goal so

every time you fail just keep getting

back up and keep doing it

keep doing it and keep doing it’s not

easy to give up after the first step

second time you’re like oh maybe i don’t

want to do it but

you know when you keep doing it over and

over again

that’s when your success comes closer to

you

so malcolm gladwell once said 1000 hours

is the amount of practice

you must put in to attain mastery 1000

hours is a long time

if you practice for three to four hours

a day

that means 10 years right so

you really need to put in a lot of work

a lot of effort to be able to

get closer to what you’re aiming at

so this one specifically is something

that i want to share with my millennial

friends my younger friends

a sustainable lifestyle is just

something that i think our generation is

moving extremely far away from

when i see a sustainable lifestyle it

means simple things like eating food

going to sleep getting a little bit of

workout meeting your friends

having healthy social life right in our

generation we want to get everything

really quick now the challenge with

getting everything really quick

is that it doesn’t last

it doesn’t sustain so the minute you see

the success stories

of people who have been there and done

that

time and again year after year year

after year

let’s take examples of sports people

right

michael jordan the the sisters the

million sisters

so all these people have been successful

over a long period of time and when you

go back and hear

any of their stories it’s because

they’re very mindful of what they eat

how they take care of themselves how

much of a workout they do

what they put in their body everything

so it’s very important for

each one of us to to sort of go after

our goals

keeping in mind that our sustainability

is also equally important

so eat well sleep well work out and stay

healthy

the other thing that people i think

don’t really realize many times

is the our success

is a sum of the people

who come on that journey with us so it’s

very important

to pick these people right or at least

to be aware of the people

who are in this journey with you for me

you are the sum of the five people who

are closest to you

and jim ron has said that so i’d really

like to believe that

now the reason why this is so important

is because

the people in your life influence your

daily decisions

how you look at problem solving how do

you look

at you know if you fail how do you go

back and try the other people

who are subconsciously insane so it’s

very important that these people

are in line with you and your goal as

much as you are

the second bit is to have a great mentor

a mentor is one

who sort of sees what you can’t see in

your

navigate your decisions a lot of times

when you are on different journeys

we know very limited right because we’ve

done it we’re much newer to the field

we’re much

newer to what we’re doing but the reason

you have mentors is because they have

seen obtained success stories they know

rights and wrongs from other people

and hence can avoid you from doing as

much

wrong as possible and put you back on

the right track

so these are the people you really need

to pick your five closest folks

your coach your mentor or your

inspiration

the last bit of advice in my mind is

that every time you fail you have to get

back up

so in my life in 2009 when i wasn’t able

to get into that dance school

i felt that i failed and i felt that i

failed eight times

and then when i came for miss india in

2015 and i didn’t win

i felt my i am a two-time entrepreneur

the reason i’m a two-time entrepreneur

is because my first venture failed

and i came back up and i’m doing it all

over again so

just don’t let your failure get to you

take learnings from it understand what

you can do better the next time

and if it really is your goal go after

it

yet again so having said this

i would say that talent

versus you know somebody working very

hard somebody who knows how to

get uh get working on their success i

feel that

working hard always wins over talent so

never

shy away from your goal because you

don’t think you’re talented enough

your hard work and your grip and your

perseverance can

always overpower talent and so

if if a girl like me from bangkok can do

it

i believe that each one can do it

thank you